January 2017 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday, January 3, 2017. We will be discussing A Dark Anatomy by Robin Blake. This is the first book featuring Titus Cragg, a coroner and his doctor friend, Luke Fidelis.
The summary of the book from the author's website is: "The first Cragg and Fidelis mystery begins with Coroner Titus Cragg being called to the corpse of  a lady, the wife of the local squire, when it is found in the woods near Preston. Her throat has been cut. It is his job to call an inquest that will reach a right verdict, and the investigation that follows has a number of twists and turns as Cragg tries to discover the evidence the jury will need to consider. His friend Dr. Luke Fidelis provides medical and scientific knowledge and his wife Elizabeth gives him staunch moral support, in face of determined opposition to his methods from the town's corporation."
Join us in the Second Floor Meeting Room at 7:00 PM.
Have a Happy Holiday Season!

December 2016 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday December 6, 2016. We will discussing The Thin Woman by Dorothy Cannell. This is the first book featuring Ellie (Simons) Haskell.
From the publisher's website: "Terrified by the prospect of a weekend with her snobby relatives, overweight Ellie Simons decides to distract attention from her personal and professional failings by arriving with an adoring boyfriend in tow. Unfortunately, no such person exists. Enter Bentley t. Haskell, a devilishly handsome escort who willingly agrees to play the part -- for a fat fee. But Ellie and Bentley get far more than a miserable visit with relatives when a weekend with Ellie's eccentric family suddenly turns very, very deadly."
This book was selected by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association as one of the "100 Favorite Mysteries of the Twentieth Century."
We will be meeting in the Second Floor Meeting Room at 7:00 pm.

November 2016 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday November 1, 2016. We will be discussing Judgment Calls by Alafair Burke. This is the first book featuring Portland, Oregon Deputy District Attorney Samantha Kincaid. Alafair Burke is the daughter of writer James Lee Burke.

The book description from the author’s website is:” Deputy District Attorney Samantha Kincaid walks into her office in Portland’s Drug and Vice Division one Monday morning to find the sergeant of the police bureau’s vice unit waiting for her. A thirteen-year-old girl has been brutally attacked and left for dead on the city’s outskirts. Given the lack of evidence, most lawyers would settle for an assault charge; Samantha, unnerved by the viciousness of the crime, decides to go for attempted murder. But as she prepares for the trial, she uncovers a dangerous trail leading to a high-profile death penalty case, a prostitution ring of underage girls, and a possible serial killer. And she finds her judgment — not only in matters of the law but in her personal life — called into question.”

We will be meeting at 7:00 pm in the Library’s Second Floor Meeting Room.

October 2016 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday October 4, 2016. The book we will be discussing is Under a Silent Moon by Elizabeth Haynes. This is the first book featuring DCI Louisa (Lou) Smith.
The summary from the author's website is: "In the crisp, morning hours, the police are called to a suspected murder at a farm outside a small English village. A beautiful young woman has been found dead, blood all over the cottage she lives in. At the same time, police respond to a reported female suicide, where a car has fallen into a local quarry.
As DCI Louisa Smith and her team gather the evidence, they discover a link between these two women, a link which has sealed their dreadful fate one cold night, under a silent moon."
We will be meeting in the Second Floor meeting room at 7:00 PM.

September 2016 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday September 6, 2016. We will be discussing Little Face by Sophie Hannah. This psychological thriller is the first featuring detectives Simon Waterhouse and Charlie Zailer.

The summary from the publisher's website is: "Two-week-old Florence Fancourt hs been kidnapped and replaced with another infant -- or so claims her mother, Alice. Her father, David, insists that Alice is mistaken and the baby in the nursery is, indeed, Florence. Despite his protests, Alice calls in the police, who are unsure of what to think about her improbable story. Sergeant Charlotte "Charlie" Zailer thinks that Alice is "a mad bitch" (p. 32) suffering from postpartum depression and that she is wasting valuable police time. However, Detective Simon Waterhouse's instincts tell him a mother should know her own child -- shouldn't she?"

Join us in the Second Floor Meeting Room at 7:00 PM.

August 2016 Book Selection

The North Providence Mystery Book Club will be meeting on Tuesday August 2, 2016 at 7:00 PM. We will be reading The Informationist by Taylor Stevens. This book is the first in the series featuring Vanessa Michael Munroe, an investigator who deals with information.
The summary from the large print edition is: "Vanessa Munroe deals in information -- expensive information -- for corporations, heads of state, and anyone else who can pay. Born to missionary parents in lawless central Africa, Vanessa became the protege of an infamous gunrunner at fourteen, and earned the respect of dangerous men. After a decade of building a new life in Dallas, she's never looked back. Until now. Pulled into the mystery of a missing girl, Vanessa finds herself back in the land of her childhood, betrayed, cut off from civilization, and left for dead."
Join us in the Second Floor Meeting Room.

July 2016 Book Selection

The North Providence Mystery Book Club will meet on Tuesday, July 5, 2016. The book that will be discussed is, Dying in the Wool by Frances Brody. This is the first Kate Shackleton mystery.

The summary from the large print edition is: “Bridgestead is a peaceful spot: a babbling brook, rolling hills and a working mill at its heart. Pretty and remote, nothing exceptional happening… until the day the Master of the Mill Joshua Braithwaite goes missing in dramatic circumstances. Now Joshua’s daughter is getting married and wants to make one last attempt at finding her father --- and amateur sleuth Kate Shackleton has always love solving puzzles. But as she taps into the lives of the townsfolk, Kate opens a crack that some would kill to keep closed.” Join us the day after Independence Day in the Second Floor Meeting Room at 7:00 pm.

June 2016 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday June 7, 2016 when we will discuss, A Question of Guilt by Frances Fyfield. This is the first book in the Helen West series. Helen West is a prosecutor in Britain's Crown Prosecution Service, who works closely with Detective Superintendent Geoffrey Bailey.
From the book's dust jacket: "Eileen Cartwright is not just another rich, middle-aged widow. Cunning and evil, poisoned by a lifetime of love withheld, she has an unrivaled passion for revenge. When she falls in love with Michael Bernard, her solicitor, she cold-bloodily arranges for the murder of his wife. It is a crime that will claim many victims...Helen West is a Crown Prosecutor assigned to this disturbing, twisted case. In a system where polite antagonism between policemen and lawyers is the norm, she finds an unexpected ally in Detective Superintendent Geoffrey Bailey, a kindred soul immediately at home in the organized chaos of her office."
We will be meeting at 7:00 pm in the Second Floor Meeting Room.

May 2016 Book Selection

The North Providence Mystery Book Club will meet on Tuesday May 3, 2016 at 7:00 PM. We will be discussing, The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax by Dorothy Gilman. This is the first book in the Mrs. Pollifax series, in which, Emily Pollifax is an older CIA operative.
The book summary is: "Mrs. Virgil (Emily) Pollifax of Brunswick, New Jersey, was a widow with grown married children. She was tired of attending her Garden Club meetings. She wanted to do something good for her country. So, naturally, she became a CIA agent. She takes on a "job" in Mexico City. The assignment doesn't sound dangerous at first, but then, as often happens, soemthing goes wrong. Now our dear Mrs. Pollifax finds herself embroiled in a quite a hot Cold War-- and her country's enemies find themselves entangled with one feisty lady."
Join us in the 2nd Floor Meeting Room on the 3rd.

April 2016 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday, April 5, 2016 when we will discuss Keeper of Lost Causes by Jussi Adler-Olsen. This is the first book in the Department Q series featuring Inspector Carl Morck, a police detective in Copenhagen, Denmark. Department Q is the cold case squad.
The description from the publisher's website: "Carl Morck used be one of Copenhagen's best homicide detectives. Then a hail of bullets destroyed the lives of two fellow cops, and Carl--who didn't draw his weapon-- blames himself. So a promotion is the last thing he expects. But Department Q is a department of one, and Carl's only got a stack of Copenhagen's coldest cases for company. His colleagues snicker, but Carl may have the last laugh, because one file keeps nagging at him: a liberal politician vanished five years earlier and is presumed dead. But she isn't dead...yet."
Join us on April 5th.

March 2016 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday March 1, 2016 when we will discuss Mr. Churchill's Secretary by Susan Elia Macneal. This is the first book featuring Maggie Hope, a young intelligent woman who was born in England, but raised by her aunt in Boston after her parents were killed in an automobile accident. She returns to London in 1940 to sell her grandmother's house, and gets caught up in the war, securing a job as secretary to none other than Winston Churchill.
The synopsis from the author's website is: "May 1940. As England stands alone against imminent Nazi invasion, betrayal and treachery threaten to bring her down from within. Maggie Hope, a young American in London, finds work as a secretary to the newly appointed Prime Minister Winston Churchill. When the P.M. is threatened by assassination, Maggie is thrown into the worlds of spies, secret agents, code-breaking and betrayal. As she searches for her missing father, she finds herself in the center of a conspiracy to murder the Prime Minister and destroy England. Racing from the damp streets of London to the hallowed halls of Trinity College to the code-breaker's huts of Bletchley Park, Maggie struggles with the brute realities of a world at war. She penetrates the heart of an undercover spy ring, and despite revelations of the most horrific kind, carries out one of the war's most deadly missions."
Please join us in the Second Floor Meeting Room at 7:00 PM.

February 2016 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery  Book Club on Tuesday February 2, 2016 as we will be discussing Faceless Killers by Henning Mankell. This is the first book in the Kurt Wallander series based in Sweden, and the basis for the BBC program starring Kenneth Branagh.
The synopsis from the author's website is: "One frozen January morning at 5 am, Inspector Wallander responds to what he believes is a routine call out. When he reaches the isolated farmhouse he discovers a bloodbath. An old man has been tortured and beaten to  death, his wife lies barely alive beside his shattered body, both victims of a violence beyond reason. The woman supplies Wallander with his only clue: the perpetrators may have been foreign. When this is leaked to the press, it unleashes racial hatred." This is the first of 11 Wallander stories written by Mankell, who died this past October.