Publishers Weekly now weighs in with its own dozen nominations for the best mystery and thriller novels of 2026:
• The Amateur, by Chris Bohjalian (Doubleday)
• Backwater, by James Sallis (Soho Crime)
• Die Famous, by Michael Koryta (Little, Brown)
• The Fervent Whites, by De’Shawn Charles Winslow (One World)
• Fruit Fly, by Josh Silver (Crooked Lane)
• Furious Violet, by Sarai Walker (Harper)
• The Midnight Taxi, by Yosha Gunasekera (Berkley)
• My Name Was Gerry Sass, by Tiffany Hanssen (Atlantic Crime)
• Paper Cut, by Rachel Taff (Morrow)
• A Past Without Pictures, by Jonathan Ames (Mysterious Press)
• A Violent Masterpiece, by Jordan Harper (Mulholland)
• The Window Man, by Christopher Goffard (Crooked Lane)
These are interesting selections, though they barely overlap with the works appearing among my preliminary choices of this year’s “bests.” I won’t be surprised to see Backwater (Sallis’ final novel?), A Past Without Pictures, and A Violent Masterpiece featured on more lists of this kind over the next few weeks.
Have not read any of them. Have heard of two of them.
ReplyDeleteMore and more when I see these "best of" lists deals, it is like when TMZ does something about Social Media Influencer, Yada, separating from fellow Social Media Influencer, Nada, and I am left asking--WHO?
Not saying these are bad books or anything other than I am clearly, more and more, totally clueless while sitting on a a very small rock ledge above a madly swollen and roaring creek of reading material.