From time to time, we like to share what we’re reading as well as what we’re writing. We’re always delighted when you chime in with what you are reading as well. We can never get enough book suggestions.

Kate Flora: For my book group, this month we’re reading Margaret Renkl’s The Comfort of Crows. Natural history, country living, a great sense of place. Her writing reminds me of my late mother’s columns for the Camden Herald. I just finished Lily King’s Heart the Lover, a Christmas gift, and really enjoyed it. Now I’m reading Susan Orlean’s memoir, Joyride. As often happens when I read writers who allow themselves to be totally immersed in their projects, I am jealous even as I’m enjoying it.

Matt Cost: I recently read two books that have not yet been published. The first was by amazing fellow Maine Crime Writer, Allison Keeton. The magic of Arctic Green is the rich smorgasbord of inhabitants of the town, the tight bonds of love and friendship, and the rugged but exquisite setting in a winter wonderland of pristine grandeur. Arctic Green is highly recommended and will pub at the end of February. I also read an out-of-my-genre science fiction book by a friend and enjoyed it immensely. Why: Earth 2278 by Leo Hill has action that is fast and furious, the characters pop from the pages like holograms, and the plot drives itself forward at a dizzying pace as it traverses not only human emotions and pain, but the science of a new world. From mother ships to transports to hovercrafts to cities, there are hints of Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, and the Fifth Element as rebel elements fight to save earth from the corruption of a dictator abusing his power. It will pub at the end of March. I am currently reading Imminent Risk by good friend S. Lee Manning. It is the fourth in the Kolya Petrov/Alex Feinstein series and it doesn’t disappoint, or it hasn’t yet! Filled with action, suspense, fully-fleshed out characters, and a twisting plot, it is something that should be checked out immediately. On audio, I am currently listening to Wreck Your Heart by Lori Radar-Day. The book is about a down and out country singer in Chicago that grabs your heart and pulls you in for a warm embrace from the very first chapter.

Kaitlyn Dunnett/Kathy Lynn Emerson: As usual, I am (slowly) reading more than one book at a time. In nonfiction, I’ve just started Kamala Harris’s 107 Days and am finding it fascinating but also a bit depressing since we know the ending. I’m also reading a biography of Anne of Cleves, fourth wife of Henry VIII. Accounting for Anne looks at her life through the account books for her household. I know that sounds dull, but in fact it is fascinating. Among other things, the records reveal details about members of her household that I’ve not seen elsewhere. In fiction, I’m rereading two favorites, Jo Beverley’s Georgian romance Hazard and Elizabeth Peters’s The Deeds of the Disturber (#4 in her Amelia Peabody Emerson series set in the Victorian era). Both are comfort reads. Next week I’m looking forward to reading a new release, the next in J. D. Robb’s Eve Dallas series, Stolen in Death. I’m not sure I can call it comfort reading, since it is a futuristic police procedural and will inevitably contain both sex and violence, but J. D. Robb (aka Nora Roberts) is a terrific writer and I’ll happily read just about anything she writes.

John Clark: My two most recent reads were a demon fantasy and a YA slasher tale.
Not today, Satan by Samantha Joyce
The Prince of Darkness’s only daughter — a seventeen-year-old born and raised in Hell — falls for one of the damned who claims he’s innocent.
Final cut by Olivia Worley
Eighteen-year-old Hazel Lejeune lands the lead role in a slasher film set in the town where her father, the Pine Springs Slasher, was convicted of a series of murders, but when real killings start occurring on set, she must uncover whether a copycat is at work or if the wrong killer is behind bars.

Rob Kelley: I confess my reading has suffered in the face of needing to get my next manuscript to my publisher (just went out the door!). Right now I’m reading The Emergency: A Novel by George Packer (2025) and really enjoying it. It’s a tough novel to categorize. I guess you would call it SF, though it is more a novel of ideas, exploring class and family after the fall of an empire and the dissolution of stable cultural expectations. If I were to look for comps, I’d say a novel like Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino, or something by Borges.

I had just finished The Proving Ground: A Lincoln Lawyer Novel by Michael Connelly (2025), which I loved. Attorney Mickey Haller is representing the family of a girl killed by her boyfriend who was influenced by a ChatGPT-style AI companion. Since technology is my bag, I really appreciated the detailed (and 100% accurate) research that Connelly brought to this novel, and the moral dilemmas he exposes that all of us are (or will have to be) facing when interacting with AI.

Maureen Milliken: I have a lot of trouble reading fiction — particularly my favorite genre, mystery fiction — when I’m writing, which is almost all the time now. That said, I have an urge to revisit some fiction I really love that is nothing like anything I write. On my to-read list are a few Anthony Trollope books, which I first read when The Pallisers was on Masterpiece Theater. I figure 50 years is enough of a gap to revisit books I read more than once. I still have the copies I bought at Mr. Paperback in Augusta way back then. So, on my shelf for this year are “Can You Forgive Her?,” “Phineas Finn,” and “The Eustace Diamonds.”

Some of what I’m reading. Or will be soon.

In case you think I’m just trying to seem high-brow, I’m always reading some nonfiction. And I’m not talking the kind that poeple say they’re reading so they sound smart when they’re really not reading them at all. No, with me it’s true crime all the time. Right now I’m reading “The Phillip Island Murder,” by Vikki Petraitis, after hearing her talk about the topic — a 1986 Australian murder — on a podcat. Next on my nonfiction list is “Barbarous Souls,” by David Strauss, about Darrel Parker’s 1956 wrongful conviction for the murder of his wife. My sister and I just did a three-episode set on our podcast, Crime & Stuff, about it, using newsapper accounts from the time, accessed on newspapers.com. But you can only get so much information that way, and I now want to know more. Parker’s case launched John Reid of the infamous Reid interrogation technique to national fame, and Parker’s “confession” at Reid’s hands was the only “evidence” against him, ignoring evidence from a known violent criminal who “passed” a lie detector and went on to kill at least one more person. The irony of it being the case that Reid hung his hat on seems to be lost to time.

I got myself a Kindle as a Christmas gift — It was on sale! — which makes reading on the go and in bed a lot easier and less expensive. I was using the Kindle app on my iPad, but the actual Kindle is more versatile and makes piling up books to read easier. This is not to say I don’t read print books as well. My sister Liz, who lives in [the other] Portland, always gives me a gift card from Powell’s Books. I usually buy some northwest-themed books with it, and also waiting on my shelf is “Murderland,” by Caroline Fraser, with looks at why the Pacific Northwest was such a hotbed of serial killers in the 1970s-1990s.

Sometimes when I’m at my author table someone will feel the need to tell me they don’t read. My response is always, “That’s too bad.” And I don’t mean that it’s too bad that they won’t be buying one of my books, but rather too bad that their life is missing such a vital piece. I can’t imagine life without reading, no matter what else I have going on.

Gabriela Stiteler – Late December / January Reading

•  Wind-Up Bird Chronicles by Haruki Murakami – a little surreal and meandering but unlike anything I’ve read. Really has me thinking about Japanese crime writing.
• Crooks by Lou Berney – If you like Lou’s other stuff, you’ll enjoy this. Family crime saga where you are really rooting for a bunch of grifters.
• Are You Happy? by Lori Ostend – Lori was in Portland for an MWPA class. I caught her speak at Print and wanted to check out the book. It is absolutely beautiful. Definitely not crime writing but definitely worth the read.
• Wreck Your Heart by Lori Rader-Day – Lori was the Guest of Honor at Crime Bake and I couldn’t wait to get my hands on this book. As always, her plotting is amazing. And the voice is delightful. Lori also did a deep dive into all things country music for this, which I really appreciate.
• God of the Woods by Liz Moore – This was dense but did not meander. Told from multiple character POV, Liz tiptoes around a tragic secret buried and rotting under a girls camp in the Adirondacks. Gave of Maine summer camp vibes with absolutely compelling tension.
• The Baseball 100 by Joe Posnaski – My older son recommended this. I’m working my way through it. There is a lot I don’t know about baseball.