Mysteries and Thrillers From Female Authors

by Frannie

Sometimes the best way to cope and forget the existential treadmill is to dig into a good book, and a page turning mystery or thriller can envelope you in story better than any other. I personally prefer to have my stories featuring fully realized female characters and often times that is best done when crafted by a female. All promise to be captivating and I challenge you not to finish them in a few days.

My Sister the Serial Killer

Megan Abbott

eBook
Horror, Humor

This wicked funny novel is for when one is perhaps more inclined to escapist horror comedy rather than nail biting thriller.
- Frannie

Conviction

Denise Mina

eBOOK
Mystery, Thriller

Anna McDonald enjoys listening to podcasts-- other people's problems are much better than one's own. But today her husband tells her he's leaving her... and the podcast is about a murdered family on a sunken yacht. Anna is convinced that she knows what really happened. The devils of her past are awakened-- and in hot pursuit. -- adapted from jacket

Tired of listening to true crime podcasts? Go meta and read this mystery where a "true" crime podcast isn't totally true.
- Frannie

Lady in the lake : a novel

Laura Lippman

eBOOK
Mystery, Thriller

"New York Times bestseller Laura Lippman returns with a new stand-alone novel about a middle aged housewife turned aspiring reporter Maddie Schwartz, who is determined to solve the murder of a forgotten young woman in order to make her own reputation"--

From the Wire to Serial season 1, mysteries set in Baltimore never fail to draw me in. From the roll of women in the workplace to failing to fully investigate the murder of women of color, this novel does not shy away from difficult subject matter either.
- Frannie

I let you go

Clare Mackintosh

eBOOK
Mystery

Just when I thought this mystery was a bit saccharin a plot twist draws you in!
- Frannie

You will know me : a novel

Megan E. Abbott

eBOOK
Mystery, Thriller

This mystery set in the world of elite gymnastics also has a great plot twist. I will also stand by almost anything Megan Abbott writes.
- Frannie

The turn of the key

Ruth Ware

eBOOK
Suspense

"From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of In a Dark, Dark Wood, The Woman in Cabin 10, The Lying Game, and The Death of Mrs. Westaway comes Ruth Ware's highly anticipated fifth novel. When she stumbles across the ad, she's looking for something else completely. But it seems like too good an opportunity to miss--a live-in nannying post, with a staggeringly generous salary. And when Rowan Caine arrives at Heatherbrae House, she is smitten--by the luxurious "smart" home fitted out with all modern conveniences, by the beautiful Scottish Highlands, and by this picture-perfect family. What she doesn't know is that she's stepping into a nightmare--one that will end with a child dead and herself in prison awaiting trial for murder. Writing to her lawyer from prison, she struggles to explain the unravelling events that led to her incarceration. It wasn't just the constant surveillance from the cameras installed around the house, or the malfunctioning technology that woke the household with booming music, or turned the lights off at the worst possible time. It wasn't just the girls, who turned out to be a far cry from the immaculately behaved model children she met at her interview. It wasn't even the way she was left alone for weeks at a time, with no adults around apart from the enigmatic handyman, Jack Grant. It was everything. She knows she's made mistakes. She admits that she lied to obtain the post, and that her behavior toward the children wasn't always ideal. She's not innocent, by any means. But, she maintains, she's not guilty--at least not of murder. Which means someone else is. Full of spellbinding menace and told in Ruth Ware's signature suspenseful style, The Turn of the Key is an unputdownable thriller from the Agatha Christie of our time"--

As an early fan of Henry James' the Turn of the Screw this novel's take on that classic tale in the talented hands of Ruth Ware is a great update. All of Ware's books are highly readable, and this is one of her best.
- Frannie

I'll be gone in the dark : one woman's obsessive search for the Golden State Killer

Michelle McNamara

eBOOK
True Crime

An account of the unsolved Golden State Killer case traces the rapes and murders of dozens of victims and the author's determined efforts to help identify the killer and bring him to justice.

Released a few years ago at the beginning of true crime capturing the cultural zeitgeist this Non-Fiction book published posthumously unwraps the mystery of a serial killer active up and down the state of California. The facts of the crimes are gruesome, but how solving them basically drives an ordinary citizen is unforgettable.
- Frannie

Behind closed doors

B. A. Paris

eBOOK
Suspense

The friends of a seemingly perfect socialite couple begin to see cracks in the fa�cade when they realize that the husband and wife are never apart and that there are bars on one of the couple's upstairs windows.

This marital mystery will keep you turning those pages. I think I re-read the ending at least 3 times...
- Frannie

The family upstairs

Lisa Jewell

eBOOK
Suspense

"Soon after her twenty-fifth birthday, Libby Jones returns home from work to find the letter she's been waiting for her entire life. She rips it open with one driving thought: I am finally going to know who I am. She soon learns not only the identity of her birth parents, but also that she is the sole inheritor of their abandoned mansion on the banks of the Thames in London's fashionable Chelsea neighborhood, worth millions. Everything in Libby's life is about to change. But what she can't possibly know is that others have been waiting for this day as well--and she is on a collision course to meet them. Twenty-five years ago, police were called to 16 Cheyne Walk with reports of a baby crying. When they arrived, they found a healthy ten-month-old happily cooing in her crib in the bedroom. Downstairs in the kitchen lay three dead bodies, all dressed in black, next to a hastily scrawled note. And the four other children reported to live at Cheyne Walk were gone. In The Family Upstairs, the master of "bone-chilling suspense" (People) brings us the can't-look-away story of three entangled families living in a house with the darkest of secrets"--

This blooming onion of a book has layers upon layers of mystery to untangle, but with expert plotting it does not disappoint in delivery.
- Frannie