Crime Book Club – Video and Vote

Monday evening saw the return of the crime book club as we discussed The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill. There were mixed views on the book as it was quite unique in style, written as a book, within a book, within a book. You can view the discussion on the below video but be aware it contains full spoilers. 

The theme for the next book is police procedurals. I feel we haven’t covered this sub-genre within crime for some time. 

To vote, read the blurbs and leave your vote in the comments by the end of Saturday 15th February. The next meeting is 8 p.m. Monday 10th March. If you are not yet a member of the book club you can find all details and sign up HERE. 

Black Reed Bay by Rod Reynolds

When a young woman makes a distressing middle-of-the-night call to 911, apparently running for her life in a quiet, exclusive beachside neighbourhood, miles from her home, everything suggests a domestic incident.

Except no one has seen her since, and something doesn’t sit right with the officers at Hampstead County PD. With multiple suspects and witnesses throwing up startling inconsistencies, and interference from the top threatening the integrity of the investigation, lead detective Casey Wray is thrust into an increasingly puzzling case that looks like it’s going to have only one ending…

And then the first body appears…

The Gift of Darkness by Valentina Giambanco

Twenty-five years ago in the woods by the Hoh River near Seattle, three boys were kidnapped. One never came home.

Last night, a family of four was found brutally murdered, the words ‘thirteen days’ carved near their lifeless bodies.
Homicide Detective Alice Madison – a one-time child runaway with a murky past – now spends her life hunting down the very worst humanity has to offer. Madison has a hunch that the two murders are linked . . . and she has thirteen days to prove it.

To stop a psychopath, Madison returns to the woods to confront the unsolved mystery of the Hoh River Boys. She must forget her training and follow her instincts to the terrifying end as enemies become allies and, in the silent forest, time is running out to save another life.

The Kill List by Nadine Matheson

He will come for them, one by one…
Five shocking murders
Twenty-five years ago, DCI Harry Rhimes arrested Andrew Streeter for the brutal murders of five young people. Streeter’s ‘kill list’ of victims was found in his home, and he was convicted of all five crimes.

A legacy under threat
Now, Streeter’s convictions are being overturned, as new evidence implies the original investigation was corrupt. No one is more shocked that DI Henley. Because this case is personal; Rhimes was her old boss, and he’s no longer alive to defend himself. But when the killings start up again, Henley must face the truth: Rhimes got it wrong twenty-five years ago.

A hunt for a killer
Henley and her team reopen the original murder cases, but they must put their personal feelings to one side. Because the real killer is still out there, and he’s working his way through a new kill list . . .

Alone by Lisa Gardner

Alone . . . Massachusetts State Trooper Bobby Dodge watches a tense hostage standoff unfold through the scope of his sniper rifle. Just across the street, in wealthy Back Bay, Boston, an armed man has barricaded himself with his wife and child. The man’s finger tightens on the trigger and Dodge has only a split second to react . . . and forever pay the consequences.

Alone . . . that’s where the nightmare began for cool, beautiful, and dangerously sexy Catherine Rose Gagnon. Twenty-five years ago, she was buried underground during a month-long nightmare of abduction and abuse. Now her husband has just been killed. Her father-in-law, the powerful Judge Gagnon, blames Catherine for his son’s death . . . and for the series of unexplained illnesses that have sent her own young son repeatedly to the hospital.

Alone . . . a madman survived solitary confinement in a maximum security prison where he’d done hard time for the most sadistic of crimes. Now he walks the streets a free man, invisible, anonymous . . . and filled with an unquenchable rage for vengeance. What brings them together is a moment of violence—but what connects them is a passion far deeper and much more dangerous. For a killer is loose who’s woven such an intricate web of evil that no one is above suspicion, no one is beyond harm, and no one will see death coming until it has them cornered, helpless, and alone.

Girl Alone by Blake Pierce

FBI Agent Ella Dark has studied serial killers from the time she could read, devastated by the murder of her own father. With her photographic memory, she has obtained an encyclopedic knowledge of every serial killer, every victim and every case. But when a serial killer strikes in the swamps of Louisiana, Ella soon comes to learn that the real thing is like nothing she ever expected.

FBI Agent Ella Dark, 29, is given her big chance to achieve her life’s dream: to join the Behavioral Crimes Unit. Ella’s hidden obsession of gaining an encyclopedic knowledge of serial killers has led to her being singled out for her brilliant mind, and invited to join the big leagues.

But face to face with a real murder, a real killer, and a real ticking clock, Ella realizes she can’t rely on her knowledge. She must learn to trust her instinct, and allow herself to enter the dark canals of a real killer’s mind.

If she gets it wrong, her career is at stake.

And so is the next victim’s life.

Will Ella’s talent be an asset?

Or the source of her downfall?