STEPHANIE BROWN draws attention to the hidden labour of the female embroiderers, and how a 19th century replica made no such error
THE DARK HOURS by Amy Jordan (HQ, £16.99) features a retired detective inspector who lives in a remote Irish village and mostly keeps to herself. When she sleeps, which isn’t her forte, there’s always a torch and a golf club close at hand.
Thirty years earlier she was a young Garda in Cork involved on the periphery of the hunt for a multiple murderer, and those events have haunted her ever since. When her old boss rings, needing her help, she learns that the past isn’t over yet.
This is a nice twisty plot, but best of all is the book’s truly unusual main character — a retired cop in her 60s who’s learned a bit over the years, and unlearned bits where necessary, too; she won’t take crap from anyone, but she’s more sympathetic to them now than she was then.
DENNIS BROE recommends two new series on Apple TV for their examination of inequality and skewed morals
Do frozen colonists carry the virus of empire? Why is monstrosity a great way to describe capital? Was God a dustman?
Looking for moral co-ordinates after a tough year for rational political thinking and shared human morality
Timeloop murder, trad family MomBomb, Sicilian crime pages and Craven praise


