We are going to play it a little differently this month.
There are so many big-name thrillers in July I could easily write a column which tells you what you already suspect, you sly minxes: new books by Laura Lippman (Dream Girl), Megan Abbott (The Turnout), Liv Constantine (The Stranger in the Mirror), and B.A. Paris (The Therapist) are all excellent books. These writers do not disappoint. Special nod to relative newbie Samantha Downing, whose For Your Own Good has already been snatched up by Hollywood in the form of Robert Downey, Jr.
That said, I’m going to talk about titles by lesser-known writers, including a couple of debuts. But first, a controversial opinion: The Other Black Girl by Zakiya Dalila Harris is the thriller of the summer, and quite possibly of the year.
Harris’s book is a well-reviewed bestseller, so the controversy I am anticipating is not about its merits or its audience appeal. It’s about timeliness: this is a book that’s overdue, a workplace thriller about race, politics, and racial politics set in the very white world of book publishing. It’s no secret that publishing and media in general have a diversity problem. We pay a lot of lip service to #ownvoices and #weneeddiversebooks and #publishingpaidme. How do these hashtags lead to action? By talking about books like Harris’s wherever and whenever we can. My colleague Molly Odintz included Other in her best of 2021 so far, and I’m compelled to write about it in this space in order to make sure you thriller lovers do not miss it. It’s the smartest book I’ve read in years about the horrors of competition, old-fashioned gaslighting, and being in thrall to a murky past. Sounds like a thriller to me.
July’s picks, in brief:
Michelle Richmond, The Wonder Test
(Atlantic Monthly Press)
Richmond is no newbie but this the first book in a new series featuring FBI Agent Lina Connelly. Set in Silicon Valley, Richmond’s book imagines a town obsessed with the Wonder Test. All’s fine until high school students start disappearing and Connelly is on the case.
Charlotte Carter, Rhode Island Red
(Vintage / Black Lizard)
This is another inauguration of a promising new series. Jazz musician Nanette Hayes can’t figure out what to do about her mercurial boyfriend, Walter. She can’t explain how an acquaintance ended up dead on her kitchen floor. Things get really heated when it turns out the acquaintance is an undercover cop.
Elisabeth de Mariaffi, The Retreat
(Mullholland)
I loved de Mariaffi’s account of the Scarborough rapist, The Devil You Know. Her new book, The Retreat, also feels like it might be based on one of Canada’s most prestigious institutions, the Banff Institute. In de Mariaffi’s telling, the High Water Center for the Arts turns into a locked-room mystery after a snowstorm strands the artists in residence and they start slowly dying.
T.J. Newman, Falling
(Avid Reader/S&S)
Falling is so freaking scary that if you have any reservations about the safety of air travel DO NOT READ IT. This is a public service message.
Willa C. Richards, The Comfort of Monsters
(Harper)
Another debut, another missing girl. But Richards’ debut has a very interesting setting: Milwaukee in the summer of 1991, during the reign of Jeffrey Dahmer. Along the way she makes a cogent case for how one missing girl isn’t a priority when there is a serial killer praying on young men.
