Archives de catégorie : Crime & Thrillers

MAKE ME A LIAR de Melissa Landers

The detective story gets a fantastical twist in this novel about a girl with a transferrable consciousness, who uses her power for good, only to have it turned on her when someone uses her body to commit murder. Now she must solve the crime before the killer comes after her.

MAKE ME A LIAR
by Melissa Landers
Disney-Hyperion, December 2023
(via Kaplan/DeFiore Rights)

Caught red handed… for a crime she didn’t commit. Within the secret circles of Harvey Davis High School, everyone knows Tia Dante is worth her weight in hall passes. Using her genetic gift of transferable consciousness, she can slip inside your mind and do your dirty work—humiliate your cheating boyfriend, bring a bully to his knees, tell your boss where to stick it—and then return your body with no one the wiser. No task is too awkward, and unlike the competition, she takes care of business without peeking at your goods.
But while Tia is occupied during a routine payback mission, someone uses her body for a few dirty deeds of their own…like murdering the town prosecutor. With the crime caught on camera and no concrete alibi, Tia is forced to ask her infuriatingly gorgeous ex—Nash Brock–to help unravel the mystery. The heat is on, in more ways than one, and a few stray bullets later, Tia is in a frantic race against the clock to find the killer before they find her.

Melissa Landers is a former teacher who left the classroom to pursue other worlds. A proud sci-fi geek, she isn’t afraid to wear her Princess Leia costume in public—just ask her embarrassed kids. She lives outside Cincinnati in the small town of Milford Ohio, where she writes romantic space adventures for teens and the young at heart.

THE HOUSE GUEST de Hank Phillippi Ryan

Another diabolical cat-and-mouse thriller from USA Today bestselling author Hank Phillippi Ryan—but which character is the cat, and which character is the mouse?

THE HOUSE GUEST
by Hank Phillippi Ryan
Forge/Macmillan, February 2023
(via DeFiore and Company)

After every divorce, one spouse gets all the friends. What does the other one get? If they’re smart, they get the benefits. Alyssa Macallan is terrified when she’s dumped by her wealthy and powerful husband. With a devastating divorce looming, she begins to suspect her toxic and manipulative soon-to-be-ex is scheming to ruin her — leaving her alone and penniless. And when the FBI shows up at her door, Alyssa nows she really needs a friend.
And then she gets one. A seductive new friend, one who’s running from a dangerous relationship of her own. Alyssa offers Bree Lorrance the safety of her guest house, and the two become confidantes. Then — Bree makes a heart-stoppingly tempting offer. Maybe Alyssa and Bree can solve each others’ problems.
But no one is what they seem. And the fates and fortunes of these two women twist and turn until the shocking truth emerges: You can’t always get what you want. But sometimes you get what you deserve.

Hank Phillippi Ryan has won five Agatha Awards in addition to Anthony, Macavity, Daphne du Maurier, and Mary Higgins Clark Awards. As on-air investigative reporter for Boston’s WHDH-TV, she’s won 37 Emmys and many more journalism honors. A past president of National Sisters in Crime and a founder of MWA University, Ryan lives in Boston with her husband.

ADRIFT de Lisa Brideau

What if you lost everything about yourself—and it would kill you to find it? A galvanizing riddle that is just as unmooring as it seems, this sharp character-driven odyssey explores a future challenged by our quickly changing world and the choices we must make to save what matters most.

ADRIFT
by Lisa Brideau
Sourcebooks Landmark, May 2023

The truth doesn’t always set you free…
Ess wakes up alone on a sailboat in the remote Pacific Northwest with no memory of who she is or how she got there. She finds a note, but it’s more warning than comfort: Start over. Don’t make yourself known. Don’t look back.
Ess must have answers. She sails over a turbulent ocean to a town hundreds of miles away that, she hopes, might offer insight. The chilling clues she uncovers point to a desperate attempt at erasing her former life. But why? And someone is watching her…someone who knows she must never learn her truth.
In Ess’s world, the earth is precariously balanced at a climate tipping point, and she is perched at the edge of a choice: which life does she want? The one taken from her―and the dangerous secret that was buried―or the new one she can make for herself?

« It’s rare for a book to be a taut page-turning thriller and also be the kind of story that makes you think about the nature of self, but Lisa Brideau has managed to do just that. Full of apocalyptic tension, tempered by warm human connection, this is a book that will stay in my memory for life. » ― Marissa Levien, author of The World Gives Way

A former aerospace engineer, Lisa Brideau has a master’s in urban planning from the University of British Columbia and works at the intersection of municipal climate change policy and equity as a sustainability specialist. Recipient of a Canada Council for the Arts grant, Brideau lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

WHAT HAVE WE DONE d’Alex Finlay

In one of the year’s most anticipated thrillers #1 New York Times bestseller Sarah Pekkanen calls « Alex Finlay’s best yet, » WHAT HAVE WE DONE is a tale about the lives we leave behind and the secrets we carry with us forever.

WHAT HAVE WE DONE
by Alex Finlay
Minotaur Books, March 2023
(via Aaron Priest Literary)

A stay-at-home mom with a past. A has-been rock star with a habit. A reality TV producer with a debt. Three disparate lives. One deadly secret.
Twenty five years ago, Jenna, Donnie, and Nico were the best of friends, having forged a bond through the abuse and neglect they endured as residents of Savior House, a group home for parentless teens. When the home was shut down―after the disappearance of several kids―the three were split up.
Though the trauma of their childhood has never left them, each went on to live accomplished―if troubled―lives. They haven’t seen one another since they were teens but now are reunited for a single haunting reason: someone is trying to kill them.
To survive, the group will have to revisit the nightmares of their childhoods and confront their shared past―a past that holds the secret to why someone wants them dead.
It’s a reunion none of them asked for . . . or wanted. But it may be the only way to save all their lives.
WHAT HAVE WE DONE is both an edge-of-your seat thriller and a gut-wrenching coming-of-age story. And it cements Alex Finlay as one of the new leading voices in thrillers today.

“Explosive, whip-smart, and compulsively readable, What Have We Done sets a new high-water mark as Alex Finlay’s best thriller yet”―Sarah Pekkanen, New York Times bestselling co-author of The Golden Couple

“This is the very best kind of thriller: fast, smart, and not a wasted word. Alex Finlay is a master at making the pages fly past.”―James Kestrel, Edgar-award winning author of Five Decembers

Alex Finlay lives in Washington, D.C. and is the author of critically-acclaimed novels, including the 2021 breakout, Every Last Fear. His work has appeared on numerous best-of-the-year lists, been published in seventeen languages around the world, and is currently in development for a major television limited series.

KILLING ME de Michelle Gagnon

Utterly original and wildly entertaining, with a protagonist whose life is a total mess, KILLING ME is the laugh-out-loud funny thriller that we never knew we needed.

KILLING ME
by Michelle Gagnon
Putnam, May 2023
(via Levine Greenberg Rostan Literary)

She escaped a serial killer. Then things got weird. Amber Jamison cannot believe she’s about to become the latest victim of a serial killer—she’s savvy and street smart, so when she gets pushed into, of all things, a white windowless van, she’s more angry than afraid. Things get even weirder when she’s miraculously saved by a mysterious woman…who promptly disappears. Who was she? And why is she hunting serial killers?
You’d think escaping one psychopath would be enough, but Amber’s problems are just beginning. Her close call has law enforcement circling a past she’s tried to outrun. So she flees across the country, ending up at a seedy motel in Las Vegas with a noir-obsessed manager and a sex worker as her unlikely companions…and danger right behind. She’s landed in the crosshairs of the world’s most prolific killer, caught up in a deadly game that’s been going on for years. To survive, she’s forced to dust off her old playbook and partner with someone she can’t trust. The odds are against her, but sometimes you just have to roll the dice.

Michelle Gagnon writes thrillers for teens and adults. A former modern dancer, dog walker, bartender, freelance journalist, personal trainer, and model, she’s currently pursuing a master’s degree in clinical psychology. She lives in Los Angeles with her family and way too many dogs.