“Yorkshire’s Answer to Inspector Morse”: Stuart Pawson’s D.I. Charlie Priest

Author of the D.I. Charlie Priest mysteries, British mystery writer Stuart Pawson began writing after a career as a mining electrical engineer and as a part-timer for the probation service. The latter work provides deep insights into the British criminal justice system, evident in his Charlies Priest mysteries, now thirteen strong and counting. The books have been referred to as “Yorkshire’s answer to Inspector Morse.” The series kicked off in 1995 with The Picasso Scam; latest is the 2010 A Very Private Murder.

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A Bloom for Every Crime: Kate Collins’ Flower Shop Mystery Series

Kate Collins is the author of the Flower Shop mystery series featuring Abby Knight, owner of Bloomers flower shop and an amateur sleuth. Abby has been center stage in ten novels in this popular, cozy, fast-paced series that began in 2004. Collins’s mystery novels have made the Barnes & Noble mass market mystery best-sellers’ lists, the Independent Booksellers’ best-seller’s lists, as well as booksellers’ lists in Australia and England.

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Iris Johansen’s Atlanta and Forensic Sculptor Eve Duncan

Bestselling author Iris Johansen turned from a successful career in contemporary romance novels and historical romances to writing crime fiction in 1991. Her novels featuring Atlanta, Georgia, forensic sculptor Eve Duncan began with the 1998 The Face of Deception. Eve has made ten more appearances since then, the most recent being last year’s Chasing the Night.

Eve is usually paired with her romantic interest, police detective Joe Quinn in these novels, along with a supporting cast of recurring characters. As Publishers Weekly noted, Johansen’s novels are known for their “flesh-and-blood characters, crackling dialogue and lean, suspenseful plotting,” while Booklist has called Johansen’s work “gripping and relevant.”

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“The UK Writ Small”–Graham Hurley’s DI Joe Faraday Novels and the Island City of Portsmouth

Graham Hurley is an award-winning former director and producer of documentaries in England who finally made a long-time dream come true by turning to fiction writing in 1990. Since that time he has penned a score of novels, beginning with such popular stand-alone thrillers as Rules of Engagement, The Perfect Soldier, and Permissible Limits, and since 2000, with the Joe Faraday series. The eleventh in that series, Borrowed Light, was published in England last November.

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From Roman Noir to the Streets of 1940 San Francisco: The Novels of Kelli Stanley

Kelli Stanley is the acclaimed author of two very different series. Her “Roman noir” books are set in the first century AD and feature physician and sometime investigator Arcturus. The first in that series, Nox Dormienda: A Long Night for Sleeping (with a tip of the hat to Chandler’s The Big Sleep), was a Bruce Alexander Memorial Historical Mystery Award winner and a Macavity Award finalist. Kirkus Reviews thought that novel “takes the reader on a colorful tour of this singular culture high and low, from jails and brothels to the corridors of power. First-timer Stanley is sure-footed and enthusiastic about history … and crafts a satisfyingly intricate puzzle.” The second novel in the series, The Curse-Maker, is just out and finds Arcturus investigating a murder in the sacred spring at Bath, Brittanica. Booklist noted of this second installment: “Stanley serves up fascinating and never heavy-handed information on Roman life.”

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