Tense trials and tribulations
Criminally good thrillers to capture the imagination
DEAR CHILD ★★★★★
Romy Hausmann Quercus, £12.99
Lena has been abducted and she is kept captive in a windowless shack in the woods with two children, Hannah, 13, Jonathan, 12, and a cat. Her captor decides whether it is day or night and forces his “family” to follow a strict schedule of meals, bathroom visits and, for the children, home schooling.
Locking them inside the cabin when he ventures out, he says he is protecting his family from the dangers lurking outside.
Papa punishes disobedience with physical and mental abuse, ensuring his children obey his every word and that they will always have a mother to look after them.
When Lena escapes with one of the children, Hannah, she believes her nightmare is finally over. But it is only just beginning. It is 13 years since Lena’s disappearance but, when police contact her parents, they are certain she is not their daughter. But Hannah is the spitting image of their Lena when she was a child.
As the police desperately try to piece together a puzzle that doesn’t seem to fit, Lena tries to come to terms with her ordeal.
But when she starts to receive threatening letters urging her to “tell the truth”, she knows her captor is coming for her and that he wants his family reunited.
Dear Child is a mesmerising debut which I simply could not put down. Flawlessly plotted, it keeps the reader guessing as nothing is quite as it seems, and I’m still thinking about its denouement weeks later.
This is a remarkably accomplished debut that marks Hausmann out as a major new talent.This stunning novel should not be missed. JC
HIS AND HERS ★★★★
Alice Feeney HQ, £7.99
WHEN glamorous Cat Jones returns to present the BBC One O’Clock News after her maternity leave, her stand-in Anna Andrews is left fuming.
Demoted to the ranks of the news correspondents, she is given the last assignment she wants, the murder of a woman she went to school with in the village where she grew up and where her elderly mother still lives.
And to make matters worse, her former husband
Detective Chief
Inspector Jack Harper is leading the murder investigation.
DCI Harper soon becomes suspicious that Anna has a personal connection to the case, though she denies it.When another woman is murdered by the same killer and the TV reporter is the first at the scene, he fears she has been lying and wants to know why.
However, Anna is hiding a secret from her past that she does not want to share with her ex. So she sets out to track down the killer on her own. But in doing so, she puts her mother at risk from a killer consumed by vengeance.
His And Hers is the third psychological thriller from the bestselling author of Sometimes I Lie, which is being adapted for a TV drama starring Sarah Michelle Gellar.
Cleverly plotted and tightly written, this deliciously dark thriller will leave readers breathless as they race towards a trademark killer twist that will leave them reeling. Feeney’s best book yet will delight her fans. JC
★★★★
Sharon Bolton Trapeze, £12.99 GLACIOLOGIST Felicity Lloyd is midway through a two-year research trip with the British Antarctic Survey on the remote island of South Georgia when her past catches up with her.
On the surface, this is her dream assignment, studying the glacial flow of water into a giant blue lake in the summer which completely drains into the ocean in winter.
But it was also her way of escaping a man she is terrified of, a man she fears will hurt her again. Freddie Lloyd has served his time in prison for murder and now that he is free, he won’t rest until he has found Felicity.The last
● To order any of the books featured, please phone The Express Bookshop on
562310, or order online at
www.expressbookshop.co.uk. Standard P & P charge of £2.95 for orders under £12.99. We no longer accept cheques or postal orders.
cruise ship of the season brings tourists to the island to see its abandoned whaling stations and its colonies of seals, penguins and birds – and Felicity knows Freddie is on board.
As the ship pulls into harbour, she sets out in a dinghy to disappear for a few days, knowing he will have to get back on the ship by then or risk starving during the island’s long winter.
The Split is a tense game of cat and mouse with plenty of twists to keep readers gripped until an epic finale. Masterfully plotted and paced, with wonderful descriptions of the windswept, icy South Georgia landscape, this is a hugely enjoyable thriller. JC
BROKEN ★★★★★
Don Winslow Harper Collins, £20 THIS collection of six short novels explores themes ranging from crime, corruption and vengeance to justice, guilt, and redemption.
They are set in a world that will be familiar to fans of Winslow’s epic novels, including last year’s acclaimed The Border and 2018’s The Force, peopled by high-level thieves and low-life crooks, obsessed police officers and jaded private detectives, drug dealers and government agents, bounty hunters and fugitives.
Often with a collection of novellas, some stories stand out while others are quickly forgotten. But every story in this brilliant book is fast-paced, suspenseful and memorable, written in razor-sharp prose that instantly commands your attention.
The first novella Broken, set in New Orleans, tells a tale of the true cost of revenge.
Sunset is one of three stories that pay homage to Winslow’s heroes Steve McQueen, Elmore Leonard and Raymond Chandler, and the other two are among the best in the collection: the slick and stylish Crime 101; and the farcical The
San Diego Zoo.
Paradise, set on the island of Kauai in Hawaii, reunitesWinslow’s fans with Ben, Chon and O from Savages and The Kings Of Cool.
And the final story,The Last Ride, is a neo-Western set at a border camp in Texas where migrant children are caged. Searing, unflinching, and a damning indictment of America’s southern border policy, this is one of the strongest tales in the collection. Broken is a masterful collection from a writer at the peak of his powers.
THE LAST TRIAL
★★★★
Scott Turow Mantle, £20 NOBODY writes better courtroom thrillers than the American lawyer and author Scott Turow. He has the rare gift of being able to make the complex ins and outs of the law seem fascinating, so that the trials in his books are consistently enthralling (which is rarely the case with real-life court cases).
In his first novel, the masterly Presumed Innocent (1987), Turow introduced diminutive defence attorney Sandy Stern who has popped up to a greater or lesser extent in all his books. Now, aged 85, Sandy takes centre stage again, taking on what will probably be his last case.
He’s defending an old friend, Nobel Prizewinning physician Kiril Pafko, whose experimental cancer treatments have been keeping Stern alive for several years. Now Kiril has been accused of causing the deaths of patients who were taking part in one of his drug trials, as well as falsifying test results and profiting from insider dealing.
As the trial progresses, it becomes apparent that Kiril is an arrogant, randy old goat as well as a great scientist, but is he guilty? As always with Turow, you’ll change your mind a dozen times as the twists keep coming, shedding new light on the evidence.
We’re also led to wonder whether Stern is doing his friend more harm than good by taking on his defence: some early mistakes suggest that one of fiction’s greatest lawyers may now be past his prime.
Turow combines sparky, entertaining character studies with an examination of the ethics of breaking rules in a good cause, whether in medicine or the law. The writing and plotting may not be quite as smooth as in some of his earlier books but, unlike Stern, there is no question that Turow is still at the head of his profession.