Chris Ewan

Chris Ewan is the award-winning, bestselling author of seven novels: The Good Thief’s Guide to Amsterdam, The Good Thief’s Guide to Paris, The Good Thief’s Guide to Vegas, The Good Thief’s Guide to Venice, The Good Thief’s Guide to Berlin, and the standalone thrillers Safe House, which was a number one bestseller in the UK, and the recently released Dead Line.

Recently I asked Ewan about what he was reading. His reply:

Some titles I finished reading not long ago, and would recommend highly, include:

Letters to my Daughter’s Killer by Cath Staincliffe. This moving and powerful novel is told exclusively in letter form by a mother writing to the person responsible for her daughter’s murder. Sometimes books are published that have interesting or unusual structural conceits and it can be at the expense of story. Not here. Staincliffe has written a page-turning, beguiling and haunting novel about grief, guilt and the complex dynamics of forgiveness.

The Hunter’s Oath by Jason Dean. An addictive action thriller with a strong hook and a cleverly constructed mystery at its heart. James Bishop’s sister has been attacked and left for dead in New York City. Bishop vows to bring the people responsible to justice, unaware of the lengths he’ll be required to go or the challenges he’ll face. Bishop is an emotionally conflicted yet highly capable and dangerous hero, and someone you’ll want to hang out with time and again.

Meanwhile, I’m in the process of reading another couple of crime novels.

Anya Lipska’s Where The Devil Can’t Go is shrewd, witty and compelling; cleverly combining elements of the police procedural novel with the maverick PI sub-genre in a London-based mystery that explores secrets and lies at the heart of the city’s Polish community. Police detective Natalie Kershaw and Polish fixer Janusz Kiszka make for a fascinating and potentially explosive team.

I wish I’d read Tom Franklin’s wonderful Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter years ago. Franklin’s descriptive writing is spectacular and he conjures his Mississippi backdrop with real flair and a distinctive style. I’m fifty pages in and can already tell this will be one of the finest novels I’ve read in quite some time.

As for the future, next up I’ll be moving on to Stav Sherez’s The Devil’s Playground and Claire McGowan’s The Dead Ground, both of which I’m looking forward to enormously.

Visit Chris Ewan's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Good Thief's Guide to Paris.

The Page 69 Test: The Good Thief's Guide to Vegas.

The Page 69 Test: The Good Thief's Guide to Venice.

The Page 69 Test: Safe House.

--Marshal Zeringue