A Peculiar Combination

December 1, 2020

Haines's Independent Bones features PI Sarah Booth Delaney, caught up with protecting a visiting professor of Greek literature at Ole Miss whose radical feminism may have sparked murder (40,000-copy first printing). In Jonasson's latest, Una is teaching in a remote Icelandic village when she discovers dark secrets the polite if distant villages have kept hidden for generations--perhaps involving The Girl Who Died (50,000-copy first printing). A peasant girl is murdered in a northern Chinese village, and exiled inspector Lu Fei takes the case in Klingborg's Thief of Souls (75,000-copy first printing). Brought back by Lupica in 2018, PI Sunny Randall investigates the suicide of best friend Spike's 20-year old niece in Robert B. Parker's Payback. In 1910, a senior barrister is found dead in a notorious London slum, and junior barrister Daniel Pitt endangers his family by investigating in Perry's Death with a Double Edge. In Walker's The Coldest Case, applying the facial reconstruction tools used on ancient skulls to the skull of a long-dead murder victim leads Bruno, chief of police in fictional town in the Dordogne, to the activities of a Cold War-era Communist organization. With A Peculiar Combination, Louisiana librarian Weaver detours from her beloved Amory Ames books to launch a new series starring Electra "Ellie" McDonnell, who cracks safes with locksmith uncle Mick to make ends meet in World War II England and agrees to help the government when she's caught (40,000-copy first printing).

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February 15, 2021
A clever young woman's criminal lifestyle improbably puts her on the road to redemption in this exciting World War II series debut from Weaver. Electra McDonnell was born in the prison where her mother died before she could be hanged for a murder Ellie's convinced she didn't commit. Raised by her Uncle Mick, she became part of the burglary squad her family ran as a sideline from their legitimate locksmithing business. Then, one night, while they're opening a safe in a house that's supposed to be deserted--they'd been told there would be jewelry there--Ellie and Mick discover that they've been set up. They're given the choice of working for the British government or going to jail. Mick and Ellie may be thieves, but they're also patriots, and with Britain locked in war with Germany, Ellie's happy to try cracking a safe that contains classified documents that have been stolen. Imperious Maj. Ramsey, who's running the operation, introduces Ellie to a whole new world. Ellie and Ramsey enter a house whose safe is supposed to contain the documents only to find the safe open and a man lying dead on the floor. Still on the trail and enjoying a bit more of Ramsey's trust, Ellie's outfitted to pose as Ramsey's date while they attend a party at the mansion of suspected German sympathizer Sir Nigel Randolf. During a lecture, they sneak off to Randolf's study, where Ellie easily opens another safe but finds nothing of interest. Sparks fly when Ellie and Ramsey recognize their attraction to each other as Ellie continues to help Ramsey in a desperate search for those documents. Brave Ellie and her aristocratic love should appeal to fans of Susan Elia MacNeal and Tessa Arlen.

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May 1, 2021
The heroine of this projected series, set in the UK during WWII, is a talented safecracker recruited by the British government to find and deliver sensitive documents. Electra McDonnell learned her trade from her uncle, a locksmith forced to turn safecracker during the Depression. Safecracking, involving mental and manual dexterity, with a kick of immediate danger thrown in, greatly appeals to both of them, especially during the blackout nights of London in 1940, when any potential target home might or might not be occupied. Electra and Uncle Mick are caught plying their trade one night and blackmailed by the government into finding the right combinations for safes that may hold crucial documents, including some that could reveal the identities of German spies. Weaver constructs excruciatingly suspenseful scenes throughout, starting with Electra's attending a high-end party under false pretenses and finding the safe gaping open, with a suspected double agent lying dead on the floor. This is a well-constructed historical spy story with plenty of romance, intriguing period details, and fascinating insights into the nitty gritties of safecracking.

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