Golden Age Hollywood is the focus of James Ellroy’s latest and Ava Barry’s debut, but there’s plenty of trouble abroad as well, shown in new novels from Victor del Árbol and Eva Garcia Sáenz.
Top 10
Above the Rain
Victor del Árbol, trans. by Lisa Dillman. Other Press, May 25 ($18.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-
1-63542-995-4)
In Malmö, Sweden, the daughter of Moroccan immigrants has an affair with a high-ranking policeman and gets drawn into the city’s criminal underworld.
The Burning Girls
C.J. Tudor. Ballantine, Feb. 9 ($27, ISBN 978-1-9848-2502-5)
Centuries ago, eight Protestant martyrs were burned at the stake in an English town. In the present, a clergyman and his 14-year-old daughter get drawn into the town’s mysteries.
Every Vow You Break
Peter Swanson. Morrow, Mar. 23 ($27.99, ISBN 978-0-06-298003-8)
A bride has reason to regret a one-night stand on her bachelorette weekend after the man she had a fling with threatens to ruin her honeymoon.
The Lost Village
Camilla Sten. Minotaur, Mar. 23 ($26.99, ISBN 978-1-250-24925-8)
In 1959, Alice Lindstedt’s grandmother’s entire immediate family mysteriously vanished with nearly all the residents of an old mining town. Decades later, Alice decides to make a documentary film about the tragedy.
The Low Desert: Stories
Tod Goldberg. Counterpoint, Feb. 2 ($26, ISBN 978-1-64009-336-2)
Among these literary crime stories is one about the parents of Sal Cupertine, a Chicago hit man who becomes a Las Vegas rabbi.
The Turnout
Megan Abbott. Putnam, June 1 ($27, ISBN 978-0-593-08490-8)
Two sisters, lifelong dancers, run a ballet school. A suspicious accident and the arrival of an interloper threaten the school’s annual performance of The Nutcracker.
The Water Rituals
Eva García Sáenz, trans. by Nick Caistor. Vintage Crime/Black Lizard, Feb. 23 ($16.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-9848-9861-6)
In Spain’s Basque region, Insp. Unai López de Ayala investigates a series of ritualistic murders of pregnant women, including an old girlfriend of his.
Widespread Panic
James Ellroy. Knopf, June 15 ($26.95, ISBN 978-0-593-31934-5)
In 1950s L.A., a sleazy PI, formerly a corrupt cop, becomes the lead tipster for Confidential magazine, collecting the dirt on movies stars, socialites, and politicians.
Win
Harlan Coben. Grand Central, Mar. 16 ($29, ISBN 978-1-5387-4821-3)
The murder of a recluse in his Manhattan apartment provides clues to an heiress’s kidnapping two decades earlier. 750,000-copy announced first printing.
Windhall
Ava Barry. Pegasus Crime, Mar. 2 ($27, ISBN 978-1-64313-626-4)
In the 1940s, movie director Theo Langley ruled Hollywood, until the murder of his lead actress drove him out of town. Decades later, an investigative journalist seeks to prove Theo was the killer.
Mysteries & Thrillers Listings
Agora
At the End of the World, Turn Left by Zhanna Slor (Apr. 13, $25.99, ISBN 978-1-951709-25-9). Two sisters, born in the U.S.S.R., go their separate ways. When one disappears from Milwaukee after a stranger from Russia approaches her, the other returns from Israel to look for her.
Akashic
Palm Springs Noir, edited by Barbara Demarco-Barrett (July 6, $15.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-61775-928-4). The stories in this Akashic noir anthology examine the underside of sunny Palm Springs, Calif., where desperate people strive for the good life, usually to no avail.
Arcade crimewise
Nighthawk’s Wing: A Gideon Stoltz Mystery by Charles Fergus (Feb. 2, $24.99, ISBN 978-1-9516-2746-1). In 1836, Pennsylvania Dutch sheriff Gideon Stoltz investigates the murder of a woman suspected of witchcraft. Suffering from memory loss, Gideon eventually realizes he knows the victim—and was with her when she died.
Atlantic Monthly
No Going Back: A Commissario Guido Brunetti Mystery by Donna Leon (Mar. 16, $27, ISBN 978-0-8021-5817-8). Venice policeman Guido Brunetti looks into the case of two American women who were injured in a boating accident. One of the two Italian men who were with them in the boat may be involved in something dubious.
Atria
The Devil’s Hand by Jack Carr (Apr. 13, $28, ISBN 978-1-9821-2374-1). A PhD
student gains access to secret bioweapons while the leader of a foreign country plots revenge against the U.S. The former Navy SEAL James Reece must try to stop them.
Bantam
Castle Shade: A Novel of Suspense Featuring Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes by Laurie R. King (June 8, $28, ISBN 978-0-525-62086-0). Marie of Roumania summons Mary Russell and her husband, Sherlock Holmes, to the queen’s new castle near Transylvania, which is threatened by what may be vampires.
Berkley
Quiet in Her Bones by Nalini Singh (Feb. 23, $26, ISBN 978-0-593-09910-0). The disappearance of a socialite from a wealthy enclave in New Zealand appears to be the case of a trophy wife who had to escape her husband. The discovery of her bones 10 years later threatens to reveal deadly secrets.
Bitter lemon
The Foreign Girls by Sergio Olguín, trans. by Miranda France (Mar. 23, $15.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-913394-38-7). The murder of two female tourists from Europe puts Buenos Aires journalist Verónica Rosenthal on a trail that leads to an official connected to Argentina’s Dirty War.
Blackstone
The Ghost Moths by Harry Farthing (Feb. 9, $27.99, ISBN 978-1-5384-6923-1). A Tibetan boy uncovers a strange relic just as members of the People’s Liberation Army enter his village. Sixty years later, mountain guide Neil Quinn tries to piece together a puzzle related to the relic and Tibet’s past.
crooked lane
Hide in Place by Emilya Naymark (Feb. 9, $26,
ISBN 978-1-64385-637-7). Undercover NYPD cop Laney Bird left the city with her son, Alfie, after a racketeering case against the Russian mob went south. Three years later, in the upstate town where they found refuge, 13-year-old Alfie disappears.
DOUBLEDAY
Hour of the Witch by Chris Bohjalian (Apr. 20, $27.95, ISBN 978-0-385-54243-2). In 1662 Boston, 24-year-old Mary Deerfield decides to divorce her cruel and powerful husband after he sticks a fork into her hand. She soon becomes an outcast as she struggles to avoid the gallows.
DUNDURN
Season of Smoke by A.G. Pasquella (Mar. 2, $16.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-4597-4252-9). A Toronto mobster wants former convict Jack Palace, who’s trying to go straight, to kill a friend of Jack’s the mobster blames for a murder. The friend, meanwhile, wants Jack’s help ripping off the mob.
Dutton
Survive the Night by Riley Sager (July 6, $27, ISBN 978-0-593-18316-8). In 1991, Charlie Jordan decides to go home to Ohio after her best friend becomes the third victim of a killer stalking her Pennsylvania college. Unfortunately, the guy who gives her a ride might just be the Campus Killer.
ECW
Deceptions: A Helena Marsh Novel by Anna Porter (Apr. 6, $16.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-77041-538-6). Former Budapest cop Attila Feher asks art expert Helena Marsh to determine whether a painting is a copy of an important canvas by a noted Hungarian artist or the real thing. East European gangsters complicate the appraisal.
Europa
In the Shadow of the Fire by Hervé Le Corre, trans. by Tina Kover (Mar. 16, $27, ISBN 978-1-60945-617-7). In 1871 Paris, during the bloody climax of the clashes between the Communards and the French army, young women start disappearing. The fiancé of one of the missing women goes to look for her.
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Embassy Wife by Katie Crouch (July 13, $27, ISBN 978-0-374-28034-5). The wife of an American diplomat in Namibia suspects her husband may actually be working for the CIA. The arrival of another American diplomat and his wife, a couple with their own secrets, complicates matters.
Flatiron
The Survivors by Jane Harper (Feb. 2, $27.99, ISBN 978-1-250-23242-7). A tragedy involving Kieran Elliott’s family prompts him to leave Evelyn Bay, Tasmania. Twelve years later, Kieran returns to his hometown, where the murder of a female college student may be related to the earlier tragedy.
Forge
The Kobalt Dossier by Eric Van Lustbader (June 1, $27.99, ISBN 978-1-250-75121-8). Field agent Evan Ryder returns to Washington, D.C., after a successful mission to find her secret black ops division within the Department of Defense shut down. 100,000-copy announced first printing.
Gallery
Do No Harm by Christina McDonald (Feb. 16, $16.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-982142-61-2). When Emma’s son, Josh, is diagnosed with a rare form of cancer, Emma, a hospital physician, decides to sell opioids to help raise money to pay for the boy’s treatment. This choice has lethal consequences.
HarD Case Crime
Later by Stephen King (Mar. 2, $14.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-78909-649-1). Jamie Conklin was born with an uncanny ability his single mother wants him to keep secret—an ability that could be useful to an NYPD detective who’s worried about a threat from a dead killer.
Harper
The Consequences of Fear by Jacqueline Winspear (Mar. 23, $27.99, ISBN 978-0-06-286802-2). In 1941 London, delivery boy Freddie Hackett turns for help to Maisie Dobbs after the police don’t believe he witnessed a murder. Maisie’s work for British Intelligence gets complicated when she spots the killer in an unexpected place.
Head of Zeus
Spoils of the Dead by Dana Stabenow (Feb. 4, $29.95, ISBN 978-1-78854-915-8). Alaska State Trooper Liam Campbell, exiled from Anchorage to a bush town after a botched operation cost five people their lives, looks into the murder of an archaeologist who claimed to be close to a big discovery.
Holt
We Begin at the End by Chris Whitaker (Mar. 9, $27.99, ISBN 978-1-250-75966-5). The police chief of Cape Haven, Calif., whose testimony helped send his best friend to prison 30 years earlier, has cause to worry when that friend is released and returns to Cape Haven. 500,000-copy announced first printing.
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
The Night Hawk: A Ruth Galloway Mystery by Elly Griffiths (June 29, $27, ISBN 978-0-358-23705-1). Archaeologist Ruth Galloway, of the University of North Norfolk, investigates Iron Age artifacts discovered by local metal detectorists on a beach. Then the detectorists begin to fall ill and die one by one.
Kensington
Triple Chocolate Cheesecake Murder by Joanne Fluke (Feb. 23, $27, ISBN 978-1-4967-1892-1). Hannah Swensen, the proprietor of the Cookie Jar in Lake Eden, Minn., takes time off from baking to try to help her sister, who’s the prime suspect in the murder of the town’s mayor. 75,000-copy announced first printing.
Little, Brown
The Devil May Dance by Jake Tapper (May 11, $28, ISBN 978-0-316-53023-1). Attorney General Robert Kennedy taps his friends Charlie and Margaret Marder to investigate a potential threat to the presidency in Washington, D.C. The couple also check out a sensitive matter involving Frank Sinatra in L.A.
Maclehose
The Carrier by Mattias Berg (May 25, $16.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-0-85705-791-4). Erasmus Levine, the man with the nuclear briefcase, always travels with the U.S. president. On an official trip to Sweden, Levine gets drawn into a plot to get rid of the world’s nuclear weapons.
Mariner
Karolina and the Torn Curtain by Maryla Szymiczkowa, trans. by Antonia Lloyd-Jones (Mar. 23, $15.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-0-358-15757-1). In 1895 Cracow, socialite Zofia Turbotynska hears that a young woman’s stabbed body has washed up on a river bank. When Zofia investigates, she discovers the victim is her missing maid.
Melville House
Northern Heist by Richard O’Rawe (Apr. 6, $26.99, ISBN 978-1-61219-903-0). James O’Hare and his crack team rob the National Bank in Belfast in what turns out to be one of the biggest heists in Irish history. Now the Provos of the IRA want their cut.
Mira
Her Dark Lies by J.T. Ellison (Mar. 9, $17.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-0-7783-8830-2). On Isle Isola, an idyllic island off the Italian coast, artist Claire Hunter is looking forward to marrying handsome, wealthy Jack Compton, but she’s still troubled by the mystery surrounding Jack’s first wife. 175,000-copy announced first printing.
Mulholland
City on the Edge by David Swinson (May 25, $28, ISBN 978-0-316-52854-2). In the summer of 1972, in Beirut, the son of an American foreign service attaché begins to learn who his father really is and his father’s role in the political upheavals that are tearing apart the city.
Mysterious
Basil’s War by Stephen Hunter (May 4, $23.95, ISBN 978-1-6131-6224-8). In this standalone from the author of the Bob Lee Swagger series, a British agent goes behind enemy lines in search of a religious text that could hold the key to ending WWII.
Oceanview
Fatal Intent by Tammy Euliano (Mar. 2, $26.95, ISBN 978-1-60809-416-5). Anesthesiologist Kate Downey is alarmed when her older patients start dying at home soon after minor surgeries. The surgeon tells her not to worry, then blames her for the deaths.
Orenda
Winterkill by Ragnar Jonasson, trans. by David Warriner (Mar. 1, $24.95, ISBN 978-1-913193-46-1). Police inspector Ari Thór investigates the death of a 19-year-old girl who fell from the balcony of a house in Siglufjörður, Iceland. An entry in the girl’s diary suggests it’s a case of murder.
Park Row
Local Woman Missing by Mary Kubica (May 4, $27.99, ISBN 978-0-7783-8944-6). When first one woman, then another along with her six-year-old daughter, Delilah, disappear from their small town, it’s unclear whether there’s a connection. Delilah’s sudden return 11 years later raises more questions than it answers.
Penguin
The Cook of the Halcyon by Andrea Camilleri, trans. by Stephen Sartarelli (Mar. 16, $16 trade paper, ISBN 978-0-14-313618-7). The suicide of a newly laid-off worker and an unscrupulous businessman’s murder lead Sicily’s Inspector Montalbano to a mysterious ship with no passengers.
PenZler
The Cat Saw Murder by Dolores Hitchens (June 1, $25.95, ISBN 978-1-61316-212-5). In this entry in the American Mystery Classics series, a spinster sleuth must solve a puzzling crime with a feline witness.
Poisoned Pen
To Die in Tuscany by David Wagner (Apr. 13, $15.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-4642-1433-2). Translator Rick Montoya and his Italian girlfriend, an art fraud investigator, investigate the murder of a wealthy Spanish collector and the theft of a Piero della Francesca drawing.
Polis
Last Seen by Kent Harrington (Mar. 23, $26.99, ISBN 978-1-951709-23-5). A killer targeting young women visiting the Bay Area snatches a French teenager from a popular tourist spot. SFPD Det. Michael O’Higgins, who’s taking LSD as part of an experimental program for PTSD patients, has his work cut out for him.
Quercus
A Silent Death by Peter May (Mar. 30, $16.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-78429-502-8). Glaswegian investigator John Mackenzie joins the Spanish authorities on the Costa Del Sol in their hunt for fugitive Jack Cleland, who has been waging a cruel vendatta against a blind and deaf woman.
Random House
You Love Me: A You Novel by Caroline Kepnes (Apr. 6, $28, ISBN 978-0-593-13378-1). Joe Goldberg, once an obsessive stalker, falls for Mary Kay DiMarco, a librarian at the library where he’s secured a job. Joe is ready for a serious relationship, but Mary Kay has her own agenda.
SCARLET
Saving Grace by Debbie Babitt (Mar. 16, $25.95, ISBN 978-1-61316-206-4). In this debut thriller, a young girl’s disappearance has echoes of the abduction of two teens decades earlier that shattered the childhood of the female Arkansas sheriff who’s investigating.
Seventh Street
Pieces of Eight: A Spider John Mystery by Steve Goble (Mar. 16, $15.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-64506-036-9). Spider John, who was forced into piracy years ago, wants to investigate a murder aboard the legit ship whose crew he’s part of, but he could get in trouble if the authorities discover his pirate past.
Severn house
Becoming Inspector Chen by Qiu Xiaolong (Mar. 2, $28.99, ISBN 978-0-7278-9044-3). Chief Inspector Chen, who’s been excluded from an investigation into a subversive poem posted online, reflects on his early career from sleuthing as a child during the Cultural Revolution to his first case on the Shanghai Police Force.
Simon & Schuster
Maze by Nelson DeMille (June 1, $28.99, ISBN 978-1-5011-0178-6). When the bodies of several prostitutes turn up on a beach close to the home of former NYPD detective John Corey, clearly the victims of a serial killer, Corey has to wonder why the police have been slow to catch the culprit.
Soho Crime
The Bombay Prince by Sujata Massey (June 1, $27.95, ISBN 978-1-64129-105-7). During a visit of the Prince of Wales to India in 1921, Bombay solicitor Perveen Mistry looks into the death of an 18-year-old female Parsi student, who fatally falls from a building as the prince’s procession passes by.
SOURCEBOOKS LANDMARK
Girls with Bright Futures by Tracy Dobmeier and Wendy Katzman (Feb. 2, $16.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-7282-1646-1). The wealthy mothers of girls at an elite Seattle prep school will do anything to get their daughters into prestigious colleges. But would they arrange a car accident to eliminate the competition?
St. Martin’s
Flowers of Darkness by Tatiana De Rosnay (Feb. 23, $27.99, ISBN 978-1-250-27255-3). In a future Paris, novelist Clarissa Katsef has an ultra-modern apartment as part of an artist residency program, but she starts feeling she’s being watched. Meanwhile, the betrayal that led to Clarissa’s divorce hangs over her.
Thomas & Mercer
In Her Tracks by Robert Dugoni (Apr. 27, $15.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-5420-0837-2). Det. Tracy Crosswhite of the Seattle PD looks into a cold case: the abduction of a five-year-old girl whose parents were the prime suspects. She’s also occupied with a current case, that of a missing jogger.
Viking/Dorman
The Damage by Caitlin Wahrer (June 15, $27, ISBN 978-0-593-29613-4). College student Nick, who’s in the hospital, can’t remember anything about the night he was attacked in a bar. Now, his attacker is out on bail, and Nick’s older brother, Tony, vows revenge.
