The Girl of My Dreams by Donna Leon
Heinemann,£16.99

Gallows Lane by Brian McGilloway
Macmillan, £14.99

Small Crimes by David Zeltresman
Serpent's Tail, £7.99

Donna Leon's The Girl of My Dreams is a sad, reflective novel beginning with one funeral and ending with another. The girl of the title is an innocent-looking ten-year-old with golden hair. Her body has just been fished out of the Grand Canal in Venice.

A gold watch has been sewn into her clothing, a gold wedding ring has been secreted about her body. The post-mortem examination shows her to have a sexual disease. No one has reported a missing child. Commissioner Guido Brunetti, one of the few happily married coppers in crime fiction, has first to find out who she is, then the disturbing mysteries she poses.

Brunetti, in melancholy mood after burying his mother, is troubled beyond his police duties. He dreams about the girl. His inquiries lead him from the rich, well-connected family with a canal-side apartment to a gypsy encampment on the outskirts of the city. As usual, subtly, Leon's social conscience gets to have a say as Brunetti grapples with the lies and evasions of both groups.

Brian McGilloway's Borderlands was one of last year's most impressive debuts. Does Gallows Lane pass the feared “second novel” test? Easily. Inspector Devlin, operating in the border area between the two Irelands, is hunting the brutal killer of a young woman. Is it “roid rage”, committed under the influence of steroids?

He has also been ordered by his superiors to make sure that a violent recently released prisoner does no further harm: the ex-con is found crucified on a tree. Another girl is attacked, but survives. More deaths ensue. What have all those criminal acts to do with a famous post office robbery of the 1970s? Devlin is being interviewed for promotion, but the investigations are not going well. He's a likeable character, full of doubts and guilt.

Small Crimes is the kind of grim noir novel they used to write in the Thirties and Forties. There are no good guys, only men who are mean, vicious, tough, corrupt and amoral. Action is frenzied and bloody, women easy but vulnerable, dialogue curt and the plot not necessarily convincing. David Zeltresman serves up the formula with enthusiasm and some fine writing.

Ex-cop Joe Denton is released from prison after a seven-year stretch for disfiguring the local district attorney. He returns to his small town, where most people hate him and many want him dead, not least his police colleagues, about whose nefarious and criminal activities he knows too much. The town's former mobster is dying, but has found God and may be about to spill many beans. If Denton can kill him before he does so, he may escape with his own life. Exhausting.

Times Recommends

• Superfreakonomics by Steven D Levitt and Stephen J Dubner
• The Times picks the 50 best paperbacks of 2009
• Vincent van Gogh’s letters show the soul of the artist