Keeping secrets carries consequences in Dunham’s moody 1951-set debut. Now that her grandmother is dead, only Deena Williams knows what skullduggery it took to secure her attendance at Bellerton, a prestigious all-female college in Virginia. Deena—a working-class orphan hiding her origins—fears she’ll have trouble fitting in among her privileged peers. Then she lands a room in South Hall dormitory alongside fellow freshman Ada May Delacourt, an influential descendant of Bellerton’s founder. Deena, Ada May, and the four other freshman in South Hall swiftly form an exclusive clique dubbed the Belles. As they begin flouting the school’s strict rules, the thrill of forbidden pranks and sneak-outs strengthens the group’s bond. Soon, though, cracks begin to show in Deena’s fake backstory—but rather than coming clean, she doubles down, determined to remain a Belle no matter the cost. Though a lengthy setup slows the book’s momentum, sporadic chapters spotlighting a macabre discovery on campus in 2002 hint at impending fireworks. Several characters are broadly sketched, which undercuts the tale’s verisimilitude, but Deena’s desperation and mounting anxiety are palpable enough to keep readers invested in her fate. Fans of dark academia will find much to savor. Agent: Jamie Carr, Book Group. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/18/2025 | Details & Permalink

A spate of robberies collides with murders past and present in Mackintosh’s solid third outing for Welsh Det. Constable Ffion Morgan (after A Game of Lies). When a woman is found dead in a kayak on the bank of the Awen River, near the border between Wales and England, Ffion’s superiors assign her the case. At the same time, Ffion’s boyfriend, Det. Sgt. Leo Brady, is looking into a series of burglaries just across the water in an exclusive Tottenham neighborhood called the Hill, where his social climbing ex-wife lives alongside influential bankers, professional soccer players, and bored housewives. While the lovers work on their respective cases, Ffion ravenously consumes the latest season of the popular true crime podcast Without Conviction, which covers a gruesome decade-old double homicide that went cold—and might hold key information about Ffion’s current investigation. Mackintosh smoothly braids her three main plot threads, infusing the action with humor and surprising sweetness. Though it’s not quite as ambitious as previous installments, mystery readers of all stripes will find something to like. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/18/2025 | Details & Permalink

Deaver and Maldonando’s second novel featuring Department of Homeland Security agents Carmen Sanchez and Jake Heron (after Fatal Intrusion) is a run-of-the-mill serial killer thriller. Given Sanchez’s investigative chops and Heron’s tech skills, the pair are assigned to a pilot program that tackles sophisticated and unusual threats to national security. One of their first cases concerns the Honeymoon Killer, who murdered the bride at one wedding in Italy and the groom at another. Each victim was rendered unconscious after their nuptials, then drowned. Either the same killer or a copycat is now active in Long Beach, Calif., catching the attention of the DHS. Interwoven with Sanchez and Heron’s investigation are chapters from the perspective of the murderer—an arrogant psychopath who believes he’s optimized serial killing—and a subplot about Sanchez looking into her father’s suspicious suicide. Unfortunately, none of the threads generate much suspense, and the authors fail to make the supporting cast three-dimensional. After the first book got the series off to strong start, this disappoints. Agent: Liza Fleissig, Liza Royce Assoc. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/18/2025 | Details & Permalink

Miller spotlights the dark side of excessive wealth in her beguiling debut. When Alice Wiley was 11, her 16-year-old cousin Caitlin Dale died tragically during the Fourth of July weekend. Like all other privileged children in Briar’s Green, N.Y., Caitlin had been celebrating at the exclusive Horseman Club. Official reports said she slipped by the pool and drowned, but Alice knows it was murder, and she knows who did it. She told the police as much, but the boy Alice accused—Patirck Yates, son of the most powerful man in Briar’s Green—was never charged. Twenty years later, Alice returns to Briar’s Green and accepts a lowly job at the Horseman Club for one reason: to get justice. But little has changed in her absence. The same people who closed ranks around Patrick two decades ago are determined to keep protecting him, and as Alice digs deeper, she learns her former peers may be covering for more than just Caitlin’s death. Miller’s intricate plot drips with opulence and subterfuge as each of her well-drawn characters fights desperately to keep their secrets hidden. Fans of Ellery Lloyd will devour this intoxicating mystery. Agent: Allison Hunter, Janklow & Nesbit Assoc. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/04/2025 | Details & Permalink

Edgar winner Krueger continues his long-running Cork O’Connor series (after Spirit Crossing) with a top-shelf whodunit. Cork, now a PI, is dreading his upcoming 60th birthday when he gets a call from his son, Stephen, an intern with an Innocence Project–style organization that seeks to overturn wrongful convictions. Stephen believes that the first major investigation Cork oversaw as sheriff of Tamarack County, Minn., put an innocent man behind bars. The first half of the book recounts that case, detailing the murder of Chastity Boshey and the events that led to the confession and conviction of her husband, Axel. The second half sees Cork reopen the case only to meet puzzling resistance from Axel, and look into a new murder that seems linked to Chastity’s. Krueger’s muscular prose keeps the action chugging along, but not at the expense of detailed character work: the author’s portraits of Axel, Cork, and their associates across more than a quarter-century lend the narrative a stirring humanity. Add in a vividly rendered setting and an elegant dual-timeline plot, and this proves that Krueger is still at the top of his game. Agent: Danielle Egan-Miller, Brown & Miller Literary Assoc. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/04/2025 | Details & Permalink

Characters wrestle with the costs of loyalty and the burdens of familial responsibility in this spare collection of six short novellas from Winslow (City in Ruins). In the title story, career thief John Highland faces a lengthy prison sentence after a botched heist. As mounting legal debts threaten to leave John’s wife destitute, John devises one last gamble: a scheme to steal millions of cartel dollars from a crooked casino. In the standout “The North Wing,” a straitlaced patrolman has his loyalty to his troubled cousin tested after a fatal drunk driving accident. Longtime Winslow fans will welcome the reappearance of surfer/PI Boone Daniels in “The Lunch Break,” which finds Boone babysitting a petulant starlet whose addictions have made her an insurance liability for the studio hoping to get one last great performance out of her. Meanwhile, a stalker threatens to end more than just her career. Winslow’s keen ear for dialogue shines throughout—especially in “True Story,” where two mob associates swap tall tales over a diner breakfast—but some of the entries feel more like outlines than full-blooded narratives. Still, it’s always refreshing to spend time with Winslow’s inimitable prose. Agent: Shane Salerno, Story Factory. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/04/2025 | Details & Permalink

Smirnoff’s second Millennium novel (after The Girl in the Eagle’s Talons) is a treat for longtime series fans. Several months after the events of the previous book, Lisbeth Salander’s 13-year-old niece Svala Hirak is interning at the newspaper Gaskassen. She’s also part of an environmental activist group, whose newest member, Simon Frisk, is an advocate for extreme—sometimes violent—protest. When Simon sexually assaults Svala and one of the teenage reporter’s friends turns up murdered, she links up with a dangerous ally to take revenge. Meanwhile, Mikael Blomkvist is hired to helm Gaskassen fresh off of his cancer diagnosis, while Lisbeth searches for her hacker friend Plague, who has been kidnapped by Marcus Branco, the sadistic crime lord who killed Svala’s mother and seeks a hard drive containing $400 million in bitcoin that only Svala can unlock. It’s a lot of plot, and Smirnoff makes no room for newcomers to the series, assuming that readers have a near-photographic memory of details from the previous novels. Those who have been following along closely, however, will be rewarded with clever twists and poignant developments in the relationships among the core cast. This continues Smirnoff’s hot streak. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/04/2025 | Details & Permalink

Weaver’s chilling debut imagines a climate-ravaged near future where the fortunate live on floating islands and a new world leader is about to be elected. Striving to accurately inform the voters of 2050 is influential journalist Marcus Tully, who works with a team of assistants in London, which, like all formerly great capitals, has been reduced to a crime-filled cesspool seared by soaring temperatures. Lately, Tully has been covering the race between former U.S. president Lawrence Lockwood and Solomon, an AI who claims to possess the sort of cold, rational leadership style that humanity needs to survive the climate crisis. The election is thrown into turmoil when master scientist Martha Chandra, who invented Solomon, is killed by a rare and complex poison. The death leaves Tully with the confounding question of which candidate may have been behind the murder, and what effect it could have on the election. Originally self-published in 2024, this rip-roaring tale moves with rattling momentum and exhibits Weaver’s knack for worldbuilding. His concerns about AI feel measured and well-informed, setting this apart from the histrionics of lesser techno-thrillers. Readers will eagerly await the sequel. Agent: David Fugate, LaunchBooks. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/04/2025 | Details & Permalink

In this solid outing, Bruno (Ordinary Hazards) uses the framework of a whodunit to drive at deeper questions of faith and family. At the prestigious St. Ignatius High School in the Pittsburgh suburbs, seniors Frankie Northrup and Shivani Badlani research the mysterious death 18 years ago of St. Ignatius hockey star Woolf Whiting for their journalism class. Woolf was found dead of an apparent overdose in the school’s chapel during a game, and police labeled the incident a suicide after a halfhearted investigation. Frankie and Shivani interview those closest to Woolf at the time—his girlfriend, Susanna Mercer; his sister Maddie Whiting; and his best friend, Vince Mahoney—learning explosive secrets about their school in the process. Bruno nimbly toggles between Frankie and Shiv’s investigation and chapters chronicling the lives of their interview subjects, playing fair with readers and planting a few major surprises along the way. For the most part, though, mystery-solving takes a backseat to weightier considerations of growing up and finding purpose. A less assured writer might have failed to make it all coalesce, but Bruno pulls it off, thanks to her keen sense of what’s at stake for her teenage characters and Frankie’s indelible voice. It’s a winner. Agent: Samantha Shea, Georges Borchardt, Inc. (July)

Reviewed on 07/04/2025 | Details & Permalink

Ryan doesn’t pull any punches in the wholly satisfying conclusion to the Seven Swords series (following The Road of Storms). Guyime, now known as the Ravager King for all the blood on his hands, leads a motley fellowship, which includes a druid, a scholar, and a beastmaster. The septet, each armed with a sword possessed by a demon that gives them a different special power, are on a quest to reach a portal in time to stop a malevolent force known as the Desecrator from unleashing a flood of demons that will enable him to take over the world. Their goal is complicated by the spirit inhabiting one of their weapons, who may pose an even bigger threat than the Desecrator. Worse, as they near the gate between worlds, a series of traps targeting each quester’s Achilles heel forces terrible choices all around. Ryan’s crisp prose effortlessly immerses readers in this dark world as he expertly pays off on choices made in previous installments. This sticks the landing. (Sept.)

Reviewed on 07/04/2025 | Details & Permalink