Raleigh News & Observer Logo

Secrets, cold cases and serial killers populate four new mysteries | Raleigh News & Observer

×
  • E-edition
    • Customer Service
    • Support
    • Contact Us
    • About Us
    • FAQ
    • Sponsorships
    • Stay connected
    • Mobile & Apps
    • Facebook
    • Google+
    • Instagram
    • Twitter
    • Social Media Directory
    • N&O Store
    • Buy Photos
    • Databases
    • Archives
    • Newsletters

    • Blogs
    • Columnists
    • Crime
    • Education
    • Health
    • Local
    • North Carolina
    • Nation/World
    • Science
    • Thumbs Up
    • Traffic
    • Weather
    • Weird News
    • All News
    • Counties
    • Durham County
    • Johnston County
    • Orange County
    • Wake County
    • All Sports
    • Baseball
    • Canes
    • College
    • Columns & Blogs
    • High Schools
    • NASCAR & Auto Racing
    • NBA
    • NFL
    • NHL
    • Olympics
    • Outdoors
    • Panthers
    • Soccer
    • Schools
    • Duke
    • East Carolina
    • NC State
    • North Carolina
    • All Politics
    • The North Carolina Influencer Series
    • State Politics
    • Blogs
    • Columnists
    • PolitiFact
    • PolitiFact NC
    • Rob Christensen
    • Under the Dome
    • All Business
    • Blogs
    • Columnists
    • Health Care
    • Personal Finance
    • Real Estate
    • Shop Talk
    • Stocks Center
    • Technology
    • All Living
    • Video Now
    • Best-Kept Secrets
    • Blogs
    • Celebrations
    • Comics
    • Family
    • Fashion
    • Fitness
    • Food
    • Games and Puzzles
    • Home and Garden
    • Horoscopes
    • Mouthful
    • Past Times
    • Pets
    • Religion
    • Travel
    • Video Now
    • Arts News
    • ArtsNow
    • Books
    • Contests
    • Dining
    • Entertainment
    • Games
    • Movies
    • Music
    • Nightlife
    • Television
    • On the Beat
    • Happiness is a Warm TV
    • All Opinion
    • Columnists
    • Dwane Powell
    • Editorials
    • Influencers Opinion
    • Letters
    • Opinion Shop Blog
    • Other Views
    • Submit a Letter
  • Obituaries

    • Advertise with us
    • Place Ad
    • Apartments
    • Cars
    • Homes
    • Jobs
    • Legals
    • Obits/In Memoriams
    • Weddings
    • Today's Daily Deal
    • Special Sections
    • Today's Circulars
    • Rewards
    • Photo Store
  • Classifieds
  • Jobs
  • Moonlighting
  • Cars
  • Homes
  • Legals

Books

Secrets, cold cases and serial killers populate four new mysteries

By Salem Macknee

smacknee@mcclatchy.com

    ORDER REPRINT →

February 09, 2017 12:05 PM

“Universal Harvester” by John Darnielle. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 224 pages.

John Darnielle, of the band The Mountain Goats, earned lots of notice for his first novel, “Wolf in White Van,” a disquieting story about a disfigured gamemaster. His second, “Universal Harvester,” is an equally eerie story about enigmatic video clips inserted into VHS films.

Jeremy, a video store clerk in a small Iowa town, starts hearing of the clips from his customers when they return the films, and when he shows his boss the grainy black-and white scenes that have been spliced into the movies, she suddenly stops coming to work, giving Jeremy two odd situations to deal with.

Darnielle writes beautifully here about families and small-town life, and often slips into a narrative style reminiscent of the Stage Manager in “Our Town,” musing about how the story might go.

Sign Up and Save

Get six months of free digital access to The News & Observer

SUBSCRIBE WITH GOOGLE

#ReadLocal

He builds a deep sense of foreboding by giving pieces of the puzzle in such a way that you really can’t see the solution until that final piece is in place.

“The Crow Trap,” by Ann Cleeves. Minotaur, 560 pages. (Paperback)

Here’s a treat for fans of Vera Stanhope: Ann Cleeves’ first Vera mystery, published in 1999 in the U.K. but never in a U.S. edition until now. The stout, abrasive detective as usual appears about halfway through the story, after Cleeves has spent time letting us get to know the victims and suspects. Three women doing environmental sampling for a quarry project are staying in a rustic cottage where Vera has history, it turns out. They each brought secrets into the mix that dovetail with the others’ and with the surrounding community’s as well. A suicide opens the story, and after our leisurely introduction to them, one of the researchers is found dead. Enjoy!

“Lucidity,” by David Carnoy. Overlook, 288 pages.

A woman who is pushed into traffic on a New York street wakes up from her coma and says a few groggy words that connect her to a cold case in California.

That connection a continent away is made because an ear-perking amount of money has been pledged for solving the cold case. So wheeler-dealer Max Fremmer reaches out to the retired detective looking into a 20-year-old disappearance, and together they try to prove they’ve found the missing woman.

I enjoyed the humanity David Carnoy gave to characters who could easily have been pure cliche, like the sharp-talking New Yorker.

“A Darkness Absolute,” by Kelley Armstrong. Minotaur, 416 pages.

Casey Duncan, a policewoman in an off-the-grid town in the Canadian wilderness, deals with crimes that are not just rural but backwoods weird, like chasing a crazed resident out into the forest but instead finding, in whiteout conditions, a missing-presumed-dead woman captive in a deep cave.

When police find bodies that seem to belong to two previous victims, they realize they have a serial abductor who may already be stalking his next victim – but is it one of the townspeople or one of the “characters” more at home in the deep woods?

  Comments  

Videos

Raleigh architect Frank Harmon sketches to see, and remember

New NC Poet Laureate Jaki Shelton Green on becoming a writer

View More Video

Trending Stories

NC judge throws out voter ID and income tax constitutional amendments

February 22, 2019 05:38 PM

If the shoe splits, repair it: Nike execs fly in for impromptu talks at Duke

February 21, 2019 08:12 PM

What in the world happened to Zion Williamson’s shoe? A sneaker expert weighs in.

February 21, 2019 05:15 PM

Will Zion Williamson play again for Duke? He’s listed as ‘day-to-day.’

February 21, 2019 04:43 PM

Syracuse basketball coach Jim Boeheim struck and killed a man on Interstate

February 21, 2019 09:54 AM

Read Next

Books

This week’s best-sellers from Publishers Weekly

Tribune News Service

    ORDER REPRINT →

February 21, 2019 03:00 AM

Here are the best-sellers for the week that ended Saturday, Feb. 16, compiled from data from independent and chain bookstores, book wholesalers and independent distributors nationwide, powered by NPD BookScan (c) 2019 NPD Group.

KEEP READING

Sign Up and Save

#ReadLocal

Get six months of free digital access to The News & Observer

SUBSCRIBE WITH GOOGLE

MORE BOOKS

Books

Facebook decided which users are interested in Nazis – and let advertisers target them directly

February 21, 2019 03:00 AM

Books

Top 25: What corporate America is reading – January 2019

February 21, 2019 03:00 AM

Books

These books-turned-movies – including ‘Where’d You Go, Bernadette’ – are coming to screens near you

February 20, 2019 03:00 AM

Books

Seattle author Tara Conklin’s ‘The Last Romantics’ is a lovely page-turner, shadowed with loss

February 20, 2019 03:00 AM

Books

Book review: John Rebus butts in on Edinburgh case in new Ian Rankin novel

February 20, 2019 03:00 AM

Books

Review: ‘The Museum of Modern Love,’ by Heather Rose

February 20, 2019 03:00 AM
Take Us With You

Real-time updates and all local stories you want right in the palm of your hand.

Icon for mobile apps

Raleigh News & Observer App

View Newsletters

Subscriptions
  • Start a Subscription
  • Customer Service
  • eEdition
  • Vacation Hold
  • Pay Your Bill
  • Rewards
Learn More
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Newsletters
  • News in Education
  • Triangletoday.com
  • Legal Notices
Advertising
  • Advertise With Us
  • About Our Ads
  • Place a Classified
  • Local Deals
  • N&O Store
  • N&O Photos
Copyright
Commenting Policy
Report News
Privacy Policy
Terms of Use


Back to Story