Edgar winner Harper’s riveting latest (after The Last King of California) follows a trio of Los Angeles strivers who investigate a series of horrific crimes. While the City of Angels is being haunted by a serial killer dubbed the L.A. Ripper, Kara, a fixer for the elite concierge service Sub Rosa, reels from the disappearance of her friend Phoebe. Increasingly convinced the Ripper killed Phoebe, she retreats into drug use and conspiracist online forums while questioning her complicity in L.A.’s culture of violence. Principled defense attorney Doug Gibson becomes Kara’s closest ally when his investigation into a client’s suspicious jailhouse death points him toward nefarious goings-on at Sub Rosa. Meanwhile, cynical livestreamer Jake Deal, who attracts followers with his lurid true crime coverage, inadvertently films Phoebe’s abduction at a Hollywood party. As Harper’s three leads converge, each becomes both weapon and target for Tinseltown’s corrupt puppet masters. Razor-sharp dialogue and vivid prose (“The city blurs in the dashcam display.... Like everything has its own light. Like the fire is already burning”) conjure an intoxicating atmosphere of glamor and decay, while Harper’s distinct characters elicit deep emotional investment. The result is a glittering neo-noir with staying power. Agent: Nat Sobel, Sobel Weber Assoc. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 01/30/2026 | Details & Permalink

A body turns up in a lake during three sisters’ summer vacation in this sizzling mystery from Roberts (Juniper Isle). Every summer, adult sisters Esme, Regina, and Piper pend two weeks vacationing at their family’s summer home in Lake George, N.Y.. This year, each woman arrives amid private struggles: picture-perfect eldest daughter Esme’s husband is cheating on her with their former nanny, middle child Piper is battling postpartum anxiety, and youngest daughter Regina’s financial difficulties force her to ask Esme to buy out her share of the house. The morning after the sisters have a heated argument, they discover a corpse in the lake that appears to belong either to their estranged cousin or Esme’s former nanny. Even as the sisters hatch a plan to keep their names clear, they start to doubt if they can trust one another. Roberts gradually reveals the depths of their secrets, keeping the pages turning as she casts suspicion on even the most unlikely culprit. This will have readers guessing until the very end. Agent: Jill Marsal, Marsal Lyon Literary. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 01/30/2026 | Details & Permalink

A second-rate foreign correspondent gets sucked into deadly tensions between the U.S. and China in Martin’s lively if far-fetched debut. Hard-drinking reporter Dani Moreau has washed up in Ghana, where she’s looking for a big story to get her foundering career back on track. While poking around for leads, she stumbles on a shadow war between the CIA and Chinese operatives, who are jockeying for control of undersea fiber optic cables off the African coast, which power world communication. To report the story—and stay alive—Dani must navigate a landscape rife with oligarchs, assassins, and dishonorable politicos. Martin’s traumatized, messy lead often comes across more like a walking cliché than a three-dimensional character, and it’s hard to root for her journalistic success when she barely manages to conduct a single interview over the course of several months. A smattering of cliff-hangers and a hard-charging finale keep the pages turning, but Dani’s flatness as a character and some implausible late-stage plot developments muddy the waters. Though Martin shows promise, this doesn’t quite hang together. Agent: Kirby Kim, Janklow & Nesbit Assoc. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 01/30/2026 | Details & Permalink

Former British intelligence officer Wolff follows his excellent Discipline Files trilogy with a quirky and captivating espionage thriller. The action kicks off with the British intelligence service receiving an anonymous complaint regarding a covert operation to identify the assassin who murdered 10 people across Europe. Aphra McQueen, a researcher with Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee, is tasked with digging into the matter. She has barely begun her investigation when she’s falsely accused of stealing a top-secret file, and the inquest is closed. Aphra has an undisclosed personal connection to the investigation, however, so she reaches out to Zak, a British Syrian dentist, after saving his contact information from the case file. Zak is a distant acquaintance of the suspected assassin, an Iranian chemistry professor from Tehran. Aphra convinces Zak that she’s a spymaster responding to his request to join the service, which sets all the players on a dangerous collision course. Sly asides and metacommentary from a cynical narrator who’s identified only as the “spirit of spying” complement the verisimilitude Wolff brings to the proceedings. Fans of Mick Herron’s Slough House series will appreciate this. (Apr.)

Correction: A previous version of this review misidentified the Iranian chemistry professor character.

Reviewed on 01/30/2026 | Details & Permalink

Ashe (The Sleeping Beauties) draws readers in with this seductive story of obsession centered on a young wife and her enigmatic therapist in 1960s London. Evelyn Westbrook has felt lost ever since her marriage brought an abrupt end to her modeling career. She’s spent recent months plagued by vivid nightmares and locked in a fight with her husband and his family about her decision to take birth control pills. To cope, she begins secret weekly therapy sessions with Dr. Daley, a Freudian psychologist. As Daley solicits intimate revelations from Evelyn, including that she was sexually abused as a teen, she grows both desperately attracted to him and infuriated by his dispassionate neutrality. Soon, Evelyn starts to unravel, and Ashe keeps readers deliciously uncertain about who’s manipulating whom. By depicting the domestic and social pressures on Evelyn with meticulous realism, Ashe makes the character’s possible descent into madness equal parts plausible and chilling. Evocative, empathetic, and ultimately empowering, this coiled psychological thriller will be catnip for fans of Alex Michaelides. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 01/30/2026 | Details & Permalink

The new hire at a Manhattan compliance company is fired during his first day on the job, then gets ensnared in a series of deadly games in this frenetic page-turner from Reid (The Hunter). Ben Cross has been eagerly anticipating his first day at DataDyne Solutions, a billion-dollar business that helps its clients avoid EPA fines, only to be locked out of his computer and escorted from the building by security without explanation shortly after he arrives. A disoriented Ben then boards the subway, where he receives anonymous text messages that promise certain passengers will die when they get off at their stop. Ben is unsure how seriously to take the messages until a man steps off the train and is fatally shot. Ben’s tormentor takes credit for the killing, then continues to taunt him, threatening to reveal a dark personal secret of Ben’s if he doesn’t meet their demands. Reid alternates claustrophobic sections from Ben’s perspective with chapters narrated by NYPD detective Kelly Hendricks, who investigates the first murder after being reassigned to the subway system for humiliating one of her superiors. Propulsive, unpredictable, and genuinely scary, this crackerjack thriller barrels forward like a runaway train. Readers won’t want it to end. (Mar.)

Reviewed on 01/23/2026 | Details & Permalink

Jackson (With My Little Eye) sticks a difficult landing in this Georgia-set thriller about a grieving cop probing a series of bizarrely personal murders. Rookie detective Penny Albright is one of first officers on the scene of a fatal stabbing in an upscale suburban shopping village. When she sees the face of the deceased, she’s stunned to recognize him as Danny Bowery, one of the men she blames for the death, five years earlier, of her twin sister, Nix. Penny quickly catches up with a woman drenched in blood near the scene who calls herself Thalia Grey. Though Penny is all but certain Thalia killed Danny, her cryptic comments about the situation (“This is not a story about a rookie who stumbles onto a killer and solves the case.... This is not a story about cops at all”) convince Penny to let her escape. Xav Castillo, another one of the men involved in Nix’s death, has also been murdered recently, leading Penny on a winding investigation into who might be avenging Nix’s death, and why. Though the wild setup requires some suspension of disbelief, Jackson rewards readers willing to go along for the ride with a whip-smart, consistently surprising procedural. It’s a job well done. Agent: Caryn Karmatz Rudy, DeFiore & Co. (Mar.)

Reviewed on 01/23/2026 | Details & Permalink

Pryor’s lively latest investigation for Hugo Marston (after The French Widow) finds the semiretired head of security at the U.S. embassy in Paris yanked back into the fray. Hugo is making arrangements to open Hugo’s Mystery & Antiquarian Bookshop in Paris’s fashionable Marais district when his superiors call and ask him to investigate a blackmail incident at Eclat de Chocolat, a chocolate factory housed in an 18th-century Catholic convent. Anya Delavigne, the company’s marketing director, has received a threatening note signed by “The Shadow” that promises to reveal her “darkest secret,” though she says she has no idea what that might be. Shortly after Hugo launches his inquiry, one of the company’s employees is killed. Teaming up with his old friend, police lieutenant Camille Lerens, Hugo tries to determine whether the blackmail and the murder are linked, and who’s responsible for each. Series fans will delight at Camille’s return, and Pryor’s depiction of the City of Light is intoxicating. If the investigation itself is somewhat underheated, readers are unlikely to mind. It’s a satisfying confection. Agent: Laura Gross, Laura Gross Literary. (Mar.)

Reviewed on 01/23/2026 | Details & Permalink

In Rosenfield’s slick latest (after You Must Remember This), a woman plots to kill her spouse on the Appalachian Trail with the help of her new lover. Emma Sharp has tired of living under the thumb of her controlling husband, Logan Grant, whom she met in a psychologically fragile state after founding a nutrition startup and then attempting suicide. At the time, Logan was a broke Uber driver, and he charmed Emma into marrying him before revealing his dark side. He’s since stonewalled her attempts at divorce, spurring her to find solidarity and unexpected romance with Taylor, Logan’s ex-girlfriend and former business partner. Together, Emma and Taylor devise a plan to murder Logan while hiking Maine’s Hundred Mile Wilderness, a remote section of the Appalachian Trail. When the trio enter the woods, however, their dynamics shift, and long-buried secrets bubble to the surface. Luckily for Emma, she was raised by a doomsday prepper who taught her how to withstand dire circumstances. Her shrewd efforts to outwit nature and her fellow hikers keep the pages turning, but Rosenfield skimps on emotional depth and character development. The result, while diverting, is unlikely to stay with readers. Agent: Yfat Reiss Gendell, YRG Partners. (Mar.)

Reviewed on 01/23/2026 | Details & Permalink

Leigh (Don’t Trust Her) follows troubled New York City accountant Ellie Taylor as she joins a mysterious secret society in this tiresome suspense novel. At the outset, 30-something Ellie—still haunted by the loss of her mother, who died when she was a child—is dealing with bouts of sleepwalking and mysterious bruises. She receives little comfort from her workaholic husband, Jack, an attorney at her father’s firm, who seems to prefer spending time with his boss to spending time with his wife. Then an ornate invitation, with Ellie’s name inscribed in gold on the envelope, is hand-delivered to her office one afternoon, inviting her to a “Spring Women’s Weekend” at an estate in Westchester and hosted by a group identified simply as “The Society.” With no idea of what the event entails, Ellie accepts. In Westchester, she’s warmly welcomed by a cabal of wealthy, well-connected businesswomen who speak proudly of their prolific charity work. Before long, however, Ellie learns that the group’s good deeds involve a healthy dose of violence and revenge. Leigh’s excessive plot twists swing between the predictable and the outlandish, resulting in a dull quasi-feminist thriller that’s more flat-footed than frightening. There’s not much here to recommend. (Mar.)

Reviewed on 01/23/2026 | Details & Permalink