Crime fiction, mystery lovers at the ready – this one is for you! The master of the killer tale is back with this cinematic cracker. Enter the cast of ‘The Word is Murder’, the first book in the Hawthorne series, is being made into a major feature film. The actors have been cast, the script written, and filming has already started in Hastings.

But it’s not a contented set, with rivalries rising and conflicts bubbling behind the scenes. In the middle of shooting, the actor playing Hawthorne is stabbed – which leaves the real Hawthorne with no choice. He finds himself investigating the murder. Because the killer may not have the right man. Was it Hawthorne himself who was meant to be the target?

A Deadly Episode is a wild ride through a world that the author knows extremely well, and the most personal case Hawthorne has had to deal with so far.

Hbk, William Collins, £22

A beautifully buoyant read from the writer of ‘Frayed Atlantic Edge’, the senior lecturer in modern history from Birmingham University is about as far from the image of a dry academic as you can get. An award-winning photographer, lyrical writer with a fascination for all sea vessels small.

Join David Gange on a seabound journey along Atlantic coasts and islands, exploring places and ways of life that have been built on small rowed or paddled boats. These boats outnumber decked ships by at least fifty to one. Yet almost all history writing is about big boats

Along the way he encounters whales, sharks and icebergs and skies filled with tens of thousands of seabirds. Small traditional boats fulfil roles in their communities unlike any other supposedly inanimate things. Often treated as sentient members of the family, they’ve been essential to many cultures’ ways of living with the seascapes that surround them.