August went pretty well, reading-wise. Actually, it went pretty well all round, with two lovely breaks where Mrs Puzzle Doctor and I revisited two of our favourite places in Wales and Scotland. The Scotland trip is why there haven’t been any posts for a week or so, and the Wales trip is why there have been so many reviews this month – thirteen so far. In fact, I’ve read two more – L C Tyler’s The Murder Planner and Victoria Dowd’s  Threefold Death – both of which will get reviewed on publication date.

And of course, as I’ve been in a Scottish cabin with no television and just my phone, there are loads of books that I’ve read in the last week that I haven’t reviewed yet – so expect a torrent of reviews over the next few days as well. UPDATE: Obviously I wrote that before going to Scotland – I managed to squeeze in one review on getting back, but there are ten more to come…

But the Puzzly for the month goes for the best book reviewed in that month. So the candidates are:

• A Killer In Paradise by Tom Hindle – Hindle strikes gold with this one, pulling the wool over my eyes completely.
• The Chapel Of Bones by Kate Ellis – a body in a wall and a modern murder are somehow linked, and it falls to Wesley Peterson to sort things out.
• Black Summer by M W Craven – magnificent but ineligible as it’s already won the Puzzly in June 2016
• Death After Evensong by Douglas Clark – the second Masters and Green novel with an interesting plot, but only after you know what happened.

• In The Cold Dark Ground by Stuart MacBride – back to Aberdeenshire with DI Logan MacRae with a healthy slice of Tartan Noir.
• Puzzles Of The Parish ed Martin Edwards – the latest short story collection, with the highlight being Paul Doherty/Harding’s The Confession Of Brother Athelstan.
• The Crime At The “Noah’s Ark” by Molly Thynne – a nicely seasonal classic Christmas mystery.
• The Frozen People by Elly Griffiths – a time-travel murder mystery with some clever twists and turns.

• World’s Greatest Sleuth! by Steve Hockensmith – another magnificent tale, but again, a former Puzzly winner, so disqualified from this month.
• You’ll Be Sorry by Lisa Gardner – ten years after a family disappeared from a house, a new couple moving in starts the nightmare all over again.
• A Rather Dastardly Death by Anthony Slayton – a Golden Age homage, the second Mr Quayle mystery.

• The Burglar Who Painted Like Mondrian by Lawrence Block – the fifth Bernie Rhodenbarr mystery, just as much fun as the first four.
• The Reader Is Warned by Carter Dickson – a stunningly plotted murder mystery, badly let down by the last chapter.
• Crow Moon by Suzy Aspley – darkness falls as a teenager is found dead with a poem concerning crows written on their body. An amazingly assured debut.

It’s a good thing that I’m not reviewing Len or Victoria’s work this month – one of them would be easy, as that would mean it would walk off with the Puzzly – but head to head? Two very different books, each of them marvellous reads… well, we’ll get to them in the future – the very near future in the case of Threefold Death.

However, the Puzzly this month… ignoring Black Summer and World’s Greatest Sleuth! which were re-reads and, as I said above, have already won the Puzzly in times past, it’s a pretty easy choice. All of the books this month were worthy reads – even Death After Evensong had its good points.

It comes down to two – Tom Hindle almost took it for pulling the wool over my eyes, but just edging it – possibly due to being exceptionally creeped out when reading it in an isolated Scottish cabin – is Crow Moon by Suzy Aspley. An outstanding debut – really looking forward to reading The Bone Mother, the next in the series, and whatever comes after that.

Next month – well, there’s eleven books read and awaiting reviews, including three absolute bangers, and the debut of an exciting new feature on the blog which hopefully will take off… Let’s see.