HERE’s a string of descriptors I’ve never used before: Samir Machado de Machado’s novella The Good Nazi (Pushkin Vertigo, £12.99) is a Brazilian whodunnit set on a 1933 Zeppelin flight, against a background of gay people’s struggle for survival in the early days of Nazi Germany.

It’s a grim topic — especially as the readers, unlike the characters, know how much worse is to come — but out of it Machado has made a fine entertainment. A murder in mid-air is inherently intriguing, and the eventual explanation displays appropriate chutzpah. At the same time the book works well as a historical and a political novel. Not bad for just 156 pages.

The title is explained by the final words, so I won’t give that away except to say that I think most Star readers will smile in agreement.

Unemployed and divorced — and minus his best friend, who was the cause of the divorce — tech entrepreneur Harry seeks a new start in a peaceful Sussex village. He’s hoping to continue work on his greatest project: a wearable device which allows the user to detoxify traumatic memories by reliving them.

However, he’s no sooner off the train, in Freebourne by Salman Shaheen (Roundfire Books, £14.99), than he discovers a dead body. Since Harry’s the only stranger in a town where murder is unheard of, the police promptly adopt him as chief suspect. But there’s something more sinister than a simple killing going on here.

This mixture of whodunnit, conspiracy thriller and dystopia makes for a gripping read — and one with some thought-provoking things to say about free will and justice.

A Christmas blizzard, a power cut, no phone reception, and an enforced overnighter in a remote Norfolk mansion full of secrets — a formula that rarely fails, and certainly doesn’t in Dead of Winter by Keri Beevis (Boldwood Books, £12.99). Lola, adopted at birth, just wanted to meet her only surviving blood relative, a reclusive brother. But now she just wants to survive until morning.

The plot is a twistaholic’s delight, with a fresh surprise in almost every chapter.

Twenty years ago Ken Bruen and Jason Starr decided to write a caper about a character as outrageous as they could make him, and the resultant cult trilogy is now collected for the first time, as Supermax (Hard Case Crime, £10.99).

The titular New York businessman, who starts out with the relatively humble ambition of hiring a hitman to murder his wife so he can marry his Irish mistress, is soon surrounded by characters who almost make even Max look restrained and decent. Almost — but, really not at all.

This is indeed, as advertised, noir fiction without any restraints; relentlessly violent, obscene and amoral, it’s 600 pages of hilarity verging on hysteria. If that is the kind of thing you like then, firstly, you’ll love this. And secondly, don’t forget you’ve to sign in at the police station once a week or they’ll put you away again.