Amy Pershing really hits her stride in this, the third book of the Cape Cod Foodie Mystery series. Our heroine is Samantha Barnes, a former NYC chef with an unfortunate penchant for viral online notoriety. Nowadays, she lives a quieter life on the Massachusetts coast, writing a food column and doing video segments as the…

The post Cooking the Books: <i>Murder Is No Picnic</i> by Amy Pershing appeared first on Criminal Element.

Part of why Philip K. Dick’s novels are so effective is how the daring, game-changing sci-fi author juxtaposed the extraordinary with the relatable. Take his 1970 novel A Maze of Death, for instance. The main thrust of that story involves fourteen humans who come to inhabit a mysterious space colony which proves to be treacherous…

The post Book Review: <i>The Next Time I Die</i> by Jason Starr appeared first on Criminal Element.

So, full disclaimer, I’ve been a huge fan of Fabian Nicieza since the 1990s, when he wrote multiple X-Men titles for Marvel Comics. When I heard that he had moved into writing novels, I was ecstatic. Mortifyingly, I have not yet had time to pick up the first book in the Suburban Dicks series, but…

The post Book Review: <i>The Self-Made Widow</i> by Fabian Nicieza appeared first on Criminal Element.

Tell Us No Secrets plays out across the graduation year of four adolescent girls whose lives are inextricably intertwined. Stonybridge School for Girls is an exclusive—but not top-tier—New England boarding school; it’s the school that families choose if their daughters “couldn’t get into a school like Madeira or Miss Porter’s, or if your mother had…

The post Book Review: <i>Tell Us No Secrets</i> by Siena Sterling appeared first on Criminal Element.

Whether she’s writing under her own name or under the nom de plume Maria diRico, I love Ellen Byron’s culinary cozies. With her latest mystery series, she takes us back to her beloved Louisiana with our heroine, the New Orleans-born but Los Angeles-raised Miracle “Ricki” Jones-Diaz. Ricki was abandoned shortly after birth but was swiftly…

The post Cooking the Books: <i>Bayou Book Thief</i> by Ellen Byron appeared first on Criminal Element.

After recovering from breast cancer but still reeling from her longtime boyfriend’s defection, Rarity Cole pulls up stakes and moves from St. Louis to Sedona, Arizona. She embraces “her second shot at life” by opening The Next Chapter bookstore, nestled between “a fortune teller’s shop and a place that sells crystals.” Books, chocolate, ice cream,…

The post Book Review: <i>The Tuesday Night Survivors’ Club</i> by Lynn Cahoon appeared first on Criminal Element.

Lem Devlin has had it with being surrounded by art that costs more than his entire life. Working for the Fine Artemis shipping and storage company, he doesn’t mind so much the value assigned to the beauty he sees every day. What bothers him is the casual consumerism that buys an extravagant work of art…

The post Book Review: <i>Balloon Dog</i> by Daniel Paisner appeared first on Criminal Element.

As A Killing Rain starts, our heroine—homicide detective Raven Burns—thinks she’s finally put at least some of her demons to rest. Her father was notorious serial killer Floyd Burns, who used his only daughter as bait in his sick schemes. When Raven grew up, she was determined to put Floyd behind her by enrolling in…

The post Book Review: <i>A Killing Rain</i> by Faye Snowden appeared first on Criminal Element.

Detective Elise King is convalescing from cancer treatments in the seaside town of Ebbing—a hamlet filled to the brim with gossiping, secret-keeping locals and ambitious newcomers. Elise spends her days gazing out of her front window, watching the comings-and-goings of the people along the street, so she has a front-row view of the music festival…

The post Book Review: <i>Local Gone Missing</i> by Fiona Barton appeared first on Criminal Element.

In my next book, The Lies I Tell, I explore the world of con artist Meg Williams. However, I also dive deep into the mind and professional desires of investigative journalist Kat Roberts, a woman whose career was derailed by Meg, and who now wants revenge of her own. I spent a lot of time…

The post The Top Shows, Podcasts, and Books About Investigative Journalism appeared first on Criminal Element.

A Miami native, New York’s Alex Segura has spent his professional life balancing two great loves: novels and comic books. In addition to writing the critically acclaimed five-book Pete Fernandez Miami Mysteries series and a variety of short stories (one of which, “Red Zone,” won an Anthony Award), he has also penned multiple comics (“The…

The post Book Review: <i>Secret Identity</i> by Alex Segura appeared first on Criminal Element.

PROLOGUE Every night, no matter how many drinks he’d had or joints he’d smoked, he would awaken to the screams of birds. For an instant, he would think he was back on the island. Then his hand would find the lamp beside the bed and the light would expose the messiness of his dorm room.…

The post <i>Hatchet Island</i> by Paul Doiron: Featured Excerpt appeared first on Criminal Element.

Yip Tolroy was born mute, but even before his speechlessness was discerned, the pale, hairless baby was not thought to be long for this world. His father, already in a state of high emotion at the birth of his first child, went outside to get some air after the doctor expressed his doubts as to…

The post Book Review: <i>My Name Is Yip</i> by Paddy Crewe appeared first on Criminal Element.

When two high school students break into a disabled old man’s home one night looking for a fast score, the last thing they expect is for him to be more than a match for them. Jenny Wheeler is a good kid most of the time, but her slightly older boyfriend Jesse Crawford is desperate to…

The post Book Review: <i>And There He Kept Her</i> by Joshua Moehling appeared first on Criminal Element.

What a delightfully meta-textual examination of writing in the 21st century! With The Woman In The Library, Sulari Gentill has written a truly thought-provoking modern crime fiction novel—one that entertains and enthralls at a high level while still keeping at least one foot grounded in reality. The book’s core is the story of four people…

The post Book Review: <i>The Woman in the Library</i> by Sulari Gentill appeared first on Criminal Element.

It’s been long enough that Detective Chief Inspector Hannah Scarlett no longer views her assignment to head Cumbria Constabulary’s Cold Case Review Team as a demotion from regular policing. Now, with the election of new Police and Crime Commissioner Kit Gleadall, Hannah has some hope that her overstretched team—about to be taxed further by the…

The post Book Review: <i>The Girl They All Forgot</i> by Martin Edwards appeared first on Criminal Element.

The eighth book in the Daisy’s Tea Garden Mystery series may be the most heartwarming yet, even with murder marring the proceedings! It starts out with our heroine, tea house proprietor Daisy Swanson, looking for the perfect birthday gift for her boyfriend, Jonas Groft. Her efforts lead her to the statuary business of Wilhelm Rumple,…

The post Cooking the Books: <i>Murder with Darjeeling Tea</i> by Karen Rose Smith appeared first on Criminal Element.

The involvement of animals in popular mystery fiction, as Martin Edwards notes in his excellent introduction to this collection, has been a large and lively part of the genre from its very inception. From what’s commonly acknowledged as the first detective story, Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Murders In The Rue Morgue,” to the plethora of…

The post Book Review: <i>Guilty Creatures: A Menagerie of Mysteries</i> by Martin Edwards appeared first on Criminal Element.

For decades, patrons of the New Orleans landmark restaurant Commander’s Palace were greeted by the beaming smile of proprietor Ella Brennan. Prompted by her leadership, the quaint Victorian eatery that sits on a picturesque corner of the Garden District across the street from a centuries-old cemetery, became an award-winning purveyor of Creole haute cuisine.  Ella…

The post The Legendary Women Restauranteurs of New Orleans appeared first on Criminal Element.

Best Hardcover Novel THE TURNOUT by Megan Abbott (Penguin/Putnam) RAZORBLADE TEARS by S.A. Cosby (Flatiron Books) ROCK PAPER SCISSORS by Alice Feeney (Flatiron Books) THESE TOXIC THINGS by Rachel Howzell Hall (Thomas & Mercer) RED WINDOW by Alma Katsu (Penguin/Putnam) I AM NOT WHO YOU THINK I AM by Eric Rickstad (Blackstone Publishing) Best First Novel GIRL A…

The post The 2022 ITW Thriller Awards: Nominees and Winners appeared first on Criminal Element.