April 8, 2022

April 8, 2022

New Fiction

The Old Woman with the Knife by Gu Byeong-Mo – At sixty-five, Hornclaw is beginning to slow down.  She lives modestly in a small apartment, with only her aging dog, a rescue named Deadweight, to keep her company.  There are expectations for people her age – that she’ll retire and live out the rest of her days quietly.  But Hornclaw is not like other people.  She is an assassin.  Double-crossers, corporate enemies, cheating spouses – for the past four decades, Hornclaw has killed them all with ruthless efficiency, and the less she’s known about her targets, the better.  But now, nearing the end of her career, she has just slipped up.  An injury leads her to an unexpected connection with a doctor and his family.  But emotions, for an assassin, are dangerous.  As Hornclaw’s world closes in, this final chapter in her career may also mark her own bloody end.

The Darkest Place by Phillip Margolin – Robin Lockwood is an increasingly prominent defense attorney in the Portland, Oregon, community.  A Yale graduate and former MMA fighter, she’s becoming known for her string of innovative and successful defense strategies.  As a favor to a judge, Robin takes on the pro bono defense of a reprehensible  defendant charged with even more reprehensible crimes.  But what she doesn’t know – what she can’t know – is how this one decision, this one case, will wreak complete devastation on her life and plans.  As she recovers from those consequences, Robin heads home to her small town of Elk Grove and the bosom of her family.  As she tries to recuperate, a unique legal challenge presents itself – Marjorie Loman, a surrogate, is accused of kidnapping the baby she carried for another couple, and assaulting that couple in the process.  There’s no question that she committed these actions, but that’s not the same as being guilty of the crime.  As Robin works to defend her client, she learns that Marjorie Loman has been hiding under a fake identity and is facing a warrant for her arrest for another, even more serious crime.  And buried within the truth may once again be unexpected, deadly consequences.

The Match by Harlan Coben – After months away, Wilde has returned to the Ramapo Mountains in the wake of a failed bid at domesticity that confirms what he’s known all along: He belongs on his own, free from the comforts and constraints of modern life.  Suddenly, a DNA match on an online ancestry database brings Wilde closer to his past than he’s ever dreamed, and finally gives Wilde the opening he needs to track down his father.  But meeting the man brings up more questions than answers.  So Wilde reaches out to his last, most desperate lead, a second cousin who disappears as quickly as he resurfaces, having experienced an epic fall from grace that can only be described as a waking nightmare.  Was his cousin’s downfall a long time coming? Or was he the victim of a conspiracy as cunning as it is complex?  And how does it all connect to the man once known as The Stranger, a treacherous fugitive with a growing following whose mission and methods have only turned more dangerous with time?

The Book of Cold Cases by Simone St. James – In 1977, Claire Lake, Oregon, was shaken by the Lady Killer Murders: Two men, seemingly randomly, were murdered with the same gun, with strange notes left behind.  Beth Greer was the perfect suspect – a rich, eccentric twenty-three-year-old woman, seen fleeing one of the crime scenes.  But she was acquitted, and she retreated to the isolation of her mansion.  Oregon, 2017.  Shea Collins is a receptionist, but by night, she runs a true-crime website, the Book of Cold Cases – a passion fueled by the attempted abduction she escaped as a child.  When she meets Beth by chance, Shea asks her for an interview.  To shea’s surprise, Beth says yes.  They meet regularly at Beth’s mansion, though Shea is never comfortable there.  Items move when she’s not looking, and she could swear she’s seen a girl outside the window.  The allure of learning the truth about the case from the smart, charming Beth is too much to resist, but even as they grow closer, Shea senses something isn’t right.  Is she making friends with a manipulative murderer, or are there other dangers lurking in the darkness of the Greer house?