Everything I Read On Vacation Pt. 2: Thrillers & The Like
a few great ones, a few special ones, a few duds
Click here for the pre-amble on summer reading + the literary fiction part of this recap. And while that newsletter was filled with basically “HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS” notes for 8 books, I am ready to get a little more critical here - the volume of thrillers out there is breathtaking, and not all are created the same. Below, 9 that I read on my vacation - some good, some great, some worth skipping, some pretty special.
Things Don’t Break On Their Own - Sarah Easter Collins - I had never heard of this until I scooped it at Bridge Street Books, one of my favorite independent bookstores in DC (mainly because they have zero interest in BookTok/trends/etc and are a great destination for just finding something out of the internet fray). It is a story of two sisters - one disappeared when she was 13, the other has never stopped seeing her. So when we open at a dinner party and she thinks she sees her twice in less than 30 minutes, where could this possibly go but downhill? It is well written, and while the twist is a little “gimme”, it felt refreshing overall. It is British too, which I have come to realize I prefer in my mysteries.
Home Is Where The Bodies Are - Jeneva Rose - I have been wanting to buy this book for months it feels (something about the cover felt fun and retro?). The premise behind the promising cover is this: a Mother passes away and three estranged siblings (the Father existed the picture decades a go, or did he?) discover some deep, dark secrets in the VHS tapes left behind. Anyway, it is pretty standard fare - basic writing, multiple POVs, unreliable narratives, a pretty Lifetime movie resolution - it is BETTER than Freida McFadden ouvre, but it isn’t anything worth spending hard earned money on. Has anyone else read any other Jeneva Rose books? Worth giving another one a try?
- I will now say this (it is going to start sounding bad, but it takes a turn, I promise): I felt “The Wife Between Us” (a BIG thriller hit from the late 2010s/peak post-Gone Girl era) was not good. I liked some of the other additions to that “genre” ie “The Last Mrs. Parish” etc well enough, but have stayed away from both Sarah Pekkanen and Greer Hendricks’ work ever since. This was on display at Riverby Books (a great second hand bookstore in downtown Fredericksburg) and for $3, I thought it was worth a try. The story involves Ruth Sterling, a woman who has been on the run since she was 17 and pregnant, and her daughter Catherine, now 24 and a freshly trained Memory care nurse. Just as Catherine is about to take a plum job at Johns Hopkins, Ruth starts exhibiting signs of Alzheimers herself and then… a can of all sorts of terrible worms is opened. This was FUN. I mean, I know Alzheimers is a genuine trigger warning for a lot of people around my age, but the book is twisty and dark and not actually about losing a parent (I promise!), but about nature and nurture and what we’d do to protect those we love. I am 100% going to try some more solo Pekkanens after this.Claire DeWitt & The City of Dead -
- I almost put this into the literary fiction part of this recap, because clasifying it as a mystery (though it 150% is - and a start of a new detective series no less) feels sort of like slighting it. CNN said it reads like if “David Lynch directed a Raymond Chandler novel” and that feels pretty accurate. Set in the deeply atmospheric post-Katrina New Orleans, it introduces us to Claire DeWitt, the world’s greatest PI (according to her), who doesn’t believe in hard clues or proper procedure but does believe in Jacques Sillette’s “Detection” handbook (it will all sort of make sense in the book). Anyway, a well regarded DA is dead, his nephew needs to know if he died in the hurricane or was killed, and a swirl of characters, heartbreak, green parrots and backstories unfurls. Someone whose taste I implicitly trust (Hi Sally!) gave me this for my wedding over eaight years a go, and I took it to the beach that summer and I am ashamed it took me this long to get to it. It is definitely not for everyone (litmus test: if you liked Robert Altman’s “The Long Goodbye” and think Elliott Gould’s Philip Marlow is the gold standard for cool detectives, you will love this), but I am excited to unpack more Claire DeWitt books (there’s 2 more) - Another special one. Jo Firestone is a very very funny comedian and a writer on cool shows like “Joe Pera Talks To You” and “Ziwe” so this is obviously NOT your standard mystery (for one, there isn’t a Stephen King quote on the cover, but there IS a Stephen Colbert one). Having said that, it IS the summer of “Love Island” and that summer deserves a spoof mystery and a blonde-wig-and-fake-teeth wearing social worker/private detective called Luella Van Horne. If this sounds like a thing you need in your life (and prefer your detective in the mumbling “Bored to Death” Jason Schwartzman category) - it IS what you need in your life.The Other Daughter - Lisa Gardner - This was also on that $3 display of mass market paperbacks at Riverby. I, in general, love Lisa Gardner (very reliable) and the story was GREAT: A serial killer (of children) is executed in Texas. A little girl is left abandoned in a hospital in Boston and adopted by one of the families whose daughter was a victim of this serial killer five years a go. Fast forward 20 years ahead when everyone who knew anything about the crimes and/or adoption is starting to get notes that say “You Get What You Deserve”, and our now 29 years old heroine has to figure out what is going on here and if she can trust people she loved for the last twenty years. ANYWAY - it is fun, but it was also written in the late 90s, so there’s some very of-the-time sexist / homophobic stuff happening (the author isn’t either, the times are just the times, this is HOW people behaved, as I am reminded every time I rewatch a movie I loved as a teenager) so … up to you to decide if you want to deal with that in order to get through a juicy story.
- This was creeeeeeepy. A mother and a daughter (a theme emerges for the summer!) are running across the American West, leaving a trail of death behind them. An FBI agent is on their trail. This kind of reads like Dexter meets Silence of the Lambs meets supernatural horror meets a genuinely touching take on family and sacrifice. Everyone loved this book (I really liked it) - it was the NY Times Best Horror Books of the year, the quotes on the cover are BREATHLESS, and there is a sequel coming out 3 days before Halloween. - I used to ALWAYS bring a new Sharon Bolton to the beach, and this year with my Mother-in-Law really getting into her Lacey Flint mysteries, I decided it was time to get back into Sharon’s always reliable thrillers. This was very fun and so twisty that I am not quite sure how to do a synopsis. But - no one is who they say they are, everyone has an agenda, and I hope the two detectives in it make a comeback for another book. In general, if you’re not on the Bolton train (she is A BIG best-seller in England), and are sort of disappointed by the rinse-and-repeat thrillers that seem to be popular in the US these days, this is a good author to discover.We Are All Guilty Here - Karin Slaughter - And finally, I also get a new Karin Slaughter end of every summer (one for me, one for my Mother-in-Law who loves thrillers maybe more than even me) and this one IS EXTREMELY GOOD. It is currently the #1 best-selling book in America (according to NY Times) and a start of a new series for Slaughter and I swear, it as good, if not better, than any Stephen King thriller (nothing supernatural here). The premise is as old as time: during 4th of July Fireworks in early 2010s, two teenagers go missing. What follows is a truly intricate, heartbreaking narrative spanning over a decade, some exceptional character development (you WILL want to spend more time with Emmy Lou Clifton and Jude Archer). I will give fair warning that the storyline is BRUTAL and the content trigger warnings are everywhere (think “Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” levels of upsetness at subject matter). But if you are in the mood for a THRILLER MASTERCLASS any time soon, look no further.
And that is that. Have YOU read any good thrillers this Summer? Anything I need to add to my list?