Distractions for Disorderly Times

Over the last several months, I spent a goodly number of hours researching crime, mystery, and thriller novels scheduled for publication during this new year. Two thousand twenty-five may be a turbulent period, filled with political rancor, economic disruptions, and unjust deportations—at least here in the United States. If those predictions become reality, the need for escapes of the literary sort will be considerable. Fortunately, 2025 will ultimately give us new fiction from the likes of Anthony Horowitz, Ruth Ware, Carl Hiaasen, Val McDermid, S.A. Cosby, Samantha Downing, John Connolly, Denise Mina, Stephen King, and other notable contributors to this genre.

But, you ask, what can we look forward to in the near term?

Well, among the fresh offerings due to arrive in bookshops between now and March 30—on one side of the Atlantic or the other—are Walter Mosley’s third escapade for New York City private eye King Oliver (Been Wrong So Long It Feels Like Right) and Elly Griffith’s first entry in a new series about time-traveling “cold case” investigators (The Frozen People); John Farrow’s Bright Shining as the Sun, his 11th case for Quebec police detective Émile Cinq-Mars; Kristen Perrin’s How to Seal Your Fate, a sequel to last year’s How to Solve Your Own Murder; Max Allan Collins’ 14th posthumous collaboration with Mickey Spillane, Baby, It’s Murder, marking an end to the famous Mike Hammer series; Scott Turow’s third outing for conflicted prosecutor Rusty Sabich, Presumed Guilty; Victorian Psycho, Virginia Feito’s account of “a bloodthirsty governess who learns the true meaning of vengeance”; A Serpent in the Garden, the opening mystery in what promises to at least be a trilogy from Howard Linskey, set in late 16th-century England and testing the espionage skills of one William Shakespeare; Simon Mason’s A Voice in the Night, his fourth pairing of mismatched Oxford Detective Inspectors Ray and Ryan Wilkins; Barbara Nadel’s East Ham Golem, introducing a couple of London gumshoes in a story that involves a most-peculiar corpse gone missing from a Jewish cemetery; Hang On St. Christopher, Adrian McKinty’s eighth case for Northern Irish Detective Inspector Sean Duffy; and When Sally Killed Harry, by Lucy Roth, described as “a rom com gone rogue.”

In addition, these first three months of 2025 will give us reprints of classic crime yarns. Last year was abundant with such welcome reissues, and we can look forward to still more coming soon, including books by Cornell Woolrich, Ethel Lina White, and Anthony Berkeley. Oh, and we cannot forget about all the crime-related non-fiction on its way. British writer Hallie Rubenhold, who penned a wonderful book about Jack the Ripper, 2019’s The Five, is back with a study of early 20th-century wife-murderer Hawley Harvey Crippen; and Nell Darby captivates us this month with her recollections of “the man who was once Britain's best-known private detective.”

The following list contains more than 425 books to watch for this season, covering a wide range of subgenres and storytelling styles. As usual, titles marked below with an asterisk (*) are non-fiction; the remainder are novels or collections of short stories.

JANUARY (U.S.):
• Abduction of a Slave, by Dana Stabenow (Head of Zeus/Aries)
• Ace, Marvel, Spy, by Jenni L. Walsh (Harper Muse)
• Agates Are Forever, by Logan Terret (SparkPress)
• Aurora Fragment, by Brian Shea and Raquel Byrnes (Severn River)
• Beast of the North Woods, by Annelise Ryan (Berkley)
• Beautiful Ugly, by Alice Feeney (Flatiron)
• Been Wrong So Long It Feels Like Right, by Walter Mosley (Mulholland)
• Best House on the Block, by T.R. Ragan (Thomas & Mercer)
• The Betrayal of Thomas True, by A.J. West (Orenda)
• The Big Empty, by Robert Crais (Putnam)
• Blood and the Badge: The Mafia, Two Killer Cops, and a Scandal That Shocked the Nation, by Michael Cannell (Minotaur)*
• Bronshtein in the Bronx, by Robert Littell (Soho Press)
• The Business Trip, by Jessie Garcia (St. Martin’s Press)
• Bye Bye Blackbird, by Elizabeth Crowens (Level Best/Historia)
• Chain Reaction, by James Byrne (Minotaur)
• Clever Little Thing, by Helena Echlin (Pamela Dorman)
• Close Your Eyes, by Teresa Driscoll (Thomas & Mercer)
• The Crash, by Freida McFadden (Poisoned Pen Press)
• Cross My Heart, by Megan Collins (Atria)
• The Dark Hours, by Amy Jordan (Mira)
• Darkness Rising, by Chris Mullen (Wolfpack)
• Dead Money, by Jakob Kerr (Bantam)
• A Death in Diamonds, by S.J. Bennett (Crooked Lane)
• Deceived by the Light, by Damien Boyd (Thomas & Mercer)
• The Drowning Game, by Barbara Nickless (Thomas & Mercer)
• Eleanor and the Cold War, by Ellen Yardley (Kensington)
• Elita, by Kirsten Sundberg Lunstrum (TriQuarterly)
• Enigma Girl, by Henry Porter (Atlantic Monthly Press)
• Family Inside, by Katie Garner (Mira)
• February Fever, by Jess Lourey (Thomas & Mercer)
• Fools Walk In / So Wicked My Love, by Bruno Fischer
(Stark House Press)
• The Forger’s Requiem, by Bradford Morrow (Atlantic Monthly Press)
• Forget Me Not, by M.J. Arlidge (Orion)
• The Forest of Lost Souls, by Dean Koontz (Thomas & Mercer)
• Grave Danger, by James Grippando (Harper)
• Head Cases, by John McMahon (Minotaur)
• Her Prodigal Husband, by Becky Masterman (Severn House)
• Holmes Is Missing, by James Patterson and Brian Sitts (Little, Brown)
• In at the Death, by Judith Cutler
(Severn House)
• The Incident of the Book in the Nighttime, by Vicki Delany (Crooked Lane)
• The Inheritance, by Trisha Sakhlecha (Pamela Dorman)
• In the Ghost Shadows: The Untold Story of Chinatown’s Most Powerful Crime Boss, by Peter Chin and Everett De Morier (Citadel)*
• January Thaw, by Jess Lourey
(Thomas & Mercer)
• Johnny Careless, by Kevin Wade (Celadon)
• Karma Doll, by Jonathan Ames (Mulholland)
• The Katharina Code, by Jørn Lier Horst (Simon & Schuster)
• The Killer in the Cold, by Alex Pine (Avon)
• A Killer’s Code, by Isabella Maldonado (Thomas & Mercer)
• The Last Room on the Left, by Leah Konen (Putnam)
• Leave No Trace, by Jo Callaghan (Random House)
• A Lethal Walk in Lakeland, by Nicholas George (Kensington Cozies)
• Loose Lips, by Kemper Donovan (John Scognamiglio)
• The Lost House, by Melissa Larsen (Minotaur)
• The Mailman, by Andrew Welsh-Huggins (Mysterious Press)
• Malma Station, by Alex Schulman (Pegasus Crime)
• Mask of the Deer Woman, by Laurie L. Dove (Berkley)
• Murder by the Clock, by Rufus King (Penzler/American
Mystery Classics)
• Murder in the Dressing Room, by Holly Stars (Berkley)
• Murder on the Spanish Seas, by Wendy Church (Severn House)
• My Bonney Lies Under, by Susan Cummins Miller (Artemesia)
• Mystery at the Station Hotel, by Edward Marston (Allison & Busby)
• The Naming of the Birds, by Paraic O’Donnell (Tin House)
• Never Blow a Kiss, by Lindsay Lovise (Forever)
• The Note, by Alafair Burke (Knopf)
• The Oligarch’s Daughter, by Joseph Finder (Harper)
• The Perfect Home, by Daniel Kenitz (Scribner)
• The Pot Thief Who Studied Calvin, by J. Michael Orenduff
(Open Road)
• Presumed Guilty, by Scott Turow (Grand Central)
• Pro Bono, by Thomas Perry (Mysterious Press)
• The Psychopath Next Door, by Mark Edwards (Thomas & Mercer)
• The Queen of Fives, by Alex Hay (Graydon House)
• The Really Dead Wives of New Jersey, by Astrid Dahl
(Simon & Schuster)
• Rebellious Grace, by Jeri Westerson (Severn House)
• The Reunion, by M.J. Arlidge and Steph Broadribb
(Weidenfeld & Nicolson)
• River of Lies, by James L’Etoile (Oceanview)
• Save Our Souls: The True Story of a Castaway Family, Treachery, and Murder, by Matthew Pearl (Harper)*
• Schooled in Murder, by Victoria Gilbert (Crooked Lane)
• A Sea of Unspoken Things, by Adrienne Young (Delacorte Press)
• The Secret History of the Rape Kit: A True Crime Story,
by Pagan Kennedy (Vintage)*
• See How They Hide, by Allison Brennan (Mira)
• A Serial Killer’s Guide to Marriage, by Asia Mackay (Bantam)
• The Serpent Under, by Bonnie MacBird (Collins Crime Club)
• The Seven, by Robyn Delvey (Thomas & Mercer)
• The Seven Dials Mystery, by Agatha Christie (Vintage)
• The Sinners All Bow: Two Authors, One Murder, and the Real Hester Prynne, by Kate Winkler Dawson (Putnam)*
• The Stolen Queen, by Fiona Davis (Dutton)
• Strange Pictures, by Uketsu (HarperVia)
• The Suicides, by Antonio di Benedetto (NYRB Classics)
• Sweet Fury, by Sash Bischoff (Simon & Schuster)
• Tell Me What You Did, by Carter Wilson (Poisoned Pen Press)
• The Texas Murders, by James Patterson and Andrew Bourelle (Little, Brown)
• They All Fall the Same, by Wes Browne (Crooked Lane)
• Track Her Down, by Melinda Leigh (Montlake)
• A True Verdict, by Robert Rotstein (Blackstone)
• Trust Issues, by Elizabeth McCullough Keenan and Greg Wands (Dutton)
• Turnpike Confidential, by Neal Savage (Brandylane)
• Vantage Point, by Sara Sligar (MCD)
• A Voice in the Night, by Simon Mason (Mobius)
• We Are Watching, by Alison Gaylin (Morrow)
• Wicked Jenny, by Matt Hilton (Severn House)
• The Winter Visitor, by James Henry (Quercus)
• Wiseguys and the White House: Gangsters, Presidents, and the Deals They Made, by Eric Dezenhall (Harper)*

JANUARY (UK):
• At the Bottom of the Garden, by Camilla Bruce (Magpie)
• The Antique Store Detective and the May Day Murder, by Clare
Chase (Bookouture)
• Being Dead Is Easy, by Louise Sharland (Bloodhound)
• Black Tag, by Simon Mayo (Bantam)
• The Bone Fire, by Martina Murphy (Constable)
• The Bone Garden, by Simon Beckett (Orion)
• The Bookseller, by Tim Sullivan (Head of Zeus/Aries)
• The Bridesmaid, by Cate Quinn (Orion)
• Britain’s Greatest Private Detective: The Rise and Fall of Henry Slater, by Nell Darby (Pen & Sword)*
• The Broken River, by Chris Hammer (Wildfire)
• The Case of the Christie Conspiracy, by Kelly Oliver (Boldwood)
• The Cleaner, by Mary Watson (Bantam)
• Clever Little Thing, by Helena Echlin (Headline)
• A Cold Wind from Moscow, by Rory Clements (Zaffre)
• The Dark Hours, by Amy Jordan (HQ)
• The Day of the Roaring, by Nina Bhadreshwar (Hemlock Press)
• Dead Man’s Shoes, by Marion Todd (Canelo Crime)
• Death Comes in Threes, by Michael Jecks (Severn House)
• Death in the Arctic, by Tom Hindle (Century)
• The Dog Sitter Detective Plays Dead, by Antony Johnston
(Allison & Busby)
• The Doll’s House, by Natasha Boydell (Boldwood)
• An Ethical Guide to Murder, by Jenny Morris (Simon & Schuster UK)
• Famous, by Blake Crouch (Macmillan)
• Final Victim, by Gregg Olsen (Bookouture)
• Gone to Earth, by Jane Jesmond (Verve)
• Helle’s Hound, by Oskar Jensen (Viper)
• The House with Nine Locks, by Philip Gray (Harvill Secker)
• The Husband, by Daniel Hurst (Bookouture)
• I Bet You’d Look Good in a Coffin, by Katy Brent (HQ Digital)
• Into Thin Air, by Ørjan Karlsson (Orenda)
• The Killing Sense, by Sam Blake (Corvus)
• The King’s Court Murders, by Ellis Blackwood (Vintage Mystery Press)
• The Lake, by Rachel McLean (Ackroyd)
• The Last Truths We Told, by Holly
Watt (Raven)
• Lie of the Land, by Kerry Hadley-Pryce (Salt)
• The Lighthouse Murders, by Rachel
McLean (Canelo Hera)
• The Little Girl in the Wardrobe, by C.J. Grayson (Joffe)
• Love You to Death, by Rowen Chambers (Inkubator)
• The Man She Married, by Alison Stockham (Boldwood)
• The Mother’s Phone Call, by Victoria Jenkins (Bookouture)
• The Mother’s Secret, by Karen Clarke (HQ Digital)
• Murder as a Fine Art, by Carol Carnac (British Library Crime Classics)
• Murder for Busy People, by Tony Parsons (Century)
• Murder Mindfully, by Karsten Dusse (Faber & Faber)
• Murder on the Marlow Belle, by Robert Thorogood (HQ)
• Nightingale & Co., by Charlotte Printz (Corylus)
• Notes on a Drowning, by Anna Sharpe (Orion)
• The Perfect Boyfriend, by S.E. Lynes (Bookouture)
• The Perfect Guest, by Casey Kelleher (Bookouture)
• The Real Death in Paradise: Mystery, Murder and Mayhem—A True Story of a British Detective Fighting Crime in the Caribbean, by Richard Preston (John Blake)*
• The Resurrectionist, by A. Rae Dunlap (HarperNorth)
• Revenge of the Deadly Dozen, by Peter Berry (Bloodhound)
• A Serpent in the Garden, by Howard Linskey (Canelo)
• The Seventh Floor, by David McCloskey (Swift Press)
• The Sister-in-Law, by Joanne Ryan (Boldwood)
• The Storyteller’s Daughter, by Victoria Scott (Boldwood)
• The Stranger in the Room, by Luca Veste (Hodder Paperbacks)
• The Student, by H.M. Lynn (Boldwood)
• Sweat, by Emma Healey (>Hutchinson Heinemann)
• The Time of the Fire, by Emma Kavanagh (Orion)
• Tommy the Bruce, by James Yorkston (Oldcastle)
• The Troubled Deep, by Rob Parker (Raven)
• Vanished, by M.A. Comley (Independently published)
• The Violinist’s Secret, by M.J. Hollows (HQ Digital)
• What Kind of Mother, by Anna-Lou Weatherley (Bookouture)
• The Wrong Daughter, by Dandy Smith (Embla)
• Your Child Next, by M.J. Arlidge and Andy Maslen (Orion)
• Wild Swimming, by G.R. Jordan (Carpetless)

FEBRUARY (U.S.):
• Acts of Murder: Murder in a Small Town, by L.R. Wright
(Classic Mayhem)
• Afraid to Death, by Marc Behm (Arcadia)
• After the Storm, by G.D. Wright (Avon)
• The Antique Hunter’s Death on the Red Sea, by C.L. Miller (Atria)
• The Ballad of the Great Value Boys, by Ken Harris (Black Rose)
• Baptiste: The Blade Must Fall, by David Hewson (Orion)
• Battle Mountain, by C.J. Box (Putnam)
• Beartooth, by Callan Wink (Spiegel & Grau)
• Because She Looked Away, by Alison Bruce (Constable)
• Big Name Fan, by Ruthie Knox and Annie Mare (Kensington)
• The Black Curtain, by Cornell Woolrich (Penzler/American
Mystery Classics)
• Blood Ties, by Jo Nesbø (Knopf)
• Bonded in Death, by J.D. Robb (St. Martin’s Press)
• Boystown, by John Shannon (Unnamed Press)
• Bright Shining as the Sun, by John Farrow (Exile Editions)
• The Call, by Gavin Strawhan (A&U New Zealand)
• Close Your Eyes and Count to 10, by Lisa Unger (Park Row)
• Cold As Hell, by Kelley Armstrong (Minotaur)
• The Contest, by Jeff Macfee (Datura)
• The Crime Brûlûe Bake Off, by Rebecca Connolly (Shadow Mountain)
• Dead Fall, by A.K. Turner (Zaffre)
• Dead in the Frame, by Stephen Spotswood (Doubleday)
• Death of a Smuggler, by M.C. Beaton and R.W. Green (Grand Central)
• Death Takes Me, by Cristina Rivera Garza (Hogarth)
• Death Upon a Star, by Amy Patricia Meade (Severn House)
• The Dollhouse Academy, by Margarita Montimore (Flatiron)
• An Excellent Thing in a Woman, by Allison Montclair (Severn House)
• Fagin the Thief, by Allison Epstein (Doubleday)
• Faith of Their Fathers, by Samuel M. Sargeant (Neem Tree Press)
• Famous Last Words, by Gillian McAllister (Morrow)
• Fatal Crossing, by Lone Theils (Arcadia)
• The First Girl, by Claire McGowan (Thomas & Mercer)
• The Ghosts of Rome, by Joseph O’Connor (Europa Editions)
• A Girl Like Us, by Anna Sophia McLoughlin (Sourcebooks Landmark)
• Grandma Ruth Doesn’t Go to Funerals, by Sharon J. Mondragón (Kregel)
• Ice Town, by Will Dean (Hodder & Stoughton)
• I Died for Beauty, by Amanda
Flower (Berkley)
• Into the Fall, by Tamara L. Miller
(Thomas & Mercer)
• An Island of Suspects, by Jean-Luc Bannalec (Minotaur)
• A Killing Cold, by Kate Alice Marshall (Flatiron)
• The Killing Plains, by Sherry Rankin (Thomas & Mercer)
• The Last Hamilton, by Jenn Bregman (Crooked Lane)
• Leo, by Deon Meyer (Atlantic Monthly Press)
• Little Mysteries: Nine Miniature Puzzles to Confuse, Enthrall, and Delight, by Sara Gran (Dreamland)
• Little Vic and the Great Mafia War, by Larry McShane (Citadel)
• A Long Time Gone, by Joshua Moehling (Poisoned Pen Press)
• March of Crimes, by Jess Lourey (Thomas & Mercer)
• The Medici Return, by Steve Berry (Grand Central)
• Midnight Black, by Mark Greaney (Berkley)
• The Midwives, by Anna Schofield (HarperNorth)
• Murder in an Irish Garden, by Carlene O’Connor (Kensington Cozies)
• Nemesis, by Gregg Hurwitz (Minotaur)
• The Next Deadly Chapter, by V.M. Burns (Kensington Cozies)
• No Comfort for the Dead, by R.P. O’Donnell (Crooked Lane)
• Notes on Surviving the Fire, by Christine Murphy (Knopf)
• Not Our Daughter, by Chad Zunker (Thomas & Mercer)
• Not Who We Expected, by Lisa Black (Kensington)
• One Minute More, by Robert Rotenberg (Simon & Schuster)
• Open Season, by Jonathan Kellerman (Ballantine)
• Oromay, by Baalu Girma (Soho Press)
• Paranoia, by James Patterson and James O. Born (Little, Brown)
• Partners in Crime, by Agatha Christie (Vintage)
• Poor Girls, by Clare Whitfield (Head of Zeus/Aries)
• Prey, by Vanda Symon (Orenda)
• The Profiler, by Helen Fields (Avon)
• Pursued by Death, by Gunnar Staalesen (Orenda)
• The Queens of Crime, by Marie Benedict (St. Martin’s Press)
• The Quiet Librarian, by Allen Eskens (Mulholland)
• Robert B. Parker’s Buried Secrets, by Christopher
Farnsworth (Putnam)
• Runaway Horses, by Carlo Fruttero and Franco Lucentini
(Bitter Lemon Press)
• Saint of the Narrow Streets, by William Boyle (Soho Crime)
• The Second Grave, by Jeffrey B. Burton (Severn House)
• Secret Places, by Don Stuart (Epicenter Press)
• Shoot the Moon, by Ava Barry (Pegasus Crime)
• A Slant of Light, by Kathryn Lasky (Severn House)
• A Slash of Emerald, by Patrice McDonough (Kensington)
• Smoke on the Water, by Loren D. Estleman (Forge)
• Someone from the Past, by Margot Bennett (Poisoned Pen Press)
• Something in the Walls, by Daisy Pearce (Minotaur)
• Spoiler’s Prey, by Robin Blake (Severn House)
• Stone Certainty, by Simon R. Green (Severn House)
• Their Shadows Deep, by Peter Golden (Lake Union)
• This Violent Heart, by Heather Levy (Montlake)
• Treasure Coast, by James Foley (Black Rose)
• Two Weddings and a Murder, by Alyssa Maxwell (Kensington)
• Unshackled, by Amanda DuBois (Flashpoint)
• Untouchable, by Mike Lawson (Atlantic Monthly Press)
• Victorian Psycho, by Virginia Feito (Liveright)
• We Don’t Talk About Emma, by J.D. Barker and E.J. Findorff (Hampton Creek Press)
• We Would Never, by Tova Mirvis (Avid Reader Press)
• Whiteout, by R.S. Burnett (Crooked Lane)
• Within the Circle, by Arne Dahl (Crooked Lane)
• The Wolf Tree, by Laura McCluskey (Putnam)
• You Are Fatally Invited, by Ande
Pliego (Bantam)

FEBRUARY (UK):
• Belsay, by L.J. Ross (Dark Skies)
• The Best Enemy, by Sergio Olguín (Bitter Lemon Press)
• Cold Truth, by Ashley Kalagian Blunt (Ultimo Press)
• The Daughter, by T.M. Logan (Zaffre)
• Death on Ice, by R.O. Thorp (Faber & Faber)
• Declared Dead, by James Craig (Constable)
• Dirty Money, by Charlotte Philby (Baskerville)
• The East Ham Golem, by Barbara Nadel (Allison & Busby)
• The Enemy Within, by Rob Sinclair (Boldwood)
• The Frozen People, by Elly Griffiths (Quercus)
• Gangland, by Jessie Keane (Hodder & Stoughton)
• Give Him to Me, by Dorothy Koomson (Headline Review)
• The Grave in the Ice, by Satu Rämö (Zaffre)
• Here Lie the Dead, by J.D. Kirk (Canelo Crime)
• The Hidden Dead, by Tracy Whitwell (Pan)
• How to Seal Your Fate, by Kristen Perrin (Quercus)
• How to Slay on Holiday, by Sarah Bonner (Boldwood)
• The Impossible Thing, by Belinda Bauer (Bantam)
• The Inheritance, by Trisha Sakhlecha (Century)
• In the Shadows, by Anna Smith (Quercus)
• Line of Sight, by Claire Askew (Hodder & Stoughton)
• Little Red Death, by A.K. Benedict (Simon & Schuster UK)
• Making a Killing, by Cara Hunter (Hemlock Press)
• Memorial Park, by Louisa Scarr (Canelo Crime)
• Mrs. Hudson and the Capricorn Incident, by Martin Davies (Allison & Busby)
• Murder in the Tuscan Hills, by T.A. Williams (Boldwood)
• Murder of an Oxford Scientist, by Fiona Veitch Smith (Embla)
• One Came Back, by Rose McDonagh (Trapeze)
• One True Word, by Snæbjörn Arngrímsson (Pushkin Vertigo)
• Only Murders in the Abbey, by Beth Cowan-Erskine (Hodder)
• Other People’s Houses, by Clare Mackintosh (Sphere)
• The Perfect Mother, by Claire Allan (Boldwood)
• The Quiet Wife, by Diane Saxon (Boldwood)
• Scythe & Sparrow, by Brynne Weaver (Piatkus)
• Seven Lively Suspects, by Katy Watson (Constable)
• The Spiral Staircase, by Ethel Lina White (Pushkin Vertigo)
• The Stolen Child, by Carmel Harrington (Headline Review)
• The Stolen Heart, by Andrey Kurkov (MacLehose Press)
• The Surf House, by Lucy Clarke (HarperCollins)
• The Ten Teacups, by Carter Dickson (British Library Crime Classics)
• That’ll Teach Her, by Maz Evans (Headline)
• To Pay the Ferryman, by Pat Black (Polygon)
• The Uninvited Guest, by Ruby Speechley (Boldwood)
• Wolf Six, by Alex Shaw (Boldwood)

MARCH (U.S.):
• Accidents Happen, by F.H. Batacan (Soho Crime)
• Allegro, by Ariel Dorfman (Other Press)
• All the Other Mothers Hate Me, by Sarah Harman (Putnam)
• Ambush, by Colleen Coble (Thomas Nelson)
• The Angel Deception, by David Leadbeater (Avon)
• April Fools, by Jess Lourey (Thomas & Mercer)
• Baby, It’s Murder, by Mickey Spillane and Max Allan Collins (Titan)
• The Banker, by Peter Colt (Severn House)
• The Beijing Betrayal, by Joel C. Rosenberg (Tyndale)
• Blood Moon, by Sandra Brown
(Grand Central)
• The Boxcar Librarian, by Brianna Labuskes (Morrow)
• Broken Fields, by Marcie Rendon
(Soho Crime)
• The Cambridge Siren, by Jim Kelly
(Allison & Busby)
• The Case of the Elusive Bombay Duck, by Tarquin Hall (Severn House)
• Cat’s Claw, by Dolores Hitchens (Penzler/American Mystery Classics)
• City of Destruction, by Vaseem Khan (Hodder & Stoughton)
• Claire, Darling, by Callie Kazumi (Bantam)
• Command Performance, by Jean Echenoz (NYRB Classics)
• Count My Lies, by Sophie Stava (Gallery/Scout Press)
• Dead Man’s List, by Karen Rose (Berkley)
• Death at the Playhouses, by Stuart Douglas (Titan)
• Don’t Tell Me How to Die, by Marshall Karp (Blackstone)
• Fear Stalks the Village, by Ethel Lina White (Poisoned Pen Press)
• Finlay Donovan Digs Her Own Grave, by Elle Cosimano (Minotaur)
• The Four Queens of Crime, by Rosanne Limoncelli (Crooked Lane)
• Galway’s Edge, by Ken Bruen (Mysterious Press)
• The Get-Off, by Christa Faust (Hard Case Crime)
• The Gift, by Sebastian Fitzek (Head of Zeus/Aries)
• Girl Anonymous, by Christina Dodd (Canary Street Press)
• Girl Falling, by Hayley Scrivenor (Flatiron)
• The Girl from Greenwich Street, by Lauren Willig (Morrow)
• Glory Daze, by Danielle Arceneaux (Pegasus Crime)
• Hang On St. Christopher, by Adrian McKinty (Blackstone)
• Homicide in the Indian Hills, by Erica Ruth Neubauer (Kensington)
• Human Scale, by Lawrence Wright (Knopf)
• If It Isn’t One Thing …, by Steven F. Havill (Severn House)
• I Would Die for You, by Sandie Jones (Minotaur)
• Killer Potential, by Hannah Deitch (Morrow)
• Kills Well With Others, by Deanna Raybourn (Berkley)
• The Last Days of Kira Mullen, by Nicci French (Morrow)
• The Last Visitor, by Martin Griffin (Pegasus Crime)
• Lethal Prey, by John Sandford (Putnam)
• The Library Game, by Gigi Pandian (Minotaur)
• Living Is a Problem, by Doug Johnstone (Orenda)
• The Man Who Swore He’d Never Go Home Again, by David Handler (Mysterious Press)
• Midnight Streets, by Phil Lecomber (Titan)
• A Mother’s Love, by Sara Blaedel (Dutton)
• Mr. Whisper, by Andrew Mayne (Thomas & Mercer)
• Murder of a Recluse, by Jeanne M. Dams (Severn House)
• A Murder in Zion, by Nicole Maggi (Oceanview)
• My Sister’s Shadow, by January Gilchrist (Crooked Lane)
• Nobody’s Fool, by Harlan Coben (Grand Central)
• One Bullet Away, by Dale M. Nelson (Severn River)
• The Other People, by C.B. Everett (Atria)
• Play with Fire, by T.M. Payne (Thomas & Mercer)
• Red Scare: Blacklists, McCarthyism, and the Making of Modern America, by Clay Risen (Scribner)*
• The Reluctant Sheriff, by Chris Offutt (Grove Press)
• Retreat, by Krysten Ritter (Harper)
• Sacramento Noir, edited by John Freeman (Atria)
• Salt Water, by Katy Hays (Ballantine)
• The Savage, Noble Death of Babs Dionne, by Ron Currie (Putnam)
• A Scandalous Affair, by Leonard Goldberg (Pegasus Crime)
• Serial Killer Support Group, by Saratoga Schaefer (Crooked Lane)
• Silent as the Grave, by Rhys Bowen and Clare Broyles (Minotaur)
• The Socialite’s Guide to Sleuthing and Secrets, by S.K. Golden (Crooked Lane)
• The Summer Guests, by Tess Gerritsen (Thomas & Mercer)
• The Ten Worst People in New York, by Matt Plass (Crooked Lane)
• This Book Will Bury Me, by Ashley Winstead (Sourcebooks Landmark)
• Tunnel Vision, by Wendy Church (Severn House)
• Twice as Dead, by Harry Turtledove (CAEZIK SF & Fantasy)
• The Undoing of Violet Claybourne, by Emily Critchley
(Sourcebooks Landmark)
• The Unlucky Ones, by Hannah Morrissey (Minotaur)
• Vanishing Daughters, by Cynthia Pelayo (Thomas & Mercer)
• The Vanishing Kind, by Alice Henderson (Morrow)
• Victim, by Jørn Lier Horst and Thomas Enger (Orenda)
• What She’s Hiding, by Art Bell (Ulysses Press)
• Where the Bones Lie, by Nick Kolakowski (Datura)
• White King, by Juan Gómez-Jurado (Minotaur)
• Witness 8, by Steve Cavanagh (Atria)
• The Writer, by James Patterson and J.D. Barker (Little, Brown)
• You Killed Me First, by John Marrs (Thomas & Mercer)

MARCH (UK):
• Acts of Malice, by Alex Gray (Sphere)
• A Brush with Death, by J.M. Hall (Avon)
• The Burial Place, by Stig Abell (Hemlock Press)
• The Collaborators, by Michael Idov (Simon & Schuster UK)
• The Corpse Played Dead, by Georgina Clarke (Verve)
• Date With Destiny, by Julia Chapman (Pan)
• Death and the Harlot, by Georgina Clarke (Verve)
• Death at the White Hart, by Chris Chibnall (Michael Joseph)
• A Death in Berlin, by Simon Scarrow (Headline)
• Death on the Adriatic, by Georgina Stewart (Constable)
• A Fortune Most Fatal, by Jessica Bull (Michael Joseph)
• The Grapevine, by Kate Kemp (Phoenix)
• Her Sister’s Killer, by Mari Hannah (Orion)
• His Truth, Her Truth, by Noelle Holten
(One More Chapter)
• Hollow Grave, by Kate Webb (Quercus)
• Hunkeler’s Secret, by Hansjoerg Schneider (Bitter Lemon Press)
• Lost Man’s Lane, by Scott Carson
(Free Press)
• The Mouthless Dead, by Anthony
Quinn (Abacus)
• Murder at the Palace, by N.R. Daws (Orion)
• No. 2 Whitehall Court, by Alan Judd (Simon & Schuster UK)
• Not to Be Taken, by Anthony Berkeley (British Library Crime Classics)
• Paperboy, by Callum McSorley (Pushkin Vertigo)
• The Rest Is Death, by James Oswald (Wildfire)
• The Shadow, by Ajay Chowdhury (Harvill Secker)
• Sick to Death, by Chris Bridges (Avon)
• Smoke and Silk, by Fiona Keating (Mountain Leopard Press)
• Someone Is Lying, by Heidi Perks (Penguin)
• Son, by Johana Gustawsson and Thomas Enger (Orenda)
• A Spy at War, by Charles Beaumont (Canelo Action)
• Story of a Murder: The Wives, the Mistress, and Doctor Crippen, by Hallie Rubenhold (Doubleday)*
• There Came A-Tapping, by Andrea Carter (Constable)
• A Troubled Tide, by Lynne McEwan (Canelo Crime)
• Ward D, by Freida McFadden (Poisoned Pen Press)
• When Sally Killed Harry, by Lucy Roth (Avon)
• When Shadows Fall, by Neil Lancaster (HQ Digital)

Nobody’s perfect, and that includes me. There’s every chance I neglected some significant work of crime, mystery, or thriller fiction when putting together this extensive catalogue. If you’re aware of one that should definitely be considered, please don’t hesitate to let us all know about it in the post’s Comments section. I shall continue to update this list through February.

Star Power Bursts Out All Over

Earlier today, Mystery Writers of America announced the identities of several 2025 award winners. Authors Laura Lippman and John Sandford have been chosen as this year’s MWA Grand Masters. Meanwhile, the 2025 Raven Award (for “outstanding achievement in the mystery field outside the realm of creative writing”) will go to Face in a Book Bookstore & Gifts, in El Dorado Hills, California. And the recipient of the Ellery Award (recognizing “outstanding writing teams and outstanding people in the mystery-publishing industry”) is Peter Wolverton, executive editor and vice president of St. Martin’s Press.

These prizes will be presented during the 79th annual Edgar Awards Ceremony, to be held on Thursday, May 1, at the Marriott Marquis Times Square in New York City.

* * *

We’ve also learned that best-selling fictionist Lee Child will take part in CrimeFest, which is ending its annual run in May, after 16 years.

“The celebratory finale features a record number of Diamond Dagger recipients in attendance,” a news release reports. “Alongside Lee, fellow Diamond Dagger recipients confirmed are Peter Lovesey, Simon Brett, Lindsey Davis, Martin Edwards, and John Harvey, as well as in spirit, John le Carré (with his two sons) and Dick Francis (as represented by his son, the crime writer Felix Francis).”

Rocky Mountain Highlight

Organizers of this year’s Left Coast Crime convention in Denver, Colorado—the 35th such annual gathering—today announced the nominees for the 2025 Lefty Awards, in four categories. The contenders were selected by convention registrants.

Lefty for Best Humorous Mystery Novel:
• A Very Woodsy Murder, by Ellen Byron (Kensington)
• Ill-Fated Fortune, by Jennifer J. Chow (St. Martin’s Paperbacks)
• Bronco Buster, by A.J. Devlin (NeWest Press)
• Scotzilla, by Catriona McPherson (Severn House)
• Cirque du Slay, by Rob Osler (Crooked Lane)
• We Solve Murders, by Richard Osman (Pamela Dorman)

The Bill Gottfried Memorial Lefty for Best Historical Mystery Novel (for books set prior to 1970):
• Hall of Mirrors, by John Copenhaver (Pegasus Crime)
• A Killing on the Hill, by Robert Dugoni (Thomas & Mercer)
• An Art Lover’s Guide to Paris and Murder, by Dianne
Freeman (Kensington)
• The Lantern’s Dance, by Laurie R. King (Bantam)
• Death of a Flying Nightingale, by Laura Jensen Walker
(Level Best/Historia)

Lefty for Best Debut Mystery Novel:
• Blue Ridge, by Peter Malone Elliott (Level Best)
• Obey All Laws, by Cindy Goyette (Level Best)
• The Mechanics of Memory, by Audrey Lee (CamCat)
• Ghosts of Waikiki, by Jennifer K. Morita (Crooked Lane)
• You Know What You Did, by K.T. Nguyen (Dutton)

Lefty for Best Mystery Novel (not in other categories):
• Home Fires, by Claire Booth (Severn House)
• Blessed Water, by Margot Douaihy (Zando/Gillian Flynn)
• Assassins Anonymous, by Rob Hart (Putnam)
• Molten Death, by Leslie Karst (Severn House)
• Served Cold, by James L’Etoile (Level Best)
• California Bear, by Duane Swierczynski (Mulholland)

The nominees will be voted on during the convention (March 13-16) and the winners presented with their prizes during a banquet on Saturday, March 15, at the Westin Denver Downtown.

Favorite Crime Fiction of 2024, Part IV: Ali Karim

Ali Karim is The Rap Sheet’s longtime British correspondent, a contributing editor of January Magazine, and assistant editor of the e-zine Shots. In addition, he writes for Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine and Mystery Readers International. Later this year, Ali will appear as the Fan Guest of Honor at Bouchercon in New Orleans.

• You Like It Darker, by Stephen King (Scribner):

It’s only right that the title of King’s latest short-story collection should be a tip of the hat to Leonard Cohen’s last studio album. The abbreviated yarns filling this book, like Cohen’s songs, explore age and aging. Longtime King readers—especially those who are cognizant of their approaching mortality—will find these stories not just unsettling, but elegiac as well.

However, the contents here vary greatly in quality, with the shorter stories being far less engaging than the longer ones. “The Fifth Step” is rather unpleasant, and “Red Screen” is little more than a shrug, while “Two Talented Bastids” and “On Slide Inn Road” are eventful tales that, despite their meandering pace, are delightfully throw-away ditties.

You Like It Darker’s four novellas are what make this book unmissable. “Danny Coughlin’s Bad Dream” is truly extraordinary. Ostensibly a brief crime novel, it begins with the eponymous character reporting the presence of a dead body from the fragments of a dream, only to soon become a frantic thriller. “Rattlesnakes” is a coda to Cujo (1981) and Duma Key (2008), featuring the themes of loss and reflection in the context of how past griefs can become the horrors of today.

“The Dreamers” is a superbly realized cosmic horror piece (with debts owed to H.P. Lovecraft) that weaves memories of the Vietnam War into a vision of what may lie beneath the veneer of our reality. And the final offering, “The Answer Man,” is a dark morality tale, told in a beguiling style that starts with whimsy, but soon turns nasty. It’s an EC Comics-like horror narrative that is both keen and thought-provoking.

Even half a century after he published his first novel, King continues to surprise. And he shows here that his enthusiasm for short fiction writing is just as vibrant as it has ever been.

• A Talent for Murder, by Peter Swanson (Morrow):

Peter Swanson has a genuine talent for taking a crime-fiction cliché and turning it on its head, making you question the darkness (or horror) of human nature as well as its entwined beauty.

In A Talent for Murder, he introduces us to Martha Ratcliff, a middle-aged, mild-mannered, wallflower librarian in Maine who’s newly wed to an equally unimpressive but ostensibly sweet traveling salesman, Alan Peralta. How well, though, does she really know or understand her husband? After watching him (covertly) from her bedroom window as he returns from one of his business trips to a teaching conference—an event during which a young female art instructor reportedly committed suicide by jumping, naked, from her sixth-floor hotel balcony—Martha begins to wonder if he’s up to more at those conventions than peddling merch to stressed-out schoolteachers. As this suspicion turns into an existential crisis for the librarian, she starts digging into whether similar tragedies have occurred elsewhere during Alan’s travels.

Soon overcome by her disturbing discoveries, Martha contacts an old graduate school friend, the irascible Lily Kitner, who had helped Martha escape a previous relationship. Now bored and living at home with her elderly parents, Lily is ready to provide assistance to Martha once more. She agrees to shadow Alan at his next conference, in Saratoga Springs, New York, and try to bait him into a flirtation, maybe learn whether he has any tendency toward violence. And she further enlists the support of private investigator Henry Kimball. (Those two were also featured in Swanson’s The Kind Worth Killing and The Kind Worth Saving).

What Lily hadn’t expected to find was that she’s not the only one dogging Alan’s footsteps. So is Martha’s abusive former boyfriend from college. As this dark adventure proceeds, and mysteries unravel, Kitner and Kimball both reveal the truth beneath the veneer of normal lives and turn up a trail of dead bodies.

Told in a beguiling style, and alternating between third-person and first-person points of view, Swanson delivers a sophisticated psychological thriller. One that might make you think twice before diving into other stories, like those of John Cheever, that take place in purportedly peaceful suburban environments.

• Leo, by Deon Meyer (Hodder & Stoughton UK):

Following on from Meyer’s last novel, The Dark Flood (2021), Leo finds South African detectives Benny Griessel and Vaughn Cupido still exiled—as a result of past misbehavior—to the historic tourist town of Stellenbosch, located about 31 miles east of their customary stomping grounds in Cape Town. There, recovering alcoholic Benny is preparing for his upcoming nuptials, while Cupido finds himself restless dealing with unremarkable police work.

Their attention is soon drawn away, though, to the demise of a female student cyclist, whose body is found on a desolate mountain road. Not long afterward, the principal suspect in that incident, one Basie Small, turns up murdered amid all the trappings of a professional assassination. Griessel and Cupido are keen to investigate further, but their superiors are determined to dismiss these crimes as simple robberies gone terribly wrong. Not surprisingly, the two detectives keep working the case, a choice that may lead them into dangerous intrigues and conspiracies that lie at the heart of the African continent—or do they?

If you think that’s all this book has to attract the reader, you’re wrong. Meyer, an expert at narrative gear shifts, parallels the cyclist’s story with one involving professional thieves, including the beautiful Christina Jaeger (from The Trackers), who are intent on executing a sequence of multimillion-dollar heists. In the mix, too, is a tense subplot involving an ex-member of the South African Special Forces Brigade, a man on a mission of revenge. That combination keeps the novel’s storytelling pace sprightly, and leaves one wondering who among these players might survive all the action.

Written in a terse journalistic style, and benefiting from blistering set-pieces as well as Meyer’s on-target dialogue, Leo is a powerful, dramatic tale that it would be a crime to miss. It was published in Great Britain last fall, but will be released in the States in February.

• The Rumor Game, by Thomas Mullen (Minotaur):

This timely thriller, set in 1943, is relayed from two perspectives. First, that of Anne Lemire, an earnest young reporter who writes a regular column, “The Rumor Game,” for the fictional Boston Star newspaper. Second is Devon Mulvey, a blithely philandering FBI special agent and one of the few Irish Catholics in the Bureau’s ranks.

Lemire’s assignment is to dispel hearsay and propaganda, both of which are being wielded by American right-wing groups sympathetic to the Nazi cause, and are designed to undermine U.S. support for Great Britain (and its allies) in defending Europe from the ugly, expansionist desires of Germany’s Adolf Hitler. Meanwhile, Mulvey—whose own father is an unrepentant isolationist—is tasked with investigating industrial espionage that may or may not hurt the nation’s war efforts.

It could rightly be said that anti-Semitism brings this seemingly mismatched pair together. Anne intends to write about that subject after her 17-year-old brother, Sammy, is bloodily thrashed by a pack of youths targeting him for being half-Jewish. Yet she meets with resolute resistance from both her bosses and from a source for the story, who wants to keep his name out of print. Does Sammy’s beating signal a rift opening up between the city’s Irish Americans and more recently immigrated Jews fleeing the carnage of World War II in Europe? At the same time, Devon and his partner, Lou Loomis, probe the killing of Abraham Wolf, a Jewish worker at a federal munitions factory in Boston. Can a connection be established between that crime and a crate of machine guns that has gone missing from the factory? And why aren’t the Boston Police—and Devon’s cousin on the force, Officer Brian Dennigan—more concerned about these events?

Once they’ve met and found common purpose in their endeavors, Anne and Devon go after the Christian Legion, a pro-Nazi, anti-Semitic group that is printing up fascist leaflets and phony ration stamps, the latter of which are being peddled to Jewish families the Legion intends to frame later as fraudsters and traitors. Not surprisingly, all of these shared pursuits eventually lead our two protagonists into romance. But the pressures of their respective jobs, hidden family secrets, and the era’s politics of hate conspire to separate them and have them questioning each other’s allegiances and faith.

Author Mullen, who earned our respect with his earlier novels about struggling Black policemen in 1950s Atlanta, Georgia (Darktown, Lightning Men, and Midnight Atlanta), does a particularly deft job in these pages of making Boston—with its definably ethnic neighborhoods, acrid dockyards, and class divisions—a character in its own right. He also employs religion, racial animus, and isolationist perspectives to bring contemporary resonance to what might otherwise have been dismissed as only a tale about America’s past.

Last but not least, one work from the non-fiction shelves ...

• Framed: Astonishing True Stories of Wrongful Convictions, by John Grisham and Jim McCloskey (Doubleday):

It’s hardly unexpected that when John Grisham (The Firm, The Exchange, etc.) sits down to compose a non-fiction book, it should eventually read like a thriller. And this one does. It examines 10 American cases of wrongful convictions overturned by dogged determination and an admirable level of tenacity from the advocates of the accused. Five of the cases are detailed by Grisham, while the others are laid out by Jim McCloskey, the founder of Centurion Ministries, a non-profit organization, based in New Jersey, that is dedicated to exonerating people who have been improperly convicted and sentenced to either lengthy incarceration or capital punishment. A shared preface adds useful context to everything that follows.

The explanations of these cases are restricted by the writers’ self-imposed 10,000-word limit. Framed comes off as an angry work, and not simply because of how Grisham and McCloskey approach their subjects; readers will likewise become progressively more enraged as each prosecution is scrupulously detailed. There is incompetence aplenty here, along with abusive motives and a sometimes unfortunate determination that police investigators should close their cases quickly. In some of these investigations, had it not been for the work of the advocates, innocent men might have been forced to pay unjustifiably high prices for the crimes they were falsely charged with perpetrating.

Within these 10 stories, we are given DNA, skewed evidence, unreliable witnesses, and a good deal more, all validating the book’s subtitle: Astonishing True Stories of Wrongful Convictions. Readers will wind up incredulous that such injustices came to pass, and that only through unwavering efforts were they finally corrected.

Other 2024 Favorites: One of Us Is Dead, by Peter James (‎Macmillan UK); Kill For Me, Kill For You, by Steve Cavanagh (Atria); Crampton, by Thomas Ligotti and Barndon Trenz (Chiroptera Press); The Scarlet Papers, by Matthew Richardson (Penguin, 2023); and A Short Stay in Hell, by Steven L. Peck (‎Strange Violin Editions, 2012).

Hutchings Hangs It Up

I somehow missed this news. From In Reference to Murder:

The Jan/Feb 2025 Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine (issue #1000) reported the official news that after thirty-three years as editor-in-chief of EQMM, Janet Hutchings has retired. Hutchings has served as one of the most important editors in the world of short crime fiction, creating the publication's “Passport to Crime” department (helping make crime fiction in translation more mainstream), as well as the “Something Is Going to Happen” blog and the EQMM podcast.

Hutchings is only the third editor of the publication [following both Frederic Dannay and Eleanor Sullivan], and will be succeeded by Jackie Sherbow, who has served as Senior Managing Editor of both Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine and Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.

Those are mighty big shoes to fill, Ms. Sherbow!

A Final Reckoning

After compiling the results from “108 best mystery, crime fiction and thriller lists this year (mostly from the U.S., but some from the U.K., Ireland, Canada, Australia and India),” Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine editor George Easter has tallied up the titles that received the most favorable mentions. “This is an attempt,” he writes, “to find some consensus on what exactly are the best mysteries, crime novels and thrillers of the year 2024.”

By Easter’s computations, The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead), received the most nominations—37. The count is tied for second place, with Chris Whitaker’s All the Colors of the Dark (Crown) and Richard Osman’s We Solve Murders (Pamela Dorman) both scoring 35 mentions. Here are the other books filling out his top 10:

3. The Hunter, by Tana French (Viking)
4. Listen for the Lie, by Amy Tintera (Celadon)
5. Guide Me Home, by Attica Locke (Mulholland)
6. First Lie Wins, by Ashley Elston (Pamela Dorman)
7. The Waiting, by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown)
8. The Return of Ellie Black, by Emiko Jean (Simon & Schuster)
9. Tie — Smoke Kings, by Jahmal Mayfield (Melville House); and The Sequel, by Jean Hanff Korelitz (Celadon)
10: The Midnight Feast, by Lucy Foley (Morrow)

I’ve read most, though not all, of these works. And I enjoyed a number of the other releases among those 74 titles in Easter’s “bests” catalogue, including Stuart Turton’s The Last Murder at the End of the World (Sourcebooks Landmark), C.B. Bernard’s wonderful Ordinary Bear (Blackstone), Francis Spufford’s Cahokia Jazz (‎Scribner), and Nilanjana Roy’s Black River (‎Pushkin Vertigo). A few more I still have to tackle in the coming weeks, before I feel pressured to turn away from 2024 titles and focus mostly on those due out in this new year.

Click here to see Easter’s complete record.

Revue of Reviewers: 1-5-25

Critiquing some of the most interesting recent crime, mystery, and thriller releases. Click on the individual covers to read more.

Rant and Raves

As we move hesitantly into a new year, let us thank all of those print publications, Web sites, and blogs that served up “best crime fiction of 2024” lists for the rest of us to read—and sometimes shake our heads at in disagreement. The number of such recommendations has now fallen off severely, but there are a few left to highlight.

The entertainment site Screen Rant, for instance, this week posted a top-10 list of thriller novels from the last dozen months:

• First Lie Wins, by Ashley Elston (Pamela Dorman)
• The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead)
• All the Colors of the Dark, by Chris Whitaker (Crown)
• Listen for the Lie, by Amy Tintera (Celadon)
• We Solve Murders, by Richard Osman (Pamela Dorman)
• The Return of Ellie Black, by Emiko Jean (Simon & Schuster)
• Middle of the Night, by Riley Sager (Dutton)
• Society of Lies, by Lauren Ling Brown (Bantam)
• House of Glass, by Sarah Pekkanen (St. Martin’s Press)
• The Boyfriend, by Freida McFadden (Poisoned Pen Press)

Other year-end choices come from Crimeworm, Do Some Damage’s Scott D. Parker, and Jackie Farrant of Raven’s Crime Reads. Tarrant adds this delightfully worded note, which matches my own experience of 2024: “So, although it’s been a depleted year of reviewing for me, I have read a lot of books—some brilliant, some good, some disappointing, and some where a tree has totally died in vain!”

A Purveyor of “Smart Horror”

I regret to say I have not yet read this author’s work, and now there will be no more books to come. From the Toronto Star:

Toronto writer Andrew Pyper, whose debut novel “Lost Girls” launched a career of bestselling, award-winning literary thrillers, has died.

Pyper passed away at his west-end home Friday of complications from cancer, his agent confirmed to the Toronto Star. He was 56.

The writer, who once said “I write scary stories for a living,” followed up ”Lost Girls”—which won the Arthur Ellis Award for best first novel in 2000—with such works as “The Demonologist,” “The Damned,” “The Only Child” and “The Homecoming.” His books earned him international publishing deals, were translated in multiple languages and acquired for TV and film development.

His most recent book, “William,” described as “psychological horror meets cyber noir,” was published this past fall under the pen name Mason Coile. Pyper took great delight in sharing the news that it had been chosen by the American Booksellers Association as well as People magazine as one of the best reads of September.

A list of Pyper’s publications can be found here.

(Hat tip to Mystery Fanfare.)

The Case of the Egyptian Standoff

By Peter Handel
Christopher Bollen entered the literary arena in 2011 with the publication of his first novel, Lightning People, which took a detailed look at young adults in New York City and how their lives were shaped by fate. While Library Journal called that book “impressive,” his 2015 follow-up, Orient—set in an affluent town on Long Island—made a bigger splash. “Skillfully written, with delightful malice aforethought,” Kirkus gushed in its starred review of that thriller involving a succession of murders; while Ivy Pochada wrote in the Los Angeles Times that Orient “might well be this summer’s most ambitious thriller or this summer’s most thrilling work of literary fiction.”

Over the next eight years, Bollen produced an additional trio of standalone crime/thriller novels. The Destroyers (2017) was his first to be set in a foreign country (as all of his subsequent books have been)—in this case on the Greek island of Patmos, in the Aegean Sea. A Beautiful Crime (2020) provided a delicious twist on the heist novel, its action taking place in over-touristed Venice. His Egyptian “debut” came with 2023’s The Lost Americans, about the mysterious death of an American in Cairo, working for the international arms industry.

Now 49, Bollen—reared in Ohio but currently a New York novelist and magazine writer—saw his sixth novel, Havoc, published just last month by HarperCollins. Amazon’s plot précis reads:

Eighty-one-year-old widow Maggie Burkhardt came to the Royal Karnak to escape. But not in quite the same way as most other guests who are relaxing at this threadbare luxury hotel on the banks of the Nile. Maggie, a compulsive fixer of other people’s lives, may have found herself in hot water at her last hotel in Switzerland and just might have needed to get out of there fast ... But here at the Royal Karnak, under the hot Saharan sun, she has a comfortable suite, a loyal confidante in the hotel manager, Ahmed, and a handful of sympathetic friends, similar “long-termers” who understand her still-vivid grief for her late husband, Peter. Here, she is merely the sweet old lady in Room 309.

One morning, however, Maggie notices a new arrival at check-in: a mournful-looking young mother named Tess and her impish eight-year-old, Otto. Eager to help, Maggie invites them into her world. But it isn’t long before Maggie realizes that in her longing to be a part of their family, she has let in an enemy much stronger than she bargained for. In scrawny, homely Otto, Maggie Burkhardt has finally met her match.

The New York Times’ Sarah Lyall called Havoc “a deliciously nasty tale of resentment and revenge,” and she later featured it on her “Best Thrillers of 2024” list. She wasn’t alone in applauding it so. CrimeReads and the South Florida Sun Sentinel’s Oline H. Cogdill also named Havoc among their favorite crime-fiction releases of last year.

In the following conversation with Bollen, he talks about his approach to writing novels, his extensive travels, and how visiting foreign countries inspires his work.

Peter Handel: Your new novel, Havoc, described as a “horror story,” represents somewhat of a departure from the lengthy, complex thrillers you published previously. Tell us a little about Havoc—the essential plot of the story, and how you came to write it.

Christopher Bollen: I never believed in lightning strikes of inspiration—the kind where the entire story comes all at once in a blinding flash—but that’s exactly what happened with Havoc. At the tail end of the [COVID-19] pandemic, as soon as it was possible to escape the U.S., I booked a trip to Egypt that included a boat trip up the Nile. Before embarking, I was staying a few days at the grand Winter Palace Hotel in Luxor, and one afternoon I was sitting in their back garden, and I happened to eavesdrop on a table near mine where an old American woman in a kaftan was berating a young waiter about the way the chef had prepared her lunch. It was clear to me she was a long-staying guest. And the story came to me in an instant: an old American woman living out of grand hotels at the tail end of the pandemic, causing trouble. And of course she needed a nemesis.

(Right) Author Christopher Bollen. (Photograph by Jack Pierson).

PH: And what a nemesis your protagonist, octogenarian Maggie Burkhardt, has in this book: Otto Seeber, an 8-year-old terror with a mind for revenge and mayhem. Did you have any particular inspiration for him? A niece or nephew, by chance? Because that Otto is one pint-sized piece of work! What were you feeling when you wrote about all his sociopathic behavior?

CB: I don’t really have children in my life. No nieces or nephews, and in New York City where I live, my friends with kids mostly divide their lives between family and friends, so my insight into children is somewhat limited. But I vividly remember being a child, and how un-harmless, clever, and mischievous they can be. I really wanted Otto to be an 8-year-old, and therefore not an adult trapped in a child’s body like so many over-precocious children in literature and films. So that meant making him vulnerable as well as conniving—a terror, yes, but also a little boy. In other words, the same human depth I gave Maggie.

So that’s where it all started. Truly, I didn’t immediately think of it as a novel. I really thought, oh, when I have some free time, I’ll write it as a short story, and when I began a few months later, that’s how I envisioned it. But Havoc kept growing and gaining momentum and broke out of its cage. I think it was an opportunity to explore age—the end of life, the fright and resignation that comes with old age, and certainly I didn’t want a character who goes gently into that good night.

PH: Havoc features what I think is your first unreliable narrator, Maggie, who is clearly full of deception as she relates her past family life and alludes to the deaths of her husband and daughter. One gets the impression you had a most enjoyable time creating such a devious personality.

CB: People are always saying, write what you know, which might explain why contemporary literature is filled with so many aimless, lukewarm youngsters. Stepping into the shoes of an 81-year-old Wisconsin widow running from trouble was the most freeing and exciting experience in my writing life. I could get away from myself (an aimless, lukewarm, once-youngster) and dive into a character that, on the surface, doesn’t seem to have a lot in common with me. But more than that, Maggie is fun because, yes, she’s deceptive and ruthless and perhaps psychotic, but she’s also smart, funny, witty, and full of loss and remorse and regret. In other words, a total person.

PH: But she’s also frightened, both overtly and otherwise, and she lies her ass off to everyone, including herself—mostly to herself, it seems to me. Nonetheless, you feel she is also a sympathetic character, don’t you—in spite of her own sociopathic behavior—while Otto is an unrepentant little shit.

CB: Well, it wasn’t just a case of writing a fun villain. She allowed me to find a new perspective to tackle ideas about life and aging that just would have sounded incredulous in a young character in their prime. So it was freeing on all fronts. I really felt for Maggie as I wrote her, even as she was sabotaging people’s lives.

PH: During our previous conversation, for CrimeReads, focusing on your fifth novel, The Lost Americans—much of which is set in Egypt—you mentioned your youth and your obsession with Egypt. When you finally went there, how did it feel?

(Above) The entrance of the Luxor Temple in Luxor, Egypt.

CB: I never intended to write a second Egypt novel. A second Venice novel, sure, count me in. But Egypt? The funny thing is, with The Lost Americans being set in Cairo and Havoc set in Luxor, I almost felt like I was writing about two different countries. Which is partly a testament to the diversity of Egypt. But also, the city of Cairo is geopolitical, it’s international, it has its eyes on the present and future (despite the Pyramids looming in the distance). Luxor is very much a city built around ancient Egypt and the tourism of the Valley of the Kings and the temples. So Havoc really felt like tourist Egypt, an Egypt of the past, the stuff of Tutankhamun and the gilded tombs of the pharaohs. Obviously, the political realities of the country [find their] way in. But this was actually much more the Egypt I dreamt about in my childhood. I have to say, I was as blown away by the tombs in the Valley of the Kings as Maggie is in the novel. They really are these extraordinary, all-encompassing works of art and magic. That’s Egypt. Everything feels touched by wonder.

PH: And I’d say you were touched by wonder as well—you’ve told me that when you were growing up you were a huge Egypt “fan.” Was there some seminal childhood moment, an aha! when some internal quasi-psychic voice said to you, “Egypt will occupy a large part of your consciousness when you grow up”? Or just those dreams?

CB: Actually, I can never really predict what will work for a novel or not. So many times, when traveling to a new country, I’ve thought, this will make a perfect backdrop for a story. And it just doesn’t spark. Two years ago I spent a month in Madrid, certain I’d walk away with a fresh novel idea in my head. Madrid was amazing, I found it alive and interesting, but it just didn’t induce this friction that I need for all the pieces to fit. So, I really never know what will end up speaking to me. I can say, though, that like Egypt, Venice always meant a lot to me, even as a kid before I visited, and it too didn’t fail when it came to generating wildly good ideas for stories.

PH: I do think there is an underlying theme in your books—at least in the ones I’ve read: Your protagonists, in their own unique way(s), all strike me as being, to some extent, on the “outside” of the society they inhabit. In The Lost Americans, I would suggest that both your “shadow” protagonist, the dead Eric Castle—a weapons tech for a U.S. defense contractor, who operates in a realm far from most people’s reality—and Omar—a friendly, gay Egyptian (helping Eric’s sister, who’s come to Cairo to investigate her brother’s death), who is well aware of his limitations in a homophobic society—are outsiders. And in A Beautiful Crime (there’s that first Venice novel!), two American wannabe-con artists, Nick and his boyfriend Clay, surely don’t fit into the decaying palazzo they live in while running their scams. Is this a projection on my part, Chris? In Havoc, besides the misfit aspects of Maggie’s own life as a fugitive of sorts, you include a gay couple, Zachary and Ben, who drive the plot in an unexpected way—again, gay people have (by necessity) often been forced to remain as outsiders in “society,” rather hiding in plain sight.

CB: You’re absolutely right. I’m always purposely coming from an outsider angle. That’s true of my second novel, Orient, too which was about a gay teenage orphan. It’s funny. When I was describing Havoc to a friend long before it was published, he said, “Oh, so you are finally embracing normalcy”—meaning, what can be so outsider about an 81-year-old Wisconsin widow in a ritzy hotel. But that’s just it: I think I wrote Maggie as if she were an outsider, so that colors the entire book. It probably has a lot to do with growing up gay in the time I did, where I felt like an outsider, so I was always rooting for that kind of character. The one who doesn’t fit in. In case anyone is worried I’ve embraced the norm (and I don’t imagine anyone is losing sleep worrying about that), the next novel I’m working on is about a gay American prostitute in Paris, a definite outsider. But really, all foreigners are outsiders, even Americans traveling in Europe. You are instantly the odd person out. It’s an unbalancing, which is the emotional and physical state where I like my characters to be.

PH: Finally, am I correct that you did not anticipate the enormous buzz around this novel? Best-of-the-year lists, the critical acclaim? Has all the attention on Havoc had any effect on what you might do down the road? Is horror a happy place for you now?

CB: For every novel, I always think, there’s an audience out there that will appreciate this—I’m just hoping the book finds them, or vice versa. Sometimes it does and sometimes it doesn’t. But I had a really strong feeling that Havoc would find its way—maybe because the set-up of an old woman vs. a little boy, old vs. young, is so compelling in itself. I’m so happy and grateful [for] the positive response. Sometimes, about a month after you publish a book and you get at most a little faint clapping, you think, oh well, that’s it. But Havoc seems to be taking on a life of its own.

You know what, Peter? Success can be as bad for writers as failure. Because you wonder if you can make the magic again, or if you should just reproduce the winning book in other forms. I’ve had so many debates with writer friends about whether “successful” writers really just keep writing the same book over and over. I don’t want to do that. I hope I keep going in risky unexpected directions, some of them sure to disappoint, but that’s how you keep alive as a writer. I think elements of horror will definitely come into play in future books.