Deft twist turns fantasy into mystery
Primal places, absorbing characters and the punchiness of a pro boxer in a knockout selection.
After racking up more than two dozen New York Times bestsellers, shelves of awards and legions of ardent fans worldwide, Auckland fantasy author Nalini Singh turns to crime in A MADNESS OF SUNSHINE (Hachette NZ, $34.99). The Fijian-born storyteller shows her talents transcend genre boundaries as she eschews passionate tales involving vampires, shapeshifters and archangels for an immersive rural mystery set on the rugged West Coast. Concert pianist Anahera reluctantly returns to tiny Golden Cove after years in London. As she recuperates from the loss of her husband and the betrayal revealed at his funeral, Anahera and new local cop Will get caught up in the disappearance of a vibrant young woman on the cusp of leaving Golden Cove for her own adventures. Locals band together to search amid growing concern and memories of past tragedies. Singh crafts a primal sense of place, and keeps the pages flowing through a twisting mystery seasoned with issues including misogyny and domestic violence.
Former Aussie journo Chris Hammer laid down a terrific marker last year with his award-winning debut, and he shows no second-novel wobbles with
SILVER (Allen & Unwin, $36.99), another multilayered mystery that takes readers deep into people and place. After barely surviving events in bone-dry Riversend, journalist Martin Scarsden heads to the coast to start again, only to find his new lady love, Mandy Blonde, with the bloodied body of one of his old friends in her house. A hometown that he fled decades before, Port Silver is a quagmire of tough memories and swirling emotions for Martin, heightened by Mandy becoming a murder suspect. Hammer adroitly deals with the ways hometowns and our views of them evolve as we age, and the changes brought on by economic development or decline. Martin is confronted by people who knew him years ago, and the various impressions they’ve held – sometimes different to how he perceived himself – along with new locals who could be friends or foes. It’s another terrific tale with a satisfying mystery, absorbing character development and a great sense of place and local issues. It all comes together a little hurriedly after a long simmer, but I’ll be racing to read Hammer’s next effort.
Fans of fast-paced airport thrillers may be left adrift by the storytelling of James Sallis, but those with a penchant for character-centric tales full of exquisite prose, damaged people and musings on the human condition should add him to their reading list. Sallis is a hidden gem of the crime genre, a master of noir who penned the story behind the Ryan Gosling film Drive. His latest, SARAH JANE (Old-castle
Books, $21.95), centres on the titular heroine, who becomes de facto sheriff of a tiny south-western American town and investigates the disappearance of her predecessor. A deep character study of a woman whose life has been full of slippery snakes rather than ladders to climb, this is a mesmerising novel about people and place. While she’s searching for answers, her past lives unfurl, from her humble chicken-farm beginnings, a court-ordered army stint, violent relationships and hardscrabble jobs to deep personal tragedy. It’s a story of grief and tenderness, of despair and hope. Sallis is like an elite boxer, knocking readers out with a barely seen uppercut rather than eye-catching haymakers. Seemingly effortless; efficient, brutal and beautiful.