What next in 2022!

So, 2021 was hard for so many of us with various things happening, specifically the pandemic. However, for me personally there were a number of good things to celebrate crime fiction wise. The Shotsblog has been going from strength to strength. Looking back in 2020 we had over 250 blog posts. We managed to surpass that in 2021 with 354. What a coup!

I found myself doing more events online last year than I expected and as much as I enjoyed doing them I did miss that face to face contact. Being able to see friends and catch up with people. I am however looking forward to various crime fiction events this year.

There were some great books released last year and my list of favourite reads can be found here. This list could have been doubled. Saying that there are also a great number of books due to be published in 2022. As much as I would like to indicate all the books that I am looking forward to reading this year, I am going to start with the ones that I am looking forward to reading in the first six months of 2022.

I have always been a big Raymond Chandler fan and if you have read any interviews that I have done then I have always mentioned him as one of my all time favourite authors. I am therefore quite intrigued to see how good the re-imaging of Philip Marlowe is going to be.  The Goodbye Coast: A Philip Marlowe Novel by Joe Ide (Orion). The seductive and relentless figure of Raymond Chandler's detective, Philip Marlowe, is vividly re-imagined in present-day Los Angeles. Here is a city of scheming Malibu actresses, ruthless gang members, virulent inequality, and washed-out police. Acclaimed and award-winning novelist Joe Ide imagines a Marlowe very much of our time: he's a quiet, lonely, and remarkably capable and confident private detective, though he lives beneath the shadow of his father, a once-decorated LAPD homicide detective, famous throughout the city, who's given in to drink after the death of Marlowe's mother. Marlowe, against his better judgement, accepts two missing person cases, the first a daughter of a faded, tyrannical Hollywood starlet, and the second, a British child stolen from his mother by his father. At the centre of COAST is Marlowe's troubled and confounding relationship with his father, a son who despises yet respects his dad, and a dad who's unable to hide his bitter disappointment with his grown boy. Together, they will realise that one of their clients may be responsible for murder of her own husband, a washed-up director in debt to Albanian and Russian gangsters, and that the client's trouble-making daughter may not be what she seems.

I have been a huge fan of Gregg Hurwitz even before he started writing his Orphan X series. His Tim Rackley series has always been one of my favourites. However, when Orphan X was first published he created an extraordinary character that has continued to grow and fascinate readers continuously. The next book in the Orphan X series is Dark Horse (Michael Joseph) The hero - Evan Smoak: former off-the-books assassin - code name Orphan X. His world is divided into those who deserve his help and those who've brought his singular brand of justice upon themselves. The victim - A desperate father reaches out. His teenage daughter Anjelina has been kidnapped by a brutal criminal cartel and spirited over the border into Mexico. And while money is no object, Evan soon realises that his prospective client's past is as clouded and compromised as his own. The mission - If Evan is going to put his life on the line to rescue Anjelina, he must first decide whether he can act on behalf of a bad man. And even then, up against the men who are holding his daughter, there will be no guarantee of success...

Kotaro Isaka's Bullet Train was an unusual book featuring a bunch of assassins aboard a train, where not that many get off at the other end. It was one of my favourite reads in 2021 so I am looking forward to Three Assassins by Kotaro Isaka (Vintage). Once again assassins are in the mix. Their mission is murder. His is revenge. Suzuki is just an ordinary man until his wife is murdered. When he discovers the criminal gang responsible he leaves behind his life as a maths teacher and joins them, looking for a chance to take his revenge. What he doesn't realise is that he's about to get drawn into a web of unusual professional assassins, each with their own agenda. The Whale convinces his victims to take their own lives using just his words. The Cicada is a talkative and deadly knife expert. The elusive Pusher dispatches his targets in deadly traffic accidents. Suzuki must take each of them on, in order to try to find justice and keep his innocence in a world of killers. 

If you have never read any of Mick Herron's Slough House series then I would suggest that you do so. 2021 saw the publication of Dolphin Junction a collection of short stories which included a peek into the past of Slough House's top agent Jackson Lamb. Bad Actors (John Murray) sees the return to Slough House with a full length novel. Intelligence has a new home. A governmental think-tank, whose remit is to curb the independence of the intelligence service, has lost one of its key members, and Claude Whelan-one-time head of MI5's Regent's Park-is tasked with tracking her down. But the trail leads straight back to the Park itself, with Diana Taverner as chief suspect. Has Diana overplayed her hand at last? What's her counterpart, Moscow's First Desk, doing in London? And does Jackson Lamb know more than he's telling? Over at Slough House, with Shirley Dander in rehab, Roddy Ho in dress rehearsal, and new recruit Ashley Khan turning up the heat, the slow horses are doing what they do best, and adding a little bit of chaos to an already unstable situation . . . There are bad actors everywhere, and they usually get their comeuppance before the credits roll. But politics is a dirty business, and in a world where lying, cheating and backstabbing are the norm, sometimes the good guys can find themselves outgunned.

The Book of Sand (Century) is the posthumous published book by Theo Clare who for many of us is better known as Mo Hayder. This is not strictly a crime book more of a high concept thriller. But with the loss last year of Mo Hayder The Book of Sand is a welcome reminder of how good a writer she is. Sand. A hostile world of burning sun. Outlines of several once-busy cities shimmer on the horizon. Now empty of inhabitants, their buildings lie in ruins. In the distance a group of people - a family - walk towards us. Ahead lies shelter: a 'shuck' the family call home and which they know they must reach before the light fails, as to be out after dark is to invite danger and almost certain death. To survive in this alien world of shifting sand, they must find an object hidden in or near water. But other families want it too. And they are willing to fight to the death to make it theirs. It is beginning to rain in Fairfax County, Virginia when McKenzie Strathie wakes up. An ordinary teenage girl living an ordinary life - except that the previous night she found a sand-lizard in her bed, and now she's beginning to question everything around her, especially who she really is... Two very different worlds featuring a group of extraordinary characters driven to the very limit of their endurance in a place where only the strongest will survive.

Wiley Cash has always been one of those writers whose novels have always had a great sense of place. From his brilliant debut novel A Land More Kind Than Home to his CWA Gold Dagger Award winning This Dark Road to Mercy Wiley Cash has constantly given readers lyrical, heartbreaking and haunting stories. With When Ghosts Come Home (Faber & Faber) we once again have a fascinating, nuanced meditation on life in a small town. An abandoned plane. A dead body. A small town threatening to explode. 'A searing, thunderous, heartbreaking thriller. Wiley Cash has talent to burn.' Chris Whitaker Winston did not hear it so much as feel it as it passed over their house and into the trees across the waterway. The sheriff struggling for re-election and haunted by his past. The mystery plane which crash-lands on his island. The daughter returning home to hide from her troubles. The FBI pilot sent in to help. As the mystery of the abandoned plane and the dead body stokes long-simmering racial tensions, a moment of reckoning draws ever closer for the town of Oak Island.

I have always been a big fan of (1) short stories and (2) Laura Lippman who writes phenomenal short stories.  Seasonal Work and Other Killer Stories is a collection by Laura Lippman that I am looking forward to reading. From 'The Everyday Housewife' to 'The Cougar', 'Tricks' to 'Snowflake Time', Laura Lippman's sharp and acerbic stories explore the contemporary world and the female experience through the prism of classic crime, where the stakes are always deadly. And in the collection's longest piece, the novella 'Just One More', she follows the trajectory of a married couple who, tired of re-watching 'Columbo' re-runs during lockdown, decide to join the same dating app: 'Why would we do something like that?' 'As an experiment. And a diversion. We would both join, then see if the service matches us. Just for grins...'

This is just a snapshot of some of the books that I'm looking forward to reading. There are lots more and I am in no doubt that 2022 will once again be a bumper year for great books. My thanks of course go to all the wonderful authors who have kept me busy reading. It looks as if will be the same again this year. 

Books to Look Forward to From Century Press

January 2022

One Step Too Far is by Lisa Gardner. If he never left the woods , where did he go? A young man disappears during a stag weekend in the woods. Years later, he's still missing. But his friends who were with him that day are still searching for him. Still hunting for answers. They hike deep into the wilderness. With them is missing person specialist Frankie Elkin. What they don't know is that they are putting their own lives in terrifying danger, and may not come back alive . .

November 1924. The Endeavour sets sail from Southampton carrying 2,000 passengers and crew on a week-long voyage to New York. When an elderly gentleman is found dead at the foot of a staircase, ship's officer Timothy Birch is ready to declare it a tragic accident. But James Temple, a strong-minded Scotland Yard inspector, is certain there is more to this misfortune than meets the eye. Birch agrees to investigate, and the trail quickly leads to the theft of a priceless painting. Its very existence is known only to its owner . . . and the dead man. With just days remaining until they reach New York, and even Temple's purpose on board the Endeavour proving increasingly suspicious, Birch's search for the culprit is fraught with danger. And all the while, the passengers continue to roam the ship with a killer in their midst . . A Fatal Crossing is by Tom Hindle.

Sand. A hostile world of burning sun. Outlines of several once-busy cities shimmer on the horizon. Now empty of inhabitants, their buildings lie in ruins. In the distance a group of people - a family - walk towards us. Ahead lies shelter: a 'shuck' the family call home and which they know they must reach before the light fails, as to be out after dark is to invite danger and almost certain death. To survive in this alien world of shifting sand, they must find an object hidden in or near water. But other families want it too. And they are willing to fight to the death to make it theirs. It is beginning to rain in Fairfax County, Virginia when McKenzie Strathie wakes up. An ordinary teenage girl living an ordinary life - except that the previous night she found a sand-lizard in her bed, and now she's beginning to question everything around her, especially who she really is... Two very different worlds featuring a group of extraordinary characters driven to the very limit of their endurance in a place where only the strongest will survive. Sand is by Theo Clare (Mo Hayder).

February 2022

City of the Dead is by Jonathan Kellerman. At 5am in the upscale neighbourhood of Westwood Village, two removal men are making a routine pick-up when they make a fatal hit. It's a man - who appeared from nowhere - naked and with no means of identification. Not long after, a woman is found dead in a house nearby, which neighbours suspect to be a brothel. Could the man have come from there? When LAPD homicide lieutenant Milo Sturgis calls brilliant psychologist Alex Delaware to the scene, the case gets even more complicated. Delaware has met the woman before. She's a psychologist too.

Art galleries and casinos, mansions and brothels, billionaires and thieves. Only James Patterson could create a triple-cross this decadent and suspenseful. Imagine everyone's surprise when Carter von Oehson, a sophomore in Dr. Dylan Reinhart's Abnormal Psychology class, posts on Instagram that he plans to kill himself. 24 hours later and still no one has seen him. A massive search ensues. But when Carter's sailboat rolls in with the tide without him or anyone else on it, the worst seems to be confirmed. He really did it... Or did he? The one person convinced he's still alive is his father, Mathias von Oehson, founder and CEO of the world's largest hedge fund. But what Mathias knows and how he knows it would ultimately is a secret too damaging to reveal. There's no way he can go to the police. But there's still someone he can turn to. Dylan now finds himself wrapped up in multimillion-dollar secrets and danger and it's going to take every bit of his wit to stay ahead of his enemy. Steal is by James Patterson and Howard Roughan.

The Long Weekend is by Gilly Macmillan. By the time you read this, I'll have killed one of your husbands. In an isolated retreat, deep in the Northumbria moors, three women arrive for a weekend getaway. Their husbands will be joining them in the morning. Or so they think. But when they get to Dark Fell Barn, the women find a devastating note that claims one of their husbands has been murdered. Their phones are out of range. There's no internet. They're stranded. And a storm's coming in. Friendships fracture and the situation spins out of control as each wife tries to find out what's going on, who is responsible and which husband has been targeted. This was a tight-knit group. They've survived a lot. But they won't weather this. Because someone has decided that enough is enough. That it's time for a reckoning.

March 2022

Give Unto Others is by Donna Leon. Once again, Commissario Guido Brunetti is willing to bend police rules for an acquaintance, even though Elisabetta Foscarini, the woman who asks the favour, is not really a friend. But her mother was good to Brunetti's, so he feels he has no choice but to repay the debt and agrees to look into the matter 'privately', rather than as a police official. Her son-in-law has alarmed his wife by telling her they might be in danger because of something he's involved with. Because Enrico Fenzo is an accountant, Brunetti suspects that the likely reason must be the finances of one of his clients. Brunetti takes a look and finds little: one client is an optician, another Fenzo`s father-in-law, whom he helped establish a charity, another the owner of a restaurant. He is about to tell his friend that he can find no reason for preoccupation when her daughter's place of work is vandalised, forcing Brunetti to turn his attention - still 'private' - to Elisabetta's own family. What he discovers shows the Janus-faced nature of yet another Italian institution as well as the wobbly line that attempts to differentiate between the criminal and the non-criminal.

The People Next Door is by Tony Parsons. Lana and Roman Wade have fled the city for a little corner of paradise, exchanging their flat with its unhappy memories for a small honey-coloured house among the rolling green hills of Oxfordshire. Their new home, set in a residential Close known as The Gardens, is their dream and their new neighbours are charming. So why is Lana feeling so uneasy? Lana and Roman may seem like an attractive, popular couple. But they are also a couple with a secret; a secret buried in the life they have left behind, a secret they have shared with no-one. But their new neighbours - these charming, affluent men and women in the Gardens - have secrets of their own. Terrible secrets; unimaginable secrets that include the apparently happy family who lived - and tragically died - in Lana and Roman's new home. As Lana struggles to adjust to her new life in Paradise, she becomes convinced that her new neighbours are hiding something from her, something connected with the deaths of the family who lived in her house before she did, something that could put her own life in danger...

Wilde follows a tip that he hopes will finally solve the mystery of his abandonment, but instead sends him straight into the arms of a serial killer. As a young child, Wilde was found living a feral existence in the Ramapo mountains of New Jersey. He has grown up knowing nothing of his family, and even less about his own identity. He is known simply as Wilde, the boy from the woods. But when a match at an online ancestry database puts him on the trail of a close relative - the first family member he has ever known - he thinks he might be about to solve the mystery of who he really is. Only this relation disappears as quickly as he's resurfaced, having experienced an epic fall from grace that can only be described as a waking nightmare. Undaunted, Wilde continues his research on DNA websites where he becomes caught up in a community of doxxers, a secret group committed to exposing anonymous online trolls. Then one by one these doxxers start to die, and it soon becomes clear that a serial killer is targeting this secret community - and that his next victim might be Wilde himself... The Match is by Harlan Coben.

April 2022

22 seconds... until Lindsay Boxer loses her badge - or her life. SFPD Sergeant Boxer has guns on her mind. There's buzz of a last-ditch shipment of drugs and weapons crossing the Mexican border ahead of new restrictive gun laws. Before Lindsay can act, her top informant tips her to a case that hits disturbingly close to home. Former cops. Professional hits. All with the same warning scrawled on their bodies. You talk, you die. Now it's Lindsay's turn to choose. 22 Seconds is by James Patterson and Maxine Paetro.

The Shadow Child is by Rachel Hancox. Eighteen-year-old Emma has loving parents and a promising future ahead of her. So why, one morning, does she leave home without a trace? Her parents, Cath and Jim, are devastated. They have no idea why Emma left, where she is - or even whether she is still alive. A year later, Cath and Jim are still tormented by the unanswered questions Emma left behind, and clinging desperately to the hope of finding her. Meanwhile, tantalisingly close to home, Emma is also struggling with her new existence - and with the trauma that shattered her life. For all of them, reconciliation seems an impossible dream. Does the way forward lie in facing up to the secrets of the past - secrets that have been hidden for years? Secrets that have the power to heal them, or to destroy their family forever ...

May 2022

In a disintegrating and increasingly lawless land, a young man is travelling north. Ben is a young painter from the crowded, turbulent city. For six months his fiancée Cara has been living on the remote island of Sanctuary Rock, the property of millionaire philanthropist Sir John Pemberley. Now she has decided to break off their engagement and stay there for good. Ben resolves to travel to the island to win Cara back. But the journey there is a harsh and challenging one, and when he does arrive, a terrible shock awaits him. As Ben begins to find his way around Pemberley's perfect island, he knows he must also discover - what has made Cara so determined to throw her old life away? And is Sanctuary Rock truly a second Eden, as the mysterious Sir John claims - or a prospect of hell? The Sanctuary is by Andrew Hunter Murray.

In Memoriam - Mo Hayder

 

1 January 1962 – 27 July 2021

The crime fiction world have been deeply upset to hear the news of the sad death of Mo Hayder of Motor Neurone Disease on 27 July 2021. Alison Flood's article in the Guardian can be found here. Over on social media lots of crime writers have been expressing their condolences and paying tribute to her as they remember Mo Hayder. Her debut novel Birdman (1999) took the crime fiction world by storm and was an international best-seller. 

She was certainly a firm favourite with us over on Shots since her first book Birdman was published. Ali Karim interviewed her after her second book The Treatment (2001) had been published and the interview can be read here. There is also an interview with Christine Campbell. A review of The Treatment also by Christine Campbell can be read here. The treatment was not only a Sunday Times best-seller but it was also won the 2002 WH Smith Thumping Good Read Award. Mo Hayder also wrote the screenplay for De Behandeling (2014) which was a Belgian film of an adaptation of her book The Treatment. 

Ali Karim also interviewed when her first standalone book (and my favourite) Tokyo (2004) was published. Tokyo was published in the US as The Devil of Nanking. It was shortlisted for the CWA Gold Dagger

Pig Island her second standalone book was published in 2006 and was nominated for both a Barry Award for Best British Crime Novel and shortlisted for the Ian Fleming Steel Dagger. Her fifth book Ritual (2008) and third book to feature DI Jack Caffery which was the first in The Walking Man series was nominated for the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger. This was followed by Skin (2009) the second book in the series.  Gone (2010) the third book in the series was nominated and won an Edgar Award for Best novel. 

A review of Poppet (2013) the sixth book to feature DI Jack Caffery series can be read here.

Her third standalone Hanging Hill was published in 2011.  Wolf (2014) which was the final book to feature DI Jack Caffery was nominated in 2015 for an Edgar Award. It was also announced in March 2021 that the BBC were filming Wolf in Wales.

It was announced in March 2021 that Cornerstone imprint Century had acquired two speculative thriller novels by her under the name Theo Clare. The first in the series, The Book of Sand, is due to be published in January 2022 as a lead title for Century and its sequel, The Book of Clouds, will follow in early 2023.

The death of Mo Hayder is a blow to the crime writing community and she will be sorely missed by not only her fellow crime writers but also her fans. Our condolences to her family and her friends.

The Book of Sand by Theo Clare (Published by Century) Out January 2022

SAND. A hostile world of burning sun. Outlines of several once-busy cities shimmer on the horizon. Now empty of inhabitants, their buildings lie in ruins. In the distance a group of people - a family - walk towards us. Ahead lies shelter: a 'shuck' the family call home and which they know they must reach before the light fails, as to be out after dark is to invite danger and almost certain death. To survive in this alien world of shifting sand, they must find an object hidden in or near water. But other families want it too. And they are willing to fight to the death to make it theirs. It is beginning to rain in Fairfax County, Virginia when McKenzie Strathie wakes up. An ordinary teenage girl living an ordinary life - except that the previous night she found a sand-lizard in her bed, and now she's beginning to question everything around her, especially who she really is … Two very different worlds featuring a group of extraordinary characters driven to the very limit of their endurance in a place where only the strongest will survive.

Photograph ©Ayo Onatade (2004)