Tag: Thriller

Kate’s Review: “Lady Or The Tiger”

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Book: “Lady Or The Tiger” by Heather M. Hermann

Publishing Info: Nancy Paulson Books, June 2025

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC from the publicist.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: A twisty, darkly seductive murder mystery, starring a teenage killer whose trial in the Wild West is upended when her first victim, her husband, arrives alive with a story to tell.

When nineteen-year-old Belle King turns herself in for murder, the last thing she expects to see is her abusive husband standing outside her Dodge City jail cell. He was the first man she ever meant to kill (but certainly not the last!). Somehow, though, her husband is there, hale and hearty, and very much not dead. With his arrival her plans in jail are jeopardized, and she’ll be forced to resort to all the tricks in her arsenal to prevent him from ever being in control of her again. But as a girl in the 1880s Wild West, the last thing anyone will believe is a woman—even when she confesses to her own crimes.

This story—of how Alice Springer, a mountain girl from Kentucky, became the infamous Belle King, of how she found the tiger in her heart, becoming the wickedest woman in the Wild West—is a love story that cuts through time and patriarchal ties.

Review: Thank you to Books Forward for sending me an ARC of this novel!

As a rule, I don’t usually like the Western genre. I have a few exceptions, of course, but that is usually when the conventions of the genre are flipped on their head. I’ve encountered this in books like “Lone Women” by Victor LaValle and “The Buffalo Hunter Hunter” by Stephen Graham Jones, and it has happend once again with the new YA Western “Lady Or The Tiger” by Heather M. Hermann. When I read the description of this book I knew that I really needed to check it out, and I am so glad I did.

We are following the story of Belle King, previously known as Alice Springer, as she becomes a sought out desperado in the Wild West, murdering men and living life on her own terms. We meet her as she has been arrested, and learn about how she became the fearsome villainess through flashbacks and jumping around timelines, showing how she became the hardened woman we meet at the start. Hermann takes her time unwinding this complicated, bleak, and at times absolutely maddening story, revealing the cost of being a woman during this time in a place that was almost wholly lawless, while also contrasting how it was STILL dangerous for women even if they were doing everything ‘right’. We follow Belle go from being orphaned, to being institutionalized, to being forced into the role of child bride, and then get to see her find her freedom, even if maintaining it means committing murder. This is not a romanticized Western by any means, and I loved how frank and brutal it was, with so many moments of tension just twisting up as I was reading it. We see violent misogyny, we see racism, we see classism and colonialism, and the realities of this time and place is on display in all of its nastiness. I was a bit shocked that this book is YA, but I like that Hermann trusts her readers to be able to understand it and take it on.

I also really liked our main character, Alice/Belle, because I absolutely LOVE seeing a morally grey female protagonist. It isn’t too often that women in fiction are afforded the opportunity to be unlikable, difficult, and sometimes unapologetically cruel, but Alice/Belle does a lot of really morally questionable things and I still found myself rooting for her. Hermann takes great care to give her a backstory without making her sappy or cloying, while also making her choices, both gook and bad, completely believable and in general easy to understand. Even in the times that I was taken aback by some of the things she did, her actions always fell in line with what I expected, and her circumstances were such that I never really questioned it. It’s so often in the Western genre that we get morally grey men to follow, so seeing a woman, when women are mostly sidelined or made passive in Westerns, take on the role of the desperado while also making it unapologetically feminist, was deeply, deeply satisfying.

“Lady Or The Tiger” is a relentless and angry battle cry of feminine rage. I am absolutely going to check out whatever Heather M. Hermann takes on next, because this was a stellar take on a genre I don’t usually enjoy.

Rating 8: Gritty, unapologetic, and brutal in all the right way, “Lady Or The Tiger” is a Western filled with feminine rage and proud defiance.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Lady Or The Tiger” is included on the Goodreads list “2025 YA Historical Fiction”.

Kate’s Review: “Bald-Faced Liar”

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “Bald-Faced Liar” by Victoria Helen Stone

Publishing Info: Lake Union Publishing, June 2025

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC from the publicist.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: Living a lie becomes a matter of life and death for a woman hiding from her past in a novel of mounting psychological suspense by the bestselling author of Jane Doe and The Hook.

Traveling nurse Elizabeth May has a promising new home in Santa Cruz. And another new identity. It’s a pattern of reinvention for a woman escaping her traumatic childhood—and hiding from the decades of notoriety and destruction that followed. Invisibility has kept Elizabeth safe. Until now. After all these years, someone sees her for who she is.

Threat by threat, a vengeful stalker is dismantling Elizabeth’s carefully constructed lifetime of lies. And no one in her temporary circle can be trusted—not her fleeting new love interest, not the supportive friend she knows only from online forums, and certainly not the police. They’ve never been there for her.

As fear sharpens to terror, Elizabeth soon discovers something about her past that even she didn’t know. The revelation could finally set her on a path of healing and redemption. Or, now alone in the dark, it could be Elizabeth’s worst nightmare.

Review: Thank you to Kaye Publicity for sending me an ARC of this novel!

Perhaps, if you have been following our blog for awhile now, you will see that I have picked up a thriller with a pretty significant Satanic Panic theme, and are now asking yourself ‘hey, doesn’t Kate get absolutely incandescent with rage when it comes to this topic?’ And you would be correct. The Satanic Panic really gets me steamed, so much so that I have been known to skip episodes of favorite podcasts if they are focusing on it. FAVORITE PODCASTS, GUYS. But when I was sent information about “Bald-Faced Liar” by Victoria Helen Stone, even though it was Satanic Panic themed, I had a feeling that I really wanted to give it a chance. The description of a traveling nurse named Elizabeth being stalked, possibly due to her long ago involvement in a false accusation of Satanism at her daycare, just tantalized me. I had to give it a go, even if it was going to set me off. And I’m happy to say that not only did it NOT set me off, I also really liked this book!

The mystery at hand about who is stalking Elizabeth is well crafted and well executed. Triggering for me or not, using The Satanic Panic as a backdrop means that there could be PLENTY of people with motives to get revenge on Elizabeth, and Stone has so many threads here that she pulls together. The clues are there but not too easily deciphered, and Stone takes her time to lay them out and build the suspense of Elizabeth’s past as well as the stalking incidents that start to plague her. I also liked the slow burn mystery of Elizabeth’s history of being a five year old ‘witness’ to Satanic Panic charges that she was coached to say, with a timeline being put forth in a measured way that filled me with frustration but NOT with blinding rage as I have experienced with other Satanic Panic themed thrillers. Some reveals I kind of predicted, but for the most part I was pretty well surprised, and was VERY surprised by an element of the climax that I don’t want to spoil here. But I will say that it went in a direction that I wasn’t expecting, and it added a new level of stakes, AND some genuine humor that didn’t feel out of place even though things were a bit, shall we say, hectic.

I also really liked our protagonist Elizabeth. I am always cagey when I read thrillers with hot mess female protagonists, but Elizabeth doesn’t really fall into any well worn traps or tropes of the genre. She has her problems, but her background with the Satanic Panic and the trauma involved with being a false whistleblower was unique enough made her very sympathetic and her actions completely believable. I also really appreciated the grace that was given to Elizabeth by other characters in spite of her notoriety, because at the end of the day she was a child when she did those monumental and damaging things. I’ve seen other Satanic Panic based stories that try to demonize this kind of character, but Stone makes it VERY clear that no, a five year old being manipulated and coerced by adults around her for their OWN motives should not be held accountable for her actions. I was rooting for her basically from the jump. Honestly, I thought that all of the characters were fun! Be it librarian Violet, who wants to help Elizabeth in any way she can, to landlord Grigore, who is a bit shady but who has a soft spot for Elizabeth, I thought that our cast was stellar.

I really enjoyed “Bald-Faced Liar”. The twists were good, the characters were enjoyable, and I think it will make a great read for thriller fans this summer!

Rating 8: A taut and suspenseful thriller about lies, trauma, and running from all of it, “Bald-Faced Liar” kept me on the edge of my seat.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Bald-Faced Liar” isn’t included on any super specific Goodreads lists as of yet, but similar titles include Clay McLeod Chapman’s “Whisper Down the Lane” and Gillian Flynn’s “Dark Places”.

Kate’s Review: “Now She’s Dead”

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “Now She’s Dead” by Roselyn Clarke

Publishing Info: Sourcebooks Fire, June 2025

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC from the publisher.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: Last summer, Sara Ellis was found dead by the lake, and only Mandy knows what really happened. This summer, she’s desperate to keep it a secret.

For a few weeks every summer, Sara was Mandy’s best friend. At Highmark, the lake resort where their families vacationed, the two were in a world of their own. Or at least Mandy got to be part of Sara’s world.

But now Sara’s dead. The police ruled her death an accident; a tragic mistake after a night of impaired judgment. For the past year, Mandy’s coped by escaping: leaving home and barely keeping it together at school. The last thing she wants to do is return to Highmark this summer—even if she does need “closure.” As soon as she’s back, though, she hears the whispers: someone killed Sara Ellis. And if she’s not careful, they’ll figure out it’s all her fault.

As evidence resurfaces and anonymous accusations are scrawled in angry red spray paint, Mandy must confront the truths she’s been avoiding about last summer. Because someone wants to make her pay for what happened to Sara that night.

Review: Thank you to Sourcebooks Fire for sending me an ARC of this novel!

Summer is basically here, and while it’s probably my least favorite of the seasons (it’s just so hot), I do really enjoy the vibes and ambiance of sitting by the pool with my book. It’s especially fun if the book is engaging, a little soapy, and filled with lots of drama, shocks, and surprises. Admittedly, I have a pretty picky standard when it comes to books like these, and if it even so much as VAGUELY drifts into no no territory (like last minute twists that don’t feel earned), I will feel sour about it, poolside or not. But I have great news! “Now She’s Dead” by Roselyn Clark is the kind of book that not only would make great poolside reading for the season, it also managed, for me, to not fall into any pitfalls I associate with the genre!

The structure of this thriller mystery is fairly straight forward. Our protagonist is Mandy, a teenage girl who is returning to the lakeside resort where her summer best friend Sara died in an assumed accident the previous year. Mandy off the bat has a lot of guilt, and since it’s first person POV she tells the reader that it is her fault that Sara is dead, and we get a story told through the present summer as a true crime content creator has started sniffing around the resort, and through flashbacks to the days leading up to Sara’s death. It’s a great device, and it’s the perfect kind to have an unreliable narrator drive the story as the audience has to piece together what really happened. When done well this is quite possibly a favorite structure of mine when it comes to thrillers, and Clarke manages to make it flow easily. It has a nice slight of hand, and while I was pretty convinced that Mandy didn’t have all the information and was probably missing something (and side note, her dialog DID sometimes veer to bashing the reader of the head with all the ‘BUT I KILLED HER’ quips), I was still curious to see how it was all going to unravel to what actually happened, and I was surprised a good deal of the time! The clues are there, but the sleight of hand keeps them hidden until Clarke is ready to reveal them for the most part.

And what really kept me going in this book was how it portrays a very complicated, close, but somewhat unbalanced friendship between two teenage girls. You can tell that Mandy and Sara see themselves as incredibly close, but that their closeness and their friendship is in many ways unhealthy, with resentment, jealousy, and insecurities nagging at them both during the lead up to Sara’s death. It’s a bit soapy as Mandy and Sara keep aggravating and baiting each other as disaster looms on the horizon, but what I really appreciated is that while it could solely have been a motive, it’s actually a rather emotional examination of this kind of toxic friendship between teenage girls that may hit close to home for some readers, be they the intended YA audience or not. I know that I can think of at least one close, but at times unhealthy, friendship I had when I was in high school, with my role being VERY similar to Mandy’s in the friendship of the sidekick who is overshadowed and resentful, but also unable to process my own contributions to the toxicity. It felt real and honest, even if most of us in these shoes weren’t dealing with a murder mystery we may or may not have been involved with. Minor details!

“Now She’s Dead” is a sudsy and twisty thriller that should definitely join you on your summer adventures. It’s a fun ride and I really enjoyed it.

Rating 8: A fast paced and well crafted thriller, absolutely perfect for summer reading season!

Reader’s Advisory:

“Now She’s Dead” is included on the Goodreads lists “2025 YA Thrillers and Mysteries”, and “Bisexual Books of 2025”.

Kate’s Review: “Julie Chan Is Dead”

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “Julie Chan Is Dead” by Liann Zhang

Publishing Info: Atria Books, April 2025

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an eARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: In this razor-sharp, diabolical debut thriller, a young woman steps into her deceased twin’s influencer life, only to discover dark secrets hidden behind her social media façade.

Julie Chan has nothing. Her twin sister has everything. Except a pulse.

Julie Chan, a supermarket cashier with nothing to lose, finds herself thrust into the glamorous yet perilous world of her late twin sister, Chloe VanHuusen, a popular influencer. Separated at a young age, the identical twins were polar opposites and rarely spoke, except for one viral video that Chloe initiated (Finding My Long-Lost Twin And Buying Her A House #EMOTIONAL). When Julie discovers Chloe’s lifeless body under mysterious circumstances, she seizes the chance to live the life she’s always envied.

Transforming into Chloe is easier than expected. Julie effortlessly adopts Chloe’s luxurious influencer life, complete with designer clothes, a meticulous skincare routine, and millions of adoring followers. However, Julie soon realizes that Chloe’s seemingly picture-perfect life was anything but.

Haunted by Chloe’s untimely death and struggling to fit into the privileged influencer circle, Julie faces mounting challenges during a weeklong island retreat with Chloe’s exclusive group of influencer friends. As events spiral out of control, Julie uncovers the sinister forces that may have led to her sister’s demise and realizes she might be the next target.

Review: Thank you to Atria for sending me an eARC of this book via NetGalley.

Summer is right around the corner, and that means that lots of readers are probably looking for some perfect books for vacations, for poolside, for early evenings on the deck. I love having sudsy and fast paced thrillers for times like those, and I have a recommendation (though Serena and I will have more in June with our annual Beach Reads post!). “Julie Chan Is Dead” has a catchy title, an intriguing premise, and sounds like a “Parent Trap” story from Hell, with a woman named Julie being reunited with her long lost twin Chloe, who is a famous influencer… and then ends up usurping Chloe’s identity down the line after she finds her dead. Sounds sudsy! But it’s also whip smart and a sharp social satire as well as a crazy twisty thriller.

So there are two mysteries at play in this thriller: the first is whether Julie is going to pull off her identity switch after taking over Chloe’s life, and if she can seamlessly transition her behaviors, mannerisms, and full self into that of her beloved and powerful twin sister. The second is the mystery of what actually happened to Chloe. The latter takes a bit of a back seat, at least until later in the story, and it’s more about Julie trying to keep her identity swap secret so she can indulge in the life that Chloe had without being caught as a fraud. Julie isn’t exactly a GOOD person, but as a reader I fully understood why she made the decisions she did, having grown up in rotten circumstances after her parents horrible deaths while also being separated from her twin, who was adopted into a new wealthy family and leading a seemingly charmed life. I held my breath when Julie would be faced with the threat of her cover being blown, and I was very curious to see how far she would go to maintain her new life. To make matters more suspenseful, we get some hints that Chloe’s circle of influencer friends, whom have invited Julie on an exclusive retreat with them, may be hiding things as well, and the weird sinister vibes slowly build up as the story goes on.

But the most effective theme of this book was how Zhang takes on and satirizes influencer culture and the privilege/conspicuous leisure that comes with it, as well as pointing out the racism that can also come with it. I don’t really follow any influencers of this kind in real life (mostly political ones, as well as a guy who cleans and repairs/treats cow hooves?), but the idea of being a picture perfect vision of aspiration for an audience of millions (and to encourage them to consume consume consume!) is SO fascinating, and I always love a deconstruction and satire of the harmful aspects of the whole concept. Julie finds herself one of the only non-white women in a tight and popular circle of influencer friends, not only trying to perform as Chloe to keep up her ruse, but also to perform in a way that would be appealing to white audiences, and to perform for her new ‘friends’ and colleagues, especially when she finds herself on a retreat on a private island surrounded by them with no exit.

And here is the thing that really shocked me about this book: we got a bit of a CRAZY swerve in terms of plot and reveals… and I didn’t hate it! Normally when a thriller has a huge game changing moment that feels totally out of the blue I will be a bit put off. It really takes a talent and an engaging storyteller to pull it off, and Zhang really pulls it off here. I think what also helped was that a big part of this twist (I am not going to spoil it here) was left somewhat ambiguous, with room for the reader to question what exactly HAD happened, as opposed to completely shifting things definitively and too abruptly.

“Julie Chan Is Dead” is a well done thriller that kept me hooked. PERFECT poolside reading for the summer!

Rating 8: A wild thriller that has a crazy swerve that actually worked for me, “Julie Chan Is Dead” is about privilege, race, influencer culture, and getting a luxurious life at any cost.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Julie Chan Is Dead” is included on the Goodreads list “2025 Mystery Thrillers True Crime”.

Kate’s Review: “See How They Fall”

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “See How They Fall” by Rachel Paris

Publishing Info: Scarlet, April 2025

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC from the publicist.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: In this compulsive debut thriller set in Sydney’s wealthiest suburbs, one detective’s investigation into a family tragedy threatens to collapse a powerful dynasty. . . .

When Skye married into the wealthy Campbell family, she thought she was entering paradise. But lately, she’s been unhappy in her marriage to Duncan and hiding a few secrets of her own as she tries to maintain a normal, happy life for their six-year-old daughter, Tilly.

Now the family patriarch, Sir Campbell Turner, has died and his three sons are set to inherit the luxury goods empire upon which he built their fortune. But plans for a seamless handover are complicated when a fourth, hitherto unknown, heir named Cody comes forward. The Turners gather for an intimate weekend retreat at an opulent seaside estate in order to meet this newcomer and figure out their next steps. With so much at stake, tempers flare and egos clash within their first few hours together. But even as the tensions rise no one could predict that their very first night would end with a shocking poisoning that leaves one family member dead and another fighting for her life.

Sergeant Mei O’Connor is assigned to investigate the incident and though her superiors are keen to close the case as swiftly as possible, the evidence just isn’t lining up. Mei already has enough on her mind as she struggles to care for her terminally ill mother and recover from her broken engagement, but she can’t help poking around the Turners, convinced that there’s more to the suspicious poisoning than a simple accident. As Mei continues to push for answers, she may just send the carefully laid dominoes of the Turner empire crashing down.

Review: Thank you to SparkPoint Studio for sending me an ARC of this novel!

Hoo boy, buckle up everyone because I have once again brought you all a novel that has scummy rich people behaving badly! Nope, this trope still hasn’t gone out of style for me, and the more frustrated I get with real world examples of this, the more cathartic I find novels that center nasty wealthy sleaze balls and show them for what they are. So of COURSE I wanted to read “See How They Fall” by Rachel Paris! I like soapy thrillers, I like dysfunctional families, and I like murder mysteries. It was bound to be a winner.

The premise is simple. The Turners, a billionaire family still reeling from the patriarch’s death a few months earlier, are gathering with their loved ones for a weekend at a summer estate, with hopes of hashing out the inheritance, while also dealing with a new surprise heir in the form of an illegitimate son of the middle son, Duncan. During the weekend, one of the brother’s wives is dead, and Duncan’s daughter Tilly is hospitalized in grave condition, both victims of arsenic poisoning. Skye, Tilly’s mom, is desperate to find out what happened, while Duncan hides her away, and Mei O’Connor, a detective assigned to the case, starts to peel back the nasty layers of this wealthy family. Our mystery is mostly who poisoned Tilly and her aunt Nina, but as we see it through Skye and Mei’s perspectives, the mystery becomes more about what the family as a whole has to hide. It’s suspenseful, it has believable twists and turns, and it has high stakes with a little girl near death, her mother becoming more unhinged as more secrets come out, and our lead investigator finding lots of dirty laundry, therein putting a target on her back as well. The Turner Family is filled with complete sociopaths, and as the story continued the more tense I became, fearful for Skye AND Mei and what they may uncover. Paris has a lot of tricks up her sleeve, and many of them were pulled off seamlessly.

I also enjoyed the dual perspectives between Skye and Mei, as both of them have some really well constructed back stories, well thought out motivations, and their two takes on the story as it is happening complement each other as they each present different clues to the reader about what is going on and who could be behind the poisonings. Skye is deeply sympathetic as her daughter lies unconscious after being poisoned, and while her husband Duncan is lying, gaslighting, and hiding something from her, and trying to keep her from finding out family business that may or may not be tied to Tilly’s attempted murder and Nina’s actual murder. I was seriously worried for Skye as well as enraged on her behalf, and Paris nails the way that the most insidious of wealthy people will manipulate even those that they purport to love if it will keep power within their grasp. Mei, on the other hand, has problems of her own, and it makes this case deeply personal, whether it’s because she is still reeling from a break up with a manipulative jerk, or because when she was a child her younger sister went missing, and she sees her sister in Tilly. I really felt for her, and if there was a series following her as a detective I would definitely read it.

Overall, “See How They Fall” is fun, addictive, and an entertaining thriller. If you like the genre, definitely seek it out.

Rating 8: Lots of reveals, lots of scandal, and two interesting character perspectives make this book an addictive thriller.

Reader’s Advisory:

“See How They Fall” isn’t on any relevant Goodreads lists as of yet, but it would fit in on the list “Novels If You Like ‘Succession'” in the Goodreads article “What To Read Based on Your Pop Culture Obsessions”.

Kate’s Review: “Murder Land”

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “Murder Land” by Carlyn Greenwald

Publishing Info: Sourcebooks Fire, May 2025

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an eARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

Where You Can Get That Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: Murder Land opens tonight. Not everyone will survive. Buckle up for a thriller that will have you on the edge of your seat, perfect for fans of Karen McManus and Holly Jackson.

Seventeen-year-old Billie feels like she is on top of the world. She gets to spend the summer with her best friend, sparks are flying with her crush, and she has received a promotion to ride operator for one of the most buzzworthy new attractions in the theme park she works at. But the first night on the new job takes a dark turn when her creepy coworker mysteriously dies…on her ride, when she isn’t authorized to be running it.

At first, it seems like he died by heart attack, but by the time she returns to the body with help, it looks like a broken neck. Had she just imagined him sitting upright a few minutes ago? It’s as if someone is trying to pin his death on her, and she has one night to figure out who is really responsible before she is blamed.

Billie recruits the help of her friends to sneak around the park after-hours and search for the truth. But as the night stretches on and more people wind up dead, Billie realizes she may not make it out of Murder Land alive. And her friends may know more than they’re letting on.

Review: Thank you to Sourcebooks Fire for sending me an eARC via NetGalley!

Outside of Disney World, I am not REALLY a fan of theme parks. We have a couple here in Minnesota, there’s Valley Fair a bit south of the cities, and the Mall of America has Nickelodeon Universe, which my five year old loves and I only tolerate for her sake (also, here’s some lore: it USED to be called Camp Snoopy and was Peanuts themed, but alas, those days are long over). But even though I don’t really like theme or amusement parks, I do love the idea of a horror or thriller novel set in one. It just opens up so many different opportunities for suspense and horror. Because of this I was definitely interested in checking out “Murder Land” by Carlyn Greenwald, a new YA thriller that has a murderous night at a popular theme park as its premise. Nickelodeon Universe could NEVER. Plus I really like that cover. It just screams Santa Cruz Boardwalk by way of “The Lost Boys”.

No vampires, though. (source)

But promising premise and my own dorky associations aside, I am sorry to say that, for me, an old hat connoisseur of the thriller genre, “Murder Land” was a bit of a let down.

But first, the good. As I mentioned above, the premise and potential of this story is off the charts for me. There is a precedent in thrillers and horror stories for theme parks or carnivals or festivals to be unique and unsettling settings, and I, for one, wouldn’t be opposed to more of it. And that translates over to “Murder Land”, with clear homages to places like Knotts Berry Farm. And I always love a theme of greedy corporations hoping to hide scandals for profit purposes, and the conspiracies that can come to fruition because of it. And also, as a YA thriller, I could see this being a solid introduction to the thriller genre, as there is definitely a plotted out mystery that does feel planned and thought out. I also love a device that uses epistolary or ‘found footage’, so the way that we have transcripts from a website/channel that is all about the history of CaliforniaLand and references ‘urban exploration’ along with it. That all worked for me.

But, on the flip side, I am definitely not the target audience for this book, and I have read so many thrillers over the years, that nothing about “Murder Land” really stood out to me despite all of the potential that it had. I thought that our main characters, rounded out by protagonist Billie and her friend group Grace, Leon, and Sawyer, were pretty cookie cutter in their personalities and their relationships with each other. We have a bit of a love quadrangle going on, which I can usually grin and bear if it’s basically sidelined, but within this story, taking place in ONE night with lots of death and murder and tragedy at hand, it felt clunky and out of place. I also felt that the way that the reveals were done, outside of a few in the transcripts, didn’t have that much weight. I think this is probably due to the fact that I wasn’t as invested in the story because I wasn’t as invested in the characters, but I DO feel like even if I don’t connect with any characters in a thriller I can still be, well, thrilled. And I wasn’t held in much suspense as this story was going. I do think that it’s very possible (maybe even probable) that if I was a teen reading this it would have worked better, but for this forty year old, it just didn’t click.

Overall I think that this didn’t work for me because I’m not the audience it caters to. “Murder Land” was a disappointment for me, but it probably won’t be for everyone!

Rating 6: This is a solid thriller for the age group it is intended for, but seasoned thriller fans in general may be a little underwhelmed.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Murder Land” is included on the Goodreads list “YA Releases of May 2025”.

Kate’s Review: “What Remains of Teague House”

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “What Remains of Teague House” by Stacy Johns

Publishing Info: Poisoned Pen Press, April 2025

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC from the publisher.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: Three siblings reckon with the darkness hidden within their family after multiple graves are discovered behind their childhood home.

When the Rawlins family matriarch unexpectedly dies, all three adult children rush home. What they find is a house bursting with grief, dark memories surfacing around each corner, and multiple bodies buried deep in the woods. The Rawlinses want to believe these discoveries point to a crime long past. But one of the graves behind Teague House is fresh, the earth disturbed just that week—and its inhabitant is a local woman they knew.

Is the youngest Rawlins sibling with something to hide guilty of her murder? Is his sister experiencing false memories of her late father digging near the graves? Why is their aunt in such a rush to leave town after her sister’s funeral?

Enter private detective Maddie Reed, who has her own reasons for being curious about the bodies buried behind Teague House. Detective Reed sets out to unmask a killer—one she may have been hunting all her life.

Review: Thank you to Poisoned Pen Press for sending me an ARC of this novel!

Families hiding secrets are always fun types of thrillers to me. I enjoy a sub-genre of families being terrible and damaging the generations down the line, no matter WHAT the parent genre is, but when you bring murder into it as well as generational trauma that is a topic that has so many possibilities. Because of this love for that kind of drama, I was very interested in reading “What Remains of Teague House” by Stacy Johns. When family secrets involve dead bodies, old AND new, buried on the family property, things have a possibility to get juicy!

I think that some of the strongest things in this book were character based. We followed a few of the characters through third person, and in one case first person, perspective chapters, where we get to follow their parts of the mystery and see how they all fit together. We had perspectives from all three of the siblings, Sandra, Jon, and Robby, as well as past perspectives from Aunt Phil to see the background to Russ and Val (who got a single chapter at the start). I found Aunt Phil’s to be really well done and thought that it was great getting some context for her relationship with Val, giving us insight into Val as well. The sibling perspectives went from fine (Jon and Sandra) to deeply irritating (Robby. It’s by design as he’s a scumbag, but it was grating to have to read his chapters). But the best one, for me, was that of Maddie, who is an investigator who gets privy to what is happening at Teague House, and has her own reasons and connections (potentially) to one of the bodies that has been unearthed. I really enjoyed Maddie’s chapters, as not only was hers the first person perspective, but I also thought that her motivations, backstory, and arc were the most interesting. Her chapters also read like a well done procedural, and I enjoyed seeing her on the trail and getting her information from the Rawlins siblings in hopes of finding justice.

But, along with that, comes why it didn’t work as well for me as I had hoped it would. We had some good build up and pacing for a lot of the novel, but then as we started to get closer to the climax things started to go REALLY fast and felt really rushed and cobbled together. I was left scratching my head a bit about some of the reveals, feeling like some choices were made just to make things shocking without really earning it. On top of that, going back to Robby’s character from above, we had such a frustrating and grating character in this guy that I was actively turned off anytime we were following his perspective. I can usually do fine with immoral characters or people who are deeply unlikable, but that’s only if there is something a bit more interesting about them, and Robby just wasn’t interesting. Just obnoxious. These things sadly derailed my experience, and the other characters couldn’t quite compensate.

I think that “What Remains of Teague House” had its ups and downs. I definitely don’t regret reading it, but it was pretty middle of the road.

Rating 6: I like a family drama, but with some really unlikable characters and a rushed ending this one didn’t live up to my expectations.

Reader’s Advisory:

“What Remains of Teague House” isn’t on any Goodreads lists as of now, but it would fit in on “Family Secrets”.

Kate’s Review: “This Book Will Bury Me”

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Book: “This Book Will Bury Me” by Ashley Winstead

Publishing Info: Sourcebooks Landmark, March 2025

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC of this novel from the publisher.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: From the bestselling author of In My Dreams I Hold a Knife and Midnight is the Darkest Hour comes a chilling, compulsive story of five amateur sleuths, whose hunt for an elusive killer catapults them into danger as the world watches.

It’s the most famous crime in modern history. But only she knows the true story.

After the unexpected death of her father, college student Jane Sharp longs for a distraction from her grief. She becomes obsessed with true crime, befriending armchair detectives who teach her how to hunt killers from afar. In this morbid internet underground, Jane finds friendship, purpose, and even glory…

So when news of the shocking deaths of three college girls in Delphine, Idaho takes the world by storm, and sleuths everywhere race to solve the crimes, Jane and her friends are determined to beat them. But the case turns out to be stranger than anyone expected. Details don’t add up, the police are cagey, and there seems to be more media hype and internet theorizing than actual evidence. When Jane and her sleuths take a step closer, they find that every answer only begs more questions. Something’s not adding up, and they begin to suspect their killer may be smarter and more prolific than any they’ve faced before. Placing themselves in the center of the story starts to feel more and more like walking into a trap…

Told one year after the astounding events that concluded the case and left the world reeling, when Jane has finally decided to break her silence about what really happened, she tells the true story of the Delphine Massacres. And what she has to confess will shock even the most seasoned true crime fans…

Review: Thank you to Sourcebooks Landmark for sending me an ARC of this novel!

I really loved Ashley Winstead’s previous novel “Midnight Is The Darkest Hour”, so much so that it made my top ten list the year it was published. I found it to be propulsive and addictive, and when I had the opportunity to read her newest book “This Book Will Bury Me” I knew that I had to take it. I was even more interested when I read the premise, as I thought that it sounded familiar, plot wise. I do enjoy thrillers that take inspiration from real life. But this one made me have to really do some introspection about that.

“This Book Will Bury Me” has a clever story structure, as it is a story within a story that has some unreliable narration and a design like it’s a tell all true crime memoir. We have Jane, a woman who, after being traumatized by her father’s sudden death when she was in her early twenties, latched onto a true crime forum and became an armchair sleuth with four other true crime aficionados. When she and this group break a case wide open, they get a lot of attention upon themselves, and then get pulled into a brutal multiple murder of some college students in Idaho (which is very clearly based on the Moscow Murders – I will talk about that in a bit). We are seeing things through the lens of a disgraced public figure trying to clear her name, which adds a mystery on top of other mysteries, and makes for a gripping narrative as we try to see if Jane and co can solve the mystery, and what happens to make them all so reviled after the fact. I found Jane to be a compelling narrator, because I found her to be incredibly sympathetic as well as incredibly maddening at times. Winstead did her due diligence of drawing out and fully backing up why Jane would have been so drawn into the world of internet crime solving, as she hasn’t had clear answers about the tragedy of her father’s natural, but incredibly traumatizing, death, and needs to find answers to other mysteries to compensate. Sure, I spotted a few twists before they were revealed, but I was having a fun enough time that it didn’t matter.

What also worked for me in this was how Winstead also takes a controversial topic like true crime, specifically internet sleuths and their assistance/meddling (depending on who you talk to) in real life cases with real life victims. Jane and her friends all seem to have the best intentions as they try to solve crimes, but it’s hard to deny that, good intentions or not, they let hubris, ego, and their own biases drive their investigations. It’s not exactly a farfetched problem given that there have been plenty of internet sleuths in real life who have put innocent people on blast and done horrific damage (I’m thinking of the Reddit Boston Marathon Bomber debacle, I’m thinking of that one TikTok woman who named a half assed theoretical suspect in the aforementioned/soon to be mentioned Moscow Murders and sent viral harassment their way ALL BASED ON TAROT READINGS, and more). I appreciated that Winstead didn’t set out to make Jane a nasty person, but a damaged person who makes some pretty big missteps, even if her intentions are pure. But it does raise a lot of questions about the people whose love of true crime goes a few steps further into actually trying to insert themselves into it, blurring the lines between a theoretical fascination and an active participant. I enjoyed that it wasn’t super black and white.

BUT. I will say that I was uncomfortable with how close and obviously ripped from the headlines this plot was to the Moscow Murders in Moscow, Idaho. Ripped from the headlines stories happen quite a bit in pop culture. “Law and Order”‘s entire franchise takes that premise and creates episodes from actual crimes that happen, for example. But I think that part of my issue here was that the initial student murders in this book felt like they were completely lifted from that specific crime, a crime that is still pretty raw and still hasn’t had true resolution or justice because the main suspect hasn’t even gone to trial yet. And I mean LIFTED. Like timelines, details of the house, details of the fallout, it felt like the first group of murdered college students in this book were carbon copies of what happened on King’s Road in 2022. Had there been some changes or tweaks it would have felt a bit better to me. For example, the second mass murder scene felt like it was inspired by Ted Bundy’s sorority house spree, but didn’t feel like I was just reading the spree with new names. On top of that, Bundy happened DECADES ago, and he was tried and convicted and executed, so the victims families had at least some sense of closure. That hasn’t happened for the families of the Moscow victims yet. So as it was it felt kind of ghoulish to me to be so close to the actrual details. Though perhaps there’s an argument to be made that it would still be ghoulish even if it had made the changes and tweaks. I guess it goes back to questions about true crime and exploitation. Which in turn may shadow the intent that I do feel like this book was going for.

SO, it’s a bit messy and complicated. As a thriller that kept me interested, I did enjoy “This Book Will Bury Me”. But, I hope that in the future authors who want to take inspiration from real victims and real crimes can make it feel a little less blatant, because if this one had done that it would have been a slam dunk. As it was, it felt murkier than I would have liked.

Rating 8: A gripping mystery with a dissection of true crime fandom gone too far, “This Book Will Bury Me” is another entertaining read from Ashley Winstead, though I am a little uneasy about how close it was to the inspiration.

Reader’s Advisory:

“This Book Will Bury Me” is included on the Goodreads list “2025 Mystery Thrillers True Crime”.

Joint Review: “The Bane Witch”

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Book: “The Bane Witch” by Ava Morgyn

Publishing Info: St. Martin’s Griffin, March 2025

Where Did We Get This Book: ARC from the publisher/Netgalley

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: Piers Corbin has always had an affinity for poisonous things – plants and men. From the pokeweed berries she consumed at age five that led to the accidental death of a stranger, to the husband whose dark proclivities have become… concerning, poison has been at the heart of her story. But when she fakes her own death in an attempt to escape her volatile marriage and goes to stay with her estranged great aunt in the mountains, she realizes her predilection is more than a hunger – it’s a birthright. Piers comes from a long line of poison eaters – Bane Witches – women who ingest deadly plants and use their magic to rid the world of evil men. Piers sets out to earn her place in her family’s gritty but distinguished legacy, all while working at her Aunt Myrtle’s cafe and perpetuating a flirtation with the local, well-meaning sheriff to allay his suspicions on the body count she’s been leaving in her wake. But soon she catches the attention of someone else, a serial killer operating in the area. And that only means one thing – it’s time to feed. In Ava Morgyn’s dark, thrilling novel, The Bane Witch, a very little poison can do a world of good.

Serena’s Thoughts

There are a few go-to authors that Kate and I like to joint review, as we’ve both reliably enjoyed their books in the past. This author, I believe, is new to both of us! But we’ve both enjoyed “Practical Magic,” so with a comparable like that, plus the promise of a thriller-like mystery at its heart, we both thought this would be a good candidate to check out!

Unfortunately, for me, this was just ok. And part of that is the simple fact that it skewed further into the thriller genre and away from the fantasy genre than I typically prefer. So that’s nothing against the actual quality of that portion of the story (see Kate’s opinions there for a more reliable source on this genre!), but it does speak to the balance of this book. And I think for fantasy readers, specifically those looking for a read-alike for “Practical Magic,” this might feel like a bit of a let down. Instead, I think the “Gone Girl” reference made a lot more sense, and better fit, tonally, with what this book had to offer. Sure, the witchy stuff was definitely there, but the general plotting and themes fell much more in line, I think, with a thriller than with a typical fantasy story.

I also struggled to really enjoy Piers herself. In the beginning, she comes across as incredibly competent and thoughtful, as one would need to be to successfully pull of faking one’s own death. However, as the book continued, and especially towards the end, she began to make an increasing number of ridiculous decisions that just didn’t vibe with the sort of person we had first been introduced to. Her actions and various plot points felt jammed together in unnatural ways that served to push the story forwards in the direction the author wanted to go, but didn’t necessarily make sense on their own.

For me, this was just an ok read. I didn’t think the magical elements really lived up to my hopes, and I didn’t really connect with its thriller roots. I also struggled to enjoy Piers as a main character. However, readers how are more interested in the mystery and the serial killer angle might enjoy this more than I did!

Kate’s Review

Well, Serena knows me very well, because this one worked for me on many levels! Part of that was the mystery and thriller elements, to be sure, as I love a story with a serial killer and a woman who has to play a cat and mouse game with him. I also liked the suspense that builds up within the book as the story goes on, whether it’s due to the aforementioned killer that Piers is trying to track, albeit against her will, or the stress involving her abusive ex husband Henry and the cops on her tail after her faked death. Heck, I even liked the suspense regarding whether or not the other bane witches are going to accept Piers into their circle. I will say that as we got closer to the end, things went a little bit off the rails, which put a bit of a wrench in the pacing and how I connected to the story, but I thought that the plot itself was strong enough that I wasn’t too put off by it.

But what worked the most for me were the magical systems that Morgyn created for this book, as the idea of a witch being able to consume poison and transfer it to dangerous and deadly men to take them out is SO appealing to me as a horror reader who also loves witchy books. And I actually disagree with Serena a little bit, because I did get “Practical Magic” vibes from this, specifically the darker themes of that movie (I may not be speaking for the book, it’s been awhile since I’ve read it so lets just stick to the film) like violence against women, women taking their power into their own hands in dire circumstances, and the complicated relationships between families where estrangement and trauma is a very real wedge between people. So many of these things really click for me in my witch fiction, and I thought that Piers coming into her own as a dangerous but righteous bane witch was a fun and engaging arc (though I definitely agree that she does make some REALLY dumb decisions in the later third of the novel, no arguments there). And I always like witch stories that work outside the expected box, or outside of what we usually see in the sub-genre, and a bunch of mountain witches using poison magic was VERY fun and not something that I see as much.

Overall I found “The Bane Witch” to be a really entertaining witch tale, hitting all of the notes I had hoped it would.

Serena’s Rating 7: An interesting concept with the poison magic, but I struggled to connect to Piers and wanted more from the fantasy elements in the story.

Kate’s Rating 8: A fun and deliciously wicked witch tale with poison, empowerment, and a unique magical system. Add in a solid suspense vibe and it’s overall a winner.

Reader’s Advisory

“The Bane Witch” is included on the Goodreads lists Vampires and Werewolves and Witches…Oh My! and Poisonous Plant Fiction Titles.

Kate’s Review: “Vanishing Daughters”

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Book: “Vanishing Daughters” by Cynthia Pelayo

Publishing Info: Thomas & Mercer, March 2025

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC from the publicist.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: A haunted woman stalked by a serial killer confronts the horrors of fairy tales and the nightmares of real life in a breathtaking novel of psychological suspense by a Bram Stoker Award–winning author.

It started the night journalist Briar Thorne’s mother died in their rambling old mansion on Chicago’s South Side.

The nightmares of a woman in white pleading to come home, music switched on in locked rooms, and the panicked fear of being swallowed by the dark…Bri has almost convinced herself that these stirrings of dread are simply manifestations of grief and not the beyond-world of ghostly impossibilities her mother believed in. And more tangible terrors still lurk outside the decaying Victorian greystone.

A serial killer has claimed the lives of fifty-one women in the Chicago area. When Bri starts researching the murders, she meets a stranger who tells her there’s more to her sleepless nights than bad dreams—they hold the key to putting ghosts to rest and stopping a killer. But the killer has caught on and is closing in, and if Bri doesn’t answer the call of the dead soon, she’ll be walking among them.

Review: Thank you to Kaye Publicity for sending me an ARC of this novel!

I have a very special place in my heart for the story of “Sleeping Beauty”. It was my favorite Disney movie as a toddler, and my parents say that I basically wore our VHS of the film out due to watching it over and over again. I also generally enjoy the fairy tale in so many of its forms, even if those forms can be pretty dark and disturbing (no surprise given fairy tales). With all of this in mind I was so, so very excited to read Cynthia Pelayo’s new horror/thriller book “Vanishing Daughters”, as she decided to approach the story of Sleeping Beauty through the lenses of local folklore, grief, the things that haunt a person and a community, and violent misogyny. Pelayo is one of my favorite authors and I was very curious to see what she was going to do with a fairy tale so near and dear to my heart.

Pelayo once again creates a dreamy and strange world that lives within Chicago, but treads into fantastical places while still feeling very much steeped in the Midwestern metropolis through history, folklore, urban legend, and real life terrors. We follow Briar Rose, a journalist who lives in her family home in the woods, located on the Southside of Chicago, who is mourning her mother’s recent death. Briar Rose has been dreaming strange and terrifying things, and the house she lives within feels haunted, both by something otherworldly, but also by the crushing grief of the loss of her mother. Meanwhile a serial killer has been murdering women in Chicago, leaving devastation behind but capturing their spirits to holding them within a trapped other world, and his connection to Briar Rose reflects a destiny that the journalist was unaware of, even though her free spirited mother was hinting at it in life. This dark fantasy retelling is so rich and layered, with creative analogs to the original fairy tale while also connecting folklore of Chicago and its darker histories that still linger in the minds of its citizens. I loved how ethereal and odd this felt, really bringing out the idea of sleep and dreaming and all the themes that come with a Sleeping Beauty story.

The horror and thriller elements of the serial killer mystery are also on point, not only tapping into very real themes like violent misogyny and victims memories being exploited, but also the tales of cruel fairies that curse bloodlines and steal people for their own devices. For our evil fairy analog we have someone/something that is part fantastical in how it functions in this story, but also just feels like a very real threat, as women in real life can go missing and be left without a voice or justice, becoming ideas and warnings instead of being seeing as living breathing humans. It’s both a critique of the way women victims are exploited by true crime narratives, but also an interesting exploration of how real life folk lore and cautionary tales are created from tragedies and how we forget that. I enjoyed the POV of the serial killer, as it was such a jolting distinction from Briar Rose’s chapters, and it made me uneasy and on edge. You throw in the dark past of Chicago and so many cultural references to this city and its history (another thing I love about Pelayo’s books: Chicago itself is a character, and given that I really enjoy Chicago it’s so fun to see how she represents it) and you have a strong time and place with a lot of well explored history lessons.

“Vanishing Daughters” is my favorite of Pelayo’s works. This book is compelling and beautiful and raw and emotional, and I highly recommend it. If you haven’t ready anything by Cynthia Pelayo, now is the time and this is the title.

Rating 9: Probably my favorite Pelayo story to date, “Vanishing Daughters” is strange and dreamlike, while also exploring themes of grief, folklore, and the very real people who turn into myth, for better or worse.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Vanishing Daughters” is included on the Goodreads list “Horror To Look Forward To in 2025”.