A Morbid Taste for Bones

Brother Cadfael had given up a life of adventure to now have a quiet life of contemplation in his herb garden in the Benedictine abbey in Shrewsbury.  He requests to travel to Wales to be part of a delegation that hopes to bring the bones of St. Winifred to the abbey.  But, how would the Welsh, where the saint is buried, take the idea of her being taken away from them?

It doesn’t take long for the delegation to find out that the little community where the saint is buried is not in favour of her being moved.  Rhisiart, leader of the local community, speaks strongly against letting the saint’s bones go, and is angered when Prior Robert offers him money for the bones.  The following day the pair are to meet for dinner for further negotiations, however Rhisiart doesn’t show up.  A search is mounted and he is later found dead with an arrow imbedded in his chest.

Cadfael immediately began investigating the body and the area about.  Prior Robert accuses the boyfriend of the daughter of the victim, and she stands up for him, in turn accusing the prior.  Threatened, the boyfriend runs.  Cadfael is certain that the boyfriend is not the killer.

The following day, the community decides that Prior Robert can take the bones of St. Winifred.  The prior declares three days of vigil and prayer at the gravesite beforehand.

Having now had the opportunity to closer examine the body of the victim, Cadfael determines that he had been stabbed from behind first and then an arrow inserted from the front.  Who would do such a vile thing?

Cadfael thinks he has the culprit at hand, and the suspect confesses to other things, but not the murder.  So, if they don’t have the killer, what are they left with?

Author Ellis Peters has a few twists and surprises left in her first Cadfael chronicle.  A good quick read.

The Lost Child

DI Lottie Parker and DS Mark Boyd are at the scene of a brutal murder, but the victim isn’t who they thought it would be.  Late the following day, the daughter of the victim is discovered at the hospital with serious head injuries and her tongue removed. 

A cottage fire results in one man dead and another in serious condition.  There is a smell of cannibis Could it be connected to the murder?  It turns out that one of the victims of the fire is the boyfriend of the granddaughter of the murder victim.  And now she has gone missing.

When quantities of heroin are found in the boyfriend’s home, Parker’s superintendent calls in the national drug unit.  Parker now has limited time to find the missing girl and solve her murder case.

How many more deaths will happen before they can solve the case.  Is it all drug related or is there more to it than meets the eye?  Author Patricia Gibney cooks up a fine mess in this murder mystery, complete with a shocking twist at the end.  A thoroughly enjoyable read, which I could not put down!

The Skeleton Room

DCI Gerry Heffernan and DI Wesley Peterson have been called out to an old girls’ boarding school, now under renovation, where a skeleton has been discovered in a room sealed off long ago.  Just as they were preparing to return to the station, Peterson received a call about a body being found in the sea not far away.

It turns out that the skeleton was likely walled up in the sixties, so would have to be investigated.  The body found in the sea is quickly identified and appears that she had been killed under suspicious circumstances.

Heffernan and Peterson are able to the former headmistress of the girls’ school and she is able to provide information that links to the new owner of the building.

DC Steve Carstairs has been researching some similar deaths to the one in the sea that had happened in the past.  He discovers some similarities.  Could they all have been perpetrated by the same person?  Could they have a serial killer on their hands?  It appears that they have their suspect, too.

However, Peterson isn’t sure that the suspect that they have is the right one.  Carstairs’ research leads to an insurance scam.  Now to find out who is behind it.  Author Kate Ellis has a surprising conclusion to this mystery.  This is a good quick read, and thoroughly enjoyable.  I also recommend reading the author’s historical note after the conclusion of the novel.

The Iberian Flame

Sir Thomas Kydd is back home from the Baltic.  While in Tavistock he encounters Captain Marceau, a French prisoner of war, held on parole.  By posting a bond, Kydd is able to invite the man to dine with him and Persephone.

Later while in Ivybridge, Kydd speaks to four Swedes on the Exeter stage.  It is Persephone who realises that they are not Swedish, and when he speaks to them in French, they realise that they are French officers trying to escape captivity.  With the help of Persephone he is able to alert the authorities.  There is more to this escape plan than meets the eye.

Not long after this, Kydd’s ship, Tyger, is ordered to join Admiral Collingwood’s fleet in the Mediterranean.  However on the way there another admiral orders Kydd to follow a French fleet, which has broken out of its port.  Upon discovering the French fleet, Kydd shadows it.  Before long, it appears that the French are headed to the Mediterranean where it could join with the Toulon fleet and be unbeatable by anything the British could throw at them.  Fortunately nothing comes of it

Meanwhile, Napoleon’s army has marched into Spain on its way to take over Portugal.  Tyger is back outside Cadiz as part of the blockade fleet.  Kydd’s friend, Nicholas Renzi, now known as Lord Farndon, has been asked to go to Spain in the hopes that the Spanish will informally begin talks with Britain to break away from Napoleon.

Napoleon has removed the king of Spain from power and replaced him with his brother, Joseph, who he had appointed King of Naples earlier.  Will the people rise up in revolt, and can Renzi be the one to help them?  How long will Napoleon’s Marshall Murat, stand for a revolution before he uses force to put it down brutally?  The next question is, can Renzi get out of Spain and back to England?

The end result is peace!  Britain and Spain are now allies against the French!  To Kydd’s surprise an invasion is in the works under the leadership of Lieutenant General Sir Arthur Wellesley.  Fortunately, Kydd knows of a secure place on the Portugal coast where the army can be set down.

The French quickly capitulate, and are given terms, which allow them to be shipped back to France.  Would Napoleon stand for this humiliation?  Of course not!

What follows, author Julian Stockwin details very well.  The British army saved by the navy to fight again another day.  For fans of historical fiction, this is a very good read.

The Painted Doom

DI Wesley Peterson and DCI Gerry Heffernan have been called out to the countryside where the body of a man has been discovered by a farmer. There is a gunshot in the centre of the man’s forehead.  After several minutes, Heffernan recognises the man as the leader of a rock band from years ago.

Later Peterson and DS Rachel Tracey discover blood stains and what appears to be a bullet hole in a vacant house.  Later that evening a young lady confesses to Heffernan that she had helped to move a body from that same house at the behest of her boss, an estate agent.

The same morning that the suspect is brought in for questioning, a woman reports that her teenage son is missing.  The family lived where the body had been discovered.  Might he have seen something?  Heffernan is convinced that he has the killer, but Peterson isn’t, he also feels that the murder and the missing boy are somehow connected.

When a shop owner is attacked and left for dead, a new case opens up.  Peterson feels that there is some connection to the murder, as the victim had been seen near the murder victim’s home.

Can Peterson and Heffernan’s team connect the dots or will the killer get away with it?  What role will medieval letters sold by the missing lad have in helping to solve the mystery?  Author Kate Ellis intertwines a medieval story of doom into a modern mystery leading to a good, quick read.

The Pale House

It is November 1944; Captain Gregor Reinhardt is in Vienna and finds himself suddenly transferred to the Feldjaegerkorps - military police.  By March he is back in Sarajevo area where his unit has discovered a massacre of civilians plus the killings of some soldiers.

Back in Sarajevo, Reinhardt is given the responsibility of coordinating the Feldjaegerkorps within the city.  However, not far in the back of his mind is the massacre.  He also meets with a judge by the name of Dreyer, whom he had known in the past.  Dreyer wants Reinhardt’s help in getting a major in charge of a penal battalion for corruption.  Reinhardt feels that he really can’t help.

Later he is called out to where three Feldjaegerkorps men were attacked.  Two are dead.  Casting about, Reinhardt discovers another set of bodies, all shot and disfigured.  They were also at some time tied up.  He plans to keep the investigation from the local police.  His investigation leads him back to the witnesses to the massacre outside Sarajevo.  However, they have disappeared.

Shortly after this, the local secret police, known as the Ustase, show Reinhardt several bodies.  In this case they are their own men, who they claim were killed by partisans.  The leader of the police then shows him the brutal way they are controlling the populace.

Will Reinhardt have time to complete his investigation before the partisans take the city or will he be part of the army escaping to the north before the onslaught?  Or will the Ustase kill him?

Author Luke McCallin ‘ second novel in this series has plenty of action awaiting Reinhardt.  Betrayal is a way of life amongst the Ustase and some German soldiers as they try to find a way to survive the war.  Another exciting and enjoyable read by this author.

The Risk of Darkness

DCI Simon Serrailler has been seconded to the North Riding Yorkshire where a child has gone missing.  The evening of his first day there another child is abducted, however this time there are witnesses.  Fortunately this results in the capture of the person who took the child and the release of the child.  Now the police need to find the other child.

The day after returning to his own patch, Serrailler finds himself involved in a hostage taking.  A man has taken Reverend Jane Fitzroy hostage in her home.  Fortunately the hostage taking comes to a safe, positive conclusion.

Forensic evidence shows that the other child had been in the kidnapper’s car.  It also shows that there was another child in there, but who?

Author Susan Hill’s  psychological thriller has many victims in it, from the kidnapped and murdered children to people that are the victims of random acts of violence.  Although none seem related, all are in one way or another.  The reader is left with lots to think about at the end of this novel.

The Stolen Girls

DI Lottie Parker has been off work for four months, and on this first day back at work a young woman appears on her doorstep asking for help. The unfortunate thing is that she is unable to communicate in English, so she gives Lottie a sealed envelope telling her that her troubles are written in her own language in the envelope and then she leaves.

Moments after arriving back at the station she and her DS Mark Boyd, are headed off to a site where the body of a female has been found in a water main excavation.  Pathologist Jane Dore informs Parker that the victim had been shot, and that she was pregnant at the time of her death.  Dore also thinks that she is of Eastern European descent.

Parker and Boyd check out a detention centre for asylum seekers.  They are sure afterwards that the head of the centre knows something.

Whilst in the middle of their investigation, a seventeen year old girl is reported missing.  She is the daughter of a well known felon who now resides in Spain.  Not long after this another body is found in similar circumstances to the first, and by the same man who had found the first!  Is it the missing girl?

Then a third body is discovered, and once again by the same man.  The thing is he was with his boss this time, and the boss had received a phone call to go to the location to make a minor repair.

Is the man who has been finding all the bodies really the killer?  Why would he kill and then find the bodies?  Is he an attention seeker?  Author Patricia Gibney’s latest thriller is fast paced and immensely engaging.  I couldn’t put this book down.  I highly recommend it and am looking forward to reading the next book in the series.

Secrets of the Dead

DI Tom Shearer has been called out to a spa where the manager has been found inside the sauna, done to a crisp.  Shearer suspects that the victim had a heart attack and the sauna overheated.

Meanwhile DI Robyn Carter has a case of her own to investigate.  Someone has been attacking people with a knife to rob them.  He has injured a few of the people he has robbed.  Fortunately her team has their man due to someone turning him in.

A friend of the man who died in the sauna tells Carter that there was no way he would have gone into the sauna because he had a heart condition, which would have been aggravated by the heat and humidity.  Unfortunately, DCI Mulholland will not let Carter look into it any further.

A few days later the barman at the Happy Pig pub has his throat slashed.  This is Carter’s case.  In the hand of the victim was an invoice, marked “Paid in Full”.  It is quickly discovered that the barman had worked at the spa in the past.

Unable to get the other case out of her mind, and unable to continue to investigate it, Carter asks her cousin, Ross Cunningham, a private investigator, to check into things on her behalf.

Shearer is next to have a case similar to Carter’s.  A woman has been murdered in her own home.  She also has an invoice with her body.  What is going on, and why kill a young mother?  What was the debt that was being called in?  Carter vows to catch the killer.

She hopes to interview another man who works at the spa, but he is killed by a hit and run driver.  Again an invoice is found with the body.  Carter immediately arranged protection for another man who she thinks could be in the killer’s sights.

Can Carter stop the killer before he strikes again?  Author Carol Wyer’s murder novel is fast paced, and a page turner.  I found it hard to put down.  A thoroughly enjoyable quick read.

Silent Scream

DI Anna Travis has just finished a case and is immediately called out to investigate the murder of a young actress.  The same murder team that just finished the last case is reassembled.  Travis wants an experienced DI to work with her, so DI Simon Dunn becomes her new partner.

Travis and Dunn are unable to get anything of value from the workers on the set where the victim was filming nor from the parents of the victim.  As the investigation progresses, they find out a bit more about the victim.  She used drugs and was anorexic.  Her diary is missing as is a toy bunny, which she apparently slept with.  Also found with the victim was a gold crucifix and chain.  Does it belong to the victim or the killer?

Due to lack of progress, DCI James Langton is beginning to put pressure on the investigative team. 

From the way those they are questioning respond, Travis is sure that people are covering up something.  But what and why?

It isn’t long before Langton steps in, reassigns Dunn and turns the investigation over to Detectives Mike Lewis and Tony Barolli, who Travis has worked with before.  Lewis discovers that much of the money the actress earned has disappeared due to unwise investments.  The victim’s accountant was unaware of the situation and is surprised to find vast amounts of money were not passed on to the victim by her agent.  Could fraud be the reason for her death?

As they gather more evidence, Travis continues to work independently much to the consternation of her team and Langton.  Will it be enough to get the culprit?

Author Lynda La Plante’s murder mystery may seem dragged out, but in reality it’s her way of building a case and catching the culprit.  It is an intriguing read and well written.

The Baltic Prize

Sir Thomas Kydd is back in England with his new bride Persephone.  They have time to set up their new home before Kydd is called back to command Tyger.  What’s in store for the ship and its crew now?

A new expedition under the leadership of Vice Admiral Sir James Saumarez.  A massive fleet is to sail into the Baltic to show the flag and aid in trading vessels to go about their commerce.  Alongside the fleet will be an army, ordered to serve King Gustav as he requires.  General Moore, in charge of the army is shocked to learn that Gustav plans to invade Denmark and make it his own.

Meanwhile, the Danes’ only ship sets sail from Norway.  Tyger is tasked with stopping it, along with two smaller ships from getting to Copenhagen.  At the same time the merchantmen want to get underway.  They are going to be hampered by Danish gunboats.

Be as that may, Tyger was not to be part of the Baltic Fleet, rather orders were for the gallant ship to sail to the Arctic.  There, Kydd’s actions are bound to cause consternation to the Russians.  However, that is not how Saumarez interprets it.  It may in fact cause the Tsar to send the much larger Russian fleet against the British Baltic Fleet.

Saumarez assigns Kydd to be a naval liaison to the Swedes.  He is to work with Commander Jens Stromsson.  It doesn’t take long for the two men to establish a good working relationship.  After an interesting ordeal, the pair return to their superiors with news that the Russians have taken a strategic Swedish naval base.

Kydd is then assigned to return to the mouth of the Baltic to hunt pirates.  Will the Tyger’s actions be enough to stop the pirates?  What further action is needed by Saumarez’s Baltic Fleet to hold the Russians in place?  Author Julian Stockwin’s navel novel is based on historical fact and gets his hero Kydd back into naval action.  A thoroughly enjoyable read.

The Man from Berlin

It is May of 1943 and Captain Gregor Reinhardt has been called to the scene of a murder just outside Sarajevo. A German officer has been killed as has a woman he was with.  Reinhardt’s superior, Major Freilinger wants Reinhardt in charge with the local police assisting.  Chief Inspector Putkovic of the Sarajevo police feels that they should be in charge.

Putkovic assigns Inspector Padelin to work with Reinhardt.  Reinhardt’s right hand man is Sergeant Claussen.  Padelin has his own take on the killings, which Reinhardt is unwilling to accept.

Reinhardt learns of a club nearby that both victims regularly attended.  There he learns that another branch of the armed forces and Padelin had already been there asking questions.  Two of the young women who work there were also roughed up.  As he was leaving, an SS officer warns Reinhardt off.  Reinhardt was left wondering why another branch of the army was investigating the murders almost as soon as they had happened.

As his investigation progresses, Reinhardt learns that the soldier victim was investigating the army group whose Lieutenant-colonel had warned him off.  Also, the Sarajevo police apparently have a suspect who has admitted to the murder.  It would appear that the case is done.

Is there anyway the investigation can continue?  What follows are pages of tension and excitement as Captain Gregor Reinhardt continues with his investigation despite being threatened.  Author Luke McCallin’s first novel in this series is well written, entertaining and a top notch read, which I found hard to put down.  I’m eagerly looking forward to reading the next book in the series.