2010: #59 – Cleanskin (Val McDermid)

When career criminal Jack Farlowe’s body is found washed-up on a Suffolk shore, it looks to the police like a clear-cut case. Broken-hearted at his daughter’s death, he has drowned himself – good riddance and one less crime to solve, according to CID.Then again, maybe not. For, one by one, Farlowe’s enemies are being killed. And the horrific manner of their deaths makes drowning look like a day at the beach.

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2010: #50 – Voices (Arnaldur Indridason)

Arnaldur Indridason took the international crime fiction scene by storm after winning England’s CWA Gold Dagger Award for Silence of the Grave. Now, with the highly anticipated Voices, this world-class sensation treats American readers to another extraordinary Inspector Erlendur Sveinsson thriller.

The Christmas rush is at its peak in a grand Reykjavík hotel when Inspector Erlendur Sveinsson is called in to investigate a murder. The hotel Santa has been stabbed, and Erlendur and his detective colleagues have no shortage of suspects between hotel staff and the international travelers staying for the holidays.

But then a shocking secret surfaces. As Christmas Day approaches, Erlendur must deal with his difficult daughter, pursue a possible romantic interest, and untangle a long-buried web of malice and greed to find the murderer.

One of Indridason’s most accomplished works to date, Voices is sure to win him a multitude of new American suspense fans.

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2010: #23 – Black Seconds (Karin Fossum)

Ida Joner gets on her brand-new bike and sets off toward town. A good-natured, happy girl, she is looking forward to her tenth birthday. Thirty-five minutes after Ida should have come home, her mother starts to worry. She phones store owners, Ida’s friends, anyone who could have seen her. But no one has.

Suspicion immediately falls on Emil Mork, a local character who lives alone and hasn’t spoken since childhood. His mother insists on cleaning his house weekly—although she’s sometimes afraid of what she might find there. A mother’s worst nightmare in either case: to lose a child or to think a child capable of murder. As Ida’s relatives reach the breaking point and the media frenzy surrounding the case begins, Inspector Konrad Sejer is his usual calm and reassuring self. But he’s puzzled. And disturbed. This is the strangest case he’s seen in years.

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