My Favorite Mysteries & Thrillers
Of all the genres I read, Mysteries and Thrillers are among my absolute favorites. Here are 25 titles I recommend without reservation, ordered not by my initial ranking, but by how strongly I want you to pick them up right now.
Beyond intricate, guess-proof plots, every book here offers something extra—elevated prose, deeply memorable characters, or a twist that stops you in your tracks (the one in We Begin at the End literally made me gasp). Enjoy!
An immigrant family starts offering cutting-edge treatments in a hyperbaric chamber in the woods of Virginia. When a terrible accident leaves one patient dead and others badly injured, the reader is left guessing whether this was truly an accident or something more malicious. In this courtroom drama that will keep you guessing throughout, motives and possibilities abound, and Angie Kim is an expert puppeteer as she deftly makes you change your mind several times throughout the book on who may or may not have been at fault.
In the remote outback of Australia, a man is found dead on the family homestead, and his two brothers return home to try to determine what led to him being stranded under the hot Australian sun. Harper crafts a world in which every character you meet could have had a hand in the man’s death, and she keeps you constantly guessing and second guessing whodunit as more is gradually revealed. Harper’s debut novel The Dry was my favorite book of the year in 2017, and I think that The Lost Man may be even better than that.
One email on the first of every month with a summary and rating of each book reviewed over the past 30 days, and a look at where the year's ranking stands.