November 2025 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday November 4, 2025. We will be discussing Think of a Number by John Verdon. This is the first book featuring retired detective Dave Gurney.

The book description from the publisher’s website is, “Threatening letters arrive in the mail over a period of weeks, ending with a simple declaration: “Think of any number . . . picture it . . . now see how well I know your secrets.” Those who comply find that the letter writer has predicted their random choice exactly. But when oddities that begin as a diverting puzzle quickly ignite into a massive serial murder investigation, police are confronted with a baffling killer, one who is fond of rhymes filled with threats and warnings, whose attention to detail is unprecedented, and who has an uncanny knack for disappearing into thin air.

Brought in as an investigative consultant, Dave Gurney, a recently retired NYPD homicide investigator, soon accomplishes deductive breakthroughs that leave local police in awe. Yet, even as he matches wits with his seemingly clairvoyant opponent, Gurney’s tragedy-marred past rises up to haunt him, his marriage approaches a dangerous precipice, and he wonders if he’s met an adversary who can’t be stopped.”

We will meet at 6:30 pm in the First Floor Conference Room, and through Zoom. For more information, please see Sara at the Reference Desk.

 

October 2025 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday October 7, 2025. We will be discussing The Burning by Jane Casey. This is the first book featuring detective Maeve Kerrigan.  

The book description from the publisher’s website is, “A serial killer who wants to watch you burn. The media call him The Burning Man, a brutal murderer who has beaten four young women to death, before setting their bodies ablaze in secluded areas of London's parks. And now the fifth victim has been found. Maeve Kerrigan is an ambitious detective constable, keen to make her mark on the murder task force. Her male colleagues believe Maeve's empathy makes her weak, but the more she learns about the latest victim, Rebecca Haworth, from her grieving friends and family, the more determined Maeve becomes to bring her murderer to justice.  But how do you catch a killer no one has ever seen? And when so much of the evidence they leave behind has gone up in smoke. . .?”  

We will be meeting in the Conference Room at 6:30 PM and on Zoom. For more information, please see Sara at the Reference Desk.

 

September 2025 Book Selection

 

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday, September 2, 2025. We will be discussing Case Histories by Kate Atkinson. This is the first book featuring Jackson Brodie, a former policeman, turned private investigator.

The book summary from the author’s website is, “Cambridge is sweltering, during an unusually hot summer.

To Jackson Brodie, former police inspector turned private investigator, the world consists of one accounting sheet – Lost on the left, Found on the right – and the two never seem to balance.

Surrounded by death, intrigue and misfortune, his own life haunted by a family tragedy, Jackson attempts to unravel three disparate case histories and begins to realize that in spite of apparent diversity, everything is connected…”

We will be meeting in the Conference Room at 6:30 pm, and on Zoom. For more information, see Sara at the Reference Desk.

August 2025 Book Selection

 

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday, August 12, 2025*. We will be discussing Nine Elms by Robert Bryndza. This is the first book featuring Kate Marshall a former police officer, now working as a college lecturer.

The book description from the author’s website is: “Kate Marshall was a promising young police detective when she caught the notorious Nine Elms serial killer. But her greatest victory suddenly turned into a nightmare. Traumatized, betrayed, and publicly vilified for the shocking circumstances surrounding the cannibal murder case, Kate could only watch as her career ended in scandal.

Fifteen years after those catastrophic events, Kate is still haunted by the unquiet ghosts of her troubled past. Now a lecturer at a small coastal English university, she finally has a chance to face them. A copycat killer has taken up the Nine Elms mantle, continuing the ghastly work of his idol.

Enlisting her brilliant research assistant, Tristan Harper, Kate draws on her prodigious and long-neglected skills as an investigator to catch a new monster. Success promises redemption, but there’s much more on the line: Kate was the original killer’s intended fifth victim…and his successor means to finish the job.”

We will be meeting on the second Tuesday in August in the First Floor Conference Room at 6:30 pm, and on Zoom. Please see Sara at the Reference Desk for more information.

July 2025 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday July 1, 2025. We will be discussing IQ by Joe Ide. This is the first book featuring Isaiah Quintabe “IQ”, a high school dropout, who works as an unlicensed private detective to help people in his neighborhood.

The book description from the publisher’s website is, “A resident of one of LA’s toughest neighborhoods uses his blistering intellect to solve the crimes the LAPD ignores. East Long Beach. The LAPD is barely keeping up with the neighborhood’s high crime rate. Murders go unsolved, lost children unrecovered. But someone from the neighborhood has taken it upon himself to help solve the cases the police can’t or won’t touch. They call him IQ. He’s a loner and a high school dropout, his unassuming nature disguising a relentless determination and a fierce intelligence. He charges his clients whatever they can afford, which might be a set of tires or a homemade casserole. To get by, he’s forced to take on clients that can pay. This time, it’s a rap mogul whose life is in danger. As Isaiah investigates, he encounters a vengeful ex-wife, a crew of notorious cutthroats, a monstrous attack dog, and a hit man who even other hit men say is a lunatic. The deeper Isaiah digs, the more far reaching and dangerous the case becomes.”

We will be meeting in the First Floor Conference Room and on Zoom at 6:30 pm. For more information, see Sara at the Reference Desk.

 

June 2025 Book Selection

 Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday June 3, 2025 as we discuss A Rising Man by Abir Mukerjee. This is the first book featuring Captain Sam Wyndham, an English policeman who joins the Calcutta, India police force in the 1920s.

The book description from the author’s website is, “India, 1919. Desperate for a fresh start, Captain Sam Wyndham arrives to take up an important post in Calcutta’s police force.

He is soon called to the scene of a horrifying murder. The victim was a senior official, and a note in his mouth warns the British to leave India – or else.

With the stability of the Empire under threat, Wyndham and Sergeant ‘Surrender-not’ Banerjee must solve the case quickly. But there are some who will do anything to stop them…”

We will be meeting in the First Floor Conference Room at 6:30 pm and on Zoom. For more information, ask Sara at the Reference Desk.

May 2025 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday May 6, 2025. We will be discussing, The Ruin by Dervla McTiernan. This is the first book featuring Cormac Reilly, a detective in Galway, Ireland.

The book description from the author’s website is, “Responding to a call that took him to a decrepit country house, young Garda Cormac Reilly found two silent, neglected children – fifteen-year-old Maude and five-year-old Jack. Their mother lay dead upstairs. Since then Cormac’s had twenty high-flying years working as a detective in Dublin, and he’s come back to Galway for reasons of his own. As he struggles to navigate the politics of a new police station, Maude and Jack return to haunt him. What ties a recent suicide to that death from so long ago? And who among his new colleagues can Cormac really trust? Betrayal is at the heart of this unsettling small-town noir and the Ireland it portrays. In a country where the written law isn’t the only one, The Ruin asks who will protect you when the authorities can’t – or won’t.”

We will be meeting in the Conference Room and on Zoom. For more information, please see Sara at the Reference Desk.

 

April 2025 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday April 1, 2025 as we discuss, Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson. This is the first book featuring Ernest Cunningham, an Australian writer who takes his inspiration from the authors of the “Golden Age” of mystery writing. 

The book description from the publisher’s website is, “Everyone in my family has killed someone. Some of us, the high achievers, have killed more than once. I’m not trying to be dramatic, but it is the truth. Some of us are good, others are bad, and some just unfortunate.

I’m Ernest Cunningham. Call me Ern or Ernie. I wish I’d killed whoever decided our family reunion should be at a ski resort, but it’s a little more complicated than that. Have I killed someone? Yes. I have. Who was it? Let’s get started. EVERYONE IN MY FAMILY HAS KILLED SOMEONE, My brother, my stepsister, my wife, my father, my mother, my sister-in-law, my uncle, my stepfather, my aunt, Me.”

We will be meeting in the First Floor Conference Room at 6:30 pm, and on Zoom. For more information, please see Sara at the Reference Desk.

March 2025 Book Selection

 

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday March 4, 2025. We will be discussing, How to Solve Your Own Murder by Kristen Perrin. This is the first book in the Castle Knoll series featuring aspiring writer Annie Adams.

  The book description from the publisher’s website is “It’s 1965 and teenage Frances Adams is at an English country fair with her two best friends. But Frances’s night takes a hairpin turn when a fortune-teller makes a bone-chilling prediction: One day, Frances will be murdered. Frances spends a lifetime trying to solve a crime that hasn’t happened yet, compiling dirt on every person who crosses her path in an effort to prevent her own demise. For decades, no one takes Frances seriously, until nearly sixty years later, when Frances is found murdered, like she always said she would be.  In the present day, Annie Adams has been summoned to a meeting at the sprawling country estate of her wealthy and reclusive great-aunt Frances. But by the time Annie arrives in the quaint English village of Castle Knoll, Frances is already dead. Annie is determined to catch the killer, but thanks to Frances’s lifelong habit of digging up secrets and lies, it seems every endearing and eccentric villager might just have a motive for her murder. Can Annie safely unravel the dark mystery at the heart of Castle Knoll, or will dredging up the past throw her into the path of a killer?  As Annie gets closer to the truth, and closer to the danger, she starts to fear she might inherit her aunt’s fate instead of her fortune.”

We will be meeting in the Second Floor Meeting Room at 6:30 pm and on Zoom. For more information, see Sara at the Reference Desk.

February 2025 Book Selection

Join the North Providence Mystery Book Club on Tuesday, February 4, 2025. We will be discussing, The Blessing Way by Tony Hillerman. This is the first book featuring Navajo Tribal Policeman Joe Leaphorn.

The book description from the publisher’s website is: “Homicide is always an abomination, but there is something exceptionally disturbing about the victim discovered in a high, lonely place—a corpse with a mouth full of sand—abandoned at a crime scene seemingly devoid of tracks or useful clues. Though it goes against his better judgment, Navajo Tribal Police Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn cannot help but suspect the hand of a supernatural killer.

There is palpable evil in the air, and Leaphorn's pursuit of a Wolf-Witch leads him where even the bravest men fear, on a chilling trail that winds perilously between mysticism and murder.”

We will be meeting in the either the Conference Room or Second Floor Meeting Room at 6:30 pm and on Zoom. For more information, see Sara at the Reference Desk.