Readers and writers: Treat yourself to two thrillers from Minnesota authors

Two new novels by accomplished Minnesota authors show the wide variety in the mystery crime thriller genre One takes us deep into Spanish history the other ties together women with the same last name We recommend both for reading during the lazy days of summer Courtesy of Calumet Editions Ring of Lions by Cass Dalglish Calumet Editions Ruben was on one knee leaning toward the ninth lion as if he was having a face-to-face conversation with the beast As Drummond moved forward and was nearing the fountain the lion made a low gurgling sound before the light stream coming from its mouth thickened and began to bubble and spurt squirting up and then falling down into the channel at the animal s feet The spray curved as if it were echoing the geometric proportions of the archways that surrounded the courtyard on four sides from Ring of Lions Cass Dalglish Courtesy of Calumet Editions There is something odd and amazing going on with lion number nine in the famous Court of the Lions fountain at the Alhambra palace in Granada and Graciela Corzal de Moreno is baffled and concerned Graciela is director of Alhambra the Moorish castle-city of the last Emir of Granada The stone lions were a water clock when they were built in the th century but they hadn t spouted water for centuries Now one of the lions is functioning again Was this priceless animal in one of the bulk famous palaces in Islamic architecture tampered with Graciela calls for help from Walter Drummond an American former FBI agent who investigates the authenticity of documents art and artifacts So begins this historical novel and murder mystery that introduces readers to the Alhambra a UNESCO World Heritage site various believe should be named an eighth wonder of the world Besides taking readers into the history of the Alhambra complex of palaces the story incorporates the intertwining of cultures and religions during the centuries the Moors dominated what is now Spain As Graciela and Drummond progress deep under the palace s tangle of hidden corridors to check the old water system that fed the lion fountain and dig into centuries-old documents they are joined by Ana Madrizon and Ruben Torres Ana is a young New Yorker whose family of mathematicians philosophers and storytellers fled to the mountains when the Moors were forced out of Granada in by Christian monarchs King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella Ruben is Graciela s Cuban assistant who believes his Jewish ancestor traveled with Columbus When a young man is killed falling from a cliff the Granada police captain individuals Ruben But when another body is determined in a room beneath the Court of Lions there is another mystery The workman had no visible signs of trauma that would have killed him There s more intrigue surrounding the treaty signed by the last emir before the Christians took over What hints lie in the reference to the lions Is the document Graciela keeps locked in her office a forgery What does it have to do with words written on the lion fountain There are plenty of suspicious characters including the unhappy director of digital tools for the City of Cordoba who feels he should have been Alhambra director and a musicologist who leads French docents to Spain and seems to pop up when Graciela is around Dalglish writes her characters vividly as she weaves the history of Alhambra and the Moors influence into her plot so scrupulously a reader doesn t realize how much knowledge she absorbs After finishing this look into the rich tradition left by the Moors readers will want to head to the internet to learn more about these Islamic centuries and the palaces from which the emirs ruled Dalglish a poet and professor of English at Augsburg University has lived and studied in Mexico Chile Colombia and Cuba She will introduce her novel in conversation with Minnesota nonfiction history writer Jack El-Hai at p m Thursday at Magers Quinn Hennepin Ave S Mpls Free registration required Go to magersandquinn com event Courtesy of Berkley Penguin Random House Making Friends Can Be Murder by Kathleen West Berkley How was I to know that everything would be so different just fourteen days later I couldn t have known that Ruby and I and all the Sarahs would be thrown together for another higher-stakes project Probing a murder Can you believe it It s not like murder and yarn-bombing have much in common right from Making Friends Can Be Murder Kathleen West Courtesy photo There s a lot of fun in this quirky clever mystery about a group of women with the same name including one who s dead When -year-old Sarah Jones is new to Minneapolis she and a group of women who share the name Sarah Jones bond over pranks like decorating a tree with yarn Then they learn a Sarah Jones who is not in their group has been killed That sets the Sarah Jones Project in motion sparked by a lively -year-old The Sarahs want to find the killer Because the women share a name they refer to one another by number Sixty-Nine is a crochet master retired from corporate law Thirty-Nine and Forty-Four taught elementary school and Twenty-Seven Sarah s closest friend was halfway to a doctorate in sociology What the Sarahs don t know is that there is a ringer in their midst a swindler and manageable murderer Adding a romance vibe is a hunky FBI agent who thinks the original Sarah can help him investigate the woman who has infiltrated the Sarah Jones Project But can they trust one another West keeps the action going through several devices including group emails video transcripts made by Seventeen and interviews with law enforcement West graduated from Macalester College and holds a master s in literacy schooling from the University of Minnesota She has published three previous novels including Home or Away and Are We There Yet She will launch Making Friends Can Be Murder at p m Tuesday at Pryes Brewing Company West River Road N Mpls presented by Magers Quinn Free registration required Go to magersandquinn com event Related Articles 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