The Mystery Memo is a log of all of my mystery reading, with brief comments and a star rating for each book read. It is published every 4 to 6 weeks.

This Mystery Memo has one perfect read: Sara J. Henry's Learning to Swim, described below.

The following selections from my Mystery Memo # 116 features crime solvers who are not paid investigators like private eyes or police officers of any kind. They include journalists (Jan Burke's Irene Kelly, Julie Kramer's Riley Spartz), workers in forensics (Kathryn Fox's pathologist Dr. Anya Crichton, Ellie Griffith's forensic archaeologist Ruth Galloway) and just plain amateur sleuths (Charles Todd's new series with World War I nurse, Bess Crawford and Sara Henry's young protagonist Troy Chance who sees a child fall off a ferry)

Click here to download the entire Mystery Memo # 116 and see all 16 mysteries.

Jan Burke: Disturbance (2011) ****
Journalist/investigator
Book # 11 with reporter Irene Kelly in southern California
The serial killer in Bones (# 7 in series) has recovered from a serious injury and escapes from prison, determined to take vengeance against Irene. Half way through the book, he kidnaps her with the help of several of his sons. This was a fine action/adventure mystery, but it would be best to read at least Bones before this one.
First book: Goodnight, Irene
*

Kathryn Fox: Death Mask (2011) *** ½
Forensics.
Book # 4 with freelance pathologist and forensic physician Dr. Anya Crichton.

Anya has been invited to give workshops to professional football players about sexual behaviour. After several young football players with a connection to the same high school end up dead, she helps investigate. A complex plot but with less forensics than the others in the series.
First book: Malicious Intent

*

Elly Griffiths: The House at Sea’s End (2011) ****
Amateur detective/British police procedural.
Book # 3 with Ruth Galloway, forensic archaeologist.

Several bodies found in a seaside cave turn out to be German soldiers from WW2. A German researcher comes to town claiming he knows who they are but then he is murdered. Someone is determined to keep the secret of who killed these men, but Ruth and her sometime lover DCI Nelson are on the trail. This series is strongly character-driven with good archaeology content.
First book: The Crossing Places
*

Sara J. Henry: Learning to Swim (2011) *****
Amateur sleuth
Book # 1 with Troy Chance, a young woman who works in Lake Placid, NY.

While on a ferry trip across the lake, Troy thinks she sees a child fall from a passing ferry. Without thinking, she jumps in and yes, a 6-year-old boy has been tied into a sweatshirt and is underwater. She rescues him and heroically swims to shore. The pace hardly slows down after she traces the boy’s father to Ottawa and accompanies the child back home. Troy is determined to get to the bottom of who threw the child in the water. Enthralling writing style, a good balanced character in Troy and an interesting narrative voice. A great read.
*

Julie Kramer: Silencing Sam (2010) *** ½
Journalist.
Book # 3 with television journalist Riley Spartz

Riley is the main suspect in the murder of a local gossip columnist. While trying to prove her innocence, she also tackles stories at a wind farm troubled by bombs. I find Riley’s point of view interesting.
First book: Stalking Susan
*
*

Charles Todd: An Impartial Witness (2010) *** ½
Historical/Amateur sleuth.
Book # 2 with war nurse Bess Crawford, set in England during WW1.

After Bess travels to England with a seriously injured pilot who constantly carries a photograph of his beloved wife, she sees the woman from the photo having an emotional scene with another man at the train station. When the woman is soon found murdered, Bess comes forward to the police with her information and gets involved looking into the woman’s life.
First book: A Duty to the Dead

posted by Sharon

WHAT I'M READING NOW:
The Devil's Dust
by C.B. Forrest

Canadian police procedural/investigator

Book # 3 with Charlie McKelvey, a 30-year veteran Toronto police detective, newly retired.

Description: Retired Toronto detective Charlie McKelvey runs from a cancer diagnosis and the violent memories of the big city and retreats to his hometown. A small declining mining centre in northern Ontario, Ste. Bernadette offers McKelvey a chance to resolve old family issues, including his fathers involvement in a deadly wildcat strike in the late 1950s.
When the local police force enlists his help in tracing an upswing in youth violence and vandalism, McKelvey stumbles into the hornets nest of a crystal meth industry....
First book: The Weight of Stones

Lee Child recently received the the Diamond Dagger Achievement Award. See the article in The Guardian.

This award is given by the Crime Writers' Association for a Lifetime's Achievement.

Here's the series listed in order on Stop, You're Killing Me! with Jack Reacher, ex-military policeman in the USA:
First book: Killing Floor

The most recent: A Wanted Man # 17
Book description: Nebraska - and Jack Reacher, huge, hulking and with a freshly busted nose, is still trying to hitch a ride east to Virginia. He's picked up by three strangers - two men and a woman.
Immediately he knows they're all lying about something - and then they run into a police roadblock on the highway. But they get through. Because the three are innocent? Or because the three are now four?
Is Reacher a decoy?

## Related posts:
MBTB review of Bad Luck and Trouble # 11

MBTB review of 61 Hours # 14

The Inquisitor’s Key
By Jefferson Bass ****

# 7 with Dr. Bill Brockton, a forensic anthropologist in Tennessee, in the Body Farm series

MBTB review: Bill Brockton and Miranda Lovelady are called to Avignon, France to identify a set of mysterious bones found in a hidden chamber in the Palace of the Popes. Although the stone inscription hints that the bones might be those of Jesus, the two anthropologists remain skeptical while they attempt to identify the remains. When an attempt on their own lives is made, the pair realize things are not quite as they seem and the pressure is on to uncover the mystery of the two thousand year old bones.

This installation is completely different from the rest of the series and would fall more comfortably in the “archaeological thriller/mystery” category. Bass flips back and forth between the mystery of today’s discovery of the bones, and a medieval account of what happened. The forensic detail that we are so accustomed to is paired down and the history, archaeology and politics of the time are brought into limelight which was a nice change for me. As usual, Bass’ plot was action packed and we delved into Brockton’s love life a bit more than usual. Overall, a real page turner.

First book: Carved in Bone

## Related posts:

Spotlight on Jefferson Bass and the Body Farm novels posted in November 2009

MBTB full review of The Bone Thief # 5

MBTB full review of The Bone Yard # 6

posted by Shiela

The Agency: the Traitor in the Tunnel
By Y. S Lee

MBTB review: Although this series is marketed as a Young Adult Mystery series, I have thoroughly enjoyed each and every book and look forward to the new release from this Canadian author every summer. “The Traitor in the Tunnel” was no exception.

We find our heroine Mary Quinn inside the walls of Buckingham Palace on an undercover mission to identify a petty thief pilfering items from the Queen’s collection. This simple case soon becomes complicated when the Prince of Wales witnesses the murder of his friend and Mary’s long lost father is the accused.

I love everything about this series. The characters are wonderful, fully developed and intriguing. The relationship between Mary and her paramour James Easton is so sweet and I love how Lee somehow gets James involved in the thick of each mystery. The series takes place in the rich and atmospheric setting of Victorian England (one of my favorite time periods) and the mysteries are always more involved than they first seem.

Don’t let the “Young Adult” designation fool you, this series is worth the read.

Here is the series listed in order on Fantastic Fiction

Posted by Shiela

This list is compiled from all the debut mysteries reviewed in Booklist between May 2011 and April 2012.
To see the list on the Booklist website with Bill Ott's introduction, click here. Scroll down past the Top 10 list (see that MBTB post here)

Booklist's Top 5 Debut Crime Novels:

Dove Season by Johnny Shaw (2011)

Mix some Magnificent Seven–style violence with the freewheeling comedy of a “buddy picture,” and you get this caterwauling caper novel about a thirty-something drifter who returns to his hometown in Southern California’s Imperial Valley to visit his dying father and winds up going head-to-head with some nasty Mexican drug dealers.
.
.

The Expats by Chris Pavone (2012)

Leaving her clandestine work with the CIA behind, Kate moves to Luxembourg with her banker husband. But something smells fishy. The blending of marital deception and espionage works brilliantly in this intricate, suspenseful, and stunningly assured first novel.
.
.

Ranchero by Rick Gavin (2011)

Mississippi repo man Nick Reid sets out to reclaim a $20 TV and, instead, gets beaned with a shovel and has his mint 1969 Ranchero stolen. With his enforcer pal in tow, Nick sets off across the Delta to recover his ride. Pitch-perfect dialogue drives the galvanizing chase.
.
.

Sister by Rosamund Lupton (2011)

Murder mystery? Psychological thriller? Medical-ethical exploration? Yes, but so much more, too. Attempting to determine if her sister, Tess, killed herself or was murdered, Beatrice composes a letter to Tess, expressing her puzzlement and tracking her investigation. Innovative narrative technique and remarkable suspense.
.
.

Turn of Mind by Alice LaPlante (2011)

Part literary novel, part thriller, LaPlante’s haunting debut traces the deterioration of orthopedic surgeon Jennifer White, who at 64 is suffering severe dementia and just might have killed her best friend. Masterfully written on multiple levels.
This book was also on the Booklist's Top 10 Crime Novels of 2012
.
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## Related post: Booklist's Top 10 Crime Novels 0f 2012

posted by Sharon

WHAT I'M READING NOW:
The Ambitious City
by Scott Thornley

Canadian police procedural

Book # 2 with Macneice, a senior police detective, in the fictional city of Dundurn, Ontario

from Margaret Cannon's review: The star in this terrific tale is Dundurn, Ont., Scott Thornley’s thinly veiled Hamilton. It’s his home town; he knows the history, the topography and feel to his very bones, and that’s what makes this second book featuring Detective Superintendent MacNeice so good.

There are bodies galore. The plot begins with seven dead bikers, all carefully murdered and mutilated to prevent identification. Then there’s an international archeological team dredging up a pair of 1913 warships to make a tourist event out of the city’s harbour. MacNeice is summoned when the engineer in charge catches a glimpse of a Depression-era Packard in the drink, with two very old corpses and one ventriloquist’s dummy in the trunk. There are two newer corpses in cement pillars near the car. Finally, there are dead young women, obviously targeted by race.

Thornley blends history into a really good cop-shop story as MacNeice and team hunt for clues and information. Read this and then look for the first MacNeice book, Erasing Memory.

from the review article "New in Crime Fiction: The Latest Thrillers and Mysteries" by Margaret Cannon Globe & Mail, May 18, 2012

Have you read the Globe & Mail article Clued in : 12 mystery masters name their favourites ? The subtitle "Michael Connelly, Harlen Coben and 10 more unearth buried treasure just for you."

Here's my buried treasure: John D. Macdonald's Travis McGee series.
Published from 1964 to 1984, they follow the life and investigations of Travis McGee, an adventurer, philosopher, and “salvage consultant” who does unofficial favors for friends, in Fort Lauderdale, Florida (series description from Stop, You're Killing Me!)
The stories often start on McGee's beloved houseboat "The Busted Flush" as clients and friends bring problems to him.
The writing has everything I look for in a mystery: first-person narration, beautiful original descriptions, unusual (yet believable) characters and unlikely (yet believable) plots.
They're all good. I've collected a full set, plus spares to give away or take on trips.

Here's one of my favourites:
A Tan and Sandy Silence

Booklist /* Starred Review */ MacDonald’s Travis McGee (“a refugee from a plastic-structured culture, uninsured, unadjusted, and unconvinced”) remains, long after the 21-volume series ended in 1985, one of the crime genre’s most appealing nonconformists. He lives the life every individualist craves: independent, adventurous, and unpredictable. Sequestered on his houseboat sanctuary, The Busted Flush (won in a poker game), moored in slip F-18, Bahia Mar Marina, Fort Lauderdale, he ventures out into the wider world whenever someone he cares about loses something — a loved one, money, or even self-respect — getting back whatever has been lost and keeping 50 percent of the profits. This novel, the thirteenth in the series and quite possibly the best, represents an important turning point for McGee. On the surface, it looks like a typical McGee adventure: our hero discovers that one of his “wounded ducklings” (emotionally scarred women he has nursed back to psychic and sexual health) has disappeared, leaving a distraught husband. McGee smells foul play and is soon locked in mortal combat with a Ted Bundy–like psycho who enjoys torturing his victims. Although McGee eventually dispatches his antagonist, it is not before much damage has been done, both to the people he was trying to protect and to his own sense of self. For the first time in the series, McGee is truly vulnerable: “In all my approximately seventy-six inches of torn and mended flesh and hide, in all my approximately fifteen-stone weight of meat, bone, and dismay, I sat on that damned bed and felt degraded.” McGee’s “wounding” forces MacDonald to deal with an inevitable problem for series authors: how to let the heroes grow and change without sacrificing their mythic stature. By immersing Travis a little further into the everyday world of slowed reflexes and failing nerves, MacDonald heightens the tension between myth and reality, and we receive a stronger jolt of mythic energy when that tension is released. “I know what counts,” Travis tells us, “is the feeling I get when I make my own luck.” After A Tan and Sandy Silence, that feeling is harder to come by, but it’s all the more satisfying when it finally arrives.

* * *
If you are hunting through the library catalogue for this series, all of the Travis McGee series have a colour in their title.

posted by Sharon

WHAT I'M READING NOW:
Elegy for Eddie
by Jacqueline Winspear

Historical/Private investigator

Book # 9 with Maisie Dobbs, a psychologist and investigator based in 1920s and 1930s London, England

Here's what Booklist had to say: London in the 1930s serves as backdrop for Winspear’s engaging, best-selling series featuring psychologist, investigator, and former war nurse Maisie Dobbs. A woman of humble beginnings who received a sizable inheritance from her mentor, Maurice, Dobbs harbors great compassion for the working-class woman and man. When local fruit peddler Eddie Pettit is killed in a violent accident, Dobbs suspects foul play, for Eddie was a simple soul with a kind heart and a knack for communicating with horses. Those who knew Eddie say he seemed uncharacteristically agitated in the last days of his life. Had he fallen in with the wrong crowd, or fallen prey to power brokers who took unfair advantage of his naïveté? Dobbs’ investigation takes her from the gritty streets of Lambeth to glamorous London dinner parties, where guests include press magnates and politicians with money and ambition to burn. Winspear’s books are stronger on atmosphere than plot, and here she vividly evokes early-twentieth-century London and the glaring disparity between the haves and have-nots.

MBTB review of Maisie Dobbs # 1

MBTB mini-review of The Mapping of Love and Death # 7

Nevada Barr: The Rope **** ½

Amateur sleuth/Investigator/Action/Adventure

Prequel to the 16 book series with Anna Pigeon, a park ranger at various national parks in the USA

Library Journal: /* Starred Review */ The adventures of park ranger Anna Pigeon have filled the pages of 16 books, and now her legion of loyal fans can find out how her story began. After her husband's death in 1995, Anna leaves New York City to take a seasonal position at Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. On a hike to explore the dry canyon lands around Lake Powell, Anna literally falls into a mystery. Fighting thirst and drug-induced delirium, she extricates herself from the dry well and begins to unravel the who and why of her tortuous ordeal. Barr's luxuriant depictions of desert landscapes with its colors and hues and details about Lake Powell's tourist population are interwoven into the narrative as an indispensable element of her popular series. Anna emerges from this canyon escapade as a strong, determined woman who plans to return to park service employment as a law enforcement ranger, stating that "more women should carry guns."
VERDICT Another awesome winner for Barr.

MBTB review: Many of Anna's actions in The Rope are puzzling, as she gets herself into some serious near-death situations, but I must remind myself, she is younger and far more inexperienced than we see her in later books. And she is grieving the recent death of her husband. I put this in my "Amateur Sleuth" category, since at this point in her career, Anna has had no investigator training.
An enjoyable, often edge-of-my-seat read.

Prequels seem to be all the rage. Recently I've read the prequel to Lee Child's Reacher series The Affair. Still on my "to be read list": the prequel to Steven Havill's series with Undersheriff Bill Gastner, One Perfect Shot.

They are an excellent way to start a series .... and for those of us who are already fans, prequels fill in some early background and give us a glimpse of the character before they accumulate all the experience.

First book: Track of the Cat

posted by Sharon

WHAT I'M READING NOW:
Taken
by Robert Crais

Private investigator/Action/Adventure

Book # 15 with Elvis Cole and Joe Pike, a pair of Hollywood private eyes, in Los Angeles, California

Description: Hired along with Joe Pike to investigate the alleged kidnapping of a young law student, Elvis Cole goes undercover to infiltrate a ring of professional border kidnappers only to be abducted himself.

First book: The Monkey's Raincoat

Paul Doiron: The Poacher’s Son (2010) *** ½

Book # 1 with Maine game warden Mike Bowditch.

MBTB mini-review: Mike’s father, a known poacher, becomes the main suspect in the shooting deaths of a police officer and an executive of a big lumber company. His father has escaped police custody and Mike isn’t allowed to officially help in the hunt. Mike has to choose between his job and doing something to assist his father.

Non-stop action. Recommended for fans of Nevada Barr, series with Anna Pigeon, a park ranger at various national parks in the USA (e.g. Track of the Cat) or C. J. Box, series with Joe Pickett, a game warden in the Bighorn Mountains of Wyoming (e.g. Open Season).

The next book with Maine game warden Mike Bowditch: Trespasser

This is a MBTB mini-review from Mystery Memo # 109

* * *

Here's what the Booklist review had to say:
/*Starred Review*/ Doiron’s debut crime novel is set on the coast and in the North Woods of Maine, the home of rookie game warden Mike Bowditch. As tensions rise across the state with the impending sale of huge tracts of paper-company forest land to an out-of-state developer, Mike receives a strange message from his father, left on the same night the paper company rep and a state trooper are shot and killed after a heated town meeting.

Doirin, editor-in-chief of Down State magazine, is well acquainted with the current political and cultural tensions that crisscross Maine, and his local knowledge drives this fast-paced and twisty narrative. With realistically flawed characters and a strong sense of place—both on the coast and in the woods — the novel avoids tourist stereotyping, of Maine itself and its citizens. As a game warden, Mike is devoted to upholding the law, and as a conflict appears to develop between that responsibility and his love for his estranged father, he finds himself with both his job and life on the line.

One hopes this fine novel is the first in a series starring Warden Bowditch, who could quickly become the East Coast version of C. J. Box’s game-warden hero Joe Pickett, who patrols the range in Wyoming.

posted by Sharon

WHAT I'M READING NOW:

Betrayal of Trust
by J.A. Jance

Book # 20 with J.P. Beaumont, wealthy homicide detective in Seattle, Washington

Summary: When the governor of the state of Washington asks him to investigate a snuff film found on her grandson's phone, J.P. Beaumont, no stranger to human depravity, is shocked by this horrific crime and discovers that this murder has much wider implications.NoveList

First book: Until Proven Guilty

Here are some new entries in a couple of my favourite series:

J.A. Jance: Betrayal of Trust (2011)

Book # 20 with J.P. Beaumont, homicide detective in Seattle, Washington

Summary: When the governor of the state of Washington asks him to investigate a snuff film found on her grandson's phone, J.P. Beaumont, no stranger to human depravity, is shocked by this horrific crime and discovers that this murder has much wider implications. NoveList

First book: Until Proven Guilty

* * *

Lee Child: The Affair (2011)

Book # 16 with Jack Reacher, ex-military policeman in the USA

Summary: Traces the story of Jack Reacher's early life in the military before the events that rendered him a vigilante hero on the road. NoveList

First book: Killing Floor

posted by Sharon

Thomas Perry: Strip (2010) ****

This is a stand-alone, more a caper than a mystery.

MBTB review: When strip club owner Manco is robbed at the night deposit, he asks around and deduces that a new man in LA, Joe Carver, is likely the robber. Carver tries to tell Manco that he has the wrong man, but Manco won’t change his mind. In the meantime, the reader also sees the story from the point-of-view of the actual robber, a man who has no idea of the trouble he’s causing. Nicely written.

It reminded me of Donald Westlake’s books (e.g. the Dortmunder series - see Related Post below).

## Related post: Donald Westlake 1933 - 2008

This is a mini-review from Mystery Memo # 108

* * * * *

Here's what Library Journal had to say:
/* Starred Review */ Former bar owner Joe Carver has come to L.A. with a new identity and lots of cash only to find that thugs hired by low-level mobster Manco Kapak are out to get him. Carver has been mistakenly fingered as the person behind the armed robbery of Kapak's night deposit, a hefty sum used in part to launder drug profits, only the first of many hits the gangster will absorb from a masked gunman. Failing to clear his name, Carver counterattacks. Along the way, readers meet bigamist detective Nick Slosser, who is juggling the demands of two families and trying to capture the increasingly brazen robber while investigating Kapak for a drug lord's murder. As these and other colorful characters spiral around each other with gripping intensity and one startling twist after the other, the question is: Who's going down, and who's getting away?
VERDICT Featuring rich, complex characters, Perry's 18th novel (after Runner ) is pure, unadulterated fun, sure to please not only the many fans of this master craftsman but also lovers of imaginative, character-driven thrillers a la Elmore Leonard.

posted by Sharon

WHAT I'M READING NOW:

Devil's Peak
by Deon Meyer

Book # 1 with Benny Griessel, an aging, alcoholic police inspector in Capetown, South Africa

Summary: In the aftermath of a gruesome child abuse case that has caught the attention of the media, Inspector Benny Griessel struggles to maintain his sobriety in order to bring down a vigilante killer who has won the sympathy of the public. NoveList

Next book: Thirteen Hours

series information from Stop, You're Killing Me!