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William Lashner: A Filthy Business
A writer & a psychopath Walk into a bar A man who searches may find himself, but won’t necessarily like the result. Phil Kubiak is a fixer on the wrong side of the law. He does what he’s told as much as he can. Always the outlier, Kubiak can’t help deviating from instructions. On the…
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Ron Corbett: Ragged Lake
Confluence Like a fire gone to ground, Ragged Lake is slow and steady. For those who like their crime fiction dark, it’s well worth the immersion. Atmospheric, strained and striking, descriptions of the area bring you deep into Northern Divide country. Frank Yakabuski is the detective on the case of a family found murdered…
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Marcus Sakey: Afterlife
Entwined in ether Claire McCoy, FBI boss, Will Brody, her direct report. Lovers just discovering each other. Their lives severed then rejoined in a place neither could expect. Afterlife is not paradise. Existence on a different plane is rife with danger and more than that, it’s not even the last stop on an…
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Barbara Nickless: Blood on the Tracks
Broken Souls Little Comfort Special Agent Sydney Rose Parnell has done her time in Iraq. Her role, pick up the pieces of dead soldiers for Mortuary Affairs. The aftermath of the combat carnage and the loss of the man she loved has damaged her soul. Clyde, the K9 who served on active duty, is also…
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Bob Kroll: The Hell of it All + Q&A
Halifax Noir A body long buried and undiscovered. An ex-con with vengeance raging in his brain. A prostitute with personal history with Peterson, and a missing daughter. All underscored by pain, loss and regret. T.J. Peterson takes the hard way through everything, leaving those in his wake either gasping or puzzled. For him it’s not the hard way through it’s the only way…
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Harry Hunsicker: The Devil’s Country
No ones hero Someone’s saviour Once a Texas Ranger, now inveterate traveler, Arlo Baines moves from hill to hollow to forget. The void in his life is unfillable. Never long in one place, his stopover in the West Texas town of Piedra Springs changes that. In a parking lot he encounters a woman and her children. They are desperate for help to…
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David Swinson: The Second Girl
Crime & fault Function & abuse A functional cocaine addict, Frank Marr was once a Washington, DC narcotics detective able to keep his secret for years. Finally caught-out, the brass decided forced retirement was the solution. The truth would bring too many problems. Working as a Private Investigator Marr supplements his habit and income, by robbing drug…
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What’s it all about?
Recently, I was asked by thriller writer Madeleine Callway to talk about Murder in Common on her Canadian Noir blog. It was fun to think back to when all the madness started and share why I find it rewarding. Windigo Fire Just so you know, Madeleine’s debut novel Windigo Fire was…
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Barry Eisler: Livia Lone
Sold Livia is a freak in the bedroom. She must have absolute control. Sometimes things work out okay. Other times she meets aggression with brutal finality. There are reasons of course. All of them understandable, none of them sustainable. In a book about loss and vengeance it’s irrelevant. Born Labee in the Lahu hill country…
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Robert Masello: The Jekyll Revelation
Jack the Ripper Jekyll and Hyde Time for confession, The Jekyll Revelation is outside the usual genre posted on Murder in Common. It’s not crime fiction, but as I enjoyed it so much, I decided to tell you about it anyway. Based on a story about Robert Louis Stephenson and his book The Strange…
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Autumn: New season of crime fiction
Early Autumn Time for more reading Yes, the Autumn weather is here and I’m looking forward to a brand new season of crime fiction for Murder in Common. This year I decided to add an Interview page to the website. There are many authors that I speak with about their craft and it’s time…
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Summer reads
It’s now full-on summer and perhaps you need a little down time with a good book…or three…or more. I’ll let you get on with my suggested reading while I put Murder in Common on it’s summer hiatus. See you in September! How about a double dip from crime fiction author Sue Coletta: Marred Sage Quintano…
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Dot Hutchinson: The Butterfly Garden
Wings that don’t fly An enclosed garden filled with butterflies, tended by a congenial gardener. Only the butterflies are beautiful women captured and intricately tattooed. And the congeniality is the smooth mask of a psychopath. The man takes very good care of them over the years as they are there to serve his pleasure. When…
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Ilene B. Benator: Schizo – Hidden in Plain Sight
Insane asylum Two inmates: One Escape Former medical student Dan Greenberg’s life is an endless round of medications, dull food and listless, and at times, violent companions. Pretty much the norm for living in an insane asylum. He’s not supposed to be there, a victim of a set-up when he came close to exposing medical intrusion, by…