Reader's Place: December 12, 2021

We’re heading into the darkest time of the year now, so let’s EMBRACE it. Curl up in your favorite chair, have a hot cup or a glass of wine handy, and read about the darkness that lurks, inside and out.


Not dark yet: a DCI Banks novel, by Peter Robinson, 2021.   (Library Catalog, eBccls)

When property developer Connor Clive Blaydon is found dead, Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks and his Yorkshire team dive into the investigation. Instead of discovering Connor's murderer on the multiple spycams installed around the house, however, the grainy and blurred footage reveals another crime: a brutal rape. If they can discover the woman's identity, it could lead to more than justice for the victim; it could change everything the police think they know about Connor and why anyone would want him dead.


Dark horses: a novel, by Susan Mihalic, 2021. (Library Catalog, eBccls)

Summary: Fifteen-year-old equestrian prodigy Roan Montgomery struggles to reclaim her life from her abusive father, who demands strict obedience in all aspects of her life inside and outside of the riding arena.


When the stars go dark: a novel,  by Paula McLain, 2021.  (Library Catalog, eBccls)

Anna Hart is a seasoned missing persons detective in San Francisco with far too much knowledge of the darkest side of human nature. When unspeakable tragedy strikes her personal life, Anna, desperate and numb, flees to the Northern California village of Mendocino. The day she arrives, she learns a local teenage girl has gone missing. Then, just days later, a twelve-year-old girl is abducted from her home. The crimes feel frighteningly reminiscent of the most crucial time in Anna's childhood, when a string of unsolved murders touched Mendocino.


A dark and secret place: a novel, by Jen Williams, 2021. (Library Catalog) When prodigal daughter Heather Evans returns to her family home after her mother's baffling suicide, she makes an alarming discovery--stacks and stacks of carefully preserved letters from notorious serial killer Michael Reave. The Red Wolf, as he was dubbed by the press, has been in prison for over twenty years, serving a life sentence for the gruesome and ritualistic murders of several women across the country, although he has always protested his innocence.


Compiled by Ina Rimpau





Robert Nealon