Land of Shadows by Rachel Howzell Hall
Hall’s totally winning smart, sarcastic detective, Elouise “Lou” Norton, gets called in to solve a Jane Doe case in a building owned by a man who may have murdered her own sister years before. Lou is the only woman and African American on her LAPD homicide detail. She’s also a South L.A. native who loves her city, making her a fresh narrator in crime fiction worth following through Hall’s growing series.
The Likeness by Tana French
For an unabashed literary geek like me, “The Likeness” is the perfect portrait of dreamy, bookish students who… end up murdering one of their own? Wait. That did not happen to me in grad school. In truth, “The Likeness” will keep you reading long past bedtime to find out if Irish detective Cassie Maddox survives her undercover gig posing as a murdered woman miraculously revived to return to a house full of tight university friends, one of whom might be the killer.
The Outcast Dead by Elly Griffiths
This is the sixth book in Elly Griffith’s captivating series about archeologist Ruth Galloway, who by now has a two-year-daughter. The novel starts with a dig that unearths the remains of Mother Hook, a famous fictional Victorian nanny and serial killer of children, and later plunges Ruth into the darkest fears of the working mother. Twists abound, the end is surprisingly heartening.
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
There is a reason that “Rebecca” has never gone out of print. Actually, there are many reasons. Pick up this classic 1938 mystery-thriller for impeccable prose, a delicious plot about a second wife’s obsession with the first wife, a genuine love affair, and Manderley, a dream house that literally becomes a burning nightmare.
Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado
This mesmerizing debut story collection is not a traditional murder mystery, but it should be a required companion reader. Its eight stories flip conventional fairy tales, urban legends, and the endless parade of victims in Law and Order to create haunting new narratives about women, death, monstrosity, and desire.
