My obsession with jaw-dropping final twists dates back to an upstate New York middle school classroom in the 1970s, where I first read Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery. I remember skidding into the shocking denouement and then promptly backtracking to reread the entire story, looking for clues and marveling at Jackson’s brilliant literary sleight of hand.
From then on, I was drawn to any author—screenwriters, included—capable of wrapping up a story with a blindside. Sci-fi novels or films were never my cup of tea back then (or now), but I remain captivated by the chilling final reveal in Planet of the Apes. Browsing library shelves, I gravitated toward modern-day suspense over past-era cozies, but checked out Agatha Christie’s The Murder of Roger Ackroyd more than once, a sucker for the surprise ending long after I knew what was coming.
Even then, I was studying craft as much as I was being entertained, an aspiring writer in training. Now, three decades into my own career publishing twisty psychological suspense novels, I’m grateful to the authors who inspired me and to my own loyal and smart readership. They don’t want to figure things out early on and have the story unfold in a predictable manner. They want to be kept guessing, from the first page of the first chapter to the last page of the last.
A decade ago, Bookreporter’s senior reviewer Joe Hartlaub wrote about my novel Sleepwalker: “There is a revelation at the end that you will never see coming and that goes off like a hand grenade lobbed into a small room on a quiet summer afternoon.” Ah, the bar was set, and those words rang in my head as a challenge. When I set out to write my latest, The Other Family, I knew what would happen on the shocking last page long before I’d even figured out how the story would open.
If you’re a fellow fan of final hand grenades, here are some other novels you’ll enjoy, from brand new releases to decades-old gems:
November Road by Lou Berney
This 1963 set thriller cleverly and creatively re-imagines the Before, During, and After of John F. Kennedy’s assassination. I was riveted, wondering right up to the final chapter how on earth Berney was going to pull off his fictional premise—I could think of only one way, yet just couldn’t fathom that it could work. He didn’t disappoint, concluding with a chilling, understated bombshell.
Find Me by Alafair Burke
Newly released, Find Me centers around two strong heroines, friends whose deep bond goes back to an unsolved mystery in their past. Burke is a master at plotting and pacing, and doesn’t disappoint here. Not only is this book a true page-turner with an intricate story and well-rounded cast of characters, but it combines a couple of my favorite plot points—amnesia and missing persons—and leads to an exquisite eleventh-hour shocker.
The Collective by Alison Gaylin
Alison Gaylin’s latest thriller is a taut, harrowing tale of grief and revenge, with a brittle-but-not-broken heroine who’s lost her only child to a killer who escapes punishment. While Camille breaks your heart, she’s hardly a pitiful victim. Emerging as a complex character whose strengths and weaknesses are at times exquisitely indistinguishable. This is one of those novels that you’ll never imagine will conclude the way it does—and upon reflection, you’ll realize it was inevitable.
Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens
While this book contains a provocative murder mystery and courtroom procedural, it’s also part romance, part character study, part nature study…a true genre mash-up. I resisted it longer than I should have, simply because so many novels don’t live up to their hype. Where the Crawdads Sing did. It was a beautiful, meandering character study leading up to a startling twist that truly caught me off guard.
Daisy Jones and The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid
This tale is narrated in turns by a group of former seventies rock stars/bandmates via an anonymous-to-the-last page-interviewer, and it isn’t crime fiction by any stretch. It is, however, thoroughly captivating, and more satisfying than many a mystery I’ve read. I was sure I knew exactly where it was going (and where I couldn’t help but root for it to go), but instead took a refreshing direction I never saw coming, and the final reveal of the interviewer’s identity wasn’t the only satisfying surprise.
Precipice by Tom Savage
I discovered Tom Savage before I became an author myself, and he was always at the top of my fooled-me-again list. Having reread some of my favorites, I’m more in awe than ever at his ability to conjure the unexpected like a skilled magician. Set on St. Thomas around a literal cliffhanger—that’s the name of the mansion perched high above the sea—Precipice isn’t the straightforward page-turner you anticipate as the opening chapters unfold, and the last page is a true jaw dropper.
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