This is the first episode in an ‘intelligent adventure’ series (‘Hell Holes’), which mixes the heft of heavyweight geology and climate science with the demons of the underworld unbound, in all their slavering ferocity. It’s a genre-bending bonanza of science, speculative fiction and supernatural action, a nifty idea which would make a perfect movie pitch.…
Neither Nordic noir nor Scandi crime, The Ice Star is an action-adventure pursuit story which barrels back and forth across Greenland’s Arctic landscape. This is not an atmospheric, melancholic exploration of the long night of the Scandinavian soul, but rather a runaway sledge ride from one shoot-out to the next. The strong female protagonist is,…
Splinters of glass cascaded across the sidewalk, a bed of needles on which the squint-eyed thug went to sleep. Seconds ago he’d been jumping around, as hyper as a speed addict, spitting froth from the corners of his mouth in his agitation, until I’d delivered the sleeping pill by way of a straight right to…
Author Elias Zanbaka crams a stack of action into precious few pages in this rapid-fire short story, which turns out to be the perfect length for a coffee break. He breaks almost every writing convention and hurls the reader into a non-stop heart-pumping pursuit through the crowded streets of Los Angeles. The writing is raw…
While readers get to grips with his new collection of quick thrillers, author Frank Westworth pauses in between projects to chat about what he writes, and why. And what he reads, and where his characters come from, and which kinds of Kevlar can actually stop bullets… What made you want to write? Vanity. Pure, simple,…
In ‘Spy On Spy’ by John Day, a secret team of hastily-trained German spies are sent to infiltrate England at the end of the 1943. Their mission: to covertly install the technical equipment which will help Hitler win the war with the Nazi’s new terror weapon, delivering death from the skies. Karl Strom, the…
Catherine (‘Cat’, inevitably) is a talented woman. Smart enough to be a biochemist. Beautiful enough to be a top-class catwalk model. Physically skilled and strong enough to free-climb a sleek city office block. Determined enough to avenge the financial ruin and deaths of her parents. Yup, she’s a thoroughly modern girl. But Cat is…
Stripped down to bare basics, this is a straightforward, high velocity, heavy calibre action thriller. An uncomplicated romp, it kicks off locked and loaded and barely grabs a breath throughout. Travis Kain is a semi-retired killer from the Jason Bourne school of assassins. (Rogue agents are all the rage right now: there’s another couple…
The dead bodies are really starting to stack up! There are just too many excellent new crime-thrillers and murder mysteries to cram into one update this month. So here’s an initial assortment of killer priests, Nordic noir, American blues, black comedy, private eyes, psychological thrillers, Scandi crime and savage assassins. Look out for more next…
Alexandria Thorne is a disgraced special agent who’s given one last chance to get back on the right side of the unreliable men from the ministry. An arms dealer has been kidnapped in Belarus and Alex can rehabilitate herself by leading the rescue effort. More importantly, there’s a shadowy Russian figure from her family’s…
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