Stop You're Killing Me - Sept. 1 email

[fadedrose]

I thought some of this interesting and the board is slow, so I'm passing it on with added enhancements to make it easier to read. Found it in my email today. Mentioned is a mystery that takes place in Pittsburgh!

What's New on Stop, You're Killing Me! for September 1, 2012

Website: http://www.stopyourekillingme.com/
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Lucinda Surber -- [e-mail]
Stan Ulrich -- [e-mail]

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IN THIS ISSUE
=> GREETINGS
=> WHAT WE ARE READING
=> NEWLY LISTED AUTHORS & CHARACTERS
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GREETINGS

Giveaway Winner: Joseph L. from Washington and Michele L. from Kansas won copies of Broken Harbor by Tana French. Our thanks to Angela Messina of Viking for sponsoring this giveaway. Congratulations to our winners, and thanks to all of you who entered.

September 1st Giveaway
Kathleen George
Simple (Minotaur 2012) finds Cassie Price thrilled when she's hired to work at one of Pittsburgh's most prestigious law firms. Young, pretty, and from a sheltered background, Cassie's new life as an adult now includes meeting rich and powerful people, and she may even be having a mysterious affair. But when her lifeless body is discovered, the police are stumped. Suspicion falls on a neighborhood handyman, but Detective Colleen Greer and her boss, Commander Richard Christie, are not sure. The detectives discover that what seem like the easiest cases are actually the most complicated. We are giving away a hardback copy of this 6th in the series.

To enter the drawing, visit our Giveaway page or email your mailing address to [e-mail]. The deadline for entries is midnight September 8, 2012.
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The SYKM newsletter is published twice a month. The first-of-the-month issue (this one) features new authors and series characters added to the site over the past month. The mid-month issue features current and future book releases. Information about new book releases is always available online: Hardcover, Paperback, Large Print, Audio

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Best regards,
Lucinda & Stan
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WHAT WE ARE READING
Here are some of our favorite books from the last month:

Elizabeth Kane Buzzelli
Dead Dancing Women (Midnight Ink 2008) introduces Emily Kincaid, still adjusting to her new solitary life in rural Leetsville, Michigan, after her divorce from Jackson, an arrogant and philandering professor. Emily is trying (unsuccessfully) to write a mystery novel, working as a stringer for a local newspaper, and struggling to grow a garden that won't be instantly devoured by slugs and deer. Her nearest neighbor is a peculiar loner with a pack of dogs who occasionally drops by with a mason jar of surprisingly delicious possum stew or other strange backwoods fare. One morning Emily discovers a severed head in her garbage can, and the prickly Deputy Dolly (one-half of the local police force) convinces Emily that the two of them can solve the case while the state police are being stonewalled by the insular local inhabitants. Jackson decides that Emily's remote location is the perfect place to spend his sabbatical and shows up with his beautiful young research assistant in tow, seemingly content to sponge off his ex-wife for 10 months. Emily's treasured peace and quiet is suddenly all too full of human contact. It turns out that the head belonged to an elderly woman, a fanatic gardener who had taken to dancing deep in the woods with three of her equally aged friends. When another member of the group is murdered, Emily and Dolly suspect that the deaths have something to do with a suddenly valuable oil lease, or perhaps the survivalist group who lives next door. Wonderfully eccentric characters form the supporting cast of this delightful debut mystery, first in a series that now numbers four.

Shamini Flint
A Most Peculiar Malaysian Murder (Minotaur 2010, UK 2009) introduces Inspector Singh, a portly Sikh Singapore police inspector. Singh is sent to Kuala Lumpur to ensure that Chelsea Liew, a former model and Singapore citizen, is treated fairly in her murder trial. Chelsea was in the process of divorcing her abusive husband Alan Lee, a powerful timber tycoon, when he suddenly announced that he had converted to Islam, making custody of their children a matter for the religious courts. Startled by the realization that the children would be taken from her to be raised in a Muslim home, Chelsea threatened to kill Alan in open court. When Alan was found shot to death a week later, Chelsea was arrested for murder. The Malaysian police assign Sergeant Shukor to keep an eye on Singh, and the young officer is fascinated by Singh's investigative techniques. The two are soon convinced that Chelsea is innocent and become so involved in clearing her name that Singh is ordered home and Shukor is suspended. But Singh refuses to leave, even though he misses the cleanliness of Singapore, finding it impossible to keep his trademark pristine white sneakers spotless on the dirty streets of Kuala Lumpur. Local color and Singh's endearingly idiosyncratic personality make this debut mystery -- first in a series that now numbers five -- something special.

Anthony Horowitz
The House of Silk (Mulholland Books 2011) finds Dr. Watson staying with Sherlock Holmes in the winter of 1890 while his wife Mary is visiting relatives. Edmund Carstairs, a wealthy fine art dealer, appears one evening at 221B Baker Street, asking for assistance dealing with a man who is following him, a threatening figure wearing a flat cap. Carstairs explains that his gallery recently sold a valuable series of Constable landscapes to Cornelius Stillman, an American collector. While the paintings were in transit from New York to Boston the train was robbed by the Flat Cap Gang, led by the notorious O'Donaghue twins, who blew up the safe in the mail car, destroying the paintings and killing the guard. A Pinkerton agent hired by Stillman to track down the gang surprised and killed most of the gang, including Rourke O'Donaghue, but the body of Keenan O'Donaghue was never found. Stillman was shot in his own rose garden, and Carstairs began to worry that Keenan O'Donaghue had survived and was seeking revenge. When a man wearing the distinctive flat cap of the O'Donaghue gang appeared outside his home in England, Carstairs knew he would be the next victim. While following the trail of jewels stolen from Carstairs's home, one of the street urchins from the Baker Street Irregulars disappears, and Holmes and Watson are drawn into a dangerous conspiracy that threatens their very existence. This deft recreation of the world of Holmes and Watson, the first Sherlock Holmes mystery authorized by the Arthur Conan Doyle Estate, is nominated for the 2012 Macavity and Nero Awards.

Peter James
Dead Simple (Carroll & Graf 2007, UK 2005) introduces Roy Grace, a Detective Superintendent of the CID, in Sussex, England. Still mourning the disappearance of his wife nine years earlier, Grace is finally on the verge of beginning a new relationship. When Ashley Harper reports that her financée Michael Harrison never returned from the night of his bachelor party, Grace is drawn to the investigation, empathizing with the agony of a loved one's disappearance. What Grace doesn't know is that Michael, who had played tricks on his friends before their marriages, was buried in a coffin in the woods after visiting several bars. His friends planned to release him after a few hours, leaving him a walkie-talkie to communicate with them, but a bad accident left most of them dead, and the one survivor in a coma. Davey Wheeler, the mentally challenged son of the tow truck driver, finds the walkie-talkie. Unfortunately Davey lives in his own imaginary world based on American TV shows, and Michael can't convince him to tell anyone about the walkie-talkie that he shouldn't have taken from the accident scene. Grace consults a couple of the psychics he uses in difficult cases, to the horror of his superiors, and suspects that Mark Warren, Michael's partner and best man who missed the bachelor party because his flight was delayed, has something to do with Michael's disappearance. Grace's powers of logical analysis, eidetic memory, and a tentative belief in psychic powers make him an engaging protagonist in this series debut. Dead Man's Grip, 7th in the series, is a finalist for the 2012 Barry Award for Best British Crime Novel.

Louise Millar
The Playdate (Emily Bestler Books 2012) is the story of three women who live next to each other in a quiet London suburb. Callie, who gave up her job in sound design when her daughter Rae was born, hoped that she would find it easy to fit into the family neighborhood when she moved there after her divorce. But both Callie and Rae, who suffers from a heart condition, have made few friends. The exception is Suzy, who lives next door with her rich husband and three young sons. Henry, Suzy's oldest, is in Rae's class at school and the two children have become close, but Rae longs to be invited for a playdate with one of the girls in her class. Callie knows that she is friends with Suzy only out of desperation. The two have nothing in common, but Callie has come to rely on Suzy for adult companionship. Now that Rae has started school, Callie has secretly been investigating the possibility of returning to work, needing that stimulation though she worries Rae will be unhappy in after-school care and that Suzy will miss having someone to talk to during the day. Then Debs moves into the neighborhood, a strange woman who immediately becomes paranoid that someone is spying on her and seeking revenge for a mysterious incident with a child in her past. Written from the perspectives of all three women, this engrossing debut novel of psychological suspense builds on the primal fear all parents have of trusting relative strangers to care for their children.

Clare O'Donohue
Missing Persons (Plume 2011) introduces Kate Conway, a TV producer for the show "Missing Persons" in Chicago. Kate is in the process of divorcing her husband, Frank, who left her for Vera Bingham. Late one night Vera calls Kate to tell her that she can't wake Frank up. Kate rushes to the hospital and is surprised to discover that Vera is not a midlife-crisis trophy blond, but a graying woman who appears to be older than Kate herself. Frank doesn't respond to treatment, and Kate demands an autopsy, unable to accept that a healthy 37-year-old man could suddenly drop dead from a heart attack. To distract herself from Frank's death, Kate throws herself into the current Missing Persons story of Theresa Moretti, a young woman who disappeared a year earlier. Kate and her two-man crew film interview Theresa's mother, brother, best friend, boyfriend, and ex-boyfriend, searching for a story line that will tie the sound bites together into a cohesive story. Kate has a sympathetic interview persona which induces people to talk frankly with her, masking her calculated strategy to get the emotion she wants on film. The autopsy on Frank indicates the possibility of murder, and Kate finds herself on the other side of the interview table, in the uncomfortable position of playing a starring role in a script she has not constructed. When Kate's house is broken into and searched, she isn't sure if she has attracted the attention of someone involved with Theresa's disappearance, or with Frank's death. O'Donohue's real-life experience as a TV writer and producer provides the background to place her quick-thinking protagonist solidly in a believable environment. Life Without Parole, second in the series, was released in spring 2012.

Linda Rodriguez
Every Last Secret (Minotaur 2012) introduces Marquitta "Skeet" Bannion, the half-Cherokee chief of police for the campus police force of Chouteau University in the small town of Brewster, Missouri. Formerly a homicide detective in Kansas City, Skeet left the big city for a slower life, unable to continue working on the force with her jealous ex-husband and the rumors swirling around her alcoholic father's sudden retirement to avoid an internal investigation. The discovery in the campus newsroom of the murdered body of Andrew McAfee, the student editor of the school newspaper, is a shock to the peaceful community. The McAffees are neighbors, and Skeet breaks the news to McAfee's wife and teenaged stepson, who mows her lawn and cares for her pets when she's tied up at work. The college chancellor pushes Skeet to find the killer quickly, before too much bad press is generated, but Skeet soon discovers that McAfee seems to have been blackmailing one or more of the vice-chancellors. Then Skeet's ex-husband coerces her into visiting her father for the first time in months, and Skeet realizes his health is failing. Though pulled in too many directions by her various responsibilities, Skeet pursues the murder investigation with single-minded dedication. The tough yet vulnerable Skeet, who knits brightly colored socks while letting her mind sort through case details, has just the right mix of strengths and flaws to build a series on in this debut mystery, winner of the Malice Domestic Best First Traditional Mystery Novel Competition.

Sheldon Russell
Dead Man's Tunnel (Minotaur 2012) finds one-armed railroad security agent Hook Runyon banished to the West Salvage Yard in the high desert of Arizona at the end of WWII. Hook is in disgrace for giving boxes of damaged goods to St. John's Orphanage. The orphans discovered a box of military condoms and used them as balloons, to the horror of the resident priest. Hook is on the lookout for copper thieves when he is summoned to the nearby Johnson Canyon Tunnel, under 24-hour military guard because of its importance in the transport of war supplies. One of the guards was crushed by a train in mid-tunnel, something that should never have happened with a guard as experienced as Sergeant Joseph Erikson. Lieutenant Allison Capron from the Army Transportation Department decides the death was an accident, or perhaps suicide, but Hook is not convinced. Hook discovers a love triangle between Erikson, the other guard, and a waitress in the nearby town, and pursues his own investigation, hopping trains, including the luxurious Super Chief, to get from clue to clue. Hook hopes that either figuring out the truth about Erikson's death or catching the copper thieves will convince the railroad to send him somewhere less desolate. Scrap West, owner of the salvage yard, provides comic relief with his continual schemes to convert scrap into gold with ideas like building generators from old car batteries and windmill blades. Scrap continually borrows and replaces parts on the jeep Hook uses, leaving him unexpectedly without important functions like reverse gear or headlights. This compelling historical mystery is third in the series.

Marcus Sakey
The Two Deaths of Daniel Hayes (Dutton 2011) is the story of a man who regains consciousness on an empty beach, naked, wet, and very cold. Unfortunately the man can't remember who he is, how he got there, or even which ocean is lapping at the shore. Inside a nearby BMW is an auto registration in the name of Daniel Hayes and expensive clothes that fit. Realizing that he is in Maine, the man decides to call himself Daniel Hayes, and heads off across country for the Malibu, California, address on the registration. As he travels, Daniel continually reinterprets reality as if it were a screenplay, seeing the dialog and scene notes in his head. A TV show playing in a motel room triggers a memory -- Daniel is sure he knows Emily Sweet, the main character in Candy Girls. Desperate to find out who he is, Daniel breaks into the Malibu house, discovering that he was married to Laney Thayer, the actress playing Emily Sweet, and that he is the main suspect in Laney's recent murder. Daniel's anguished search to discover what happened to Laney and why he fled across the country is hampered by his status as a wanted man and threatened by Bennett, a cold-blooded killer searching for a diamond necklace Daniel didn't know Laney had bought. This compelling thriller is a finalist for the 2012 Macavity and Thriller Awards.

John Verdon
Shut Your Eyes Tight (Crown 2011) finds retired NYPD homicide detective Dave Gurney not as appreciative of bucolic life in rural upstate New York as his wife Madeline. Dave knows that Madeline wants to spend more time with him, but can't resist promising to spend two weeks looking into the beheading of a young bride on her wedding day. Cameras recording the entire wedding afternoon show Jillian entering the cottage of gardener Hector Flores, an illegal immigrant protégé of psychiatrist Scott Ashton, Jillian's brand-new husband, just before the wedding toast. No one else entered the cottage until Ashton discovered Jillian's decapitated body. Somehow Flores managed to escape from the window of his cottage on the estate, drop the bloody machete in the woods, and then disappear without a trace. Not even the bloodhounds can discover a scent that continues beyond the weapon. Dave finds this "impossible" disappearance irresistible, and accepts a commission from the dead bride's mother to track down Flores, even though Jillian's mother shows no signs of grief, admitting that her daughter was a violent manipulating nymphomaniac. Dave suspects that Jillian's staged murder is symptomatic of a serial killer even more disturbed than his victim. Despite the increasing horror of his discoveries and dangers to himself and his wife, Dave thrives on the intellectual stimulation of the hunt, realizing he is only half-alive when not fully engaged in solving a challenging crime. This sequel to Think of a Number is highly recommended.
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AUTHORS AND CHARACTERS ADDED IN AUGUST

Ben Aaronovitch: Peter Grant, a police constable, apprentice wizard, and all round nice guy, in London, England, in the Rivers of London urban fantasy series

Connie Archer: Lucky Jamieson, inheriting the By the Spoonful Soup Shop, in fictional Snowflake, Vermont, in the Soup Lover's mysteries

David Ashton: James McLevy, a police inspector in 1880s Edinburgh, Scotland

New David Baldacci series: John Puller, a combat veteran, now Special Agent in the U.S. Army's Criminal Investigation Division

Tom Benn: Henry Bane, a gang fixer and loanshark, in mid-1990s Manchester, England

Parker Bilal: Makana, a political refugee and former Sudanese police inspector, now a low-rent private investigator, in Cairo, Egypt

New John Billheimer series: Lloyd Keaton, a local sportswriter with a gambling addiction

Colleen Coble: Bree Nichols and her search and rescue dog Samson, in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, in the Rock Harbor Christian mystery series

New Sheila Connolly series: Maura Donovan, fulfilling her grandmother's wish by returning from Boston to the original family home in the small town of Leap, Ireland, in the County Cork mysteries

Cheryl Crane: Nikki Harper, a celebrity realtor and amateur sleuth, in Hollywood, California

Carol Culver: Hanna Denton, returning home to take over her grandmother's pie shop, in fictional Crystal Cove, California, in the Pie Shop mysteries

Glen Ebisch: Laura Magee, the advice columnist at the Ravensford Chronicle, in a small town in New England; Lou Dunlop, a high school student and son of a police officer [YA]

Michael Ennis: non-series

New Earlene Fowler series: Ruby McGavin, inheriting a ranch in fictional Tokopah County, California, in a suspenseful family saga

Dorothy Francis: Keely Moreno, a foot reflexologist who solves crimes in her spare time, in Florida

Penny Hancock: non-series psychological thrillers

Oliver Harris: Nick Belsey, a detective constable in London, England

Mischa Hiller: non-series thrillers

Eve Houston: village saga, with some criminous and mysterious doings, set in a pretty border town in Scotland, in the Prior's Ford series

Ewart Hutton: Glyn Capaldi, a half-Italian, half-Welsh detective sergeant exiled to mountainous mid-Wales

Loretta Jackson & Vickie Britton: Ardis Cole, an archaeologist working in Egypt; Arla Vaughn, an archaeology professor at Chicago University, in the Pre-Columbian Treasure series; Jeff McQuede, a sheriff in Wyoming, in the High Country mysteries

Grant Jerkins: non-series crime fiction

Michael Kardos: non-series thrillers

C.E. Lawrence: Lee Campbell, a criminal profiler with the NYPD, in New York City (Carole Buggé pseudonym)

Molly MacRae: Kath Rutledge, a textile preservationist, inheriting her grandmother's wool shop, along with a depressed ghost, in fictional Blue Plum, Tennessee, in the Haunted Yarn Shop series

Nora McFarland: Lilly Hawkins, a TV news photographer in Bakersfield, California

Louise Millar: non-series psychological thrillers

Nele Neuhaus: Oliver von Bodenstein, Kriminalhauptkommissar (chief superintendant), and his colleague Pia Kirchhoff, a police detective, in the Tanus mountain region of Germany

Mike Nicol: Mace Bishop and Pylon Buso, former spies, arms dealers, freedom fighters, and mercenaries, now working as security consultants, in Cape Town, South Africa, in the Revenge trilogy

New Frederick Ramsay series: Gamaliel, the chief rabbi and head of the Sanhedrin, tangles with Pontius Pilate in the late 20s CE, in the Jerusalem mysteries

Linda Rodriguez: Marquitta "Skeet" Bannion, a half-Cherokee ex-Kansas City homicide detective, now chief of the campus police force at Chouteau University, in Brewster, Missouri

Michael Sears: Jason Stafford, a former Wall Street trader trying to put his life together after two years in prison, and his young autistic son, in Manhattan, New York

Scott Spencer: non-series mysteries

Neal Stephenson: swashbuckling historical action in the 17th century, in the Baroque Cycle; non-series techno-thrillers

Franck Thilliez: Lucie Hennebelle, a detective in Lille, Belgium, and Franck Sharko, a police inspector in Paris, France

Marco Vichi: Bordelli, a police inspector (commissario) in 1960s Florence, Italy

Kim Westwood: post-apacalypse fiction set in Australia
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[Lydia Leftcoast]

1. Dead Simple is a real page turner,

as it keeps shifting in point of view between the missing man and the police who are trying to find him.

It inspired me to read more of Peter James' books.