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SCIENCE FICTION

MYSTERIES & THRILLERS

Travis McGee wades into a sordid case of group sex and murder

Travis McGee wades into a sordid case of group sex and murder

Before there was Jack Reacher, there was Travis McGee. Lee Child, who created Reacher, has never been shy about the debt he owes. Neither have Carl Hiaasen, Dean Koontz, and a long list of other bestselling writers. Between 1964 and 1985, John D. MacDonald wrote 21 novels about...

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NONFICTION

Popular Fiction

Laughs in sci-fi? P. G. Wodehouse did humor better.

Laughs in sci-fi? P. G. Wodehouse did humor better.

The legendary English humorist Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse (1881-1975), known to readers as P. G., wrote about 100 books in a career that spanned much of the 20th century. His output included 71 novels, 24 collections of short stories, 42 plays, three memoirs, and a lot...

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Explore My “BEST OF the category” selections

WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE BOOK?

When people ask me that question, I never know what to say. In a lifetime of reading, I’ve read many thousands of books. And I’ve reviewed well over 2,000 of them on this site. Picking just one as a “favorite,” or even a handful of them, makes no sense to me.

The problem is, I read for many different reasons. Perhaps you do, too. And I read many different sorts of books. Mysteries and thrillers. Popular fiction, especially historical fiction. Science fiction. And nonfiction, history in particular. You’ll find hundreds of reviews in every one of those categories on this site.

Check out our rotating random selection here, culled from throughout this site.

Happy reading!

 

Corporate crime and political corruption are at the heart of Black Water Rising.

Corporate crime and political corruption dominate this promising debut

In her debut as a novelist, the award-winning mystery author Attica Locke explored themes of Black Power, trade union racism, corporate crime and political corruption. It's the stuff that might have elevated Black Water Rising into the ranks of Great American Novels. Although she fell short, the...
Cover image of "Journey to Munich" in 1938.

Maisie Dobbs, now a secret agent, travels to Munich in 1938

Few Americans have any appreciation for the complicated relationship between Britain and Germany in the run-up to World War II. The British royal family was German, having changed their name from Saxe-Coburg-Gotha to Windsor in World War I. In fact, King Edward VIII and his American wife, Wallis...
Cover image of "Secret Service," the first in a series of British spy novels

Is Britain about to elect a Russian spy as Prime Minister?

Spy novels are full of stories about the hunt for moles in the CIA, MI6, and other intelligence agencies. It's less common to come across a tale in which the mole is embedded in the uppermost reaches of the political establishment. And perhaps that's no coincidence. Authors of spy literature are...
Cover image of "The Umbrella Man," one of the Singapore detective novels

Investigating a terrorist bombing in Singapore

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes Just imagine: three enormous bombs explode almost simultaneously, destroying the three largest American-owned hotels on Singapore's busiest thoroughfare. The heart of the city now lies in ruins. And Inspector Samuel Tay of the Singapore police lies in the rubble,...
Cover image of "All the Sinners Bleed," one of the best small-town mysteries

The 10 best small-town mysteries and thrillers

Setting a novel of suspense in a small town offers a writer several advantages. And those advantages multiply when the book is one in a series. Many of those in the cast of characters become familiar over time. They, and not just the investigator, as in an urban-based series, may come across as...
Jimmy the Kid is a comic caper novel.

A kidnapping tale from the master of the comic caper novel

In the course of his 75 years, Donald E. Westlake (1933-2008) published more than 100 novels and nonfiction books. He's best known for his comic stories about crime capers, especially the fourteen books in the Dortmunder series about (to crib a phrase from Jimmy Breslin) a "gang that couldn't...
Cover image of "The Collapsing Empire," the beginning of a new John Scalzi series

A promising start to a new John Scalzi series

It's not hard to see why John Scalzi has so many fans in the science fiction community. His writing is unusually accessible, frequently profane, and often funny. If anyone is writing expressly for the proverbial 14-year-old sci-fi fan, it's John Scalzi. And there's just enough of the...
My Not So Perfect Life is a great example of British humor.

“Chick lit?” Wikipedia thinks so. But oh, so funny!

Kate, Katie, or Cat Brenner is 26 years old. The name she uses depends on the circumstances. She grew up on a farm in rural Somerset, raised largely by her father after her mother died when Kate was very young. Her dream has been to work at a London branding agency, and finally she has managed to...
Cover image of "The Lacuna,"

Leon Trotsky, Diego Rivera, and the Red Scare

When years ago I read The Poisonwood Bible, I was flummoxed by its power and beauty. It was clear to me that Barbara Kingsolver possessed a fierce talent not just as a storyteller but also as a wordsmith and a reporter. Her vivid prose brought into high relief the tragic reality of life in...
Cover image of "Phantom Orbit," a novel about real war in space

War in space may be closer than you think

A real war in space might already have broken out in the skies above Ukraine. In Low Earth Orbit (LEO) a thousand miles up, some 4,000 Space X Starlink satellites share space with the International Space Station and the Hubble Telescope. As we learned in 2022, Ukraine's armed forces depended on...

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Mal Warwick - Book Reviews

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