Book picks similar to
The Knives by Richard T. Kelly
fiction
politics
political-fiction
thriller
One More Chance
Lucy Ayrton - 2018
. . I loved every page'
CLARE MACKINTOSH
'I loved this book. Its witchy, and sweaty and unputdownable. It takes a traditional thriller structure and turns it on it's head' DAISY JOHNSON'Refreshing, heartbreaking and magical . . . Every mother should read this' CATH WEEKS
'A riveting and utterly convincing story, that shines a light on the shadows between right and wrong. A sensitive and thought-provoking into the lives of women'
KAREN MILLWARD HARGRAVE
'Fascinating. Enlightening. Sobering.'
OXFORD TIMES
'Hard to believe it's a debut . . . utterly compelling' JENNY BLACKHURST
'Fiction that navigates issues not often showcased on the page with care and without judgement is something to savour. One More Chance does just that'
SKINNY
'Gritty . . . Brutally honest. Emotionally powerful'
MY WEEKLY
***
THE BATTLE ON THE INSIDE IS JUST THE BEGINNING
Dani hasn't had an easy life. She's made some bad choices and now she's paying the ultimate price; prison.
With her young daughter Bethany, growing up in foster care, Dani is determined to be free and reunited with her. There's only one problem; Dani can't stay out of trouble.Dani's new cellmate Martha is quiet and unassuming. There's something about her that doesn't add up. When Martha offers Dani one last chance at freedom, she doesn't hesitate.Everything she wants is on the outside, but Dani is stuck on the inside. Is it possible to break out when everyone is trying to keep you in . . .***
What readers are saying
A brilliant insight into the life of a prisoner told in such a clever and sympathetic way. . . that will have you gripped to the very end.
A fantastic read. 5*****
The story was . . . refreshingly different from anything l have read before. Well worth reading.
A gritty, honest read. Really enjoyed it!
Just couldn't put it down
A brilliant engrossing story and I can't wait to read more by Lucy Ayrton
I loved this book. I loved the plot and the story arc. I loved Danni.
Leaving Berlin
Joseph Kanon - 2014
Almost four years after the war’s end, the city is still in ruins, a physical wasteland and a political symbol about to rupture. In the West, a defiant, blockaded city is barely surviving on airlifted supplies; in the East, the heady early days of political reconstruction are being undermined by the murky compromises of the Cold War. Espionage, like the black market, is a fact of life. Even culture has become a battleground, with German intellectuals being lured back from exile to add credibility to the competing sectors.Alex Meier, a young Jewish writer, fled the Nazis for America before the war. But the politics of his youth have now put him in the cross-hairs of the McCarthy witch-hunts. Faced with deportation and the loss of his family, he makes a desperate bargain with the fledgling CIA: he will earn his way back to America by acting as their agent in his native Berlin. But almost from the start things go fatally wrong. A kidnapping misfires, an East German agent is killed, and Alex finds himself a wanted man. Worse, he discovers his real assignment — to spy on the woman he left behind, the only woman he has ever loved. Changing sides in Berlin is as easy as crossing a sector border. But where do we draw the lines of our moral boundaries? At betrayal? Survival? Murder?Joseph Kanon’s compelling thriller is a love story that brilliantly brings a shadowy period of history vividly to life.
The Fear
C.L. Taylor - 2018
But Mike wasn’t what he seemed and he left her life in pieces.Now 32, Lou discovers that he is involved with teenager Chloe Meadows. Determined to make sure history doesn’t repeat itself, she returns home to confront him for the damage he’s caused.But Mike is a predator of the worst kind, and as Lou tries to bring him to justice, it’s clear that she could once again become his prey…
Sirens
Joseph Knox - 2017
Pulling it off while also rescuing Isabelle Rossiter, a runaway politician's daughter, from Zain's influence? Impossible. That's why Aidan Waits is the perfect man for the job. Disgraced, emotionally damaged and despised by his superiors. In other words, completely expendable.But Aidan is a born survivor. And as he works his way deep into Zain's shadowy world, he finds that nothing is as it seems. Zain is a mesmerizing, Gatsby-esque figure who lures young women into his orbit--women who have a bad habit of turning up dead. But is Zain really responsible? And will Isabelle be next?Before long, Aidan finds himself in over his head, cut loose by his superiors, and dangerously attracted to the wrong woman.How can he save the girl if he can't even save himself?
I Am Pilgrim
Terry Hayes - 2013
An anonymous young woman murdered in a run-down hotel, all identifying characteristics dissolved by acid. A father publicly beheaded in the blistering heat of a Saudi Arabian public square. A notorious Syrian biotech expert found eyeless in a Damascus junkyard. Smoldering human remains on a remote mountainside in Afghanistan. A flawless plot to commit an appalling crime against humanity. One path links them all, and only one man can make the journey. Pilgrim.'
Black Out
Lisa Unger - 2008
Her husband, Gray, loves her fiercely; together, they dote on their beautiful young daughter, Victory. But the bubble surrounding Annie is pricked when she senses that the demons of her past have resurfaced and, to her horror, are now creeping up on her. These are demons she can't fully recall because of a highly dissociative state that allowed her to forget. Disturbing events trigger strange and confusing memories for Annie, who realizes she has to quickly piece them together before her past comes to claim her future . . . and her daughter.
The Darkening Hour
Penny Hancock - 2013
A middle class woman at her wits' end.A struggling migrant worker with few options for survival.When tensions boil over, who will be the first to snap?Will it be Theodora, finally breaking under the pressure?Or Mona, desperate to find a way out?
The Truants
Kate Weinberg - 2019
One, Alec, a journalist in exile, the other, Lorna, a charismatic literature professor. Starting out under the flat grey skies of an east Anglian university campus and ending up on an idyllic Mediterranean island, The Truants is about a group of clever and eccentric misfits who yearn to break the rules. As Jess’ experience of infatuation and betrayal, disappearance and loss gives way to a breathless search for the truth, she finds herself detective in a twisted crime of the heart. Unsettling, challenging, surprisingly funny and beautifully written, The Truants is a compulsively readable literary debut with a twist – and a dead body to boot.
Truth and Lies
Caroline Mitchell - 2018
But when a letter arrives from the prison cell of Lillian Grimes, one half of a notorious husband-and-wife serial-killer team, it contains a revelation that will tear her life apart.Responsible for a string of heinous killings decades ago, Lillian is pure evil. A psychopathic murderer. And Amy’s biological mother. Now, she is ready to reveal the location of three of her victims—but only if Amy plays along with her twisted game.While her fellow detectives frantically search for a young girl taken from her mother’s doorstep, Amy must confront her own dark past. Haunted by blurred memories of a sister who sacrificed herself to save her, Amy faces a race against time to uncover the missing bodies.But what if, from behind bars, Grimes has been pulling the strings even tighter than Amy thought? And can she overcome her demons to prevent another murder?
The Donor
Clare Mackintosh - 2020
But what does she want in return?
When Lizzie's daughter Meg is given a life-saving heart transplant, Lizzie feels hugely grateful to the nameless donor. Then she receives a letter from the donor's mother, Karen, asking to meet, and it seems like the least she can do.But as soon as Karen is welcomed into their lives, Lizzie feels something isn't right. And before long, she can't help but worry that by inviting Karen in, she might have put Meg in danger . . .
Before I Go to Sleep
S.J. Watson - 2011
She looks in the mirror and sees an unfamiliar, middle-aged face. And every morning, the man she has woken up with must explain that he is Ben, he is her husband, she is forty-seven years old, and a terrible accident two decades earlier decimated her ability to form new memories.Every day, Christine must begin again the reconstruction of her past. And the closer she gets to the truth, the more unbelievable it seems.
Fierce Kingdom
Gin Phillips - 2017
They are happy, and the day has been close to perfect. But what Joan sees as she hustles her son toward the exit gate minutes before closing time sends her sprinting back into the zoo, her child in her arms. And for the next three hours—the entire scope of the novel—she keeps on running. Joan’s intimate knowledge of her son and of the zoo itself—the hidden pathways and under-renovation exhibits, the best spots on the carousel and overstocked snack machines—is all that keeps them a step ahead of danger.A masterful thrill ride and an exploration of motherhood itself—from its tender moments of grace to its savage power—Fierce Kingdom asks where the boundary is between our animal instinct to survive and our human duty to protect one another. For whom should a mother risk her life?
Magpie Lane
Lucy Atkins - 2020
As Dee looks back over her time in the Master's Lodging—an eerie and ancient house—a picture of a high achieving but dysfunctional family emerges: Nick, the fiercely intelligent and powerful father; his beautiful Danish wife Mariah, pregnant with their child; and the lost little girl, Felicity, almost mute, seeing ghosts, grieving her dead mother.But is Dee telling the whole story? Is her growing friendship with the eccentric house historian, Linklater, any cause for concern? And most of all, why was Felicity silent?Roaming Oxford's secret passages and hidden graveyards, Magpie Lane explores the true meaning of family—and what it is to be denied one.
Too Late to Say Goodbye: A True Story of Murder and Betrayal
Ann Rule - 2007
Bart Corbin, a successful dentist -- who was tall, handsome, and brilliant. But gradually their seemingly idyllic life together began to crumble. There was talk of seeing a marriage counselor. Bart was distraught; Jenn seemed disenchanted. She needed to reach out to someone she could confide in -- beyond her mother and her sisters. Then, just a few weeks before Christmas 2004, Jenn was found dead with a bullet in her head, a revolver beside her. From the position of the body her death appeared to be a suicide. But Gwinnett County detective Marcus Head was not totally convinced, nor was Jenn's family, who could not believe she would take her own life.And how was this death related to another apparent suicide fourteen years earlier -- that of Dorothy "Dolly" Hearn, a spectacularly beautiful dental student? A star athlete and homecoming queen in high school, Dolly later dated Bart Corbin in dental school. Was there a connection, or was the answer to be found in a secret -- even dangerous -- relationship Jenn Corbin was having outside her marriage? For "Too Late to Say Goodbye," Ann Rule has interviewed virtually everyone in any way related to the story -- the victims' families, police investigators, prosecutors, and sources from Georgia to Australia -- to uncover the truth behind the headlines of these two sensational deaths. What emerges is an incredible tale of jealous rage; of stunning circumstantial and physical evidence that runs from the steamy to the macabre toalmost-unheard-of forensic techniques; and of a tragic irony -- a fateful discovery that motivated the killing. The definitive unraveling of one of the strangest murder investigations of our time, "Too Late to Say Goodbye" is perhaps the finest achievement of a truly great writer's career.
The Catch
T.M. Logan - 2020
Ryan appears to be the perfect future son-in-law. There's just one problem. There's something off about Ryan. Something hidden in the shadows behind his eyes. And it seems that only Ed can see it.Terrified that his daughter is being drawn in by a psychopath, Ed sets out to uncover her fiancé's dark past - while keeping his own concealed. But no-one believes him. And the more he digs, the more he alienates her and the rest of the family who are convinced that Ryan is 'the one'.Ed knows different. For reasons of his own, he knows a monster when he sees one...