Suspense/Thriller

The first chapter of this novel is a master class on how to kick off a gripping thriller. We meet an unnamed woman as she sneaks out of—somewhere?—we just find out it’s very cold and she has to be quiet. We join her on her escape and ultimate chase and death, caring about her more and more the more we read. In indelible strokes and in a short amount of space—only 9 pages—Castillo introduces her story conflict, brings us a character we care about and are invested in, and establishes a vivid setting. Really, if you want to write a gripping crime novel, this would be a great chapter to check out as an example. But if you’re a reader, like most of us, you’ll simply want to find out what’s next. read more

If you want a compelling reading experience, just pick up a David Bell book. Reading the first page can be like leaning over a suspense generating machine—the gears of the story will grab any loose time you have and draw you in irresistibly. Take, for instance, the first few lines of his latest, Since She Went Away:

Five police cars. Three news vans. And one coroner’s wagon.

Boom. There’s obviously something intriguing going on here and the reader will want to know what it is.

Bell’s developing story is anything but mechanical, however, but powered, as most good stories are, by realistic, multifaceted characters. It alternates between two viewpoints; that of Jenna Barton and her son Jared. Jenna is a nurse and single mother who can be a little too candid at times. Her main concern these days is her best friend Celia who has been missing for three months. Since the perpetually late Jenna was supposed to meet Celia at the park the night she disappeared, Jenna has been wracked with guilt and obsessed with the search: read more

This is the first one of Laukkanen’s books I’ve read – the subject interested me – and now I know what to say when someone has read every Harlan Coben title. Give Owen Laukkanen a try. This is a thriller with a heart and a brain, a difficult combination to resist. Laukkanen’s series characters are Minneapolis FBI agents Kirk Stevens and Carla Windermere, and Stevens is caught off guard early on when one of his daughter’s classmates commits suicide.

Windemere has her own issues with a classmate’s suicide many years ago and she takes a personal interest in this young man’s death, which, upon examination, appears to have been encouraged by someone else. While the FBI agents are on a tech trail trying to figure out what happened and find the instigator, the parallel story shows the reader just what’s going on. read more

Four books in, Hank Phillippi Ryan has hit a sweet spot with her latest Jane Ryland mystery. A perfect mix of plot, suspense, emotion and character, Ryan takes a crazily snarled few days in the lives of Jane and her boyfriend Detective Jake Brogan and makes you live through them right alongside the characters. She layers her story so that she shifts between what’s happening to Jane and what’s happening to Jake, often cutting away just as she’s gotten to a reveal or plot twist, which only serves to sharpen the suspense. read more

This is a tight, smart, no hold barred thriller – I’d compare it to the Bourne Identity movies (alas, I haven’t read the books) in that the action is so organic and well staged it’s about impossible to look away. Holm’s premise is also a great one: his main character, Michael Hendricks, is a hitman – who only hits other hitmen. It has some of the joyful precision of Prizzi’s Honor, which, fans of the movie will recall, was also about hitmen (or a hitman and woman).

Hendricks only kills people who are about to kill other people. The people he’s saving aren’t always the most worthy types, but they are innocents of a kind, and Hendricks is seeking atonement for various wartime events that are revealed in the novel. His only ties to society are a fellow army buddy, Lester, a genius hacker who has been left wheelchair bound by an IED in Kandahar; and his former girlfriend, Evie, who, thinking Hendricks is dead, has made a life with another man. read more

We all know how masterfully P.J. Parrish (actually the sisters Kristy Montee and Kelly Nichols) can create suspense. What is amazing to me—considering that my sister and I can hardly write a joint grocery list without getting all Cain and Abel—is how seamlessly all the elements of a great mystery come together in a satisfying whole in their collaboration. Their new book, She’s Not There, a departure from the Louis Kincaid series, hits the ground running, with a set-up reminiscent of the great noir thrillers of the past. read more

Unfortunately, Stefanie Pintoff is no longer writing her wonderful (and Edgar winning) series set in turn of the century New York; fortunately, she’s turned her hand to thrillers and she’s very, very good at it. I wasn’t so sure when I saw the title (which is kind of generic) but I don’t think Pintoff as a writer is actually capable of writing anything approaching generic. She’s too good, and too smart, of a writer. The book I was most reminded of as I was reading was Deaver’s The Bone Collector, both for the intelligent storytelling and for the memorable main character. read more

Taking the detective from his excellent stand-alone, The Bone House, Freeman brings the eccentric Cab Bolton to Florida and lands him in the middle of an unholy mess. The novel begins with a shooting at a political rally, where the candidate and a couple others were shot and killed. The shooter escapes and a later capture and imprisonment leaves some folks not so sure the right person is in jail for the crime. Flash forward 10 years and the dead candidate’s wife, Diane, is in the race for Florida Governor as a third party candidate. She’s supported by her best friend, Tarla, who also happens to be Cab’s mother. Cab has been asked by a campaign operative to look into possible threats to Diane as the 10th anniversary of the shooting approaches. read more

This is the first novel by Brit Ruth Ware, and it’s that rare thriller that is also a mystery. In a straight thriller, you may know whodunnit, and the thrill is catching or finding that person in time. But combining the best parts of the thriller—pacing, suspense—with the best parts of a mystery—whodunnit?—is a rarer skill. It’s shared by such writers as Jeffery Deaver and Lee Child. Heady stuff for a first timer.

This is a completely gripping story—I read it straight through in one sitting, just about—and you won’t forget it anytime soon. The central character is Nora, who lives alone in a London flat. She’s contacted out of the blue by someone named Flo who is throwing a bachelorette party (or in Brit lingo, a “Hen Do”) for Clare, Nora’s childhood best friend who she hasn’t seen in a decade. read more