April is the cruelest month, so perhaps that’s why all the thrillers coming out this month are so delightfully vicious. In the list below, you’ll find new works from top writers in the genre and some rising voices to round out the mix. You’ll also find the adage “hell is other people” split rather evenly between “hell is other people who you are related to” and “hell is other people that you are not related to but still have a weird amount of control over your life.” Without further ado, behold, the best psychologicals of the month.
Sara Koffi, While We Were Burning
(Putnam)
In this well-plotted cat-and-mouse thriller, a surburban white woman still reeling from the death of her best friend hires a Black personal assistant to help her with day-to-day tasks. Little does she suspect that her new employee only took the gig so she can keep investigating the circumstances surrounding her son’s death, and figure out which “concerned citizen” was the person who called the cops and put her beloved child in their cross-hairs. The looming, inevitable confrontation between the two is forceful and stunning. Koffi has used the thriller genre with great effect for a prescient critique on the petty resentments and deliberate ignorance that underpin our racist power structure.
K.T. Nguyen, You Know What You Did
(Dutton)
In this propulsive psychological thriller, artist Annie “Anh Le” Shaw is sent spiraling when her mother dies suddenly, and long-repressed memories begin to crowd their way to the surface to destabilize her further. When a local art patron disappears, and Annie finds herself waking up in a hotel room next to a dead body with no idea how she got there, things really get unhinged. Although this is Nguyen’s debut, her voice is already self-assured and powerful, and I can’t wait to see what she does next.
Laura McHugh, Safe and Sound
(Random House)
Laura McHugh has been one of the major forces in bringing women’s stories into the rural noir genre, and Safe and Sound looks to be another well-plotted and furious examination of small-town misogyny. Two sisters decide to look into the disappearance of their cousin, taken from the home in which she was babysitting them and leaving only blood and unanswered questions behind. As determined as the sisters are to find the truth, there are other voices just as determined to keep them in the dark.
Kellye Garrett, Missing White Woman
(Mulholland)
When Kellye Garrett publishes a new book, you KNOW you’re going to be in for an amazing read. Our heroine is Bree, whose new boyfriend, Ty, has taken her away on a romantic trip to New York City. But on the final night of her stay, she comes downstairs in their rented Jersey City townhouse and finds a dead body. And not just any dead body, the body of a missing white woman whose disappearance has been virally covered. Oh, and Ty is missing. Bree’s aware that, as a Black woman, her situation is really precarious right now. And she has no choice but to figure the truth out, herself. I’m counting the MINUTES. –Olivia Rutigliano, CrimeReads Editor
Alyssa Cole, One of Us Knows
(William Morrow)
In One of Us Knows, a woman recovering from a debilitating mental illness gets a new position as caretaker of a historic estate, only to be trapped with several visitors during a fierce storm. When one of the motley crew is found murdered, Cole’s heroine must solve the crime or face accusation, despite her own difficulty trusting her mind.
Megan Miranda, Daughter of Mine
(S&S/Marysue Ricci Books)
In Daughter of Mine, a woman inherits her childhood home and heads back to the secretive community she abandoned years before. As she reluctantly reacquaints herself with those she’d rather have left in the rearview mirror, a drought is causing the water in the nearby lake to drop, and there are secrets hiding beneath the waters.
