Favorite Crime Fiction of 2025, Part I: Peter Handel

(Peter Handel has reviewed and written about crime fiction for the San Francisco Chronicle, the Portland Oregonian, Pages Magazine, Crimespree Magazine, and CrimeReads. He now produces the Substack newsletter Carnivorous: A Steady Diet of Crime Fiction.)

Because much, though not all, of my reading time is focused on what books I will be writing about, my list is largely, though not exclusively, titles I read for “work.” I’ve enjoyed many terrific books this year—but then, there are always plenty of enticing titles every year. Finding time enough to read them is the issue!

In no particular order, here are my 2025 crime and mystery favorites:

• The Wasp Trap, by Mark Edwards (Atria)
• Pro Bono, by Thomas Perry
(Mysterious Press)
• Pariah, by Dan Fesperman (Knopf)
• Venetian Vespers, by John Banville (Knopf)
• Kill Your Darlings, by Peter Swanson (Morrow)
• Fair Play, by Louise Hegarty (Harper)
• Killer Potential, by Hannah Deitch (Morrow)
• The Mailman, by Andrew Welsh-Huggins (Mysterious Press)

It was a bittersweet year for me regarding books and authors. Two people I worked with are no longer on the planet: Ken Bruen and Tom Perry. Both were wonderful, generous interviewees, and while I’m grateful for the opportunity to have worked with them, it’s rotten that they have died.

Three titles struck me as genuine “sleepers” this year: The Wasp Trap, Killer Potential, and Fair Play. All of those, in their own ways, subverted genre expectations and were stronger for it.