Tantalizing Tales — June 2025 — Part Three

I feel like every one of these columns recently starts with me marveling over how fast time is passing but for real, readers, how is it almost the end of June already?

On the plus side, we have several great books publishing soon, to close out our featured titles this month before turning to July (July! Already!) First off, we have Christina Dodd’s delightfully genre-crossing mystery Thus With A Kiss I Die. Narrated by the vivacious Rosie Montagu, daughter of the infamous star-crossed lovers of Shakespeare’s Romeo And Juliet (rumors of their deaths were, apparently, greatly premature,) this second book in her series continues her madcap adventures in life, love and amateur detecting.

Despite having fallen head over heels for Lysander in the prior novel, A Daughter Of Fair Verona, Rosie finds herself trapped in an engagement with Escalus, the Prince of Verona himself. So when his father, the deceased Prince Escalus the Elder, appears, asking her to solve his murder in exchange for helping to reunite her with her one true love, she barely hesitates. Sure, it’s weird that Elder is a ghost, but she did just unmask and stop the city’s first serial killer. How hard could this task be, especially with such a valuable prize waiting for her at the end?

Ms Dodd continues her forward-thinking, feminist romp through Shakespeare’s greatest hits by adapting Hamlet to her charming mash-up of mystery and history, through the lens of the irresistible, self-aware Rosie.

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Our next selection also adds elements of the fantastic to its historical adventures, in Denis Theriault’s The Samurai Of The Red Carnation, translated from the French (Canadian) by Louise Rogers LaLaurie. Set in medieval Japan, this romantic adventure uses the traditional art of waka poetry to magical — and, in the narrative, deadly — effect.

Matsuo was born to be a samurai. But as he is training in the art of war, he realizes that he was destined for a different art altogether. Turning his back on his future as a warrior of the sword, he decides instead to do battle with words, as a poet. Little does he realize the adventure, passion, betrayal and intrigue he’ll encounter on his way.

Matsuo’s quest to find his true self — and his true love — takes him across medieval Japan, through bloody battlefields and burning cities. But his ultimate test will be the uta awase, a tournament where Japan’s greatest poets engage in fierce verbal combat for the honor of victory… and where Matsuo will find himself fighting for his life.

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We kick off our July picks with the “flower-threaded horror” of Lyndall Clipstone’s Tenderly I Am Devoured. This moody, monstrously Gothic romantic horror novel follows a young woman who must bind herself to a dangerous chthonic god in order to save her family’s legacy — and herself — from ruin.

Expelled from her prestigious boarding school after a violent incident, eighteen-year-old Lacrimosa “Lark” Arriscane returns home in disgrace, only to discover that her family is on the point of financial ruin. Desperate to save them, she accepts a marriage of convenience to Therion, the chthonic god worshiped by Lark’s isolated coastal hometown.

But when her betrothal goes horribly wrong, Lark begins to vanish from the mortal realm. Her only hope is to seek help from Alastair Felimath, the brilliant, arrogant boy who was her first heartbreak, and his alluring older sister Camille. As the trio delves into the mythology of gods, Lark finds herself falling under the spell of both Felimath siblings.

Ensnared by a fervent romance, they perform a bacchanalia with hopes that the hedonistic ritual will repair the connection between Lark and her bridegroom. Instead, they draw the ire of something much darker, something which seeks to destroy Therion — and Lark as well.

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Anna Fitzgerald Healey’s dishy debut Etiquette For Lovers And Killers is another coastal romance, tho with a much more lighthearted tone — even if there is murder involved in this historical cozy mystery tinged with noir.

It’s 1964 in Eastport, Maine, and Billie McCadie is bored to death. She’s surrounded by dull people with more manners than sense in her tiny town of haves and have-yachts, with no sign of the intrigue or romance that fills her beloved novels.

Until, that is, an engagement ring and cryptic love letter turn up, addressed to ‘Gertrude’.

Until she meets yacht-club handsome Avery Webster.

Until the unsettling phone calls and visits from a man in a fedora begin.

Until, unfortunately, she’s one of the last people to see Gertrude alive. . . and the first to see her dead.

Everyone is a suspect. Everyone has a secret. And (strangely) everyone has a boat. But who is willing to kiss and tell? As the body count rises and the danger nears, why does Billie feel like she’s more than just a supporting character in this scandal? And after yearning to be in the action for so long, would it be terribly unladylike for her to finally have some fun of her own?

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Another small town mystery takes a more somber tone, in Marieke Nijkamp’s After We Burned. This timely, thoughtful mystery about a deadly fire that burns away a small town’s closely held secrets opens with a terrible accident in Fenix, Colorado. After a high school burns down with a student inside, the entire town mourns… except for those who were there that night and know what really happened.

When Pierce High School burns to the ground, it’s called a tragic accident, especially since a student who should never have been inside at night was caught in the flames. Her death is awful, but no one could have foreseen it. No one could have prevented it.

At least, that’s the official story.

Five teenagers have very different stories tho: about the fire that wasn’t an accident, about the school they wanted destroyed, and about Eden, who was trapped inside.

Told through intertwining POVs and timelines, each teen has their own secrets to protect. The truth, however, will shine through the darkness — but only the strong will rise from the ashes.

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Finally, we have a murder mystery starring a sleuth at the other end of life. Bruce Nash’s All The Words We Know is his first novel to be published in the USA, featuring clever wordplay and a spunky heroine whose memory might be failing her but who’s still acutely observant of her surroundings.

Rose may be in her eighties and suffering from dementia, but she’s not done with life just yet. Alternately sharp as a tack and spectacularly forgetful, she spends her days roaming the corridors of her assisted living facility, musing on the staff and residents, and enduring visits from her emotionally distant children and granddaughters.

But when her friend is found dead after an apparent fall from a window, Rose embarks on an eccentric and determined investigation to get to the truth. She’ll uncover all manner of secrets as she does so… even some from her own past.

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Let me know if you’re able to get to any of these books before I do, dear readers! I’d love to hear your opinions, and see if that will help spur me to push any of them higher up the mountain range that is my To Be Read pile.

And, as always, you can check out the list of my favorite books in my Bookshop storefront linked below!