Better Off Dead


H.P. Mallory - 2013
    Killed in a car accident before it’s her time to go, Lily learns that the hereafter isn’t exactly what she hoped it might be. First, there’s AfterLife Enterprises, the company responsible for sorting out the recently dead and sending them on their way to the Kingdom, (aka happily ever after,) or to the Underground City, (not so happily ever after.) Learning that Lily’s death was indirectly their fault (her guardian angel, Bill, was MIA during her accident and was one of their employees,) Afterlife Enterprises offers Lily the chance to live again. But, as with most things involving the afterlife, beware the fine print. Most notably, Lily will have to become a soul retriever, venturing into the bowels of the Underground City to retrieve souls that were mistakenly sent there by Afterlife Enterprises during a Y2K computer glitch. Second, there’s angel Bill. As if risking her second life in the Underground City wasn’t enough, Lily’s guide to the Underground is none other than her incompetent, alcoholic, womanizing guardian angel, Bill, the antithesis of anything wholesome. With only Dante’s Inferno and Bill to help her in her quest, Lily’s future isn’t looking bright.Finally, there’s the legendary bladesmith, Tallis Black. As Scottish as his kilts and heavy brogue, Tallis Black is a centuries-old Celt who, for reasons only known to him, offers to train Lily and act as her escort into the depths of the Underground City. Dark, brooding and definitely dangerous, Lily knows she shouldn’t trust Tallis, but she also can’t deny her attraction to him. Between soul retrieving in hell, dealing with Bill and trying to figure out what’s in it for Tallis, Lily wonders if maybe she would’ve just been better off dead.

The Wives


Tarryn Fisher - 2019
    A thriller you won’t be able to put down! Thursday’s husband, Seth, has two other wives. She’s never met them, and she doesn’t know anything about them. She agreed to this unusual arrangement because she’s so crazy about him.But one day, she finds something. Something that tells a very different—and horrifying—story about the man she married. What follows is one of the most twisted, shocking thrillers you’ll ever read. You’ll have to grab a copy to find out why.

The Silent Daughter


Claire Amarti - 2020
    Blonde hair waterfalling over her shoulders, serious eyes, lips a little parted like she's about to speak. That's when I realize I've been holding my breath, because the gasp when I inhale almost chokes me.Sadie Kelly has lost her job. Until last month, she was a teacher at Horton College – the same high school she went to ten years ago along with her best friend, Fiona. But Fiona died in an accident on their graduation night, in circumstances Sadie's spent the last ten years trying to forget, and since then nothing's been the same.Now Sadie's back in the small Connecticut town where she grew up, jobless and living temporarily with Fiona's mother. But when she hears that a Horton schoolgirl has gone missing, everything changes. Because the missing girl is Devon Hundley - daughter of Philip Hundley, a man Sadie knows all too well…

We Were Mothers


Katie Sise - 2018
    Devoted mother Cora O’Connell has found the journal of her friend Laurel’s daughter—a beautiful college student who lives next door—revealing an illicit encounter. Hours later, Laurel makes a shattering discovery of her own: her daughter has vanished without a trace. Over the course of one weekend, the crises of two close families are about to trigger a chain reaction that will expose a far more disturbing web of secrets. Now everything is at stake as they’re forced to confront the lies they have told in order to survive.

Hide Away


Jason Pinter - 2020
    After an unspeakable crime shatters her life, she changes her identity and moves to a small town in Illinois, hoping to spare her children from further trauma…or worse. But crime follows her everywhere.When the former mayor winds up dead, Rachel can’t help but get involved. Where local detectives see suicide, she sees murder. They resent her for butting in—especially since she’s always one step ahead. But her investigative genius may be her undoing: the deeper she digs, the harder it is to keep her own secrets buried.Her persistence makes her the target of both the cops and a killer. Meanwhile, the terrifying truth about her past threatens to come to light, and Rachel learns the hard way that she can’t trust anyone. Surrounded by danger, she must keep her steely resolve, protect her family, and stay one step ahead, or else she may become the next victim.

Long Gone


Alafair Burke - 2011
    According to Drew Campbell, the well-suited corporate representative who hires her, the gallery is a passion project for its anonymous, wealthy, and eccentric owner. Drew assures Alice that the owner will be hands off, allowing her to run the gallery on her own. Her friends think it sounds too good to be true, but Alice sees a perfect opportunity to make a name for herself beyond the shadow of her famous father, an award-winning and controversial film maker.Everything is perfect until the morning Alice arrives at work to find the gallery gone—the space stripped bare as if it had never existed—and Drew Campbell’s dead body on the floor. Overnight, Alice’s dream job has vanished, and she finds herself at the center of police attention with nothing to prove her innocence. The phone number Drew gave her links back to a disposable phone.The artist whose work she displayed doesn’t seem to exist. And the dead man she claims is Drew has been identified as someone else.When police discover ties between the gallery and a missing girl, Alice knows she’s been set up. Now she has to prove it—a dangerous search for answers that will entangle her in a dark, high-tech criminal conspiracy and force her to unearth long-hidden secrets involving her own family… secrets that could cost Alice her life.

Little White Lies


Jennifer Lynn Barnes - 2018
    "But."Eighteen-year-old auto mechanic Sawyer Taft did not expect her estranged grandmother to show up at her apartment door and offer her a six-figure contract to participate in debutante season. And she definitely never imagined she would accept. But when she realizes that immersing herself in her grandmother's "society" might mean discovering the answer to the biggest mystery of her life-her father's identity-she signs on the dotted line and braces herself for a year of makeovers, big dresses, bigger egos, and a whole lot of bless your heart. The one thing she doesn't expect to find is friendship, but as she's drawn into a group of debutantes with scandalous, dangerous secrets of their own, Sawyer quickly discovers that her family isn't the only mainstay of high society with skeletons in their closet. There are people in her grandmother's glittering world who are not what they appear, and no one wants Sawyer poking her nose into the past. As she navigates the twisted relationships between her new friends and their powerful parents, Sawyer's search for the truth about her own origins is just the beginning.Set in the world of debutante balls, grand estates and rolling green hills, Little White Lies combines a charming setting, a classic fish-out-of-water story, and the sort of layered mystery only author Jennifer Lynn Barnes can pull off.

The Last Stone


Mark Bowden - 2019
      On March 29, 1975, sisters Katherine and Sheila Lyons, ages ten and twelve, vanished from a shopping mall in suburban Washington, D.C. As shock spread, then grief, a massive police effort found nothing. The investigation was shelved, and the mystery endured.   Then, in 2013, a cold case squad detective found something he and a generation of detectives had missed. It pointed them toward a man named Lloyd Welch, then serving time for child molestation in Delaware.   The acclaimed author of Black Hawk Down and Hue 1968 had been a cub reporter for a Baltimore newspaper at the time of the original disappearance, and covered the frantic first weeks of the story. In The Last Stone, he returns to write its ending. Over months of intense questioning and extensive investigation of Welch’s sprawling, sinister Appalachian clan, five skilled detectives learned to sift truth from determined lies. How do you get a compulsive liar with every reason in the world to lie to tell the truth? The Last Stone recounts a masterpiece of criminal interrogation, and delivers a chilling and unprecedented look inside a disturbing criminal mind.

The Innocent Wife


Amy Lloyd - 2018
    You Trust Him. So Why Are You So Scared?Twenty years ago, Dennis Danson was arrested and imprisoned for the brutal murder of a young girl. Now he’s the subject of a true-crime documentary that’s whipping up a frenzy online to uncover the truth and free a man who has been wrongly convicted.A thousand miles away in England, Samantha is obsessed with Dennis’s case. She exchanges letters with him, and is quickly won over by his apparent charm and kindness to her. Soon she has left her old life behind to marry him and campaign for his release.When the campaign is successful and Dennis is freed, however, Sam begins to discover new details that suggest he may not be quite so innocent after all. But how do you confront your husband when you don’t want to know the truth?

The Devil and the Dark Water


Stuart Turton - 2020
    A detective duo. A demon who may or may not exist.It's 1634 and Samuel Pipps, the world's greatest detective, is being transported to Amsterdam to be executed for a crime he may, or may not, have committed. Traveling with him is his loyal bodyguard, Arent Hayes, who is determined to prove his friend innocent.But no sooner are they out to sea than devilry begins to blight the voyage. A twice-dead leper stalks the decks. Strange symbols appear on the sails. Livestock is slaughtered.And then three passengers are marked for death, including Samuel.Could a demon be responsible for their misfortunes?With Pipps imprisoned, only Arent can solve a mystery that connects every passenger onboard. A mystery that stretches back into their past and now threatens to sink the ship, killing everybody on board.The breathtaking new novel from Stuart Turton, author of the The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, winner of the Costa Best First Novel Award.

Russian Winter


Daphne Kalotay - 2010
    Former Bolshoi ballerina Nina Revskaya auctions off her jewelry collection and becomes overwhelmed by memories of her homeland, the friends she left behind amidst Stalinist aggression, and the dark secret that brought her to a new life in Boston.

The Ghost Writer


A.R. Torre - 2017
    I stood in front of the police, my friends and family, and made up a story, my best one yet. And all of them believed me. I wasn't surprised. Telling stories is what made me famous. Fifteen bestsellers. Millions of fans. Fame and fortune.Now, I have one last story to write. It'll be my best one yet, with a jaw-dropping twist that will leave them stunned and gasping for breath.They say that sticks and stones will break your bones, but this story? It will be the one that kills me. This book is not a romance. It is contemporary fiction, but very suspenseful in nature. It is about a famous romance author and a dark secret she keeps.

He Is Watching You


Charlie Gallagher - 2018
    The killer is careful to position her under a camera that links to his smartphone. He likes to look back at his work.HE IS WATCHING HER. BUT SHE ISN’T DEAD.So he will go back to finish the job. He can barely contain his excitement at the thought of getting to do it all over again. But he must be careful. He cannot rush. Rushing makes you careless.Detective Maddie Ives is new to the area. She is handed a missing person report: a young woman with a drink problem who’s been reported missing fifteen times. It looks like a waste of time. But DS Ives has a bad feeling about the woman’s disappearance.DI Harry Blaker is called to a hit and run of an elderly man left to die on a quiet country road. There is no motive and it looks like a tragic accident. But he’s been working Major Crime long enough to know that something isn’t quite right. The two officers find their investigations intertwine and they will need to work together.BUT THEY MUST WORK FAST. TIME IS RUNNING OUT FOR THE WOMAN IN THE CONTAINER. And the killer has already identified his next target.HE IS WATCHING YOU: The new race against time thriller from Charlie Gallagher. Perfect for fans of Kimberley Chambers, Damien Boyd, Rachel Abbott, Patricia Gibney or Mark Billingham.

Her Name Is Knight


Yasmin Angoe - 2021
    Her Name Is Knight is a propulsive character story and action thriller driven by retribution, passion, strength — and coming to terms with your own true self, regardless of what anyone calls you.

The Quiet Girl


S.F. Kosa - 2020
    Quiet girls won't stay silent forever.When Alex arrives in Provincetown to patch things up with his new wife, he finds an empty wine glass in the sink, her wedding ring on the desk, and a string of questions in her wake. The police believe that Alex's wife simply left, his marriage crumbling before it truly began. But what Alex finds in their empty cottage points him toward a different reality:His wife has always carried a secret. And now she's disappeared.In his hunt for the truth, Alex comes across Layla, a young woman with information to share, who may hold the key to everything his wife has kept hidden. A girl without a clear recollection of her own past. A strange, quiet girl whose memories may break them all.To find his wife, Alex must face what Layla has forgotten. And the consequences are anything but quiet.