by Renee Holden, Head Editor, INALJ Nebraska
Reader’s Advisory – If You Liked HBO’s True Detective
As a fiction librarian in a public library, I often get patrons who have watched compelling shows or movies and want to read fiction books that are similar to what they have seen on TV or at the movies. The latest TV show that patrons cannot seem to get enough of is HBO’s True Detective. So, if you have any patrons that are asking for titles like this tense crime drama, then here are a few titles that patrons are really enjoying.
An Officer and a Spyby Robert Harris
• Paris, winter 1895. Georges Picquart is promoted head of the agency that helped convict Dreyfus of treason. Picquart believes in Dreyfus’s guilt, even after he witnesses the man’s protestations of innocence. But gradually Picquart comes to suspect that a spy remains at large in the military. With evidence mounting, pointing to deceit at the highest levels of government, Picquart has nowhere to turn and is compelled to question his most deeply held beliefs about his country and himself.
The Last Child by John Hart
• After his twin sister Alyssa disappears, thirteen-year-old Johnny Merrimon is determined to find her. When a second girl disappears from his rural North Carolina town, Johnny makes a discovery that sends shock waves through the community in this compelling tale of broken families and deadly secrets.
Alex by Pierre Lemaitre
• Police Commandant Camille Verhoeven must learn all he can about a woman with a troubled past if he is ever going to save her from the twisted killer who is holding her hostage.
The Bat by Jo Nesbo
• Inspector Harry Hole of the Oslo Crime Squad is dispatched to Sydney to observe a murder case. Harry is free to offer assistance, but he has firm instructions to stay out of trouble. The victim is a twenty-three year old Norwegian woman who is a minor celebrity back home. Never one to sit on the sidelines, Harry befriends one of the lead detectives, and one of the witnesses, as he is drawn deeper into the case. Together, they discover that this is only the latest in a string of unsolved murders, and the pattern points toward a psychopath working his way across the country.
Winter’s Bone by Daniel Woodrell
• Seventeen-year-old Ree Dolly sets out to track down her father who put their house up for his bail bond and then disappeared. If she fails to find him, she and her family will be turned out into the Ozark woods. Challenging her outlaw kin’s code of silence and risking her life, Ree hacks through the lies, evasions, and threats offered up by her relatives and begins to piece together the truth.