Mystery Book Club 2024

It’s hard to believe that 2023 is coming to a close! We’ve read some intriguing mysteries together this year in Mystery Book Club and are looking forward to another thrilling year of book club picks. If you are eager to begin reading next year’s titles, check out the first few Mystery Book Club book picks of 2024 below. 

Mystery Book Club meets on the third Thursday of the month (except for December) at 7pm at Davis Library and virtually through Zoom. If you are interested in attending the meetings virtually, please register here.  

January 18, 2024 

Killers of a Certain Age by Deanna Raybourn (Print | eBook | eAudio) 

Older women often feel invisible, but sometimes that’s their secret weapon. They’ve spent their lives as the deadliest assassins in a clandestine international organization, but now that they’re sixty years old, four women friends can’t just retire – it’s kill or be killed in this action-packed thriller by New York Times bestselling and Edgar Award-nominated author Deanna Raybourn. Billie, Mary Alice, Helen, and Natalie have worked for the Museum, an elite network of assassins, for forty years. Now their talents are considered old-school and no one appreciates what they have to offer in an age that relies more on technology than people skills. When the foursome is sent on an all-expenses paid vacation to mark their retirement, they are targeted by one of their own. Only the Board, the top-level members of the Museum, can order the termination of field agents, and the women realize they’ve been marked for death. Now to get out alive they have to turn against their own organization, relying on experience and each other to get the job done, knowing that working together is the secret to their survival. They’re about to teach the Board what it really means to be a woman-and a killer-of a certain age. 

February 15, 2024 

The Family Chao by Lan Samantha Chang (Print | eBook | eAudio) 

The residents of Haven, Wisconsin have dined on the Fine Chao restaurant’s delicious Americanized Chinese food for thirty-five years, happy to ignore any unsavory whispers about the family owners. But when brash, charismatic, and tyrannical patriarch Leo Chao is found dead–presumed murdered–his sons find they’ve drawn the exacting gaze of the entire town. The ensuing trial brings to light potential motives for all three brothers: Dagou, the restaurant’s reckless head chef; Ming, financially successful but personally tortured; and the youngest, gentle but lost college student James. Brimming with heartbreak, comedy, and suspense, The Family Chao offers a kaleidoscopic, highly entertaining portrait of a Chinese American family grappling with the dark undercurrents of a seemingly pleasant small town.

March 21, 2024 

Blackwater Falls by Ausma Zehanat Khan (Print | eBook | eAudio) 

Girls from immigrant communities have been disappearing for months in the Colorado town of Blackwater Falls, but the local sheriff is slow to act and the fates of the missing girls largely ignored. At last, the calls for justice become too loud to ignore when the body of a star student and refugee–the Syrian teenager Razan Elkader–is positioned deliberately in a mosque. Detective Inaya Rahman and Lieutenant Waqas Seif of the Denver Police are recruited to solve Razan’s murder, and quickly uncover a link to other missing and murdered girls. But as Inaya gets closer to the truth, Seif finds ways to obstruct the investigation. Inaya may be drawn to him, but she is wary of his motives: he may be covering up the crimes of their boss, whose connections in Blackwater run deep. Inaya turns to her female colleagues, attorney Areesha Adams and Detective Catalina Hernandez, for help in finding the truth. The three have bonded through their experiences as members of vulnerable groups and now they must work together to expose the conspiracy behind the murders before another girl disappears. Delving deep into racial tensions, and police corruption and violence, Blackwater Falls examines a series of crimes within the context of contemporary American politics with compassion and searing insight.

April 18, 2024 

Blood Relations by Jonathan Moore (Print) 

Who is Claire Gravesend? So PI Lee Crowe wonders when he finds her dead, in a fine cocktail dress, on top of a Rolls Royce in the most dangerous neighborhood in San Francisco. Claire’s mother, Olivia, is one of the richest people in California. She doesn’t believe the coroner: her daughter did not kill herself. Olivia hires Crowe, who–having just foiled a federal case against a cartel kingpin–is eager for distraction. But the questions about the Gravesend family pile up fast. To start: the autopsy reveals round scars running down Claire’s spine, old marks Olivia won’t explain. Then, Crowe visits Claire’s Boston townhouse and has to fend off an armed intruder. Is it the Feds, out for revenge? Or is this connected to the Gravesends? He leaves Boston afraid, but finds his way to Claire’s secret San Francisco pied-á-terre. It’s there that his questions come to a head. Sleeping in an upstairs bedroom, he finds Claire–her face, her hair, her scars–and so far as he can tell, she’s alive. And Crowe’s back at the start: Who is Claire Gravesend?