New Leaf Nominations for November • If Books Could Kill, Thrilling Stories

[CRussel]

Hello and Welcome to the New Leaf Book Club's November Book Nomination thread where we nominate the books that we'd like the New Leaf Book Club to consider reading in November, 2020. The theme is If Books Could Kill, Thrilling Stories .

Everyone is welcome to join the nomination process even if they'd rather lurk during the voting and discussion; if that is still a little too much commitment, please feel free to suggest titles without making a formal nomination. Also, don't sweat the links. Yes, it's helpful to check availability and prices before nominating in order to eliminate anything that's out of the question, but ultimately our global members with different gadgets and preferences will have to check for themselves.

The nominations will run through 9 AM Pacific, October 7, 2020. Each nomination requires a second to make it to the poll, which will remain open for three days. The discussion of the selection will start on November 15, 2020.

And don't forget to join us for the discussion of The Secret Life of Bletchley Park: The WWII Codebreaking Centre and the Men and Women Who Worked There , our October selection. That discussion starts on Thursday, October 15th. (Or whenever I manage to get the discussion thread up!)

Any questions? See the FAQ below, or just ask!

FAQs for the Nomination, Selection and Discussion process

General Guidelines for the New Leaf Book Club

Official choices with two nominations:

• Friday the Rabbi Slept Late by Harry Kemelman (JSWolf,astrangerhere)
  Spoiler:

  David Small is the new rabbi in the small Massachusetts town of Barnard’s Crossing. Although he’d rather spend his days engaged in Torah study and theological debate, the daily chores of synagogue life are all-consuming—that is, until the day a nanny’s body is found on the rain-soaked asphalt of the temple’s parking lot.
  
  When the young woman’s purse is discovered in Rabbi Small’s car, he will have to use his scholarly skills and Talmudic wisdom—and collaborate with the Irish-Catholic police chief—to exonerate himself and find the real killer.
  
  Blending this unorthodox sleuth’s quick intellect with thrilling action, Friday the Rabbi Slept Late is the exciting first installment of the beloved bestselling mystery series that offers a Jewish twist on the clerical mystery, a delightful discovery for fans of Father Brown and Father Dowling or readers of Faye Kellerman’s suspense novels set in the Orthodox community.

  208 pp.
• The Girl in the Ice by Robert Bryndza(gmw,Luffy)
  Spoiler:

  Originally Posted by Goodreads

  Detective Erika Foster#1
  When a young boy discovers the body of a woman beneath a thick sheet of ice in a South London park, Detective Erika Foster is called in to lead the murder investigation.
  
  The victim, a beautiful young socialite, appeared to have the perfect life. Yet when Erika begins to dig deeper, she starts to connect the dots between the murder and the killings of three prostitutes, all found strangled, hands bound and dumped in water around London.
  
  What dark secrets is the girl in the ice hiding?
  
  As Erika inches closer to uncovering the truth, the killer is closing in on Erika.
  
  The last investigation Erika led went badly wrong… resulting in the death of her husband. With her career hanging by a thread, Erika must now battle her own personal demons as well as a killer more deadly than any she’s faced before. But will she get to him before he strikes again?

  417 pp.
  
• Still Life by Louise Penny (CRussel,JSWolf)
  Spoiler:

  Originally Posted by Goodreads

  As the early morning mist clears on Thanksgiving Sunday, the homes of Three Pines come to life - all except one…
  
  To locals, the village is a safe haven. So they are bewildered when a well-loved member of the community is found lying dead in the maple woods. Surely it was an accident - a hunter's arrow gone astray. Who could want Jane Neal dead?
  
  In a long and distinguished career with the Sûreté du Quebec, Chief Inspector Armand Gamache has learned to look for snakes in Eden. Gamache knows something dark is lurking behind the white picket fences, and if he watches closely enough, Three Pines will begin to give up its secrets…

  (Canada, 2005, 321 pp.)
  
• Casino Royale, by Ian Fleming (Victoria, issybird)
  Spoiler:

  Originally Posted by wikipedia

  The story concerns the British secret agent James Bond, gambling at the casino in Royale-les-Eaux to bankrupt Le Chiffre, the treasurer of a French union and a member of the Russian secret service. Bond is supported in his endeavours by Vesper Lynd, a member of his own service, as well as Felix Leiter of the CIA and René Mathis of the French Deuxième Bureau. Fleming used his wartime experiences as a member of the Naval Intelligence Division, and the people he met during his work, to provide plot elements; the character of Bond also reflected many of Fleming's personal tastes. Fleming wrote the draft in early 1952 at his Goldeneye estate in Jamaica while awaiting his marriage. He was initially unsure whether the work was suitable for publication, but was assured by his friend, the novelist William Plomer, that the novel had promise.
  
  Within the spy storyline, Casino Royale deals with themes of Britain's position in the world, particularly the relationship with the US in light of the defections to the Soviet Union of the British agents Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean. The book was given broadly positive reviews by critics at the time and sold out in less than a month after its UK release on 13 April 1953...

  (GB, 1953, 220 pp.)
  
• A Killer in King's Cove, by Iona Whishaw (CRussel,Victoria)
  Spoiler:

  Originally Posted by Goodreads

  It is 1946, and war-weary young ex-intelligence officer Lane Winslow leaves London to look for a fresh start. When she finds herself happily settled into a sleepy hamlet nestled in the idyllic interior of British Columbia surrounded by a suitably eclectic cast of small-town characters she feels like she may finally be able to put her past to rest.
  
  But then a body is discovered, the victim of murder, and although she works alongside the town’s inspectors Darling and Ames to discover who might have possibly have motivation to kill, she unknowingly casts doubt on herself. As the investigation reveals facts that she has desperately tried to keep a secret, it threatens to pull her into a vortex of even greater losses than the ones she has already endured.
  
  A clever postwar mystery that will appeal to fan of historical mysteries with women sleuths like the Maisie Dobbs series by Jacqueline Winspear or the Bess Crawford series by Charles Todd.

  (Canada, 2015, 432 pp.)
  
• Dragonwyck by Anya Seton (Catlady,BookwormGirl)
  Spoiler:

  A novel of seduction, mystery, and danger set in New York’s Hudson Valley in the nineteenth century, by the author of Foxfire.
  
  There was, on the Hudson, a way of life such as this, and there was a house not unlike Dragonwyck . . .
  
  In the spring of 1844, the Wells family receives a letter from a distant relative, the wealthy landowner Nicholas Van Ryn. He has invited one of their daughters for an extended visit at his Hudson Valley estate, Dragonwyck. Eighteen-year-old Miranda, bored with her local suitors and commonplace life on the farm, leaps at the chance for an escape. She immediately falls under the spell of both the master and his mansion, mesmerized by the Gothic towers, flowering gardens, and luxurious lifestyle—but unaware of the dark, terrible secrets that await.
  
  Anya Seton masterfully tells the heart-stopping story of a remarkable woman, her remarkable passions, and the mystery that resides in the magnificent hallways of Dragonwyck.

  (USA, 1944, 419 pp.)
  
• A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness (John F, BookwormGirl)
  Spoiler:

  Deborah Harkness’s sparkling debut, A Discovery of Witches, has brought her into the spotlight and galvanized fans around the world. In this tale of passion and obsession, Diana Bishop, a young scholar and a descendant of witches, discovers a long-lost and enchanted alchemical manuscript, Ashmole 782, deep in Oxford's Bodleian Library. Its reappearance summons a fantastical underworld, which she navigates with her leading man, vampire geneticist Matthew Clairmont.

  594 pp.
  
• The Loney by Andrew Michael Hurley (Bookworm_Girl,gmw)
  Spoiler:

  Originally Posted by Amazon

  When Smith was a boy, he and his family went on an Easter pilgrimage with their local parish to the Loney, a bleak stretch of the English coastline, to visit an ancient shrine, in search of healing for Smith’s disabled brother. But the locals were none too pleased to welcome them, and the two brothers soon became entangled in a troubling morass of dangerous rituals. For years after, Smith carries the burden of what happened that spring. And when he hears that the body of a young child has been found during a storm at the Loney, he’s forced to reckon with his darkest secrets, no matter the cost. “The masterpiece by which Hurley will enter the Guild of the Gothic” (Guardian), The Loney marks the arrival of a remarkable new talent.

  (GB, 2015, 369 pp.)

[CRussel]

Nominations awaiting a second:

[Catlady]

Your forgot to change the author for the October selection--Sinclair McKay. Oops!

[Luffy]

I'm actually reading a book called If Books Could Kill, by Kate Carlisle.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Luffy

I'm actually reading a book called If Books Could Kill, by Kate Carlisle.

Too bad is't the 2nd book of a series or it would have been perfect to nominate.

[Luffy]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Too bad is't the 2nd book of a series or it would have been perfect to nominate.

Right. And it's a cozy so it wouldn't have won.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Luffy

Right. And it's a cozy so it wouldn't have won.

Given that what we are reading now is not a light book, I'd have voted for it.

Anyway, time to find something to nominate.

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by Catlady

Your forgot to change the author for the October selection--Sinclair McKay. Oops!

Oops! Thanks

[JSWolf]

I'm nominating something a bit different.

I'll nominate Friday the Rabbi Slept Late by Harry Kemelman.

David Small is the new rabbi in the small Massachusetts town of Barnard’s Crossing. Although he’d rather spend his days engaged in Torah study and theological debate, the daily chores of synagogue life are all-consuming—that is, until the day a nanny’s body is found on the rain-soaked asphalt of the temple’s parking lot.

When the young woman’s purse is discovered in Rabbi Small’s car, he will have to use his scholarly skills and Talmudic wisdom—and collaborate with the Irish-Catholic police chief—to exonerate himself and find the real killer.

Blending this unorthodox sleuth’s quick intellect with thrilling action, Friday the Rabbi Slept Late is the exciting first installment of the beloved bestselling mystery series that offers a Jewish twist on the clerical mystery, a delightful discovery for fans of Father Brown and Father Dowling or readers of Faye Kellerman’s suspense novels set in the Orthodox community.

Overdrive: https://www.overdrive.com/search?q=F...lassification=
Freading: https://newtonfreelibrary.freading.c...ate&type=basic
Hoopla: https://www.hoopladigital.com/search...ng&type=direct
Kobo US: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/search?qu...bbi+slept+late
Kobo UK: https://www.kobo.com/gb/en/search?qu...bbi+slept+late
eBooks.com US: https://www.ebooks.com/en-us/searcha...bbi+slept+late
eBooks.com UK: https://www.ebooks.com/en-gb/searcha...bbi+slept+late
Amazon US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00ZJZH6XK
Amazon UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00ZJZH6XK
Google Play UK: https://play.google.com/store/search...bbi+slept+late
Google Play US: https://play.google.com/store/search...ks&hl=en&gl=US

[astrangerhere]

I will second this.

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I'm nominating something a bit different.

I'll nominate Friday the Rabbi Slept Late by Harry Kemelman.


Overdrive: https://www.overdrive.com/search?q=F...lassification=
Freading: https://newtonfreelibrary.freading.c...ate&type=basic
Hoopla: https://www.hoopladigital.com/search...ng&type=direct
Kobo US: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/search?qu...bbi+slept+late
Kobo UK: https://www.kobo.com/gb/en/search?qu...bbi+slept+late
eBooks.com US: https://www.ebooks.com/en-us/searcha...bbi+slept+late
eBooks.com UK: https://www.ebooks.com/en-gb/searcha...bbi+slept+late
Amazon US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00ZJZH6XK
Amazon UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00ZJZH6XK
Google Play UK: https://play.google.com/store/search...bbi+slept+late
Google Play US: https://play.google.com/store/search...ks&hl=en&gl=US

[gmw]

So the following has been on my list for quite a while. I've read some of his humorous works and thoroughly enjoyed them (and even nominated one of them here), but I have not yet tried any of his murder mysteries, so...


I nominate The Girl in the Ice by Robert Bryndza (first of the Detective Erika Foster mysteries). (2016)

Blurb from Goodreads:

When a young boy discovers the body of a woman beneath a thick sheet of ice in a South London park, Detective Erika Foster is called in to lead the murder investigation.

The victim, a beautiful young socialite, appeared to have the perfect life. Yet when Erika begins to dig deeper, she starts to connect the dots between the murder and the killings of three prostitutes, all found strangled, hands bound and dumped in water around London.

What dark secrets is the girl in the ice hiding?

As Erika inches closer to uncovering the truth, the killer is closing in on Erika.

The last investigation Erika led went badly wrong… resulting in the death of her husband. With her career hanging by a thread, Erika must now battle her own personal demons as well as a killer more deadly than any she’s faced before. But will she get to him before he strikes again?

417 pages (357 ADE)

Example prices: Kobo US $2.99, Kobo CA $3.99, Kobo UK £1.99, Kobo AU $3.99.

[Luffy]

I second The Girl in the Ice by Robert Bryndza.

[Catlady]

I nominate Dragonwyck by Anya Seton (1944, 419 pp.).

A novel of seduction, mystery, and danger set in New York’s Hudson Valley in the nineteenth century, by the author of Foxfire.

There was, on the Hudson, a way of life such as this, and there was a house not unlike Dragonwyck . . .

In the spring of 1844, the Wells family receives a letter from a distant relative, the wealthy landowner Nicholas Van Ryn. He has invited one of their daughters for an extended visit at his Hudson Valley estate, Dragonwyck. Eighteen-year-old Miranda, bored with her local suitors and commonplace life on the farm, leaps at the chance for an escape. She immediately falls under the spell of both the master and his mansion, mesmerized by the Gothic towers, flowering gardens, and luxurious lifestyle—but unaware of the dark, terrible secrets that await.

Anya Seton masterfully tells the heart-stopping story of a remarkable woman, her remarkable passions, and the mystery that resides in the magnificent hallways of Dragonwyck.

Available in all relevant countries; available as e-book and audiobook; can be borrowed through Overdrive, Freading, Hoopla, and Scribd.

Amazon U.S., $2.99

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Too bad is't the 2nd book of a series or it would have been perfect to nominate.

It's still find to nominate. We don't require that folks nominate the first in a series, even though some people might hesitate to vote for a book that's not the first if they haven't already read that first. (Maybe even more so if they have, of course. )

We've had this discussion before, but it's important to reiterate that we don't restrict the nominations, nor do we denigrate ANY nomination. Full stop. Obviously, when a person nominates a book that is outside of the norm, it's useful for everyone if they add a note of explanation. For example, where a book is not the first, a simple "Yes, I know that [bookname] is the second in a series, but really, it reads fine as a standalone so don't sweat it if you haven't read the first" would be an appropriate explanation to reassure folks that they can jump right in at book #2.

A concrete example of this is a series like the Liaden Universe books where there are multiple entry points into the Universe as well as several that are standalone, and the first two books, chronologically, are not the place you want to start. (They're really, in some ways, prequels, and definitely better when you have already read one or more of the later books.)

[Victoria]

I nominate The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, by Alexander McCall Smith. I’ve not read it, but it was enormously popular when first published, so I thought it may be fun for us.

From Amazon:

This first novel in Alexander McCall Smith’s widely acclaimed The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series tells the story of the delightfully cunning and enormously engaging Precious Ramotswe, who is drawn to her profession to “help people with problems in their lives.” Immediately upon setting up shop in a small storefront in Gaborone, she is hired to track down a missing husband, uncover a con man, and follow a wayward daughter. But the case that tugs at her heart, and lands her in danger, is a missing eleven-year-old boy, who may have been snatched by witchdoctors.

The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency received two Booker Judges’ Special Recommendations and was voted one of the International Books of the Year and the Millennium by the Times Literary Supplement.

272 pages


Overdrive
Kindle $5.99 CA
Kobo $11.99 AUD; $7.99 USD; $5.99 CA; £4.99 GB