Archives de catégorie : Crime & Thrillers

THIS SIDE OF GONE de Saundra Mitchell

Celebrated children’s novelist Saundra Mitchell makes her adult debut with the thriller THIS SIDE OF GONE—a police procedural for people who don’t trust the police.

THIS SIDE OF GONE
by Saundra Mitchell
Morrow, January 2026
(via Dystel, Goderich & Bourret)

Vanetta (Vinnie) Taylor isn’t a cop anymore. After 25 years in service, she retired from her job in spectacular fashion—working undercover for Internal Affairs to bust a sex trafficking ring in her own Homicide Unit. Nearly beaten to death by her former colleagues to prevent her testimony from crossing the thin blue line, Vinnie is now living a small-town life, far from the police who tried to kill her. Vinnie is determined to put her past behind her, but the story of a teenager missing in her new hometown catches her attention.

Avery Adair’s family is notorious in Wills Harbor, Maryland. If there’s a burglary, a scam, or a drug deal in this town, it’s safe to assume an Adair was involved. Which is why no one was particularly concerned when Avery went missing. But Vinnie feels a kinship to this teen she’s never met. Vinnie also grew up poor, surrounded by hard circumstances and harder people.

Celebrated children’s novelist Saundra Mitchell makes her adult debut with the thriller THIS SIDE OF GONE—a police procedural for people who don’t trust the police, it follows Vinnie as she becomes increasingly involved in a case that she has no right to be investigating while fearing for her own safety and attempting to stay as far away from any police officer as humanly possible. This terrific novel is perfect for fans of Tana French and Rachel Howzell Hall.

Saundra Mitchell has been a phone psychic, a car salesperson, a denture-deliverer and a layout waxer. She’s dodged trains, endured basic training, and hitchhiked from Montana to California. She now lives in Maryland with her wife, daughter and two terrible, perfect cats. THIS SIDE OF GONE is her first novel for adults.

LUCKY THING de Tom Baragwanath

In this follow-up to his award-winning debut novel Paper Cage, Tom Baragwanath delivers another bone-deep exploration of life in the margins of small-town New Zealand. LUCKY THING is a thrilling new instalment in the Lorraine Henry series.

LUCKY THING
by Tom Baragwanath
Text Publishing, September 2025

When brilliant young student Jessica Mowbrie is found beaten nearly to death in a remote patch of New Zealand bush, nobody has a clue what happened— or how to begin piecing it together. Except long-serving police records clerk Lorraine Henry.

Lorraine knows the Mowbries, like she knows everyone in her part of Masterton, and soon she’ll know a lot more. Because as something of an institution at Masterton police station, Lorraine is a woman people don’t expect much from. But sometimes, that’s an advantage. When her colleagues are busy stomping around making threats and accusations, Lorraine is listening and observing, quietly piecing together a different understanding of what happened to Jessica—an understanding that threatens everything she thought she knew about her community, her friends, and even her own family.

To get to the bottom of things, Lorraine must navigate fractured neighbourhood allegiances, and unearth all kinds of long-buried secrets—secrets that could provoke a danger hiding in plain sight and threaten those she loves the most.

In this follow-up to his award-winning debut novel Paper Cage, Tom Baragwanath delivers another bone-deep exploration of life in the margins of small-town New Zealand. Lucky Thing is a thrilling new instalment in the Lorraine Henry series.

Praise for Tom Baragwanath and Paper Cage:

‘Just the kind of dark, disturbing, gritty, and unusual treat thriller lovers are looking for.’ ―Kirkus [starred review]

‘Magnetic…This beautifully constructed plot has already won awards, and it is easy to see why with a protagonist who is impossible not to root for…Breathtakingly compelling.’ ―Daily Mail

Tom Baragwanath is originally from Masterton, New Zealand, and now lives in Paris. His debut novel, Paper Cage, published in 2022, introduced the world to records clerk Lorraine Henry. It was the winner of the 2021 Michael Gifkins Prize, shortlisted for Best International Crime Fiction in the 2023 Ned Kelly Awards and shortlisted for Best First Novel in the 2023 Ngaio Marsh Awards.

THE NIGHTLESS CITY de Callum McSorley

The first in a new series of historical thrillers set in nineteenth-century Japan, from the prizewinning author of Squeaky Clean.

THE NIGHTLESS CITY
by Callum McSorley
Pushkin Press, September 2026

Tokyo, 1886.

Chino Kunio, a male courtesan in Tokyo’s infamous Yoshiwara neighbourhood, the Nightless City, discovers his one and only client, a British diplomat, dead and himself in the frame for the man’s grisly murder.

Trying to save Chino from the judicial blade are his friend, samurai rebel turned reckless drunk Shimura Shingo, police inspector Tokuda Reiji, and the victim’s wife, Fiona Gordon, a Scottish teacher living a stifled life in the foreign concession, who is seeking her own answers.

But as more foreigners are slain, dredging up the shadow of shipwreck that led to a diplomatic scandal, Chino’s only hope may be to escape the Nightless City for good, before it explodes into violence between belligerent westerners and nationalist bully boys.

Callum McSorley is a writer based in Glasgow, where he grew up. His debut thriller, Squeaky Clean, the first book in the Alison McCoist thriller series, was published to great acclaim and went on to win the prestigious McIlvanney Prize for best Scottish Crime Book of the Year. THE NIGHTLESS CITY is the first in a new series of historical thrillers set in nineteenth-century Japan.

ALL AT SEA de Jonathan Whitelaw

A destination murder-mystery – think Below Deck meets Knives Out. Perfect for all fans of Only Murders In the Building.

ALL AT SEA
by Jonathan Whitelaw
HarperNorth, publication date TBC
(via Northbank Talent Management)

Howie Temple is down on his luck and desperate for cash. A once promising action movie star, he now lives off a crumbling reputation. On his way to film a new reality TV show, which casts a team of c-list celebrities as crew aboard a luxury yacht, he meets fellow contestant, influencer-of-the-moment Cassandra Troy. The duo take an immediate dislike to each other.

After a hectic first day of filming, the pair are shocked discover that the captain of the ship has been murdered – locked in his control room, slumped over the wheel, a knife in his back. Convinced by the show’s ever-opportunistic director to keep the cameras rolling, the pair team-up to hunt the murderer.

Will the show make Howie and Cassandra bigger stars than they could ever dream of? And can they crack the case before the killer strikes again, or will they go down with this sinking ship?

Jonathan Whitelaw is a Scottish writer and journalist based in Canada, and he’s also a regular host at book events and panels, as well as a regular arts reviewer on BBC Radio Scotland’s Afternoon Show. Jonathan is a leading author in the cosy crime market. His latest series, Bingo Hall Detectives, is published by HarperNorth. There are currently two books in the series, The Bingo Hall Detectives (2022) and The Village Hall Vendetta (2023), the first of which awarded the Gilpin Hotel Prize for Fiction at this year’s Lakeland Book Awards.

CLOSE RELATIONSHIPS WITH STRANGERS de Krista Diamond

A modern literary noir in the tradition of Bret Easton Ellis for fans of A Touch of Jen by Beth Morgan, the LA stories of Emma Cline, and Uncut Gems.

CLOSE RELATIONSHIPS WITH STRANGERS
by Krista Diamond
Simon & Schuster, Fall 2026
(via Sterling Lord Literistic)

CLOSE RELATIONSHIPS WITH STRANGERS follows a Las Vegas wildlife photographer who, while moving to Los Angeles to become a paparazzo, loses his relationships, his morals, and eventually his tether to reality.

A Los Vegan itching for LA, Ben is an amateur wild-life photographer and busser in a diner where tourists come to recreate a movie scene starring Jack Whitlock, “the last real movie star.” He meets a man who promises money as a paparazzo, which he likens to wildlife photography, inciting Ben to move to LA. The job is a thrill; high that he chases to increasingly damaging ends.

A year and a half later, Ben—broke, single, and receiving increasingly credible death threats from a pop star’s stans—is desperate for a win. And when scandalous photos of Jack Whitlock leak, and Ben becomes obsessed with being the first photographer to break new photos of Jack. He follows leads through the absurd horrors of celebrity LA, dodging close encounters with fans, weaving his way back to Las Vegas and the desert of his redemption or demise.

Krista Diamond is a Black Mountain Institute PhD fellow in creative writing at the University of Nevada Las Vegas. Her writing has been supported by Bread Loaf, Tin House, the Nevada Arts Council, and has appeared in The New York Times, Cosmopolitan, Slate, Longreads, Hazlitt, Catapult, Joyland, and elsewhere. The opening of CLOSE RELATIONSHIPS WITH STRANGERS was longlisted for both the First Pages Prize and the Stockholm Writers Festival First Pages Prize.