Talking About Mysteries

Before I start on mysteries, I just have to say...I knew it. In the Oct 21st New York Times, Bill O'Reilly makes the top 10 nonfiction list TWICE!!!! I wonder how many people can say that. Not many I would bet. Killing Lincoln is hanging in there at #6 and his new book, Killing Kennedy debuts at #1. Congratulations to him!!!! Quite a feat.

Now - on to mysteries coming out in November. Quite a change of topics I know. I've been out of touch now for almost 2 weeks so I have lots of books to discuss in a limited number of weeks. I thought I would try to get the mysteries out there first.

If you have read and enjoyed the British mysteries of J.M. Gregson feature Superintendent John Lambert and Detective Sergeant Bert Hook, a new one, More Than Meets The Eye, comes out on November 1. Dennis Cooper has a dream job as a full-time resident National Trust curators of the spectacular Westbourne Gardens, which receives thousands of visitors each year. It may seem perfect but secrets flow in the background and foul play is the result.Lambert and Hook try to discover the cause.

Also on November 1, is Susan Rogers Cooper title Dead Weight which is part of her E.J. Pugh series. One of E.J.'s Weight Watchers group met her untimely death and when Pugh started investigating, another death followed. That isn't going to stop E.J.

Lots of people wait for the newest Sharon McCone mystery. Marcia Muller comes out with the next, Looking for Yesterday, on November 6th. Many consider Muller the best American mystery author ever and this title is the 29th in the the McCone series. She seems to remain consistently good and this title is true to that statement. If you are looking for a mystery series to read, this one is a strong recommendation. 3 years previously, Caro Warrick had been acquitted of murdering her best friend. She arrives at McCone's doorstep brutally beaten. How can McCone turn down the investigation into who actually committed the murder? She can't.

I love this title. If Hooks Could Kill by Betty Hechtman comes out on November 6. It is number 7 of the Crochet Mystery series. The series feature a crochet group from Tarzana, CA called the Tarzana Hookers.

In this outing, a television crew comes to town to use the local background for a show. One of the Hookers homes is being used. When the Hooker ends up dead and her home becomes a crime scene, this group of crocheters hits the investigative trail. A cute cozy.

Another cozy, a Pennyfoot Hotel mystery, that has a Christmas theme comes out on November 6th also. The Clue is in the Pudding by Kate Kingsbury shows the Pennyfoot Hotel at the holiday season when her housekeeper is called home on an emergency. A temporary housekeeper is found but she is an argumentative, bossy...well, not nice person. A prominent guest keels over dead after she serves him a piece of plum pudding. Hmmmm - Cecily Sinclair Baxter has to investigate to save the hotel's good name.

Also on November 6th and defined as a quirky cozy is Death in the 12th House by Mitchell Scott Lewis. This is the second in a series which features an astrologer detective. Yes, he in fact uses people astrological charts to obtain clues. The first in the series, Murder in the 11th House was quite popular. This time he is called in to investigate the death of an aging rock star. Interesting premise, no?

Charles Finch has won awards for his Charlie Lenox series, the next one, A Death in the Small Hours, arrives on November 13th. Charlie Lenox is an up and coming politician now  - having left his detective job to pursue high goals. When he retreats to his uncle's estate in Somerset to write an important speech, he expects peace and quiet. Instead, he finds vandalism which turns deadly and he is pulled back into an investigative role before the violence strikes his family.

On November 20, Margaret Maron brings us her newest in the Judge Deborah Knott series, The Buzzard Table.  Knott and her husband Dwight Bryant are back home in North Carolina. When a group of family and friends gather at the home of aging, ailing Mrs. Lattimore, they meet Martin Crawford, an ornithologist who claims to be researching a new book on Southern vultures. More importantly, he's Mrs. Lattimore's long-lost nephew. Something doesn't sit right with Deborah and when a murderer strike, she goes into investigative mode.

I like max Allan Collins. His Nathan Heller series takes real life people from history and involves them in mysteries. His newest, Target Lancer, comes out on November 27. Long before November 22, 1963, Nathan Heller, “P.I. to the Stars,” knows that a conspiracy is in the works. Several years earlier, Heller had been involved with the Kennedys, the Mob, and the CIA in the early stages of a plan to assassinate Fidel Castro. Shortly after, Heller’s Mafia contact is murdered. After being interrogated by gangsters and contacted by U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy, Heller realizes that he may be the one person who can prevent a devastating political assassination. This should go nicely with O'Reilly's Killing Kennedy.

Donald Bain carries on Margaret Truman's Capital Crimes series with Experiment in Murder which also comes out on November 27. When a Washington psychiatrist is found dead in his office, Mackenzie Smith is called in to defend one of his patients who has become a suspect. Then information emerges that links the slain shrink to a highly secret CIA mind control project. Then an assassin gets involved. An exciting addition to the series.