Some crime books that I am looking forward to the first half of 2023.

With the start of the New Year there are so many books that I am looking forward to read during the first six months.These include debuts, long running series from some of my favourite authors as well a standalone books.

These are some of the books that I am looking forward to being published and reading during the first half of the year. In no particular order -

All The Sinners Bleed (Headline) by S A Cosby. After years of working as an FBI agent, Titus Crown returns home to Charon County, land of moonshine and cornbread, fist fights and honeysuckle. Seeing his hometown struggling with a bigoted police force inspires him to run for sheriff. He wins, and becomes the first Black sheriff in the history of the county. Then a year to the day after his election, a young Black man is fatally shot by Titus's deputies. Titus pledges to follow the truth wherever it leads. But no one expected he would unearth a serial killer who has been hiding in plain sight, haunting the dirt lanes and woodland clearings of Charon. Now, Titus must pull off the impossible: stay true to his instincts, prevent outright panic, and investigate a shocking crime in a small town where everyone knows everyone yet secrets flourish. All while also breaking up backroads bar fights and being forced to protect racist Confederate pride marchers. For a Black man wearing a police uniform in the American South, that's no easy feat. But Charon is Titus's home and his heart, and he won't let the darkness overtake it. Even as it threatens to consume him..

Cast a Cold Eye (Pan Macmillan) by Robbie Morrison. Glasgow, 1933. Murder is nothing new in the Depression-era city, especially to war veterans Inspector Jimmy Dreghorn and his partner 'Bonnie' Archie McDaid. But the dead man found in a narrowboat on the Forth and Clyde Canal, executed with a single shot to the back of the head, is no ordinary killing. Violence usually erupts in the heat of the moment - the razor-gangs that stalk the streets settle scores with knives and fists. Firearms suggest something more sinister, especially when the killer strikes again. Meanwhile, other forces are stirring within the city. A suspected IRA cell is at large, embedded within the criminal gangs and attracting the ruthless attention of Special Branch agents from London. With political and sectarian tensions rising, and the body count mounting, Dreghorn and McDaid pursue an investigation into the dark heart of humanity - where one man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist, and noble ideals are swept away by bloody vengeance.

The Last Dance (LittleBrown) which is the start of a new series by Mark Billingham. Meet Detective Miller: unique, unconventional, and criminally underestimated... He's a detective, a dancer, he has no respect for authority - and he's the best hope Blackpool has for keeping criminals off the streets. Meet Detective Declan Miller. A double murder in a seaside hotel sees a grieving Miller return to work to solve what appears to be a case of mistaken identity. Just why were two completely unconnected men taken out? Despite a somewhat dubious relationship with both reality and his new partner, can the eccentric, offbeat Miller find answers where his colleagues have found only an impossible puzzle?

The Hand that Feeds You (Bitter Lemon Press) by Mercedes Rosende.The attempted robbery of the armoured car in the back streets of Montevideo is a miserable failure. A lucky break for the intrepid Ursula Lopez who manages to snatch all the loot, more hindered than helped by her faint-hearted and reluctant companion Diego. Only now, the wannabe robbers are hot on her heels. As is the police. And Ursula's sister. But Ursula turns out to be enormously talented when it comes to criminal undertakings, and given the hilarious ineptitude of those in pursuit, she might just pull it off. She is an irresistible heroine. A murderess with a sense of humour, a lovable criminal with an edge and she is practically invisible to the men who dominate the deeply macho society of Uruguay. 

Fatal Legacy (Hodder & Stoughton) by Lindsey Davis. An unpaid bar bill leads Flavia Albia to her most bitter and complex case yet. Decades earlier Appius Tranquillus Surus wrote his will: it freed his slaves and bequeathed his businesses to them. He left an orchard to the Prisci, a family he was friendly with, on the condition that his freedmen could still take its harvest. The convoluted arrangement has led to a feud between the two families, each of which has its own internal strife. Endless claims and counterclaims lead to violence and even death. Lawyers have given up in exasperation as the case limps on. The original will has disappeared, along with a falsified codicil - and might there be another one? But is there a solution? Two youngsters from each side of the divide, Gaius Venuleius and Cosca Sabatina, have fallen in love, which could unite the feuding families. There is only one problem: were Sabatina's grandmother and father really liberated in the Surus will? If not, the stigma of slavery will stop the marriage and the dispute will rage on forever. Reconciliation seems impossible, but Albia will try. Her investigation must cut through decades of secrets, arguments, lies and violence to reach a startling truth.

Needless Alley (John Murray/Viper Press) by Natalie Marlow. Birmingham, 1933. Private enquiry agent William Garrett, a man damaged by a dark childhood spent on Birmingham's canals, specialises in facilitating divorces for the city's male elite. With the help of his best friend - charming, out-of-work actor Ronnie Edgerton - William sets up honey traps. But photographing unsuspecting women in flagrante plagues his conscience and William heaves up his guts with remorse after every job. However, William's life changes when he accidentally meets the beautiful Clara Morton and falls in love. Little does he know she is the wife of a client - a leading fascist with a dangerous obsession. And what should have been another straightforward job turns into something far more deadly.

The Shadows of London (HarperCollins) by Andrew Taylor. London 1671. The damage caused by the Great Fire still overshadows the capital. When a man's brutally disfigured body is discovered in the ruins of an ancient almshouse, architect Cat Hakesby is ordered to stop restoration work. It is obvious he has been murdered, and Whitehall secretary James Marwood is ordered to investigate. It's possible the victim could be one of two local men who have vanished - the first, a feckless French tutor connected to the almshouse's owner; the second, a possibly treacherous employee of the Council of Foreign Plantations. The pressure on Marwood mounts as Charles II's most influential courtiers, Lord Arlington and the Duke of Buckingham, show an interest in his activities - and Marwood soon begins to suspect the murder trail may lead right to the heart of government. Meanwhile, a young, impoverished Frenchwoman has caught the eye of the king, a quiet affair that will have monumental consequences..

The Last Orphan (Penguin Random House /Michael Joseph) by Gregg Hurwitz. As a child, Evan Smoak was plucked out of a group home, raised and trained as an off-the-books assassin for the government as part of the Orphan program. When he broke with the program and went deep underground, he left with a lot of secrets in his head that the government would do anything to make sure never got out. When he remade himself as The Nowhere Man, dedicated to helping the most desperate in their times of trouble, Evan found himself slowly back on the government's radar. Having eliminated most of the Orphans in the program, the government will stop at nothing to eliminate the threat they see in Evan. But Orphan X has always been several steps ahead of his pursuers. Until he makes one little mistake... Now the President has him in her control and offers Evan a deal - eliminate a rich, powerful man she says is too dangerous to live and, in turn, she'll let Evan survive. But when Evan left the Program he swore to only use his skills against those who really deserve it. Now he has to decide what's more important - his principles or his life.

The Murder Game (Century) by Tom Hindle. One house. Nine guests. Endless motives for murder... In the seaside town of Hamlet Wick, nine guests assemble for a New Year's Eve party to remember. The owner of Hamlet Hall has organised a murder mystery evening with a 1920s twist, and everyone has their own part to play. But the game has barely begun when one guest is found dead - killed by a fatal injury to the head. With no phone signal and no way out of the house, the others are trapped with a killer in their midst. Someone is playing by their own rules. And in a close-knit community, old rivalries run deep...

Red Queen (Pan Macmillan) by Juan Gómez-Jurado. You've never met anyone like her . . . Antonia Scott is special. Very special. She is not a policewoman or a lawyer. She has never wielded a weapon or carried a badge, and yet, she has solved dozens of crimes. But it's been awhile since Antonia left her attic in Madrid. The things she has lost are much more important to her than the things awaiting her outside. She also doesn't receive visitors. That's why she really, really doesn't like it when she hears unknown footsteps coming up the stairs. Whoever it is, Antonia is sure that they are coming to look for her. And she likes that even less. This is soon to be a major series on Amazon Prime.

The Square of Sevens (Pan Macmillan) by Laura Shepherd Robinson. 'My father had spelt it out to me. Choice was a luxury I couldn't afford. This is your story, Red. You must tell it well.' A girl known only as Red, the daughter of a Cornish fortune-teller, travels with her father making a living predicting fortunes using the ancient method: the Square of Sevens. When her father suddenly dies, Red becomes the ward of a gentleman scholar. Now raised as a lady amidst the Georgian splendour of Bath, her fortune-telling is a delight to high society, but she cannot ignore the questions that gnaw at her soul: who was her mother? How did she die? And who are the mysterious enemies her father was always terrified would find him? The pursuit of these mysteries takes her from Cornwall and Bath to London and Devon, from the rough ribaldry of the Bartholemew Fair to the grand houses of two of the most powerful families in England. And while Red's quest brings her the possibility of great reward, it also leads into her grave danger.

The Invisible Web (Quercus Publishing) by Oliver Bottini. Berlin: A man is beaten up, the attacker escapes undetected. As a trail leads to Freiburg, Chief Inspector Louise Boni is sent to investigate. It's a complex case: the attacker appears to be a professional, the victim a secret service informer, the only witness knows more than she's saying, and the domestic intelligence service is hovering in the background but refusing to cooperate. Industrial espionage appears to be at play, focused on the burgeoning solar energy sector. Boni's investigation keeps being obstructed, so yet again she has to rip up the police handbook in her attempt to find out how the different threads of the web are linked. But by the time she discovers the truth, it's already too late for one of those involved . . .

Forthcoming books from Bitter Lemon Press.

 January 2023

Trouble is by Katja Ivar. Helsinki, June 1953, at the heart of the Cold War. Hella, now a reluctant private investigator, has been asked by her former boss at the Helsinki murder squad to do a background check on a member of the Finnish secret services. Not the type of job Hella was hoping for, but she accepts it on the condition that she is given access to the files concerning the roadside death of her father in 1942, at a time when Finland joined forces with Nazi Germany in its attack against the Soviet Union. German troops were sent to Finland, the Gestapo arrived in Helsinki and German influence on local government was strong, including demands for the deportation of local Jews. Colonel Mauzer, his wife and other family members were killed by a truck in a hit and run incident. An accident, file closed, they said. But not for Hella, whose unwelcome investigation leads to some who would prefer to see her stopped dead in her tracks.

February 2023

The attempted robbery of the armoured car in the back streets of Montevideo is a miserable failure. A lucky break for the intrepid Ursula Lopez who manages to snatch all the loot, more hindered than helped by her faint-hearted and reluctant companion Diego. Only now, the wannabe robbers are hot on her heels. As is the police. And Ursula's sister. But Ursula turns out to be enormously talented when it comes to criminal undertakings, and given the hilarious ineptitude of those in pursuit, she might just pull it off. She is an irresistible heroine. A murderess with a sense of humour, a lovable criminal with an edge and she is practically invisible to the men who dominate the deeply macho society of Uruguay. That Hand that Feeds You is by Mercedes Rosende.

March 2023

The Translator is by Harriet Crawley. Moscow 2017. Clive Franklin, a Russian language expert in the Foreign Office, is summoned unexpectedly to Moscow to act as translator for the British Prime Minister. His life is turned on its head when, after more than a decade, he discovers that his former lover, Marina Volina, is now the interpreter to the Russian President. At the embassy, Clive learns of a pending Russian assault on undersea cables linking the US to the UK which would paralyse communications and collapse the Western economy. Marina stuns Clive with the news that she's ready to help the UK to stop the attack, betraying her country for a new identity and a new life. Clive understands that it's a race against time. He becomes the go-between, relaying Marina's intelligence to MI6. He joins Marina as she trains for the Moscow marathon, an excuse to be together and an opportunity to exchange information. What are the odds that two translators, running the Moscow marathon with the FSB on their backs, can save the UK and much of Western Europe from economic meltdown?

May 2023

The Man in the Corduroy Suit is by James Wolff. British spy Leonard Flood is asked to investigate the poisoning in London of Willa Karlsson, a retired British secret service vetting officer suspected of being a Russian agent. British intelligence is terrified by the possibility that Moscow poisoned her upon her retirement since she was no longer useful to them. When Leonard discovers that he is also a suspect in the investigation and that Willa's story is less a story of betrayal than one of friendship, he must decide whether to hand her to her masters or to help her to escape.

June 2023

For Inspector Hunkeler the New Year begins with a most unwelcome phone call. He is summoned back to Basel from his holiday to unravel a gruesome killing in a gardening allotment on the city's outskirts. An old man known as Anton Fluckiger has been shot in the head and found hanging from a butcher's hook from the roof of his garden shed - like butchers hang the carcasses of dead animals. Hunkeler must deal not only with the quarrelsome tenants of the allotment but with the challenges of investigating a murder that has taken place outside his jurisdiction, across the French border in Alsace. The clues lead to the Emmental in Berne, and then events from the last weeks of the Second World War in Alsace come to light, the wounds of which have never healed in the region. The Murder of Anton Livius is by Hansjörg Schneider.

Books to Look Forward to from Bitter Lemon Press

 January 2021

The story is set in Uruguay, it starts in a Montevideo prison where Diego waits for his lawyer, the slick Dr Antinucci, always raybanned, chain-smoking, never frisked by the prison guards. Diego, betrayed by his partner in crime, was arrested for kidnapping a businessman. But charges will not be pressed. The businessman and his wife have described Diego as duped by his partner, certainly no master criminal, so he will be let out. But Antonucci has plans for him, a favour must be returned for his surprising freedom, he must join forces with the psychopath El Roto and hold up an armoured truck in Montevideo. The mad and hilarious caper includes the robbery of course which degenerates into appalling violence, a few murders, and the general bungling of affairs by all the men involved. It is the belittled women, including Police Inspector Lima, who end up the true heroines of the story. This seemingly classic lowlife crime story has a powerful message: never, ever underestimate the women. All told with excoriating wit and humour from the Rio de la Plata. Crocodile Tears is by Mercedes Rosende.

February 2021

The Foreign Girls is by Sergio Olguin. Veronica Rosenthal has retreated to a cousin's remote cottage in the province of Tucuman, to recuperate from the traumatic events in The Fragility of Bodies. She befriends two female tourists -an Italian and a Norwegian-- invites them to stay and starts a sexual relationship with one of them. After a party they attend together, Veronica travels on alone but days later discovers that the women have been murdered. Suspicion falls on a local Umbanda priest, but Veronica starts to uncover a web of corruption, abuse and femicide in which government, wealthy landowners and a high-ranking official from the Argentina's 'Dirty War' are all implicated. Veronica's investigation, with its unforeseen political dimensions, has alarmed new enemies who will try to stop her at all cost.

March 2021

The Measure of Time is by Gianrico Carofiglio. One spring afternoon, defence attorney Guerrieri is confronted with an unexpected spectre from his past. In her youth, Lorenza had been a beautiful and unpredictable girl with dazzling charm. A changed woman faces him in his office that day. The ensuing years have ravaged her appearance and embittered her mind. As if that weren't enough, her son Jacopo, a small-time delinquent, stands convicted of the first-degree murder of a local drug dealer. Her trial lawyer has died, so, for the appeal, she turns to Guerrieri as her last hope. Guido is not convinced of the innocence of Lorenza's son, nor does he have fond memories of the way their relationship ended two decades earlier. Nevertheless, he accepts the case; perhaps to pay a melancholy homage to the ghosts of his youth. His old friend Carmelo Tancredi, a retired police inspector, and his girlfriend, the charming investigator Annapaola Doria are once again by his side. A masterful, compassionate novel, striking a balance between a straightforward trial story -some say the purest distillation of human experience - and the sad notes of time as it passes and exhausts itself.

April 2021

Things are looking bad for disgraced spy August Drummond. In emotional free fall after the death of his wife, fired for a series of unprecedented security breaches... and now his neighbor on the flight to Istanbul won't stop talking. The only thing keeping him sane is the hunch that there's something not quite right about the nervous young man several rows ahead - a hunch that is confirmed when August watches him throw away directions to an old European cemetery seconds before being detained by Turkish police. A reckless August decides to go to the cemetery, where he meets a mysterious figure from the dark heart of the Islamic State and quickly finds himself drawn into a shadowy plot to murder an Iranian scientist in Istanbul. But nothing is what it seems, and before long August realises he has gone too far to turn back. As he struggles to break free from the clutches of Islamic State and play off British intelligence against their Turkish counterparts, he will find his resourcefulness, ingenuity and courage tested to the very limit of what he can endure. How To Betray Your Country by James Wolff. 

June 2021

The Transparency of Time' by Leonardo Padura sees the Cuban investigator pursuing a mystery spanning centuries of occult history. Mario Conde is facing down his sixtieth birthday. What does he have to show for his decades on the planet? A failing body, a slower mind, and a decrepit country, in which both the ideals and failures of the Cuban Revolution are being swept away in favour of a new and newly cosmopolitan worship of money. Rescue comes in the form of a new case: an old Marxist turned flamboyant practitioner of Santeria appears on the scene to engage Conde to track down a stolen statue of the Virgen de Regla-a black Madonna. This sets Conde on a quest that spans twenty-first century Havana as well as the distant past, as he delves as far back as the Crusades in an attempt to uncover the true provenance of the statue. Through vignettes from the life of a Catalan peasant named Antoni Barral, who appears throughout history in different guises-as a shepherd during the Spanish Civil War, as vassal to a feudal lord-we trace the Madonna to present-day Cuba. With Barral serving as Conde's alter ego, unstuck in time, and Conde serving as the author's, we are treated to a panorama of history, and reminded of the impossibility of ever remaining on its sidelines, no matter how obscure we may think our places in the action.

July 2021

It is the end of October, the city of Basel is grey and wet. It could be December. It is just after midnight when Police Inspector Peter Hunkeler, on his way home and slightly worse for wear, spots old man Hardy sitting on a bench under a street light. He wants to smoke a cigarette with him, but the usually very loquacious Hardy is silent-his throat a gaping wound. Turns out he was first strangled and his left earlobe slit, the diamond stud he usually wore there missing. The media and the police come quickly to the same conclusion: Hardy's murder was the work of a gang of Albanian drug smugglers. But for Hunkeler that seems too obvious a resolution. After all, Barabara Amsler, a prostitute, was also recently found strangled, her ear slit. He follows his own intuition and methods which lead him deep into a seedy world of bars and night clubs. More ominously, he soon must face the consequences of certain events in recent Swiss history that those in power would prefer to keep far from the public eye. The Basel Killings is by Hansjörg Schneider.