She Lies In Wait by Gytha Lodge

Fourteen-year-old Aurora Jackson has been waiting for 30 years for her body to be found. Once it is, old wounds are re-opened and all five of the other teenagers who were with her that night are now prime suspects in her murder. Was it her older sister Topaz? Or Coralie, Topaz's jealous best friend? More likely it was one of the boys, Benner, Conner or Brett, and no one seems to suspect the tomboy, Jojo. DCI Jonah Sheens is on the case, but there's just one problem - he was slightly older than the kids at the time but still knew them, perhaps a little too well. The five characters are still a tight-knit group, protecting each other's secrets even as they've gone on to live successful lives. The book alternates back and forth between that fateful night and the present day investigation, and we also get a good look at the rest of DCI Sheens investigative team, as this is presumably the first book in a series. I like what I see, and look forward to reading the next one.

Watching You by Lisa Jewell

Where Watching You starts off and where it ends are in two completely different places, but you can be sure to feel the hair on your neck raised the whole time as you wonder "who is watching me?" A quaint street in Bristol where neighbors know each other (and watch each other obsessively, apparently) becomes the scene of a grizzly murder. We don't know who is dead, but the young Joey Mullen is a prime suspect due to her infatuation with the owner of the house, a married Tom Fitzwilliam, and the fact that the police found one of her boot tassels on scene. As we alternate between present day police interviews and scenes from the past few weeks as Joey and Tom get to know each other, the image of what might have happened starts to crystallize, until new details emerge and it gets all blurry again. This is truly one of those books that will leave you uncertain until the very end.

You Were Always Mine by Nicole Baart

The premise to You Were Always Mine by Nicole Baart is an interesting one, and not what you might immediately think. Jessica has recently separated from her husband, their marriage having descended into complacency and general lovelessness. She holds on tight to her two sons, especially Gabe, 6, who is adopted. One day her ex doesn't show up for school pick up, and Jessica starts down a slippery slope to discover why and what happened to him. It's hard to discuss it any more without revealing some of the carefully plotted twists. I can say that there's a fair amount of sadness in this novel, but a good amount of mystery as well, and as already mentioned, it's not what you might initially think!

An Anonymous Girl by Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen

The second offering from Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen is in the same vein as the first. There’s some mind-bending deception, a couple of twists here and there, and a satisfying conclusion. Jess, a twenty-something makeup artist, fakes her way into a morality study to make a little side-cash, only to have the study make more demands of her than she signed up for. The puppet-master, Dr. Lydia Shields, has an ax to grind and Jess becomes her blade. An Anonymous Girl lacks the “I never saw that coming” twist that was the highlight of The Wife Between Us (you can quickly guess where this storyline is going), but it’s an enjoyable ride there. My only beef is the tone that Dr. Shields was written in as she observes Jess (You fiddle with your hair, you hesitate before you answer this question, etc. [not verbatim]). It almost made me stop reading the book. But if you get past that hurdle the rest is worth it.

The Family Next Door by Sally Hepworth

Essie’s living a quiet life in suburban Melbourne. She suffered severe postpartum depression after the birth of her daughter, and her husband and mother have been on edge since the birth of her second. Cracks are starting to show, and when a mysterious woman named Isabelle moves into the neighborhood, Essie becomes fascinated with her and goes a little Single White Female. Isabelle seems to be looking for a missing child, and thinks Essie might be involved. There’s some side plot drama with two other neighbors, Ange and Fran, (affairs, cuckolding, etc.) that help round out the narrative a bit, but the main, and weird, story is between Essie and Isabelle. It’s not quite full-on suspense, but the twist is interesting and it makes you question the limits and boundaries of human memory. Can we really forget that we did something terrible in a traumatic and psychotic state?

The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn

Sometimes the latest and greatest thrillers don’t live up to the hype, but that’s not the case for The Woman in the Window. It’s a taut and unpredictable story about a devastated woman who spends too much time spying on her neighbors and eventually sees something awful – or does she? Sure, there are some tropes involved: the wine, the gaslighting, etcetera, etcetera. In fact, I am kind of done reading about drunk, unreliable women, but if you want to read one last one before the genre goes belly up, this is the best of the recent crop for sure. Anna has been housebound for the last 10 months after a traumatic experience that also involved her husband and child leaving her. While she still speaks to them regularly, she is increasingly isolated in her Harlem house, and distracts herself by looking at the goings on outside, various online pursuits, and copious amounts of wine and psychotropic meds, which should not be mixed together. When a new family moves in across the way, she’s immediately drawn into their lives, seeing things she wasn’t meant to see. The first “reveal” as to why Anna suddenly developed a bad case of agoraphobia is no big surprise, nor do I think it was really meant to be – anyone paying attention will figure it out about 100 pages in, though the reveal takes another 100 pages or so to come. It’s the end game that you want to keep reading for, with a well-done twist that I didn’t see coming.  

Tips for Living by Renée Shafransky

Nora Glasser is living a nightmare. Not only did her famous artist husband leave her for a younger (and more fertile) woman, but then they have the audacity to move to her small town and rub her nose in their happiness and wealth. Nora has to see them living their extravagant lifestyle with the daughter she always wanted, while she walked away with nothing, except a precious journal of sketches of her that her ex, Hugh, now wants back. Not even her Pilates class is sacred, as Hugh’s new wife, Helene, shows up to that too. So it’s no surprise that she fantasizes about doing them bodily harm, but when that actually happens in real life, Nora is suspect number one. To make matters worse, she can’t trust her own memory, and worries that she’s the one who committed the crime. Tips for Living leaves you wondering until the end: did she or didn’t she? This debut novel by Renée Shafransky is a fast-paced page turner with a satisfying (but unpredictable) end.

Working Fire by Emily Bleeker

Working Fire starts off with every EMTs worst nightmare: running a call on your own family member. Ellie’s dropped out of med school and moved back to her hometown to help her sister, Amelia, take care of their dad, who’s had a stroke. Even though Broadlands is the last place she wants to be, things seem to be going alright for Ellie – she likes working as a medic and just got engaged to her boyfriend. Then there’s a shootout, and both her sister and her brother-in-law have been hit. Ellie is first on scene, and the prime suspect is none other than Amelia’s high school boyfriend, who just happens to be her fiancee’s brother. Such is life in a small town.

Told in alternating timelines, Emily Bleeker works the case forward and also show glimpses of the past couple of months and what (might have) led to the shooting. While it seems hard to find a domestic suspense novel that’s told start to finish these days, it does work well in this scenario once you get past the first few chapters. Bleeker gets your adrenaline pumping with the first response scenes, but then lets you catch a breath and go back to the family’s mostly jovial domestic life. It’s a little disconcerting at first, but eventually the timelines meld and the pace picks up continuously. A solid effort and worthy read.

Intrusion by Mary McCluskey

Intrusion by Mary McCluskey jumps into the lives of Kat and Scott Hamilton soon after the accidental death of their only son, Chris. This is one of those books that I hesitate to read solely based on the subject matter, as being a mom of two boys myself this is like living out your worst nightmare, and who wants to do that? And this book delivers sadness mightily, from the abject despair and thoughts of suicide to the inevitable marital tension and strain. But I was intrigued enough by the premise of an old friend of Kat's who randomly comes back into her life to give this a go. Sarah Cherrington used to be Kat's best friend in high school and roommate afterwards, until her misbehavior caused Kat to cut her out of her life completely. Now Sarah's back, and attempting to play nice, or is she?

So begins the slow unfurling of a web of lies and deception. I won't give too much away, but even the back cover copy suggests that she's back for "one more thing," so you can assume that she is up to no good. The final denouement does make for good reading, though the twists and turn are not quite as developed or original as The Girl on the Train or any Mary Kubica novel, but still worth checking out. And it's another Kindle First title, so it's "free" for the rest of the month!