Scorched Grace

Recommended by Rachel Greenhaus, library assistant for printed and published materials, Schlesinger Library

This book takes the tired conventions of the hard-boiled detective noir and revives them by centering the story on Sister Holiday, a queer, tattooed Catholic nun with a checkered past, while she investigates a series of arsons and associated murders centered on the convent school where she lives and works in modern-day New Orleans. The mystery itself is compelling, but it was the idiosyncratic and morally complex set of characters that really drew me in. This is the first of a new series, and I’m intrigued to know what comes next.