MARK TURNER wallows in the virtuosity of Swansea Jazz Festival openers, Simon Spillett and Pete Long
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Crime Fiction with Mat Coward: April 4, 2022
New titles from Louise Hare, Christobel Kent, Cate Ray and Peter Lovesey
PAUL DONOVAN recommends three new books that explore the human relationship with nature
Doomed adolescents, when the missing person is you, classic whodunnit, and an anti-capitalist eco-thriller
WILL STONE takes a ticket to indie disco heaven, but misses the rarely performed tunes
Reviews of new releases by Jens Lekman, Big Thief, and Christian McBride Big Band
TOM PIERSCIONEK recommends a remarkable series of interviews with those few and brave Israeli citizens who refuse to do military service
LENA is a struggling London club singer in the 1930s in Miss Aldridge Regrets by Louise Hare (HQ, £14.99), who receives an out-of-the-blue offer to take up a potentially career-making role in New York. The timing is convenient, as she has an urgent reason to vanish from her usual haunts for a while and a first-class cabin on the Queen Mary sounds like a good spot in which to lie low.
People warn her that the US may not be a safe place for a black woman, but Lena is confident that her dark looks can pass for Mediterranean. When a murder takes place on board which has echoes of the event from which she is fleeing, it’s clear someone is setting Lena up as a scapegoat in a dynastic power play.
A golden age ocean liner is a great setting for a whodunnit, and Hare has also created a delightful central character.
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