Tall and Small: Dangerous Winter Nights

From Halloween until Valentines Day, we see very little light, waking to dark skies and leaving work long after the sun has set. It is perhaps this gloom that leads many readers to pick up those novels and short stories that delve into the most disturbing elements of humanity. Daphne du Maurier’s unnerving short story collection The Birds, Laura Purcell’s The Silent Companions and Jo Nesbo’s The Snowman are the perfect accompaniment for an evening spent under a blanket with the curtains closed and the lights firmly turned on.

For those readers seeking a new injection of crime into their winter evenings, there can be no better place to start than with Hannah Kent’s spectacular novel Burial Rites. Soon to be turned into a film starring Jennifer Lawrence, Hannah Kent’s Burial Rites is based on the true story of Agnes Magnusdottir- the last woman to be executed in Iceland. Arrested for murdering two men, Agnes spent her final days watched over by a farmer’s family deemed to be respectable enough to guard her. The relationship between the women who come to know her bounces between distrust and grudging affection, never allowing the reader to settle on their own view of the infamous, yet captivating prisoner. While we puzzle over her guilt, the harsh landscape pushes itself to the forefront. Just as Agnes is trapped, unable to escape her fate, Kent’s characters cannot escape the tyranny of the weather. Crops fail, help is unable to reach a new-born baby and the country freezes as time and again it is hit by the unrelenting blows of winter. This is a gripping read for fans of historical crime that will leave you unsure who to you should be rooting for.

And for younger readers who like a good dose of the gruesome and mysterious?

Fleur Hitchcock’s books are the perfect reads for any amateur detective. Her middle-grade novel

Murder in Midwinter is the perfect blend of mystery, intrigue and frozen landscapes for smaller bookworms. When Maya witnesses an argument from the top deck of a bus, the police ignore. But when a body is found, she becomes an important part of a murder investigation. For her own safety she is sent to her aunt’s reclusive house. But will this isolation put her in even more danger? This is an incredibly fast-paced page-turner that makes a brilliant introduction to the genre for confident readers.