Book #183 of 2025: The Man Who Died Seven Times by Yasuhiko Nishizawa I’m a sucker for a good time loop story, but I’m afraid this 1995 Japanese novel, newly translated into English, doesn’t get there for me. It’s not a fault in the premise, which isn’t that absurd for this particular genre: the teenage …
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Book #133 of 2025: The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco I haven’t loved this 1980 Italian classic as much as I expected to from the premise, which seems like it should be right up my alley: two fourteenth-century monks investigating a string of suspicious deaths at a secluded monastery. They aren’t called detectives, …
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Book #120 of 2025: The Guest List by Lucy Foley A good plot twist should feel surprising in the moment but almost inevitable in hindsight, and there are several such developments woven throughout this wicked thriller about a disastrous wedding off the coast of Ireland. Other readers have compared this 2020 novel to an Agatha …
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Book #99 of 2025: Death at the White Hart by Chris Chibnall This 2025 title is the debut novel of author Chris Chibnall, better known as the former showrunner behind Doctor Who and — more relevant here — Broadchurch. Like the latter show, it’s a murder mystery set in a coastal English village and investigated …
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Book #85 of 2025: Nightshade by Michael Connelly (Detective Stilwell #1) This 2025 release is the start of a new series for author Michael Connelly, although there are a few subtle indications throughout that it’s set in the same continuity as his long-running Bosch and Lincoln Lawyer titles. I’d be shocked if there aren’t crossover …
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Book #80 of 2025: We Solve Murders by Richard Osman (We Solve Murders #1) Mixed feelings on this one. I like the interpersonal dynamics of the private security officer, her father-in-law the retired detective, and their eccentric author friend, and it’s fun to watch them bounce around the globe dodging their enemies while trying to …
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Book #34 of 2025: This Book Kills by Ravena Guron I was expecting this novel — in which a student’s classmate is murdered in the same way as the victim in a story she wrote — to be a YA thriller, so it was a pleasant surprise to find it’s more of a traditional whodunnit …
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Book #30 of 2025: Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson (Ernest Cunningham #1) A decent murder mystery of the snowed-in-with-a-rising-body-count subgenre. Unfortunately, as that description suggests, this is not the most original storyline, and I’ve personally found its efforts to stand out a little hokey. The narrator is very meta with …
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Book #187 of 2024: The Most Wonderful Crime of the Year by Ally Carter A cute winter mystery story, in which a famous elderly writer of detective fiction has invited several younger peers to her mansion for the holiday, along with her seemingly ungrateful relatives. Soon after the guests arrive, their hostess vanishes amid evidence …
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Book #177 of 2024: Carnacki, the Ghost-Finder by William Hope Hodgson This 1913 short story collection consists of six entries initially published in various British magazines a few years prior, all concerning the titular occult detective, Thomas Carnacki. His methods are somewhat like those of Sherlock Holmes, but his domain is the supernatural and especially …
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