Technofascism: whether or not you want to think about the term or what it means, you’re probably living in its shadow right now. To paraphrase Catherine D’Ignazio, Director of the Data + Feminism Lab and Associate Professor at MIT, technofascism can be understood as the fusion of … | Continue reading
Maybe it’s my subconscious reaction to current events, or something to do with (ahem) midlife, but lately my female characters seem to be more in touch with their dark sides. From con artist Pearl in CONFESSIONS ON THE 7:45, to assassin Paige in THE KILL CLAUSE, to “herbalist” An … | Continue reading
The call wakes me at three a.m. I fumble for the logbook and pen. I’m the after-hours duty officer at U.S. Embassy Wellington. If a U.S. citizen is in trouble in New Zealand, I’m the person they talk to when they call the embassy for help. Earlier in the week I assisted several t … | Continue reading
There is a kind of recklessness that takes over at end of the world. I felt it, in Brooklyn, after the world shut down in March 2020. The way cars ran redlights at intersections; the way people pushed each other out of the way for toilet paper; the way people thew COVID parties, … | Continue reading
What is it about the early New York Mafia figures—both real and fictional—that are so compelling? Is it that they’ve been depicted as glamorous gents sporting cashmere overcoats, felt fedoras and silk suits with hot showgirls on one arm and a machine guns in the other? Or maybe i … | Continue reading
In the best murder mystery novels, the killer is always the person you least suspect. It’s never the obvious villains who did it. It’s always someone you failed to notice or forgot about, until the final scene, when the detective reveals that it was the quiet housekeeper all alon … | Continue reading
Most novels are written in solitude. A single author with their laptop—slowly getting lonely, disappearing into plot knots, and opening and re-opening Instagram. My partner, Jo, kept saying: if we write a book together, it’ll be half as much work, and twice as much fun. I couldn’ … | Continue reading
I’d first heard about the Gardner Museum robbery when I was a recent college graduate living in New York, probably a week or so after it occurred. I was at the American Museum of Natural History on the Upper West Side, gazing up at the giant blue whale suspended from the ceiling, … | Continue reading
The creation of every book still feels like holding a newborn kitten in my hand, a small and fragile creature that I never quite believe will grow strong enough to survive on its own. Although I’ve done it nine times now — ten times, if you include the finished manuscript now aw … | Continue reading
Another week, another batch of books for your TBR pile. Happy reading, folks. Lisa Unger, Served Him Right (Park Row) “The combination of revenge, generational trauma, and girl power makes this a fun and twisted tale. Perfect for fans of Lisa Jewell and Shari Lapena–and angry wom … | Continue reading
Martha’s Vineyard, south of Cape Cod in New England. A summer destination known for its charming harbor towns (like Edgartown, Oak Bluffs, Vineyard Haven), sandy beaches, lighthouses, and rich history. Over 50% of properties there are seasonal homes, meaning the place takes on a … | Continue reading
Olivia Waite is best known to many as a romance writer, the author of books like The Lady’s Guide to Celestial Mechanics, and the romance columnist for the New York Times Book Review. Last year Tor published Murder by Memory, a novella featuring Dorothy Gentleman, the ship detect … | Continue reading
A mystery lover’s guide to what’s new to streaming this weekend. ___________________________________ New and Returning Mystery and Thriller Series ___________________________________ RJ Decker (ABC) In case the name doesn’t immediately ring a bell, RJ Decker is a former photojo … | Continue reading
In an age where the awful and the unthinkable ping brightly across our phone screens, Gothic literature can seem almost quaint in its shyness, in its shadowy reserve. But that would be to underestimate what horror the suppression of horror can beget. I grew up in South Central Pe … | Continue reading
In April 1986, somebody started a fire in one of the restricted book stacks of the Los Angeles Central Library. The resulting destruction and damage to over one million books – and the years of repair and restoration – inspired Susan Orlean’s 2018 best-seller The Library Book, th … | Continue reading
A champion of the gutsy, go-getter approach to work (and life), Kate White knows that one of the best ways to get what you want is to give something in return. It’s a great way to get ahead in business—and books (which are also a business). At the time she penned her first suspen … | Continue reading
Antony Johnston is the best-selling, award-winning crime writer of Can You Solve the Murder? and the Dog Sitter Detective series, the fourth book of which, The Dog Sitter Detective’s Christmas Tail, came out in the U.S. last year. That’s just some of the most recent work in a pro … | Continue reading
In like a lamb, out like a lion: if you reverse the proverb, March is rather suspense-coded, don’t you think? Which is my awkward transition into praising this month’s bounty of psychological thrillers, all of which, taken together, form a masterclass in genre writing. As always, … | Continue reading
Crafting a crime novel in a small town is rewarding, but also comes with a unique set of challenges. For one, the setting needs to be a secondary character in the story. Small towns are famously close-knit with their own brand of quirks, characters, and inside jokes. As such, the … | Continue reading
My debut novel, Ava, is a feminist speculative fiction story set in the near-future South. Its dystopian edge can feel uncomfortably close to home, and I know that kind of reading is not always what people want when they sit down with a book. Sometimes you do not want to confront … | Continue reading
Fiction has a long history of exploring the damage wrought by adults on the lives of youngsters. In my own crime novel, A Bad, Bad Place, twelve-year-old Janey’s childhood is wrecked by her discovery of a murdered woman. From David Copperfield to Demon Copperhead, disrupted child … | Continue reading
On a blustery February day, plucky, red-headed nurse Sarah Keate takes a taxi to the gloomy, isolated Federie mansion. Her charge: to care for the wealthy aging patriarch, Jonah Federie, who has just suffered a debilitating stroke. (I know. What could go wrong?) Right away, the s … | Continue reading
Most readers see writing as a process in which staring at blank pages, hand wringing, hair twirling, binge-eating, and emergency alcohol consumption are undertaken in lonely isolation. But they don’t have to be. While cowriting five novels, we have learned that the suffering—and … | Continue reading
When I was first sought to hone my craft as a novelist, I took a few screenplay writing classes. I had heard such lessons were a great way to learn about plotting, how to build a three-act structure that makes a story compelling. Yet, what I took most from that education was not … | Continue reading
When it comes to conjuring atmosphere, good old Pathetic Fallacy is one of literature’s hardest working tropes. From the desolate Arctic setting of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein to the tumultuous wind-blown moors in Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, what’s happening with the weather can … | Continue reading
One of the great joys of writing novels is the rabbit hole experience. Over the years, I’ve spent hours learning about the history of pockets in women’s clothing, the 1930s line-up at the Grand Ole Opry, the 1885 cholera outbreak in Spain, and adorable microscopic creatures calle … | Continue reading
As Daylight Savings approaches, and we all prepare to spring forward, why not lean into your disrupted sleep schedule with…a crime novel? They will keep you up late and disorient you enough that you’ll forget all about that lost hour of sleep. Plus, you’ll have a better excuse fo … | Continue reading
At the heart of nearly every irresistible psychological thriller is a simple, deliciously dangerous idea: someone the protagonist knows—or has recently met—isn’t at all who they appear to be. In these novels, trouble never bursts through the door wearing a ski mask. It strolls in … | Continue reading
Life, like novels and movies, plays out in a series of acts—and Deborah Goodrich Royce has embraced each chapter of her story, using fragments of fact in the creation of facsimile. Before commanding readers on the page, Royce entertained audiences as an actress. Perhaps best know … | Continue reading
First, a promise: This is not one of those introductions that assumes you’ve already read the book. No spoilers. It’s safe to keep reading. Second, a confession: When I received the email inviting me to write this introduction, I had never read Seichō Matsumoto. Also, I was in a … | Continue reading
Another week, another batch of books for your TBR pile. Happy reading, folks. Elizabeth Arnott, The Secret Lives of Murderers Wives (Berkley) “Arnott plays scrupulously fair with readers, seeding the narrative with well-disguised clues, but the novel’s real appeal lies in its con … | Continue reading
There are few European capitals with more charm than Zagreb, the main city of Croatia, with about a million people in the city proper and the surrounding metropolitan area. Museums, café culture and with easy access to neighbouring Moldavia and to Croatia’s stunning coastline. No … | Continue reading
Corvids! They’re everywhere—stealing shiny objects, remembering their enemies’ faces, holding funerals for their dead, and stealing all the tourists’ fries on the Whole Foods patio at Sixth and Lamar (that last one’s a reference to Austin’s beloved trash birds, otherwise known as … | Continue reading
I learned at a young age how transformative storytelling is; it led me to build a career as an actress and writer. My new book, The House in the Middle of the Street, is my winter tale about a house, its occupants, and a yearly visit made by a boy and a girl on New […] | Continue reading
A mystery lover’s guide to what’s new to streaming this weekend. ___________________________________ New and Returning Mystery and Thriller Series ___________________________________ Paradise, season 2 (Hulu) Season one of this breakout hit was one of the most original high-con … | Continue reading
Some of the most intriguing partnerships in crime fiction began not on the dark streets, but at home. And while many crime stories feature fathers and sons, a smaller, more exclusive club highlights fathers and daughters. They may fight crime as cops, private investigators, amate … | Continue reading
My husband and I and our two sons hiked for many years in Rocky Mountain National Park, beginning when the boys were very young. I loved watching them amble along the trail in front of me, hiking boots clunking on the rocks, bills of their baseball caps pointing backward, talking … | Continue reading
The best reviewed crime fiction, nonfiction, mystery, and thrillers of the month, via Bookmarks. Ian McGuire, White River Crossing (Crown) “Thrilling … Expertly paced … Predictably, the novel’s twin undercurrents of pride and corruption surface with fatal consequences, and the li … | Continue reading
When The Guinness Book of World Records first appeared, in 1956, its most gruesome distinctions fell in the Crime & Punishment section. Here H. H. Holmes was named “Most Prolific Murderer,” having “disposed of some one hundred and fifty young women ‘paying guests’ in his ‘Castle’ … | Continue reading
Whether it’s a snowed-in rest stop or an isolated beach house, I love trapping characters in confined spaces! So it’s actually surprising that it took me this long to realize a cave would be a heart-racing setting for a thriller. My new novel Her Last Breath follows two best frie … | Continue reading
If you’re like me, I’m sure there’s no way you’re avoiding seeing the AI slop that seems to have seeped into every nook and cranny of the internet these days. Whether it’s scrolling through social media, searching for a reference online, or God-forbid the algorithm suggesting a n … | Continue reading
For decades, the slasher taught us the rules: Girls screamed. Girls ran. Girls died. The Final Girl lived, yes—but survival was her only reward. She didn’t get joy. She didn’t get closure. She didn’t even get rest. More often than not, she got sequels: Laurie Strode returning aga … | Continue reading
A few days later, I was on a plane again, headed to a tech conference in Silicon Valley. There I met Roomy for a Thai lunch in Palo Alto. I don’t remember if we talked about Kronos or Hilton, but I’m sure we talked about edge, which got me thinking about the trades. Roomy wanted … | Continue reading
Here are 15 of the best novels to come out in paperback over the past month (plus a few from January), as selected by the CrimeReads editors. Alison Gaylin, We Are Watching (William Morrow Paperbacks) “Gaylin’s chilling tale is right on point for our disinformation-fueled times.” … | Continue reading
Quick question: why do we read mysteries? What is it about identifying the secret perpetrator of a singular crime that rocks our socks, so to speak? Well, lots of reasons; but chiefly, I think, it’s because we all want justice. This is, after all, a genre whose essential core is … | Continue reading
Motherhood has long followed an unspoken script: a woman becomes a mother by carrying a child, giving birth, and raising that child within a recognizable family structure. Even when reality is messier, the narrative holds. Biology, pregnancy, and childrearing define what motherho … | Continue reading
I never thought, being an author of a book called How to Get Away With Murder, that’d I’d see pieces of me in the finished novel. My book is a serial killer thriller, after all. The story of a self-proclaimed murderer named Denver Brady, writes a ‘how to’ guide for aspiring kille … | Continue reading
There is always, when writing a substantial piece of fiction, a moment or possibly more than a moment, let’s call it a phase, of desperation when all hope seems lost. It is part of the writing process, although knowing that it’s part of the process rarely makes it less surprising … | Continue reading