February has an extensive list of book releases, and March is just as busy. I hope you enjoy the list of forthcoming books for March. I’m sure I don’t have all the popular books in my closet. So, what am I missing?
Let’s start with a psychological thriller, Alexandra Andrews’ debut novel,, Who is Maud Dixon? Florence Darrow stumbles into a job as assistant to the brilliant novelist Maud Dixon, whose real name is Helen Wilcox. Florence finds her inspiring, and accompanies her on a research trip to Morocco. But when Florence wakes up in the hospital after a terrible car accident, with no memory of the previous night, and no sign of Helen, she decides to take a shortcut. Why not upgrade into Helen’s life? Why not take over her bestselling pseudonym, Maud Dixon? (Release date is March 2.)
I’ve been raving about SJ Bennett’s adult debut for several months now. The Windsor Knot introduces Queen Elizabeth II as an amateur sleuth, with the assistance of her assistant private secretary, Rozie Oshodi. In 2016, just before Queen Elizabeth’s ninetieth birthday, a guest is found dead after a dine and sleep at Windsor Castle. When the investigation seems to be heading in the wrong direction, the queen asks Oshodi, a British Nigerian and recent officer in the Royal Horse Artillery, to be her legs in a secret investigation of their own. I loved this first in a proposed series. Bennett is planning to go backwards in time to earlier periods in Queen Elizabeth’s reign for additional mysteries. (Release date is March 9.)
I’m going to be honest here. While I admire Olivia Campbell’s coverage of women who were doctors in Victorian times, I object to the subtitle of Women in White Coats. It may say, “How the first women doctors changed the world of medicine”, but actually women were recognized doctors and surgeons as well as authors of medical texts, educated in Salerno, Italy between the tenth and thirteenth centuries. However, by the early 1800s, as told in Campbell’s book, women had to again fight for places in the male-dominated field. The stories of Elizabeth Blackwell, Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, and Sophia Jex-Blake are covered in this history. (Release date is March 2.)
The synopsis of Melissa Colasanti’s Call Me Elizabeth Lark indicates three storylines. Twenty years earlier, Myra Barkley’s daughter disappeared from the beach near the family inn. Now, when Elizabeth Lark and her son register there, Myra insists the woman is her long-lost daughter. Elizabeth knows better, but she’s on the run, and this identity and the inn provide an opportunity for safety. However, the Barkley girl didn’t disappear on her own. Once rumors of her return spread through the town, the culprit behind that disappearance is back to finish the job. (Release date is March 9.)
Float Plan is Trish Doller’s adult fiction debut, and I’ll definitely take a chance on this one. Since the death of her fiance, Anna has been “shipwrecked by grief”. Then, a reminder goes off about a trip they were supposed to take together. Impulsively, she goes to sea in their sailboat, intending to complete the voyage alone. But after a treacherous night’s sail, she knows she can’t do it by herself and hires Keane, an Irish sailor, to help. Much like Anna, Keane is struggling. Both will discover “it’s never too late to chart a new course.” (Release date is March 2.)
I love the cover of Emma Duffy-Comparone’s Love Like That. It looks like a murder mystery rather than a collection of short stories. “Love Like That is a collection of joyfully subversive and moving stories about brilliant, broken women that are just the right amount wrong.” (Release date is March 9.)
The publishing world may not call novels Gothics as they did in the ’70s, but J.T. Ellison’s Her Dark Lies fits that description. Up-and-coming artist Claire Hunter is about to marry Jack Compton at the Compton family’s clifftop villa on Isle Isola off the Italian coast. From the moment Claire sets foot on the island, something seems wrong. Skeletal remains have just been found. There are menacing texts. A ruined wedding dress. And one troubling shadow hangs over Claire’s otherwise blissful relationship – the strange mystery surrounding Jack’s first wife. Then a raging storm descends, the power goes out, and the real terror begins. (Release date is March 9.)
Alex Finlay’s Every Last Fear puts the spotlight on the survivor of a family tragedy. After a late night, NYU student Matt Pine returns to his dorm room to the devastating news that nearly his entire family has been found dead from an apparent gas leak while vacationing in Mexico. The FBI won’t tell Matt why they’re not as certain as the police that it was an accident. This isn’t the first time the Finlays have been in the spotlight. Matt’s older brother, Danny, is serving a life sentence for the murder of his girlfriend. His case was the subject of a true-crime documentary suggesting Danny was wrongfully convicted, and people throughout the country has rallied behind him. But, Matt saw something that makes him believe his brother is guilty. Now, with both cases in the media, somehow connected, Matt’s determined to find the truth. (Release date is March 2.)
In Laurie Elizabeth Flynn’s The Girls Are All So Nice Here, Ambrosia “Amb” Wellington is invited back to her ten-year reunion. Along with the invitation comes an anonymous note, “We need to talk about what we did that night.” Alternating between the reunion and Amb’s freshman year, the novel covers the brutal lengths girls can go to get what they think they’re owed, and what happens when the games they play in college become matters of life and death. (Release date is March 9.)
Candice Fox brings us Gathering Dark. Dr. Blair Harbour, once a wealthy, respected surgeon, is now an ex-con. She’s determined to keep her nose clean and regain custody of her son. But when her former cellmate begs for help to find her missing daughter, Blair is compelled to put her newfound freedom on the line. She turns to Detective Jessica Sanchez, who arrested Blair ten years earlier for murder. Sanchez doesn’t expect the disgraced doctor to be there begging for help. “A convicted killer. A gifted thief. A vicious gang lord. A disillusioned cop. Together they’re a missing girl’s only hope.” (Release date is March 16.)
I’m a big fan of Heather Graham’s Krewe of Hunters books, but I seldom read her thrillers. The latest thriller is set on the edge of the Everglades where the eerie crime scene of a ritualistic murder sets off an investigation. Special Agent Amy Larson from the Florida state police teams up with FBI Special Agent Hunter Forrest, a man with insider knowledge of how violent cults operate. The case sends the two agents deep into a world of corrupted faith, greed and deadly secrets. (Release date is March 23.)
Elly Griffiths’ latest novel, The Postscript Murders, is a literary mystery. When a ninety-year-old woman with a heart condition dies, her caretaker, Natalka, thinks it’s suspicious. She goes to Detective Sergeant Harbinder Kaur. While clearing out Peggy’s flat, she noticed an unusual number of crime novels, all dedicated to Peggy. And, each thriller includes a postscript: PS: for PS. When a gunman breaks into a flat to steal a book, and the author is found dead shortly after, Detective Kaur begins to think maybe that first death was suspicious. (Release date is March 2.)
Martha Hall Kelly’s bestseller Lilac Girls introduced readers to Caroline Ferriday. Now, in Sunflower Sisters, Kelly tells the story of Ferriday’s ancestor Georgeanna Woolsey, a Union nurse during the Civil War whose calling leads her to cross paths with Jemma, a young enslaved girl who is sold off and conscripted into the army, and Anne-May Wilson, a Southern plantation mistress whose husband enlists. (Release date is March 30.)
I haven’t picked up a Stephen King novel since Misery, but I’m going to take a chance on Later. “The son of a struggling single mother, Jamie Conklin just wants an ordinary childhood. But Jamie is no ordinary child. Born with an unnatural ability his mom urges him to keep secret, Jamie can see what no one else can see and learn what no one else can learn. But the cost of using this ability is higher than Jamie can imagine – as he discovers when an NYPD detective draws him into the pursuit of a killer who has threatened to strike from beyond the grave.” (Release date is March 2.)
In Essie Lang’s latest Castle Bookshop mystery, A Deadly Chapter, bookseller and amateur sleuth Shelby Cox has already investigated two murders connected to Bayside Books and its home base on Blye Island. This time, she finds a body lodged between her houseboat and the dock. She doesn’t know him, but does recognize him from his visits to Bayside Books and his questions. When the victim’s daughter shows up, demanding answers, Shelby is ready to help. (Release date is March 9.)
Mercy Carr and her dog, Elvis, are back in Paula Munier’s The Hiding Place. When the man who killed her grandfather breaks out of prison, and is after her grandmother, Mercy has a hard time uncovering secrets her grandmother doesn’t want to reveal. While protecting family, she has to cope with her own emotions. Elvis’ original handler shows up, and he wants Elvis back. (Release date is March 30.)
In Sarah Penner’s debut novel, The Lost Apothecary, a female apothecary secretly dispenses poisons to liberate women from the men who have wronged them – setting three lives across centuries on a dangerous collision course. (Release date is March 2.)
I’m also looking forward to Pamela Terry’s debut novel, The Sweet Taste of Muscadines. Lila Bruce Breedlove returns to her small hometown in Georgia after her mother dies unexpectedly. She and her brother, Henry, had fled north after high school, while their sister, Abigail, stayed behind. Now, when Lila and Henry return, they uncover shocking truths about the family history. It’s a novel that takes readers from Maine to Georgia and the Scottish Hebrides. (Release date is March 16.)
Here’s one last debut, W.S. Winslow’s The Northern Reach., set in the coastal town of Wellbridge, Maine. It’s a story of the power of place and family ties. At the center of town life is the Baines family, land-rich, cash-poor descendants of town founders, along with the ne’er-do-well Moody clan, the Martins of Skunk Pond, and the dirt farming, bootlegging Edgecombs. Over the course of the twentieth century, the families intersect, interact, and intermarry, grappling with secrets and prejudices that span generations. (Release date is March 2.)
So, what am I missing? What do you have on your March list?
Don’t forget to check out the additional Treasures, books I didn’t summarize.
Bonventre, Peter – Where Have You Gone Without Me? (3/30)
Coster, Naima – What’s Mine and Yours (3/2)
Ginsburg, Melissa – The House Uptown (3/16)
Green, Elon – Last Call (3/9)
Lovering, Carola – Too Good to Be True (3/2)
Matheson, Nadine – The Jigsaw Man (3/16)
Miksa, Matt – 13 Days to Die (3/9)
Moccia, Federico – One Step to You (3/2)
Search and Destroy, the start of a new series by JT Sawyer comes out on March 31.
Deadly Chapter is the only book in your closet that really appeals to me.
I’m not a fan of some of those thrillers, Glen, but I know some readers are.
Second attempt to post this list…I got an error message and lost it all!
I have ARCs of the following mysteries with March release dates:
A Game of Cones by Abby Collette (3/2)
No Sin Unpunished by LynDee Walker (3/2)
Into the Sweet Hereafter by Kaye George (3/9)
Fatal Fried Rice by Vivien Chien (3/9)
The Bounty by Janet Evanovich and Steve Hamilton (3/23)
Murder at Wedgfield Manor by Erica Ruth Neubauer (3/30)
Under the Cover of Murder by Lauren Elliott (3//30)
And I have ARCs for Deadly Chapter and The Hiding Place, plus I am looking forward to the latest J.T. Ellison book, Her Dark Lies.
I’m sorry, Grace. I’m glad you made the second attempt, though. There are some good authors on your list. Thank you!
Yay! Paula Munier’s THE HIDING PLACE is top of my list. Excellent K-9 series, and unusual in that it is set in Vermont.
I also reserved the Stephen King.
Also looking forward to:
Viet Thanh Nguyen, THE COMMITTED (sequel to the award-winning THE SYMPATHIZER) March 2
Andrea Camilleri, THE COOK OF THE HALCYON (Insp. Montalbano) March 16
Peter Robinson, NOT DARK YET (DCI Banks) March 16
Jeff,
Thanks for listing the latest DCI Banks book.
I agree, Jeff. Yay on the Paula Munier. And, I’m going to give the Stephen King a try. I only read one of Andrea Camilleri’s books. I liked it, but just haven’t circled back.
Good morning! I already had Later, The WIndsor Knot, The Sweet Taste of Muscadines, and The Hiding Place on my TBR list, and I am adding the Penner book. Also on my list of March releases are An Unexpected Peril by Deanna Raybourn, Are We There Yet by Kathleen West, On Harrow Hill by John Verdon, The Consequences of Fear by Jacqueline Winspear, Every Vow You Break by Peter Swanson, Death at the Salon by Laura R. Innes, Win by Harlan Coben, and Infinite by Brian Freeman.
Oh, yes on An Unexpected Peril by Deanna Raybourn! I don’t have a copy at home, but I’m on the waiting list at the library, Margie. Kaye Barley loved The Sweet Taste of Muscadines. March looks like a good month for reading!
Turns out that Infinite is on the Amazon First Reads list for February, so I scored a Kindle copy today!
I now have a running list of types of books that I do not want to read. Serial killers, true crime (unless it is just money) the struggling rich and for some reason I am turning away from books set in France! I have no clue why.
I enter the contests on GoodReads.com and have made the discovery that the more that I want to read the book, the smaller the print!. I add them to my wish list when they have an affordable audio book on CD. Recently, I tried my Kindle (model T) and it is dead. If any of you have Kindles, I have a question, is the paper white worth the money. I have accumulated quite few free books now but I am even unable to read them on my PC. I read about two pages and then, it disconnects.
carolee – yes, the Paperwhite is definitely worth it, IMHO. My wife uses it to read in bed at night, so I can sleep and she can read without a light. I have one too and like it a lot. (They are our third and fourth Kindles.)
Thank you, Jeff.