“where a good crime C r i m e can be had by all” c h r o n i c l e Issue #231 April 2005 HAMMETT PRIZE NOMINEES AUTHOR OF THE MONTH The Havana Room by Colin Harrison (Pb 18.95) DONNA LEON Prince of Thieves by Chuck Hogan Blood from a Stone (Pb 18.95, Due Sept) 320pp Tp $32.95 The Madman’s Tale by John Katzenbach The stunning new (Pb 21.95) Commissario Brunetti mystery from an author California Girl by T Jefferson Parker (Tp 29.95) whose sales continue to Playing with Fire by Peter Robinson (Pb 18.95) grow with each new book. DILYS AWARD On a cold Venetian Darkly Dreaming Dexter by Jeff Lindsay (Tp 29.95) night shortly before Christmas, a man is killed in a scuffle in LEFTY AWARD Campo San Stefano. (tie) The closest witnesses We’ll Always Have Parrots by Donna Andrews to the event are the (Pb 16.95) tourists who had been Blue Blood by Susan McBride (Pb 16.95) browsing the man’s wares before his death – fake handbags of BRUCE ALEXANDER AWARD every designer label. The Witch in the Well by Sharan Newman Officially termed a (Hb 54.00, To order only) venditore ambulante or extracomunitario, the dead man was working as a vu cumpra, one of the many Black CALAVERA AWARD Africans purveying goods outside normal shop hours and Grave Endings by Rochelle Krich without work permits. Arriving on the scene, Commissario (Hb 44.95, To order only) Brunetti’s response matches that of everybody involved: why would anyone kill a vu cumpra? With few social connections and little money, in-fighting amongst these AGATHA AWARD NOMINEES workers is the obvious answer. But once Brunetti begins BEST NOVEL investigating this Venetian underworld, he discovers that We’ll Always Have Parrots by Donna Andrews matters of great value are at stake within the immigrant (Pb 16.95) society. Warned by Patta, his superior, to resist further By a Spider’s Thread by Laura Lippman (Tp 29.95) involvement in the case, Brunetti only becomes more High Country Fall by Margaret Maron determined to unearth the truth behind this mysterious (Hb 49.95 To order only) killing. However, reluctant as he is to let this event be The Pearl Diver by Sujata Massey (Hb 49.95) smugly relegated to the category of ‘not worth dealing with’, Birds of a Feather by Jacqueline Winspear how far will Brunetti be able to penetrate the murky (Tp 32.95) subculture of Venice’s illegal community? This is the 14th in this excellent series with wonderfully familiar characters, a powerful sense of place and expert plotting. EDGAR AWARD NOMINEES BEST NOVEL All in paperback and $21.95 (unless otherwise priced), the earlier titles in the series are: #1 Death at la Fenice; #2 Evan’s Gate by Rhys Bowen (Pb 16.95) Death in a Strange Country; #3 Anonymous Venetian, By a Spider’s Thread by Laura Lippman (Tp 29.95) $18.95; #4 Venetian Reckoning $18.95; #5 Acqua Alta, Remembering Sarah by Chris Mooney (Pb 18.95) $18.95; #6 Death of Faith, $18.95; #7 Noble Radiance; #8 California Girl by Jefferson Parker (Tp 29.95) Fatal Remedies; #9 Friends in High Places; #10 Sea of Out of the Deep I Cry by Julia Spencer-Fleming Troubles; #11 Wilful Behaviour; #12 Uniform Justice; (Pb 16.95) and coming in April in paperback, #13: Doctored Evidence. If you haven’t tried Donna Leon then she comes with my ANZAC DAY PUBLIC HOLIDAY highest recommendation. MON 25 APRIL - Peter WE ARE OPEN 12 MIDDAY - 5PM 2 Modern Crime Linda BARNES Robert BRACE Donna ANDREWS Coyote 264pp Pb 16.95 Black Tiger 320pp Pb 18.95 We’ll Always Have A Carlotta Carlyle mystery. When a It was pure luck that Lysander Dalton Parrots mysterious woman asks Carlotta to help got up to use the bathroom seconds 331pp Pb 16.95 locate her missing immigration card, it before someone shot his bed full of A Meg Langslow mystery. Meg looks to be a pretty straightforward bullets. And it is pure chemistry when the knew the fan convention for her assignment. That is, until the lady ex-special ops Marine meets Valentina actor-boyfriend’s hit television series was disappears, and the card turns up in the Mariposa. She is a sexy lawyer who will going to be the ultimate in weird. But she possession of another woman... who just double as Dalton’s bodyguard and hired came along to sell her hand-crafted happens to be dead. Suddenly the case is gun in the search for the terrifying truth weapons and so far, she was dealing well far too intriguing for Carlotta to drop and behind his bullet-riddled bed. (American) with the costumed fans camped outside when her investigation indicates that her Lilian Jackson BRAUN and the escaped parrots and monkeys client was somehow connected to her The Cat Who Went Bananas tearing up the hotel. But soon after Meg inner-city little sister Paolina, Carlotta’s 200pp Hb 59.95 goes head-to-head with egomaniacal got an even bigger stake in seeing it A Jim Qwilleran Feline Whodunit #27. series star Tamerlaine Wynncliffe-Jones, through. (American) Qwilleran, prize winning reporter with a the Queen B turns up brutally murdered. Nevada BARR nose for crime, and his Siamese cats Koko Now, with Michael in the running as High Country 300pp Pb 18.95 and. Yum Yum are the most unlikely, prime suspect, Meg will go up against an An Anna Pigeon Mystery. National most unusual, most delightful team in all-star cast of not-even-innocent parties, Parks ranger Anna Pigeon goes detective fiction. They are back to solve hidden identities and buried motives. undercover as a waitress at Yosemite their 27th case when an out-of-town actor (American) National Park to investigate the dies suspiciously after the theft of a rare disappearance of four young casual book. (American) employees. What waits for her in the Kirsty BROOKS snowy wilderness of the Sierra Nevada is The Happiness Punch a nightmare of death and greed. And 387pp Pb 19.95 perhaps, her final adventure… Six weeks after the end of The Vodka KEY (American) Dialogue (Pb 19.95), PI Cassidy Blair is academic M C BEATON back and better than ever. Cassidy has a Agatha Raisin and the Haunted new client, her teenage idol, pop star banking House 260pp Pb 16.95 Jason Wilde, who has a big problem with Snug and warm in her Carsley cottage, some lurid internet sites. She also has a canine detectives Agatha has that same old feeling of new PI colleague, Ned (who she finds boredom until a report of a haunted strangely attractive), and she meets clerical house sends her and new neighbour, Adelaide’s porn-king and his leading handsome Paul Chatterton, to thug, Mince. In an attempt to prove cosy/malice domestic investigate. Suddenly, middle-aged herself to Sam, who questions her PI Agatha is aglow with romance and abilities, Cassidy gets herself tied up culinary/food excitement. But the glow fades fast. It (literally) in a high-speed shoot-out on a turns out Paul is a cad. The victim of the bus, a kidnapping, a drug bust and a fbi haunting is a universally disliked old couple of bizarre film shoots. And that is biddy. And the ghost is most likely before she even begins to tackle Josie’s feline detectives someone playing a dirty trick. Then an new boyfriend, Zara’s personal old lady is found murdered. But never transformation and the latest cocktail at forensic fear! For Agatha, solving a homicide is the Easy Lounge. With even more action more fun than hunting a ghost. (British) and comedy, this instalment is sure to put horse racing mystery J S BORTHWICK a smile on your face while packing a punch. (Australian) medical Intensive Scare Unit 374pp Pb 16.95 Sandra BROWN military A Sarah Deane mystery White Hot 426pp Pb 18.95 #12. Crotchety, 70- Ten years ago, Sayre Lynch native american something Julia Clancy escaped from her small Louisiana of High Hope Farm feels hometown. Now she must return to police procedural a little wobbly one Destiny to bury her brother, and confront August morning. With her manipulative father and the painful political/legal stables to clean and memories she attempted to flee. riding lessons to give, Complicating her attempts to learn psychological the stoic New Englander exactly how her brother died is Beck ignores her symptoms Merchant, her father’s brilliant and canny private eye and ends up in the ER with a heart attack. attorney, who seems every bit as corrupt And a glimpse of something highly as her father. Yet despite her low opinion romantic suspense unusual will entangle Julia and her niece of Beck, Sayre finds herself irresistibly Sarah Deane in the murder of a hospital drawn to him. Tension between the sport VIP. Now amateur sleuth Sarah needs to workforce and management is mounting make her own diagnosis of Julia’s in Sayre’s father’s steel mill. While spy revelation and sew up the case before the another hotbed of lies, secrecy and star witness gets a fatal visit from Dr depravity smoulders and then ignites suspense/thriller Death.... (American) within his family... (American) AUTHOR’S NATIONALITY AT END OF BLURB CRIME CHRONICLE www.abbeys.com.au 3 John DUNNING RECOMMENDED READING The Bookman’s Promise Ian CALDWELL & Dustin THOMASON 469pp Pb 18.95 The Rule of Four 527pp Pb 21.95 A Cliff Janeway novel #3.