Mystery in White: A Christmas Crime Story (1937) exploits seasonal chill to the max on every possible level. It’s cold, neck-deep in snow–and there might be ghosts or other unearthly things hiding in the shadowy whiteness. The story begins conventionally enough, with a group of strangers stuck on a train that’s stuck in a snowdrift. One of them, an elderly man who seems to know a lot about the paranormal, and the traces left on the present by violent or highly emotionally-charged events of the […]
The first “must read” book of 2015 has arrived
This should have been my Cannonball. One of the joys of becoming a Cannonball Reader and starting this blog has been occasionally managing to get my hands on an advance reading copy of an upcoming novel. And this one, which is published mid January 2015, is a real treat. It’s being touted as the next Gone Girl and the first must read book of 2015. SJ Watson, who made a huge splash with his own debut novel a few years back, is quoted on the cover. And […]
Just what kind of thriller writer are you?
I love a good thriller. Anyone who’s been reading my reviews since I started Cannonballing will have noticed that I’m a bit partial to a Sophie Hannah here, a Val McDermid there. So this much talked about debut from Paula Daly, with its intriguing tagline of “Your friend’s child is missing. It’s your fault” seemed right up my street. So it’s a shame it ended up leaving me flat. Our put upon heroine is Lisa Kallisto. Living in the quiet Lake District, she’s a working […]
Actually not that much of a mystery….
Now, as my blog title tells you, I really do read a lot. But it’s an odd gap in my book life that I haven’t read very many Agatha Christie novels. Those I have read, I read when I was in my teens and don’t really remember them anyway. So I decided to address this and read all the Poirot and Marple books, as well as her most famous stand alone novels like And Then There Were None. So what better place to start than at the […]
A new Lehane drama that I would call “Mystic River Lite”
A bleak story filled with flawed individuals trying to survive in a flawed society, expertly written in the dark and violent tone of Mystic River but somehow lacking the heart and soul and depth of that brilliant novel. Lehane created The Drop from a screenplay, which in turn was forged from a short story Lehane had written but shelved a decade ago. The story centers around Bob Saginowski, an emotionally-damaged guy who tends bar in his cousin’s crime-linked pub, devoutly attends church services on Sundays, […]
You can probably see where it’s going inside of Six Pages though….
I have never read a Harlan Coben book before. I keep confusing him with Dennis Lehane. Whenever I see anything about Harlan Coben, I always think “oh, yeah, he wrote Mystic River, I really want to read that. Wait. NO HE DIDN’T”. But I loved the French movie they made from his book Tell No-One and the plot for this sounded super intriguing so I thought what the heck. So the titular time period is how long lapses between Jake Sanders watching the love of his life Natalie Avery, marry […]
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