Reviews Archives - Criminal Element -- Login / Register Search for: -- Search for: Read Excerpts Reviews Author Spotlight Essays Interviews Book Listicles On-Screen Television Film Trailers Cooking the Books Newsletter Login / Register Reviews Book Review: We Had a Hunch by Tom Ryan By John Valeri November 4, 2025 All aboard the twisty, turny Tom Ryan train! If you haven’t yet gotten your ticket punched, now is the time. A screenwriter and producer, Ryan is also the author of two young adult mysteries. The first, Keep This to Yourself, won the 2020 ITW Thriller Award for Best YA Thriller, while the second, I Hope… Book Review: The Board by Katy Farber By Doreen Sheridan October 15, 2025 When Liv Wilcox moves to New Hampshire, it’s with a fresh start in mind. She’s quit her job and divorced her husband, and is intent on making a new life for herself and her daughter Piper in the house that she’s recently inherited from her late Aunt Esther. Staying in the small town of Whitebridge… Book Review: Colin Gets Promoted and Dooms the World by Mark Waddell By Jeff Ayers October 15, 2025 Colin works for a company called Dark Enterprises, which is involved in the dark forces that lurk behind the scenes. Employees routinely die under accidental circumstances or are executed for failure to live up to the high standards demanded of management. Colin is on the lowest rung of the corporate ladder, and his direct supervisor… Book Review: All This Could Be Yours by Hank Phillippi Ryan By Janet Webb October 14, 2025 Debut author Tessa Calloway is in an enviable position: her book, All This Could Be Yours, is the flavor of the month. How did Tessa pull this off?  Three years earlier, emboldened by her connection to the #MomsWithDreams cyber-community, Tessa made the irrevocable decision to jettison her high-powered job. Readers will be reminded of poet… Book Review: The Black Wolf by Louise Penny By Janet Webb October 7, 2025 It isn’t always necessary to read every book in a mystery series to understand the overarching plot and the characters, but that’s not true of The Black Wolf. A sense of what happened in The Grey Wolf is required to understand the thriller that completes the story arc. Can there be a worse feeling for… Book Review: Play Nice by Rachel Harrison By Doreen Sheridan October 6, 2025 Clio Barnes is living the high life in New York City as a young and beautiful fashion influencer when she gets a phone call that changes everything. Her mother, Alexandra, has been found dead in the house where they lived after Alexandra’s messy divorce from Clio and her sisters’ father. Now the Barnes sisters are… Book Review: You Are the Detective: The Creeping Hand Murder by Maureen Johnson & Jay Cooper By John Valeri October 2, 2025 New York Times bestselling author Maureen Johnson (the Truly Devious/Stevie Bell series) and illustrator Jay Cooper (The Spy Next Door)—each distinguished in their respective fields of words and/or imagery—just may be the proverbial partners in crime. Longtime friends, the two first collaborated on 2021’s Your Guide to Not Getting Murdered in a Quaint English Village—a… Book Review: A Spell to Wake the Dead by Nicole Lesperance By Doreen Sheridan September 30, 2025 Mazzy and Nora have been best friends since they were little girls. With their other friend Elliot, they’ve been a tight little trio since seventh grade, even if Elliot doesn’t quite believe in the witchcraft that the teenage girls have immersed themselves in. He’s happy to come along for the ride, however, and hang out… Book Review: The Killing Stones by Ann Cleeves By Janet Webb September 29, 2025 Readers were so disappointed when Ann Cleeves’ Shetland series ended. They were not ready to say cheers enoo to Detective Inspector Jimmy Perez after Wild Fire, the final Shetland book. Ann Cleeves’ new series features Willow Reeves and Jimmy Perez, now a firmly established couple. They live in Orkney, “the group of islands, off the… Book Review: Framed in Death by J.D. Robb By Janet Webb September 17, 2025 In Death, J.D. Robb’s futuristic police procedural series, set in the second half of the 21st century, has maintained its best seller status for thirty years. What has readers hooked? The number one reason is the eternally fascinating character of Lt. Eve Dallas. She rose from detective to lieutenant; she’s now “in charge of a… 1 2 3 … 15 Next Page » About Advertise With Us Terms of Use Privacy Notice Your Privacy Choices Contact Us Site Powered by Supadu The owner of this website has made a commitment to accessibility and inclusion, please report any problems that you encounter using the contact form on this website. This site uses the WP ADA Compliance Check plugin to enhance accessibility.