AJ Hawley's World of Crime
@ajhawley.bsky.social
Formerly Hawley Reviews
My reviews of authors I read around the @newarkbookfestival.bsky.social: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/07/13/m...
My reading at Newark
This weeks’ Newark Festival was an eclectic one, with me appearing at three different events. One was the launch of the Newark Festival charity book that I wrote to raise money for them, the …
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Here's my review of @markedwardsauthor.bsky.social One of the Family: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/06/26/p...
Psychology in Nottingham
This Wednesday just gone I was at Nottingham Waterstones to see Mark Edwards and KL Slater. In the heat of this week it seemed weird to be talking about a book set on New Years Eve in a snowy Scott…
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Looking forward to launching this book on behalf of @newarkbookfestival.bsky.social at Newark Library at 15.30 on 9th July. It'll be sold through the Newark branch of Waterstones
Here's my review of Sarah Pinborough's @harrogatefestivals.bsky.social long listed: We Live Here Now: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/05/18/c...
Crossing the Genres with Sarah Pinborough
With so many authors on this year’s list that I’ve read before, I wasn’t sure at first if I’d read anything by Sarah Pinborough, but looking through my archive, I’ve d…
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Pleased to announce my election to the CWA board which was confirmed today. My love of all things crime will help me to take an active role in this post. Thank you to everyone who voted for me. Special thanks to @ellygriffiths.bsky.social and Paul Gitsham for nominating me.
My review of Abigail Dean's The Death of Us: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/05/09/t... longlisted for @harrogatefestivals.bsky.social
The book that made me think
The Death of Us is a book that if I were reading in isolation, I wouldn’t know where to put, because it has a plotline that will put a lot of people off and it’s gloomy outlook made me …
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Here's my review of Andrew Taylor's A Schooling in Murder: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/05/02/c... @harrogatefestivals.bsky.social
Congratulations on being Longlisted
Congratulations to all of the authors who have been longlisted for this years’ Theakston’s Crime Book of the Year. Below is a review of one of the books I’d not read before the lo…
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Here's my review of Vaseem Khan's A Quantum of Menace: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/04/29/t...
The other side of Vaseem
Before I read Quantum of Menace I had no idea how much of a fan of James Bond Vaseem Khan is. This book has been officially sanctioned by the Fleming estate and is a spin off. Although when I descr…
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Here's my review of Simon Mason's A Voice in the Night: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/04/23/o...
Old Oxford in more ways than one
Simon Mason’s 4th Wilkins’ book brings together the two men from the opposite sides of the tracks once again. Ryan Wilkins and his son, Little Ryan are by far my favourite characters, b…
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Here's my review of Louise Candlish's A Neighbour's Guide to Murder: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/04/22/c...
Candlish’s New Property
Louise Candlish openly admits in the interview with the narrator at the end of the book that she likes to write books about property, so Candlish fans will not be surprised that this is another pla…
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Here's my review of Kia Abdullah's What happens in the Dark: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/04/15/r...
Reading on the Road
Yesterday on the 14th of April I was invited down to London for the launch of Theakston’s Crime 2026, run by Harrogate International Festivals. As part of this, it was a good idea to have a l…
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Here's my review of Gillian McAllistair's Famous Last Words: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/04/09/1...
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My review of Yemi Dipeolu's Kiss, Marry, Kill: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/04/07/a...
A Timely Offer
Yesterday as I was searching for what to read next, Audible had Yemi Dipeolu’s Kiss Marry Kill on offer. Reading the synopsis, it sounded slightly generic when my PA read it to me, and the co…
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My review of Denise Mina's The Good Liar: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/04/06/w...
Writing Backwards
For the first time in a while, I’ve gone to my TBR pile. This book has been in my library since it was shortlisted for last years’ Bloody Scotland prize and the only reason that it̵…
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Here's my review of The Other Couple by Claire McGowan: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/04/01/i...
Industry Expectations
The Other Couple is a very apt title, because throughout this novel, which is told from multiple perspectives (but unfortunately with only a single narrator on the audiobook), was really well const…
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My review of Natalie Chandler's The Voices: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/03/31/t...
The book I was unsure about
Reading through the synopsis of books is something that I generally avoid, but when you’re isolating and have time to read more books sometimes you come across a book with a similar plotline …
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Here's my review of the Midnight Feast by Lucy Foley: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/03/29/m...
Midnight Reading
The Midnight Feast by Lucy Foley is a really interesting story about a community battling against a rich incomer who has decided to build a hotel on their family’s land. The hotel’s ope…
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My review of Tom Hindle's Death in the Arctic: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/03/24/h...
Hot air isolation
Several years after reading The Murder Game and after seeing Tom speaking to TM Logan in Nottingham Waterstones, I purchased this after hearing how unique the plot was. Tom, as a former travel jour…
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My review of Alice Feeny's Beautiful Ugly: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/03/23/s... @alicefeeney01.bsky.social
Surprising Slow Burn
When you read as many books as I do you come across a lot of different styles of writing, but the first time you read an author, you don’t know what their style is or how they will surprise y…
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hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/03/22/i... My review of Murder in the Dressing Room by Holly Stars.
Is this a new sub-genre?
Murder in the Dressing Room by Holly Stars could be a new sub-genre of crime: The drag queen detective. This came recommended as something different and it definitely was, as it was the first time …
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Here's my review of Daniel Aubrey's The Dying Light: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/03/21/r...
Returning to Orkney
In Daniel Aubrey’s second novel, The Dying Light, Freya’s life gets more and more complicated as she looks into the corruption surrounding book one. This book is a hard one to review as…
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My review of @neillancaster66.bsky.social When Shadows Fall: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/03/16/c...
Climbing with Craigie
Last Friday night I was listening to Neil Lancaster being interviewed about his latest book The Dark Heart on UKCBC and realised that it was a while since I’d read one, so decided to read the…
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Here's my review of The House at Devil's Neck by @tommeadauthor.bsky.social hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/03/14/a...
A devilish locked room
Tom Mead’s 4th Spector novel is probably the most complex novel that he’s written. Although no 3 was a lot more violent because it was aiming towards the Asian side of the locked room, …
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Here's my review of Lisa Jewell's Don't Let Him In: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/03/13/a...
A new twist on a trope
Lisa Jewell’s Don’t let him in is an examination of coercive control, toxic masculinity, fraud and a spiteful sod. But that’s just the main character, voiced by Richard Armitage i…
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My review of From the Ashes by Deborah Masson: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/03/06/t...
The other Hunter
On Cara Hunter’s birthday I read the third in the Eve Hunter series by Deborah Masson. We all get our names from somewhere when writing and I’ll be checking whether this is coincidence …
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Here's me chatting to @DeborahMasson about her latest book, I'll be watching You: open.spotify.com/episode/2H3D...
Interview with Deborah Masson - I'll be watching You
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My review of Deborah Masson's I'll be watching You: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/02/28/t...
The book I wish I’d Written
As the title says, this is definitely the book I wish I’d written for personal reasons, as I wrote an essay on CCTV and whom might be watching the watchers back in 2009, back when the legisla…
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Here's my review of Harriet Tyce's A lesson in Cruelty: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/01/18/t...
The companion Traitor
As a crime writer, I’ve always been a big fan of The Traitors, right from series one and now that both the UK and NZ versions have had published authors, with Harriet Tyce and Vanda Symon, yo…
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@tomjhindle.bsky.social Hi Tom, sorry we haven't spoken since Waterstones in Nottm. Was looking for authors to appear on the 4th season of my podcast. Would you be interested in this as your new book A Killer In Paradise is out this Thursday. Please let me know. Regards Alex
My first review of the year is JD Pennington's The Othello Club: hawleyreviews.wordpress.com/2026/01/02/t...
Two titles, one book
Over Christmas whilst waiting for several things to come to fruition I was randomly watching 4oD and saw an advert for a TV show called The Revenge Club, but I couldn’t get Paramount, so goog…
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