February 2024
Harlequin Butterfly is by Toh Enjoe. Successful entrepreneur A.A. Abrams is pursuing the enigmatic writer Tomoyuki Tomoyuki, who appears to have the ability to write expertly in the language of any place they go. Abrams sinks endless resources into finding the writer, but Tomoyuki Tomoyuki always manages to stay one step ahead, taking off moments before being pinned down. But how does the elusive author move from one place to the next, from one language to the next? Ingenious and dazzling, Harlequin Butterfly unfurls one puzzle after another, taking us on a mind-bending journey into the imagination.
The Trials of Lila Dalton is by L J Shepherd. 'I look up to find twelve strangers staring back at me... I realise I'm the one they're waiting for.' Lila Dalton has no memory of how she got to this courtroom. The man in the docks is accused of mass murder, and she's his barrister - but she can't remember anything about the case. She can't remember anything at all. Lila is stranded on an island hundreds of miles from the UK, where the most serious crimes go to trial. The next plane out doesn't leave for days. And she's being watched. Someone keeps breaking into her hotel room to leave cryptic notes, threatening her with deadly consequences if she doesn't get her client off... Can Lila Dalton win her case and solve the mystery of her own identity?
March 2024
'We all have our secrets...' Renowned therapist Clarissa Virtanen is not afraid to look at the darkest side of humanity. Haunted by the death of a young patient, she will do whatever it takes to save the most vulnerable. But when Ida - angry, damaged and seemingly suicidal - walks into her office, Clarissa may have met her match. For Ida has secrets. Murderous secrets, which mark her like a bloodstain. Secrets which drive her to kill. And kill again. Somehow, Clarissa must find the key to unlock her past. So she makes a bargain with Ida - six months to try and stop her taking her own life. But what if she has entered a game more deadly, and more evil, than she could ever imagine? Follow The Butterfly is by Marta Kaukonen.
April 2024
Blessed Water is by Margot Douahy. Tattooed from her neck to her toes and sporting a gold tooth as sharp as her wisecracks, Sister Holiday struggles to stay on the righteous path. She's committed both to taking her permanent vows with the Sisters of the Sublime Blood and joining Magnolia Riveaux's latest venture, Redemption Detective Agency-both in service of satisfying her eternal quest for answers. When Sister Holiday and Riveaux set out to bust a philandering husband, they instead find the body of a priest floating in the Mississippi river, and with it, Redemption's next case. As a torrential rainstorm drowns New Orleans for three harrowing days over Easter weekend, Sister Holiday and Riveaux follow the clues. With the stakes rising alongside the relentless floodwaters, our favourite punk nun-sleuth throws herself into the deep end yet again.
Strange things are happening in the Chizurui mansion... At night, a figure clad in a Hannya mask is spotted wandering around the house. The amateur crime fiction writer, Akimitsu Takagi, is sent to investigate, but then tragedy strikes. The head of the Chizurui family is found dead inside his study, locked from the inside, with only a Hannya mask and the scent of jasmine as clues to his mysterious death. As Takagi delves deeper into the case, can he discover the link between the family and the curse of the Hannya mask? Who was the person who called the undertaker and asked for three coffins? And how many buried secrets lie behind the inexplicable murder? The Noh Mask Murder is by Akimitsu Takagi a gripping masterpiece of a locked-room mystery written by one of Japan's most celebrated crime writer.
May 2024
The Little Sparrow Murders is by Seishi Yokomizo. An old friend of Kosuke Kindaichi's invites the scruffy detective to visit the remote mountain village of Onikobe in order to look into a twenty-year-old murder case. But no sooner has Kindaichi arrived than a new series of murders strikes the village - several bodies are discovered staged in bizarre poses, and it soon becomes clear that the victims are being killed using methods that match the lyrics of an old local children's song... The legendary sleuth investigates, but soon realises that he must unravel the dark and tangled history of the village, as well as that of its rival families, to get to the truth.
