New Books

Presenting a very short list of upcoming thrillers and crime fiction told with a Latin beat. 


Perfect Days
Raphael Montes
Penguin - February

[from the publisher]
Teo Avelar is a loner. He lives with his paraplegic mother and her dog in Rio de Janeiro, he doesn’t have many friends, and the only time he feels honest human emotion is in the presence of his medical school cadaver—that is, until he meets Clarice. She’s almost his exact opposite: exotic, spontaneous, unafraid to speak her mind. An aspiring screenwriter, she’s working on a screenplay called Perfect Days about three friends who go on a road trip across Brazil in search of romance. Teo is obsessed. He begins to stalk her, first following her to her university, then to her home, and when she ultimately rejects him, he kidnaps her and they embark upon their very own twisted odyssey across Brazil, tracing the same route outlined in her screenplay. Through it all, Teo is certain that time is all he needs to prove to Clarice that they are made for each other, that time is all he needs to make her fall in love with him. But as the journey progresses, he digs himself deeper and deeper into a pit that he can’t get out of, stopping at nothing to ensure that no one gets in the way of their life together. Both tense and lurid, and brimming with suspense from the very first page, Perfect Days is a psychological thriller in the vein of Patricia Highsmith’s The Talented Mr. Ripley—a chilling journey in the passenger seat with a psychopath, and the English language debut of one of Brazil’s most deliciously dark young writers.

RAPHAEL MONTES was born in Rio de Janeiro in 1990, and is a lawyer and a writer. His short stories have appeared in Playboy and Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. His debut novel, Suicides, was published to much acclaim in Brazil in 2010 and was a finalist for the Sao Paolo Literature Prize, among many other accolades. Perfect Days is being published in seven countries. The author lives in Rio de Janeiro.

Last Night at Tremore Beach
Mikel Santiago
Simon & Schuster - February

[from the publisher]
What starts out as an idyllic summer holiday on the Irish coast soon becomes a living nightmare with unpredictable consequences for a world-renowned composer and his family in this chilling psychological thriller.

Recently divorced and in the middle of a creative crisis, Peter Harper decides to take shelter on Ireland’s scenic and isolated Tremore Beach. But after he is struck by lightning one stormy night, he begins experiencing terrible headaches and strange dreams. As the line between his dreams and reality begins to blur, Peter realizes that his bizarre dreams may be a warning of horror still to come…

Gripping and impossible to put down, The Last Night at Tremore Beach is a haunting, atmospheric thriller perfect for fans of Stephen King and S.J. Watson.

 

MIKEL SANTIAGO was born in northern Spain in 1975 and is a musician and writer. He is the author of a novella, History of a Perfect Crime, and The Last Night at Tremore Beach is his first novel and was a Top Ten international bestseller. He spent over a decade living in Ireland and the Netherlands, and now lives in Bilbao with his family.

Dangerous Ends
Alex Segura
Polis Books - April 
 
[from the publisher]
Pete Fernandez has settled into an easy, if somewhat boring life as a P.I.. He takes pictures of cheating husbands. He tracks criminals who’ve skipped bail and he attends weekly AA meetings The days of chasing murderous killers are behind him. Or are they?

When his sometimes partner Kathy Bentley approaches him with a potential new client, Pete balks. Not because he doesn’t need the money, but because the case involves Gaspar Varela, a former Miami police officer serving a life sentence for the murder of his wife – one of the most infamous crimes in Miami history. The client? None other than Varela's daughter, Maya, who's doggedly supported her father's claims of innocence.

As Pete and Kathy wade into a case that no one wants, they also find themselves in the cross-hairs of Los Enfermos, a bloodthirsty gang of pro-Castro killers and drug dealers looking to wipe Pete off the Miami map. As if trying to exonerate Varela wasn’t enough, they find themselves entangled in something even older and more surprising–a bloody, political hit ordered by Fidel Castro himself, that left a still-healing scar on Pete and his dead father’s past.

Fast-paced, hardboiled and surprising, Dangerous Ends pushes Pete Fernandez into a battle with a deadlier, more complex threat, as he tries to shake off the demons haunting Miami s own, sordid past.

 ALEX SEGURA is a novelist and comic book writer. He is the author of the Miami crime novels featuring Pete Fernandez, Silent City and Down the Darkest Street. He has also written a number of comic books, including the best-selling and critically acclaimed Archie Meets Kiss storyline, the Occupy Riverdale story, and the just-released and sold out Archie Meets Ramones one-shot. He lives in New York with his wife and son. He is a Miami native.














Later.



Manuel Ramos is the author of several novels, short stories, poems, and non-fiction books and articles. His collection of short stories, The Skull of Pancho Villa and Other Stories, was a finalist for the 2016 Colorado Book Award. My Bad: A Mile High Noir was published by Arte Público Press in October, 2016