CLAIRE LADDS

Author of character-driven psychological literary fiction and other darker books, all with an emotional pull

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Spell the Month in Books: August

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It’s August and here in the UK it’s the height of summer (as I write this it’s pouring with rain!). When I was a kid, I was often encouraged to go outside and play in the lovely weather. Truth be told, all I really wanted to do was to curl up in a corner and read a book, hoping that the summer holidays would pass quickly and I could go back to school. I absolutely loved school, and I couldn’t stand the hot weather, so six weeks off was like torture. Luckily, I loved being at home, too, and I created reading areas in the shade. One year, my neighbourhood friends and I used my dad’s trailer shelter as a den. It was pretty good reading in there, too, if somewhat dark! (This same den is fictionalised in my Hearts & Crimes novel, The Secrets That Haunt Us).

Suffice to say that summertime became a reading frenzy for me. If you’d like a bit of mystery-oriented summer reading, then just maybe I can help you out with my August Spell the Month in Books list.

Anthem for Doomed Youth – Carola Dunn

This is the 19th Daisy Dalrymple book, and I am hooked on them! I have really enjoyed following Daisy’s exploits and the developments in her life. Daisy herself is perfectly feisty and astute, while maintaining a great wit and managing her relationships with her “interesting” family members, and her romance with DCI Alec Fletcher.

Anthem for Doomed Youth sees Daisy visiting their daughter at school – to the relief of Alec’s boss who warns Alec to keep Daisy from meddling in their newest case. Three unidentified bodies have turned up in Epping Forest, shot through the heart and Scotland Yard wants it cleared up ASAP. But just because Daisy isn’t there, doesn’t mean she’s not entangled in murder. And she can’t really help herself because a teacher at their daughter’s school ends up dead…

If you like 1920s murder mysteries with a light-handed touch, then the Honourable Daisy Dalrymple might just be your cup of aristocratic tea.

Unexpected Guest (The) – Agatha Christie (play novelised by Charles Osborne)

I became a real fan of Agatha Christie’s plays a number of years ago, some of which I have as an original stage play, and some which have been novelised. My version of The Unexpected Guest is a novelisation of Agatha Christie’s play, written by Charles Osborne, but I’ve linked above to the original stage play.

A man manages to send his car into a ditch in South Wales on a dreadful foggy night. Having escaped the car, he seeks out shelter and finds an isolated house. When he enters through the patio doors, he discovers a woman standing over her exceedingly dead, wheelchair-bound husband, complete with a gun in her hand. The man says he will help her create a cover story. But it’s clear that the woman is not guilty of murder – so who is she protecting? There are a whole house-full of suspects, and it must be one of them. But who?

I have absolutely no hesitation in recommending this book. Christie’s original play is fantastic and this novelisation has been exceedingly well written by Charles Osborne. The mystery runs hand-in-hand with suspense. What I particularly love about this is that the narrator is not completely clean cut and innocent – after all, he does offer to concoct an alibi for someone who appears to be a murderer! I’m really glad I chose this book for my August list as the play itself had its debut performance on 12th August, 1958 and it’s been performed many, many times since!

Guilty Consciences – Ed. Martin Edwards

This is a crime collection I have had on my shelf for a while and am ashamed to say that I haven’t yet read from cover to cover. Of course, books of short stories have the advantage that you can read them (usually) in any order.

This anthology brings together seventeen stories by members of the Crime Writers Association, and includes stories by esteemed authors such as Ann Cleeves, Peter James and HRF Keating, among others. The stories I have read so far have all the hallmarks of great mysteries and I am absolutely sure that I’m going to love reading the entire collection.

I would have loved to have linked to this book for you, but I haven’t been able to find it at the time of writing. If I do come across a copy, I’ll add it in here as an update.

Unnatural Habits – Kerry Greenwood

I first came across Kerry Greenwood’s mystery novels set in 1920s Australia and which give us the exploits of the high society Phryne Fisher as a series on the TV. I enjoyed the Phryne Fisher Mysteries series so much that I began buying the novels, and I haven’t been disappointed.

Phryne and her maid-sidekick, Dot, get to investigate when young, pretty, blonde girls begin to go missing from the Magdalene laundry. All of them are pregnant and there’s a big cover-up afoot. But Phryne has no intention of allowing these girls to vanish into oblivion.

What I really enjoy about Phryne is her feistiness and her refusal to give up on anyone, regardless of race or class. She treats everyone equally and, despite social tensions, she has the ability to cross those invisible borders and isn’t above investigating the most heinous and lowlife of crimes. Her sense of justice is profound. She is one of my favourite high society female sleuths.

Something Wicked – David Roberts

Originally, I think I bought this book for two reasons: firstly, I had just completed my Masters dissertation which I wrote on Agatha Christie, and the main text that I worked with was the Tommy and Tuppence novel, By the Pricking of my Thumbs; secondly the title reminded me of the Ray Bradbury book, Something Wicked This Way Comes. It was a bit of a foregone conclusion, therefore, that I’d end up buying Something Wicked!

However, I have not actually read this book (hence no recommendation link), but I can tell you what it is about. This is book 8 of a 10 book series about Lord Edward Corinth and Verity Browne. Verity has returned to England with suspected tuberculosis, and also now engaged to Lord Edward. She checks into a clinic where – surprise, surprise – Edward has to go and investigate a series of murders. He’s there because his dentist has died rather suspiciously, and so have two other patients. As war approaches and hangs over them all, Edward and Verity need to find out what, or who is casting a shadow of threat over them.

Two for Sorrow – Nicola Upson

This novel is part of the series of mysteries which fictionalise the author Josephine Tey as sleuth. In this novel, Josephine wants to write about the perpetrators of a thirty year old baby farming case. Her friend, Inspector Archie Penrose, is on a case involving the murder of a seamstress which at first glance seems to be part of a domestic fight. But it becomes clear that her death is linked to another murder – and someone wants the past to remain buried.

I find the Josephine Tey books to be extremely in depth and darker than a lot of “cozy” mystery fiction set in between the wars. Personally, I like this more sinister element of the cozy. To my mind, cozy crime fiction does not have to be light-hearted; its defining feature is that it does not have bloodshed “on the page”. Nicola Upson’s series delves deeply into the darker motivations and means of criminals, and it feels to me very much like historical crime fiction. Maybe it’s because my own work has a dark edge that I like the Josephine Tey series as much as I do.

Well, there you have it: my Spell the Month in Books for August. As always, for transparency, some of the books I mention contain my affiliate links for US readers. I only ever use affiliate links on books I have personally read and have enjoyed. You can search for the books without clicking through on this post, of course! 🙂

I hope that a book or two that I’ve mentioned here might encourage you to try a new author or a new crime and mystery-filled book, be it a novel or a short story collection. Have you read any of my August list, or are any of them among your favourites? Be sure to tell me in the comments.

Spell the Month in Books: April

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I’m back once more with my Spell the Month in Books titles, once again bringing you some of the crime and mystery books on my bookshelves. There are some fantastic authors in this little stack, and one or two of my favourite contemporary authors who write historical mysteries here.

Here’s my list for April:

Angel with Two Faces – Nicola Upson

Poor Tom is Cold – Maureen Jennings

Return of Sherlock Holmes (The) – Arthur Conan Doyle

Incomplete Revenge (An) – Jacqueline Winspear

Last Seen Wearing – Colin Dexter

I really do enjoy Nicola Upson’s novels. Angel with two Faces is another of her mysteries set in the interwar period. While Josephine Tey recovers from a trauma, she is invited to Cornwall, to the family home of Inspector Archie Penrose. She is delighted as there is an open air theatre right next to the cliffs. When she arrives, the place is coping with a young man’s funeral. His horse leapt, strangely, into a lake, and the man was drowned. This is odd enough, but when another young man disappears and the curate also falls from the clifftop Josephine likes so much, it becomes apparent that there’s a murderer on the loose. This is another of Nicola Upson’s books that I became totally immersed in. While it’s classified as a cozy mystery, what I love about this series are the undertones of darkness that lurk just near the surface.

Poor Tom is Cold is the third of the Murdoch Mysteries. If you’ve read any of my other Spell the Month in Books posts then you’ll already know that I am a huge fan of these stories in book and TV series format. The story is set in 1895 Toronto. Murdoch is not convinced by the apparent suicide of Police Constable Oliver Wicken, discovered in an abandoned house, even more so when he encounters Wicken’s mother and invalid sister and realises that the constable was the family’s only means of financial support. Why on earth, when he was needed so much, would he commit suicide? Nearby, Murdoch sees one of the Wickens’ neighbour being taken to a lunatic asylum. When he starts wondering if the woman has actually been driven insane, it makes Murdoch think that the two events are linked in some sinister way. As always, this is a fabulous mystery and Murdoch’s incredible brain weaves its intrepid way through the clues to get to the truth.

The Return of Sherlock Holmes is a collection of stories written by Arthur Conan Doyle in response to the public outrage that the author had previously killed off Sherlock. This collection of stories sees Holmes returning from his supposed death to recount the adventures that happened to him during those ‘missing’ years. I think that, whether you love the character of Sherlock Holmes or find him obnoxious and irritating, the stories are always great Victorian mysteries. I personally find Holmes exasperating (except in the TV version with Jeremy Brett as the star – totally brilliant!), but my feelings about Holmes are counteracted by the lovely, down-to-earth character of Dr Watson. I always have a very soft spot for Watson, who is often as baffled as the reader at the antics and puzzle-solving of Holmes. The parallels between these two and Christie’s Poirot and Hastings decades later are clear.

Anything by Jacqueline Winspear is a hit with me. An Incomplete Revenge is another Maisie Dobbs book, set in a Depression-filled 1931. Maisie accept a commission from a friend who wants to buy an estate in the village of Heronsdene, Kent. The problem is, the place has been denying all knowledge of the thefts, arson and vandalism that have been going on for a decade. Maisie has to find out what on earth has been going on and why the culprits have never been caught, so her friend can buy his estate with an easy mind. It’s not made easier, however, by the way that the villagers close ranks on outsiders and seem steeped in the past. This is a beautiful, entertaining mystery, which deftly reflects class and social differences of interwar Britain. I’ve not yet come across a Maisie Dobbs story that I didn’t enjoy.

Last Seen Wearing is a Morse book I haven’t read, but I’ve no doubt that I’ll enjoy it when I do. The story centres around the disappearance of Valerie Taylor, a teenage schoolgirl. After over two years, her disappearance has become a cold case. But then new evidence is revealed and Morse is asked to reopen the case. I’d love to be able to talk more about it. If you’ve read it, or manage to before I do, I’d love to know what you thought.

I hope that you might feel encouraged to try something on my April bookstack – and you’ll note that, aside from my mug in the picture, there’s no Agatha Christie here this time (which may shock you. It did me – although I did still manage to squeeze in a reference, you may have noticed!). As always, any affiliate links I use here (which apply to the US only) are for books and products that I have personally used and loved, so you know it’s a genuine recommendation from me.

Happy reading!

Spell the Month in Books: March

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<!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>I have five crime-filled stories to share with you in my Spell the Month in Books post for March. This time they span the centuries in their settings, from the medieval to the twentieth century.

I have five crime-filled stories to share with you in my Spell the Month in Books post for March. This time they span the centuries in their settings, from the medieval to the twentieth century. The books I have chosen this time around are:

Mistress of the Art of Death – Ariana Franklin

Alienist The) – Caleb Carr

Remorseful Day (The) – Colin Dexter

Coroner’s Pidgin – Margery Allingham

Holy Disorders – Edmund Crispin

Every one of these is available in audiobook, so I’ve linked to that version, although available ebooks, paperbacks and hardcovers are all listed as well.

We begin with the Middle Ages. Children have disappeared and one murdered in Cambridge. Blame is placed on the Jews who go into hiding, much to the displeasure of the king, who relies on them for revenue. In desperation, he enlists Simon of Naples to help him, and he brings with him Ariana Aguila. She has a secret for fear of being accused of witchcraft – her skill in the study of corpses. In the course of her investigations, it becomes clear that the killer has noticed her involvement. Will the killer strike again – and this time, at her?

I picked up this book originally because of my love of the Cadfael mysteries. And I am so pleased I did! It’s a very long book at just over 500 pages (or a long listen if in audio!) and wonderfully easy to read and become absorbed in. No confusing medieval dialogue to negotiate, which I appreciate, even after studying medieval literature! I have to say that I became very attached to the character of Ariana, and am really looking forward to getting around to reading the next book in the series.

Fast forward a few centuries to the Victorian period, and the setting for the quite simply stunning story of The Alienist. This is another whopping book, the story coming in at 531 pages in my version, but it’s worth every bit of your time – and if you’ve seen the series adapted from the book, you’ll know exactly what I mean. The book is written from the viewpoint of crime reporter, John Schuyler Moore, who tells the story of the solving of a set of hideous crimes.

The book is set in 1896. In New York, corruption and hypocrisy are everywhere, and someone is violently murdering young boy prostitutes. Theodore Roosevelt, Police Commissioner has to do something and he is prepared to try anything, including putting faith in psychologist (the alienist) Dr Lazlo Kreizler and John Schyler Moore to use the forensic and psychological work which is still in its infancy. There is an epitome of evil out there. They have to delve deep into the darkness of the human psyche and catch this killer, because he just keeps killing… I was spellbound by this book, and equally the series. If you love dark Victorian crime and drama, I can’t recommend this story highly enough.

Now we have three books all from the twentieth century, beginning with the most modern in this month’s stack, (The) Remorseful Day. It seems to be becoming a habit for me to pick a Colin Dexter novel and cheat a bit with the title by bracketing off the ‘the’! The wonderful Inspector Morse appears in his last crime-solving exploit. The murder of Yvonne Harrison still hasn’t been solved after a year, and Morse refuses to take on the case. So what is it that’s prompting him to make investigations of his own, as his health deteriorates? Things are not quite right, and Sergeant Lewis knows it.

If you have read (or indeed, watched) The Remorseful Day, then I have no need to tell you what a poignant book this turns out to be. If you haven’t, then I would recommend that you read the other Morse books first. I have no words to describe my emotions when reading this book, except that, for a man endlessly troubled with affairs of the heart, this last Morse book by Colin Dexter felt, to me, a very fitting ending to the series.

Coroner’s Pidgin is a book of a very different temperament to The Remorseful Day. Albert Campion is in his bath, after coming back from his holidays. Instead of relaxing, he ends up on the trail of a murderer, when his servant, Lugg comes home with a dead woman in his arms. This was the first book I ever read of Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion crime-solving antics.

While Campion is a nice enough character (although you may find in some of the books his patriarchal and sexist views, especially towards his sister, to be a bit much for you), I have developed a very soft spot for Lugg. He’s a great sidekick, and thoroughly enjoyable to watch in his split role of underground thug and honourable butler. This book has an Audible-only audiobook, so if you’re interested in listening to this one, you can take a look here.

Finally, the delightfully lighthearted mystery, Holy Disorders. I think the series of Gervase Fen stories are perfect if you’re looking for a mystery with a quirky and lighthearted narrative. Gervase Fen is an Oxford don who just seems to constantly land himself in trouble. This time, he has gone toddling off to Tolnbridge where he is busying himself with catching butterflies. And, of course, while he’s there, the most placid an inoffensive organist in the world ends up murdered. So begins Gervase’s detective work in Tolnbridge – and there are some very oddball theories thrown up as he goes about his sleuthing!

I’ve not read very many of Edmund Crispin’s books, but the ones I have read remind be very much of the feeling I got when reading P.G. Wodehouse’s Jeeves and Wooster stories. The Gervase Fen mysteries are not as obviously comedic as Wodehouse; the amusement is more subtle, but if you find you develop a liking for his quirkiness, then this could be a series for you.

There’s such a wide variety of times and settings in my February Spell the Month in Books bookstack that hopefully you might find something in a historical timeframe you enjoy, or you might be tempted to try a new historical period for your crime and mystery reads. My favourite period will always be the interwar (1920s-30s), but it’s extremely close contender is the Victorian era. What’s yours? I’d love to hear, if you’d like to leave your favourites in the comments.

As always, so you know, any Amazon affiliate links I have used in this post may earn me a tiny commission if you are able to buy through any of them (and these are all US affiliate links only). However, I only ever link to a book or product that I’ve used and thoroughly enjoyed myself, so you only ever get wholehearted, genuine recommendations from me.

Happy reading!

Spell the Month in Books: February

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Here I am again with my spell the Month in Books choices! This time, I’m looking at a bookstack of crime and mystery stories which I have on my shelves and which contain a whole host of fantastic characters, whether detective/sleuth or criminal.

Here’s my list of books:

Fear in the Sunlight – Nicola Upson

Except the Dying – Maureen Jennings

Brat Farrar – Josephine Tey

Raffles – E.W. Hornung

Unnatural Habits – Kerry Greenwood

And then There Were None – Agatha Christie

Riddle of the Third Mile (The) – Colin Dexter

You Let Me In – Lucy Clarke

Fear in the Sunlight is one of Nicola Upson’s wonderful mysteries set between the wars and featuring the writer, Josephine Tey, as the sleuth. While Josephine is on holiday in Portmeiron to celebrate a friend’s fortieth birthday and to sign a film deal with Alfred Hitchcock for a novel she’s written, one of the group becomes the unfortunate object of a brutal and gruesome murder. The next day, it happens to another one of the party. Is there a serial killer on the loose? Josephine joins forces with Chief Inspector Penrose to find out as suspicion grows rife among the remaining guests and they fear for their lives.

The fantastic Victorian detective William Murdoch appears in Except the Dying. It is 1895, and the body of a pregnant girl is discovered in a freezing cold street in Toronto. Murdoch soon begins to think that her murder may well be an attempt to disguise the knowledge that she had been embroiled with a man belonging to one of the affluent families in the city. I find Murdoch such an endearing character, and I love his quirkiness, his inventiveness and his relationships with the other characters. As someone who has watched all of the Murdoch Mysteries episodes (many times!), it’s very difficult not to envisage Yannick Bisson as the Murdoch of the book. I don’t have a problem with that in the slightest…!

Josephine Tey’s Brat Farrar gives the writer another mention in this particular bookstack, although this time, as the non-fictional version! I’m going to be honest and say that, although I’ve owned Brat Farrar quite a while, I’ve not yet read it. But I must! A man has been coached on every possible detail of the supposedly dead Patrick Ashby, who died at the age of thirteen, in order to claim his inheritance. But dark secrets emerge that threaten both Brat Farrar’s plan and his life, the longer he continues his deception.

Raffles is one in my bookstack which most certainly is not a sleuth-style crime book! In fact, it is quite the opposite, and is the first in a series of witty stories exploring the world of crime from the viewpoint of the thieves. In this first story, Raffles: The Amateur Crackman, Raffles’ schoolboy friend, Bunny Manders, enlists his help to get him out of gambling debt which has mounted up so badly that he almost shoots himself directly in front of Raffles. And so begin the adventures – starting with a daring robbery of a jewellers. This should keep Bunny out of trouble now, surely?

I really love Kerry Greenwood’s lady detective, Phryne Fisher, and Unnatural Habits sees Phryne and her maid-come-sidekick, Dot, getting involved in a series of disappearances. The victims all have something in common: they are blonde-haired girls, and three of the are definitely pregnant. They also all have one other connection – they work at the Magdalene Laundry. An intrepid female journalist is also on the case, and it’s not too long before she also goes missing. Phryne needs to do something about this before any more girls vanish without trace. What I always find thoroughly endearing about Phryne is her capability of using everything within her power – her wealth and position, certainly, but also her femininity and her empathy and understanding with all women and girls placed in dreadful situations, because there is so much more to this lady detective than beautiful clothes and a privileged lifestyle.

My all-time favourite crime writer once again appears in my bookstack. Agatha Christie wrote a number of standalone crime stories, some thriller, some with a dark Gothic feel or occult element, and some incredible mysteries. And Then There Were None, I think, combines all of these, and it is one of my absolute favourites of the standalones. Ten strangers are ‘invited’ to a house on an isolated island in Devon by the mysterious U.N. Owen. During their first dinner together, a record containing the voice of the mysterious host begins to accuse each of the guests of hiding a terrible secret and, before the end of the evening, one of the guests ends up dead. It doesn’t take long for the remaining guests to realise that the killer must be on the island, and worse, that it is one of them – and whoever it is is going to kill again and again…

Ah, now, Inspector Morse. I’ve never come across a Morse book or episode that I didn’t like. I might have cheated (just a tiny bit) by ignoring ‘the’ in the title, but the book itself hopefully makes up for it. As usual, this book sees the detective display his usual contempt for the dons of Oxford, as the torso of one of them, Browne-Smith (or at least Morse believes it could be) is fished out of the Oxford canal. Browne-Smith has disappeared and it appears that an event that happened in World War II may be the motive for the murder, but is it really? And is the dismembered body actually Browne-Smith or another victim entirely? There are suspects galore, and endless twists and turns to this one. Riddle of the Third Mile is definitely one to read for its complexity and if you love a plot to throw you in every possible direction.

I failed in my last letter, as I had to repeat last month’s book! Who would have thought it was so difficult for me to find a crime book beginning with ‘y’ on my bookcases?! So here we are again with You Let Me In. Briefly, as I described the book last month, I can tell you that Elle has felt very strange since renting out her house. Then she starts to receive threats which suggest that the person who is in her house now knows about her past – and what she did. What exactly do they know, and what are they going to do about it? And why is her imagination hearing footsteps, seeing shadows? It is in her imagination, isn’t it?

I hope that you might be inspired to read some of the books in my February bookstack. If I was going to point you to one in particular, if you’ve never read it, then be sure to read And Then There Were None. There is also an absolutely amazing three-part adaptation of the book on Amazon Prime Video, which I didn’t bother renting but bought outright and have watched countless times (Charles Dance and Sam Neill star, so what’s not to love?!). I thought it was fantastic and exceptionally well done. I will definitely be writing more on this story, and in detail on the adaptation of this, and many other Christie stories, in the coming weeks.

Doing this is also showing me that I really do need to read more of my Josephine Tey collection, and get around to curling up with Lucy Clarke’s book. Although I’m not sure that I’m going to feel very warm and cosy once I get going. I think I might be checking my door..! Sounds thrilling. 🙂

Happy reading!

Spell the Month in Books: January

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I began getting involved in ‘Spell the Month in Books’ on Instagram last year, having come across the hashtag and decided it looked like fun. If you don’t know, the idea is that you gather together a bookstack of titles and create the name of the relevant month with the first letter of the title of each book.

This year, I have decided to try and find books that fit into the crime and/or mystery category, and which I currently have in paperback in my bookcases. I can tell you already that finding certain letters of the month has been a challenge, and as much as I would love not to repeat a book in the twelve bookstacks for the year, I get the distinct feeling that there might be one or two that I have no choice to repeat, unless I go out and deliberately buy books beginning with specific letters! I’m resisting doing that, as I have so many unread books that I’m determined to use ones I’ve got.

This is my chosen Spell the Month in Books bookstack for January:

Jamaica Inn – Daphne du Maurer

Among the Mad – Jacqueline Winspear

Nemesis – Agatha Christie

Under the Dragon’s Tail – Maureen Jennings

A Shilling for Candles – Josephine Tey

Return of Sherlock Holmes (The) – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

You Let Me In – Lucy Clarke

You’ll notice a few Golden Age (or modern versions of Golden Age) mysteries among this lot – and being the Agatha Christie obsessive that I am, I couldn’t resist adding one in. However, this group ranges from Victorian to contemporary, and spans detective, suspense and thriller books.

Jamaica Inn combines the Gothic elements of landscape that Daphne du Maurice made so famous in her incredible book, Rebecca, with crime and dark deeds in Cornwall. Labelled as a suspense novel, there are enough dark deeds for me to include this in a set of crime books. When Mary ignores the coachman who warns her against travelling to her aunt at Jamaica Inn, she becomes ravelled in a whole host of villainy going on inside the house. Can she trust the mysterious stranger she meets there? Because she falls in love with him, and danger lurks everywhere.

Jacqueline Winspear’s Among the Mad is one in a series of mystery novels set in post-World War I Britain, featuring her sleuth, Maisie Dobbs. Maisie is drafted in by Scotland Yard after she sees a man commit suicide on a street in London, followed by threats to the Government by a lunatic who threatens mass destruction of people if certain demand are not met. It leads Maisie down a dark route to discover who could possibly be able to commit such atrocity, and to stop him before it is too late.

Nemesis is one of the much later novels of Agatha Christie and features the indisputably astute Miss Marple. When an old acquaintance dies and sets her a challenge of solving an old crime and setting right a wrong, Miss Marple takes it with relish. Thus, the wheels are set in motion to solve the mystery and discover a killer. The only problem is, she has been given absolutely no clue as to who is involved in this mystery or when the crime happened. A curious puzzle…

Under the Dragon’s Tail is a Murdoch Mysteries novel. The murder of Dolly Merishaw is not really unexpected. She was a midwife and abortionist for both high and lowborn, but held every one of her ‘clients’ in contempt and derision. One week later, a boy is found murdered in Dolly’s kitchen, leaving Murdoch to chase down a murderer. Or just maybe there were two on the loose.

A Shilling for Candles sets Alan Grant of Scotland yard on the trail of a murder – but where to start, and how to end? A young screen actress washes up on the south coast, but it seems that everyone the Inspector comes across during his investigation wanted her dead. There are more false and puzzling clues and dead ends than the Inspector knows what to do with!

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle caved in to public pressure after the publication in 1902 of The Hound of the Baskervilles, and resurrected his famous detective in (The) Return of Sherlock Holmes. The tales in this collection see Holmes returning to London to recount the tales of his life between 1891-4 (the time between Holmes’ supposed death and his ‘present day’).

You Let Me In in a psychological thriller by Lucy Clarke. Being a sucker for red, black and white, the cover on this (although more grey than black) sold it to me, to try. Yes, I did actually buy this for the cover, initially! Ella is a writer; she uses her imagination every day. But something doesn’t feel right when she rents out her house. It feels like someone is watching her. As threats arrive and she feels trapped in her own home, she knows that someone has discovered the secret of her past.

I hope that this makes you think about the books on your bookshelves, and maybe you now fancy taking part in #spellthemonthinbooks too. Can you create a bookstack for January, and can you create it in just one genre (although you don’t have to in the slightest)? Maybe yours would be a virtual stack of ebooks. I haven’t tried that yet – maybe that’s my challenge for next year! I’d love to know what your books for January are/would be, so do please pop them in the comments, or you can email me at claire@claireladds.com with your choices.

I also hope that I might have encouraged you to try one of the books in my bookstack! Just so you know, if you do happen to purchase any of them through my links, I may earn a very small commission (depending on the country you’re in) at no extra cost to you. I’ve only linked to the ones I’ve actually read – not ones that are sitting in my ‘to be read’ pile, so you know that if I’ve linked to it, I thoroughly recommend it.

Happy reading!