Recently published novels for the last days of summer
Here are some personal recommendations, recently published novels for the last days of summer.
Dervla McTiernan’s Three Reasons for Revenge (Harper Collins €12.99) begins with a young woman reporting an assault to Detective Sergeant Judith Lee. The culprit is someone known to Judith, someone she tried to put away 10 years ago. But it’s just not so simple and Judith’s been drawn into a truly deadly game.
Sally Hepworth’s Mad Mabel (Macmillan €21) is a funny romp around the earlier years of Elsie Mabel Fitzpatrick. Elsie now lives quietly in a quiet terrace, she’s 81 years old. But someone has discovered Elsie’s past, her Mad Mabel days when those around her died off like flies. It’s excellent.
Jessica Knoll’s Helpless (Simon and Schuster €18.99) has successful Hollywood actress Fay Heron return to New York state to attend the funeral of a beloved college professor. She already knows she’ll probably bump into her ex, Henry, a man she’s tried to forget for the last 12 years. But this reunion turns into a reconnection. A very dangerous one.
Jeananne Craig’s The Life Swap (Hachette €15.99) is set in Belfast and Dublin and revolves around two sisters, Sinead and Sarah, who live very different lives. They swap homes for a while out of necessity and Sinead is left minding Sarah’s two kids. It’s a bit of disaster. And it’s also a hoot.
Jo Spain’s Never to be Found (Zaffre €16.99) is inspired by the Japanese practice of Johatsu – disappearing from your own life. Around 100,000 Japanese people voluntarily go missing every year, many with the help of Night Movers, people who assist them in relocating. Veronica is a Night Mover in England and has helped many people disappear. But she discovers one of those she has helped is a killer and he has to be found.
Aisling Rawle’s The Compound (Borough Press €16.99) is set in the world of reality TV, within a Love Island setting, where nine young women await the arrival of 10 young men to their luxurious compound, but it’s not all it seems. This dystopian novel would put you off Love Island for life. And that’s no bad thing.
Paul Carson’s Fatal Practice (Whitefox €12.99) is set in north County Cavan in 1987, where young GP Jakob Kane takes a locum position for four weeks. The local doctor has been badly beaten and is recovering in hospital. Soon after Jakob arrives, the dead-of-night phone calls start. Then there’s a suspicious death, a missing patient file and other odd occurrences. Jakob’s in big trouble.
In Amanda Geard’s The Glass Key (Headline Review €15.99), we meet Maggie, who in her childhood was told the Nordic fairy story of the glass key, passed down by Maggie’s grandmother Anna Swan. When her grandfather dies and Maggie is going through his things, she finds a wartime letter asking him to take a baby. And travelling to Norway is the only way she will find out what happened from there.
Daisy Buchanan’s All Grown Up (Century €20) is a contemporary sequel to Louise May Alcott’s Little Women, featuring Meg, Jo and Amy, who have converged back in the family home, seemingly for good, and as all three refuse to empty the dishwasher. They’re driving their poor mother mad.
In Rosie Walsh’s The One Day you were my Husband (Macmillan €12.99), we meet Carrie who, 12 years ago, married Johan on a beach in Thailand. Four hours later, Johan was violently abducted and never heard of again. Carrie has remarried and has twins and a husband who loves her. So, when Johan’s face appears on her computer screen she gets a terrible shock. He’s alive, he’s well. Why did he never try to contact her?
Michelle McDonagh’s If These Walls Could Talk (Hachette €16.99) has ties to an old and forgotten asylum in Galway. What’s the connection between the asylum and Hazel McNamara’s husband, who’s gone missing? His car has been found overturned off the motorway but there’s no sign of him. Is he dead or alive and if he’s alive, who has taken him and why?
Carrie Walker’s Escape to the Turquoise Seas (Head of Zeus €14.50) sees two rival marketing executives, Kat and Leo, aboard a cruise ship heading for Portugal. They both want the PR contract from this cruise company, but only one can win it. A rivals-to-lovers story with a few giggles thrown in.
Annabel Monaghan’s Dolly All the Time (Head of Zeus €14.99) sees Dolly returning to her family home in Whitfield, Rhode Island, where her father and brother are in danger of losing their family home. Helping Stewart Whitfield with a flat tyre is second nature to Dolly, but things after that get a bit messy!
If time travel is your thing, Joseph Eckert’s The Traveler (Tor €24) will not disappoint. Scott Treder is driving to work one morning when he suddenly finds himself tumbling down the road, car gone, hurtling into the future. And it will happen repeatedly, travelling further into the future each time, until Scott is watching his seven-year-old son becoming an old man. Mind-bending stuff.
Karin Walker’s The Art of Midnight Kissing (Poolbeg €17.99) features three lonely and very different women living on the Cornish coast who are looking for something but don’t know what. Grace, Tansy and Elsie are all seeking to change their tired, humdrum lives for the better. But that’s easier said than done.
DV Bishop’s Shadow of Madness (Macmillan €24) is set in Tuscany in 1540, where investigator Cesare Aldo is looking for answers about his past. He’s led to Ospedale de Pazzi, an asylum for the criminally insane. His cart driver is found dead off the nearby cliffs and a terrible murder takes place in the hospital courtyard. A blizzard engulfs the hospital, trapping Cesare and his friend Saul. A new murderer is among them, and Cesare might be his next victim.
MJ Robotham’s The Spy and the Snake (Head of Zeus €22.99) is another glorious caper set in the 1960s, where Maggie Flynn has now earned her stripes at MI5. Her new mission is to fly to Budapest and bring home a British defector. And things go horribly wrong…