The Upper World by Femi Fadugba
Femi Fadugba , Penguin , Sci-Fi , Thriller / August 19, 2021

IF YOU HAD THE CHANCE TO CHANGE YOUR FUTURE WOULD YOU TAKE IT? Esso is running out of time and into trouble. After he is accidentally caught up in a gang war, he is haunted by a vision of a bullet fired in an alleyway with devastating consequences. A generation later, fifteen-year-old football prodigy Rhia is desperately searching for answers - and a catastrophic moment from the past holds the key to understanding the parents she never ...

The Final Girl Support Group by Grady Hendrix
Grady Hendrix , Horror , Titan Books / August 7, 2021

In horror movies, the final girl is the one who's left standing when the credits roll. The one who fought back, defeated the killer, and avenged her friends. The one who emerges bloodied but victorious. But after the sirens fade and the audience moves on, what happens to her? Lynnette Tarkington is a real-life final girl who survived a massacre twenty-two years ago, and it has defined every day of her life since. And she's not alone. Fo...

Dog Rose Dirt by Jen Williams
Crime , Harper Collins , Jen Williams , Thriller / July 30, 2021

When prodigal daughter Heather Evans returns to her family home after her mother's baffling suicide, she makes an alarming discovery--stacks and stacks of carefully preserved letters from notorious serial killer Michael Reave. The "Red Wolf," as he was dubbed by the press, has been in prison for over twenty years, serving a life sentence for the gruesome and ritualistic murders of several women across the country, although he has always...

Notes From The Burning Age by Claire North
Claire North , Orbit , Thriller / July 22, 2021

Ven was once a holy man, a keeper of ancient archives. It was his duty to interpret archaic texts, sorting useful knowledge from the heretical ideas of the Burning Age—a time of excess and climate disaster. For in Ven's world, such material must be closely guarded so that the ills that led to that cataclysmic era can never be repeated. But when the revolutionary Brotherhood approaches Ven, pressuring him to translate stolen writings t...

The Dying Squad by Adam Simcox
Adam Simcox , Crime , Gollancz , Supernatural / July 15, 2021

WHO BETTER TO SOLVE A MURDER THAN A DEAD DETECTIVE? When Detective Inspector Joe Lazarus storms a Lincolnshire farmhouse, he expects to bring down a notorious drug gang; instead, he discovers his own body and a spirit guide called Daisy-May. She's there to enlist him to The Dying Squad, a spectral police force who solve crimes their flesh and blood counterparts cannot. Lazarus reluctantly accepts and returns to the Lincolnshire Badlands...

The 22 Murders of Madison May by Max Barry
Hodder , Max Barry , Sci-Fi / July 12, 2021

I love you. In every world. Young real estate agent Madison May is shocked when a client at an open house says these words to her. The man, a stranger, seems to know far too much about her, and professes his love--shortly before he murders her. Felicity Staples hates reporting on murders. As a journalist for a midsize New York City paper, she knows she must take on the assignment to research Madison May's shocking murder, but the crime ...

Wild Hunters by Stuart R Brogan

Amid the worst storm in living memory, five Royal Marine reservists and a handful of civilians battle to survive. But mother nature and the heavily armed mercenaries hunting them are the least of their concerns. A seemingly unstoppable Pagan force has been unleashed from the darkest depths of our ancient past - a phenomenon that will stop at nothing to see humanity reduced to ashes. Low on ammo, no chance of rescue and surrounded by the...

Scorpion by Christian Cantrell

Around the world, twenty-two people have been murdered. The victims fit no profile, the circumstances vary wildly, but one thing links them all: in every case the victim is branded with a number. With police around the globe floundering and unable to identify any pattern, let alone find a killer, CIA Analyst Quinn Mitchell is called in to investigate. Before long, Quinn is on the trail of an ice-hearted assassin with seemingly limitless...

Rabbits by Terry Miles
Macmillan , Sci-Fi , Terry Miles / June 10, 2021

It's an average work day. You've been wrapped up in a task, and you check the clock when you come up for air--4:44 pm. You go to check your email, and 44 unread messages have built up. With a shock, you realize it is April 4th--4/4. And when you get in your car to drive home, your odometer reads 44,444. Coincidence? Or have you just seen the edge of a rabbit hole? Rabbits is a mysterious alternate reality game so vast it uses our global...

Outbreak by Frank Gardner
Bantam Press , Frank Gardner , Thriller / June 4, 2021

Deep within the Arctic Circle, three scientists from the UK's Arctic Research Station trudge through a blizzard in search of shelter. They see a cabin ahead. It appears abandoned. No lights. No snowmobile outside. But as they push open the door, the smell hits them. Rank and foetid: there's something bad inside. Then movement. A man lies slumped, his face disfigured by livid pustules. Blood runs from his nostrils; his chest glistens bla...

Anna by Sammy H K Smith
Horror , Sammy H K Smith , Solaris / May 27, 2021

I’m going to preface this review with a warning. The themes explored in Anna are likely going to act as a trigger for some readers. There are elements to the narrative that cover the trauma of physical and mental abuse.  Beaten. Branded. Defiant. Anna is a possession. She is owned by the man named Will, shielded from the world of struggles by his care. He loves her, protects her, and then breaks her. Anna is obedient, dutiful, and co...

Priest of Gallows by Peter McLean

Please note, Priest of Gallows is the third novel in the War of the Rose Throne series. If you haven’t read Priest of Bones and Priest of Lies then what follows will likely contain some spoilery type stuff.  Gangster, soldier, priest. Queen's Man. Governor. Tomas Piety has everything he ever wanted. In public he's a wealthy, highly respected businessman, happily married to a beautiful woman and Governor of his home city of Ellinburg....

The Shadow of the Gods by John Gwynne
Fantasy , John Gwynne , Orbit / May 7, 2021

After the gods warred and drove themselves to extinction, the cataclysm of their fall shattered the land of Vigrið. Now a new world is rising, where power-hungry jarls feud and monsters stalk the woods and mountains. A world where the bones of the dead gods still hold great power for those brave - or desperate - enough to seek them out. Now, as whispers of war echo across the mountains and fjords, fate follows in the footsteps of three...