The Day She Died by S.M. Freedman
I like novels that tell a story in both the present and the past. After all, so much of what we become is tied up in where we have been. When an author uses this shifting perspective it’s like getting two mysteries for the price of one. In any old book you can read to…
River of Lies By R.M. Greenaway
The dead bodies are dropping fast and furious in this latest novel in the B.C. Blues Crime series by the talented R.M. Greenaway. If you are looking for dull moments, pick up another book. In the first few pages of River of Lies, a young woman is murdered in a parking lot on her way…
The Starr Sting Scale – Official Book Trailer
It’s book trailer time! Hard to believe that the first book in the Candace Starr series is due out in only a few months. One of my favourite reviews so far calls it “Witty, irreverent, nasty, unrelenting dark crime fiction… At six foot three, Candace Starr is more woman than most men can handle.” I…
The Blood Spilt By Åsa Larsson
Before reviewing this book, I had to look up the term “Nordic Noir.” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nordic_noir) Basically, it is crime fiction that is set somewhere in Scandinavia that is short on metaphor and long on bleak landscapes. The weather in that part of the world lends itself well to bleakness apparently, particularly in the north. And this…
Book Review: The Chalk Man by C.J. Tudor
Okay, this time I wasn’t going to be fooled by initials into reviewing a book that was really written by a dude. C.J. Tudor’s first name is Caroline. Her friends call her Caz. I also write under initials my initials. My first name is Carole. The only nickname I had that ever stuck was the…
Dying for Christmas By Tammy Cohen
I wanted to review a book with a holiday theme for the season, and thus selected the talented Tammy Cohen’s Dying for Christmas for my Yuletide noir read. I thought I’d get a hokey and tame mystery, perhaps the murder of a vicar at midnight mass, or a Boxing Day stabbing death with a sharp…
Interview with Erika Rummel
Bio Erika Rummel has taught history at the University of Toronto and Wilfrid Laurier U. She divides her time between Toronto and Los Angeles and has lived in villages in Argentina, Rumania, and Bulgaria. With more than a dozen published books on social and intellectual history, she is also the author of five thrilling fiction…
The Woman in the Window By A.J. Finn
Okay, I said I wasn’t going to pick up any more novels with “woman” or “girl” in the title this year, but a friend gave this to me to read and I am not one to look a gift-book in the mouth. It is also not a book by a woman author. But I thought…
The Dame was Trouble: Edited by Sarah L. Johnson, Halli Lilburne & Cat McDonald
What a treat to read this collection of short stories featuring some of the best women Canadian crime writers out there. Special call-outs to the authors recently interviewed by She Kills Lit, Elle Wild and R.M. Greenaway who bring both award winning skill and experience to their short stories. Both these writers riff on an…
In Search of a Good Death
I love a good death. I always have. Not of anyone I like, you understand, so don’t start getting worried. I just love dark stories that feature murder and mayhem and crime and all things nasty, including clowns that eat children. And the truth is, in all my short stories and novels somebody dies in…
