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Welcome to October, thriller fans!
As always, we’re excited to get you up to speed on everything hitting bookstores this month. To do so, we’ve once again prepared two different Reading Guides for October—a free version, which you can see below, and a premium version over on our new home, The Real Book Spy Substack, that includes a complete list of all titles set for release plus reviews for each and every book. To see that list, click here.
This month’s Featured Selections are Cry Havoc by Jack Carr, Gone Before Goodbye by Harlan Coben and Reece Witherspoon, The Last Murder of the Year, a Hercule Poirot novel by Sophie Hannah, and The Tin Men, the final novel from legendary author Nelson DeMille, which he co-wrote with his son, Alex.
Find out more about those books, plus everything else coming releasing this month, below.
Happy Reading!
Tuesday, October 7th
Cry Havoc: A Tom Reece Thriller by Jack Carr
FEATURED SELECTION
Atria/Emily Bestler Books
From the “hottest author on the thriller scene today” (The Real Book Spy), #1 New York Times bestselling author Jack Carr brings the worlds of special operations and CIA paramilitary units into direct collision in the jungles of Vietnam with his explosive new thriller introducing young Navy SEAL Tom Reece, a man torn between the blurred lines and allegiances of the military and the increasingly murky world of intelligence. This is how it all began…
1968. A time of division. A time of civil unrest. A time of war.
Just before the Tet Offensive, before President Johnson announces he will not run for reelection, before the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Bobby Kennedy, as riots and protests rage across the nation, a spy ship is captured by communist forces off the coast of North Korea.
The crew thought they had destroyed everything of intelligence value. They were wrong.
As a KGB “illegal” elicits information from a high-ranking NSA official, and teams of special operators infiltrating into Laos, Cambodia, and North Vietnam disappear without a trace, an ambitious Soviet advisor launches an ingenious plan that could forever alter the world balance of power.
Tom Reece, a SEAL operator attached to the highly classified and shadowy MACV-SOG is about to be thrust into a bloody battle to discover the truth.
From the Kremlin to the White House, from the streets of Saigon to the rugged A Shau Valley, along the paths of Ho Chi Minh Trail and into the secret war in Laos, Navy SEAL Tom Reece has an official mission assigned by Military Assistance Command, Vietnam-Studies and Observations Group, but it’s his unofficial mission that might get him killed.
From “master novelist” (Ballistic) Jack Carr comes a fast-paced and brutally realistic thriller, one that will make you question all you thought you knew about Vietnam, pressing “emotional buttons that other writers wouldn’t dare explore” (The Real Book Spy).
Murder at Holly House by Denzil Meyrick
Poisoned Pen Press
A festive mystery perfect for fans of Murder on the Christmas Express and Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot’s Christmas
A village of secrets.
Yorkshire, 1952. Christmas is fast approaching when a dead stranger is found lodged up the chimney of Holly House in the snow-covered village of Elderby. Is he a simple thief, or a would-be killer?
A mystery that can’t be solved.
Inspector Frank Grasby is ordered to investigate. But as is often the way for him, things don’t go according to plan.
A Christmas to remember.
When the local doctor’s husband is murdered, Grasby begins to realize that everyone in Elderby is hiding something.
And if he can’t uncover the truth soon, the whole country will pay a dreadful price…
Thomas & Mercer
Getting to know her new friend’s secrets is becoming a dangerous obsession in a twisting novel of psychological suspense by Washington Post bestselling author Minka Kent.
What are friends for?
Wallflower Cate Cabot has always been content to keep the world at arm’s length, particularly from behind the register at the upscale Floridian boutique where she’s worked for the last nine years. Her days are filled with old-moneyed locals and nouveau-riche tourists, most of them paying her no mind as she rings up their lavish hauls. Until Odessa DuVernay.
At first glance, Odessa is just another picture-perfect Palm Shores trophy wife—until she proves herself personable, humble, and unassuming. She even goes so far as to take a genuine interest in Cate, inviting her for lunch dates, matinees, and girl talk—a refreshing change of pace for the woman who never quite mastered the art of making (and keeping) friends.
But what begins as an unlikely friendship detours into the unthinkable when Odessa leaves Cate a panicked voicemail asking to meet—and then ghosts her. And worse, when Cate attempts to find her, it’s as if the enigmatic Mrs. DuVernay never existed at all. Consumed, Cate refuses to stop searching. But the truth won’t come easy. In fact, it could cost her everything.
Revised edition: Previously published as The Trophy Wife by Sunday Tomassetti, this edition of The Trophy Wife includes editorial revisions and a new ending.
Murder Most Haunted by Emma Mason
William Morrow Paperbacks
An unforgettable heroine is faced with an unbelievable crime in this snarky, charming locked-room mystery that asks: would you rather be snowed-in with a ghost, or a murderer?
A grand country estate.
On her last day as a detective, Midge McGowan is given the retirement present from hell: a ticket to a haunted house tour. She’ll have to spend a weekend ghost-hunting in an isolated mansion with a group of misfits, including a know-it-all paranormal investigator and a has-been pop star.
A puzzle that can’t be solved.
The guests soon realize that the house has a mind of its own… and that they might not be the only ones there. An eerie figure appears on the property, and then the unthinkable happens: someone is murdered in a room that’s been locked from the inside.
A ghostly weekend they might not survive.
When a blizzard cuts the group off from help, the house’s own dark secrets begin to surface, and Midge can’t shake the creeping sense that they are walking into a nightmare. Could a ghost really be responsible? Or is the culprit one the guests, who have somehow, impossibly, endeared themselves to Midge?
Miss Winter in the Library with a Knife by Martin Edwards
Poisoned Pen Press
Six contestants. One chance at a new life. Who wouldn’t be tempted to cheat?
Award-winning, renowned master of mysteries and editor of the British Library of Crime Classics, Martin Edwards turns up the heat for the most seasoned fair play mystery connoisseurs and puzzle aficionados just in time for a gleefully wicked holiday read.
Six down-on-their-luck people with links to the world of crime writing have been invited to play a game this Christmas by the mysterious Midwinter Trust. The challenge seems simple but exciting: Solve the murder of a fictional crime writer in a remote but wonderfully atmospheric village in north Yorkshire to win a prize that will change your fortunes for good.
Six members of staff from the shadowy Trust are there to make sure everyone plays fair. The contestants have been meticulously vetted but you can never be too careful. And with the village about to be cut off by a snowstorm, everyone needs to be extra vigilant. Midwinter can play tricks on people’s minds.
The game is set – but playing fair isn’t on everyone’s Christmas list.
How to Fake a Haunting by Christa Carmen
Thomas & Mercer
A desperate woman’s plot to frighten her husband out of her life takes a nightmarish turn in a chilling novel of modern horror by a Bram Stoker Award–winning author.
Lainey Taylor is being pushed to the brink by her alcoholic husband, Callum. Prone to hallucinations and erratic behavior, it’s only a matter of time before he puts Lainey’s life—and that of their daughter, Beatrix—in jeopardy. A divorce and full custody is out of the question. In Callum’s words: Over my dead body.
Lainey’s sympathetic friend Adelaide has a wild solution. They’ll stage a haunting so convincing it will drive Callum out of Lainey’s life for good. Nothing too over the top: strange smells, noises in the walls, and flies unleashed along the windowsills. It could work. Considering Callum’s alcohol-induced night terrors, he’s already close to broken. With each new scare, Lainey is closer to seeing the haunting through to its bitter, freeing end.
But in a house filled with so much rage, resentment, and fear, is it any wonder that Lainey and Adelaide’s plan goes horribly wrong? As their fake haunting spirals into something no one can control, Lainey discovers that the only way out of this frightening trap is to join forces with Callum, or die trying.
Keep This for Me by Jennifer Fawcett
Atria Books
The acclaimed author of the “chilling, mesmerizing debut” (Rachel Harrison, author of The Return) Beneath the Stairs returns with a gripping, atmospheric suspense novel about a woman investigating a serial killer’s connection to her mother’s disappearance—for fans of I Have Some Questions for You and Notes on an Execution.
One hot August night in 1993, a young couple go to a party. When their car breaks down, they are picked up by a truck driver who attacks the man and abducts the woman. She is never seen again.
That woman was Fiona Green’s mother.
When the trucker, Eddie Ward, is caught, a mass grave of bodies is discovered in his backyard but Fiona’s mother isn’t there. Thirty years later, on his prison deathbed, Ward insists that he didn’t kill her, so Fiona finds herself back in the small town where her mother disappeared. Fighting demons of her own, she’s shocked when history repeats itself: another woman, another roadside breakdown, and another disappearance. Only this time the primary suspect is Jason Ward, Eddie’s son. Desperate, Fiona hunts down answers, unaware that she is being drawn into a dangerous trap.
With Jennifer Fawcett’s signature “suspenseful and immersive” (Library Journal) prose, Keep This for Me is a fresh, spellbinding exploration of what we unwillingly inherit from our parents and how one random act can send ripples years into the future.
Sharp Force by Patricia Cornwell
Grand Central Publishing
From a New York Times bestselling author, a serial killer wreaks havoc on Northern Virginia, appearing as a ghostly apparition before striking—and Kay Scarpetta must avoid becoming their next victim, with SCARPETTA soon to be a streaming series starring Nicole Kidman and Jamie Lee Curtis.
NO ONE IS SAFE FROM THE SERIAL KILLER
NOT EVEN SCARPETTA…
During the early hours of Christmas morning, chief medical examiner Dr. Kay Scarpetta receives a chilling call. The Phantom Slasher has struck again.
The serial killer has terrorized Northern Virginia for months. His pattern is to stalk with sophisticated technology that enables him to invade his victims’ homes and watch their every move. They wake up to a ghost-like hologram before being murdered in their beds.
Scarpetta is summoned to Mercy Island, the site of a notorious psychiatric hospital where two people have been brutalized, one of them from Scarpetta’s past. It soon becomes apparent that she could be next…
Blackstone Publishing
From New York Times bestselling author Brian Freeman, Photograph is an emotional cold case mystery of hidden identities and startling twists—perfect for fans of Lisa Jewell, Mary Kubica, and Freida McFadden.
Shannon Wells is a private investigator who helps women with nowhere else to go. Last year, a woman named Faith Selby came to Shannon with a strange request: Find out who I really am.
Shannon soon discovered that Faith was hiding a whole other life, but was unable to penetrate the web of mystery the woman had built around her past. Now Faith is dead. The only clue to who she was and why she was murdered is an old photograph of a little girl in the rain outside a Midwestern motel.
The hunt for answers takes Shannon from the hot beaches of Florida to a remote small town in Michigan as she peels away layer after layer of a shocking cold case that has rippled violently into the present. With each secret she uncovers, the danger around her grows—and forces Shannon to confront the demons hiding in her own past.
The Night That Finds Us All by John Hornor Jacobs
G.P. Putnam’s Sons
A troubled sailor. A hundred-year-old sailboat. An ancient curse. Welcome to award-winning author John Hornor Jacobs’ nautical nightmare.
It begins and ends as always, with the sea.
Sam Vines is struggling. Her boat is up on the hard and she doesn’t have enough money to get her back in the water. Turns out the snorkelers and the scubadivers are looking for the ultra-luxury boating experience, not the single-handed, rarely sober, snarky stylings of sailboat captain Samantha Vines. So it’s a good thing when her former crewmate Loick asks her to help deliver a massive, hundred-year-old sailboat from Seattle to England. Sam is the only one who can handle the ship’s engine, and did Loick mention that the money is good? It’s very good.
The Blackwatch is a huge boat. An ancient boat. It’s also probably (definitely) haunted.
Sam’s alcohol withdrawal (sobriety is important at sea) has her doubting her senses, but when one crewmate disappears and another has a gruesome accident, she knows that this simple delivery job has spiraled into something sinister.
By turns terrifying, darkly funny, thought-provoking, and heartfelt, The Night That Finds Us All is a seductive, nautical nightmare.
Tuesday, October 14th
Gone Before Goodbye by Harlan Coben & Reece Witherspoon
FEATURED SELECTION
Grand Central Publishing
Release Date: Tuesday, October 14th
An unforgettable suspense novel that combines the storytelling talents of Academy Award-winning actor Reese Witherspoon and internationally bestselling author Harlan Coben. Gone Before Goodbye is the story of a woman trapped in a deadly conspiracy—where uncovering the truth could cost her everything.
Maggie McCabe is teetering on the brink. A highly skilled and renowned Army combat surgeon, she has always lived life at the edge, where she could make the most impact. And it was all going to plan … until it wasn’t.
Upside down after a devastating series of tragedies leads to her medical license being revoked, Maggie has lost her purpose, but not her nerve or her passion. At her lowest point, she is thrown a lifeline by a former colleague, an elite plastic surgeon whose anonymous clientele demand the best care money can buy, as well as absolute discretion.
Halfway across the globe, sequestered in the lap of luxury and cutting-edge technology, one of the world’s most mysterious men requires unconventional medical assistance. Desperate, and one of the few surgeons in the world skilled enough to take this job, Maggie enters his realm of unspeakable opulence and fulfills her end of the agreement. But when the patient suddenly disappears while still under her care, Maggie must become a fugitive herself—or she will be the next one who is … Gone Before Goodbye.
The Picasso Heist by James Patterson and Howard Roughan
Little, Brown and Company
A $100 million painting.
A previously unknown Picasso is discovered in the attic of a French villa.
Everyone wants to possess it.
Filthy-rich Manhattan art people. Organized crime bosses. Power-hungry government officials. A notorious forger. A glamorous twenty-two-year-old art thief.
Only one person knows how to take it.
She’s the rival none of the power players see coming.
Berkley
A deeply compelling historical horror novel following a woman accused of being a witch who must use her voice to fight for her life—and the truth—from the acclaimed author of The Book of Witching
Innsbruck, 1485. Helena Scheuberin should be doing what every other young wife is doing: keeping house, supporting her husband, and bearing his children, but as an outspoken, strong woman, she sometimes has difficulty fitting in. Then she draws the unwanted attention of a malign priest who is just starting his campaign to root out “witches” from among the women of her town, and when her husband’s footman dies, she finds herself accused not only of murder but of witchcraft.
Helena must find the courage to risk her life and the lives of others by standing up to a man determined to paint her as the most wicked of all….
Based on the incredible true story of a woman who challenged a man who went on to become one of Europe’s most notorious and cruel witchfinders, this novel offers a jewel-bright portrait of female power.
The Tourists by Christopher Reich
Thomas & Mercer
From the New York Times bestselling author of Matterhorn comes a heart-stopping thriller about a man who returns to a life of espionage to save the woman he loves and the City of Light.
Retired special agent Mac Dekker travels to Paris to propose to Ava Attal, once Mossad’s deadliest operative. After too long, life is good. But before he can propose, Ava leaves the table to take an urgent call. And never returns.
Mac launches a frantic search, spiraling through the city’s brightest and darkest places. People are lying, agents are dying, and he finds himself caught in the crosshairs of CIA shadows and enigmatic assassins while battling a wealthy, ruthless prince planning a truly terrifying act of violence.
With only hours to find Ava and save thousands of lives, Mac’s CIA training kicks in, along with his instincts: Is Ava truly missing, or did she come to Paris on a mission even more secretive than his own?
The Man Next Door by Sheila Roberts
MIRA
“In this spunky nod to Rear Window, Roberts infuses a charming domestic comedy with a soupçon of suspicion. . . . a heartwarming diversion.” –Publishers Weekly
Love in the Time of Serial Killers meets The Woman in the House Across the Street from the Girl in the Window in this delightful romp about a recently broke divorcee who moves in with her house-bound mother only to spend their days spying on her grumpy, mysterious, and sexy new neighbor.
Zona never thought her life was headed this way, but here she is, newly divorced and moving back in with her mom, Louise. After her gambling addicted ex-husband lost all of their savings, including their daughter’s college fund, she doesn’t really have a choice. She’s cutting every coupon she can and she’s going to help put her daughter through nursing school, even if it kills her.
This wasn’t Louise’s plan, either, laid up at home with a broken leg after one unfortunate tumble on the senior singles cruise she’d been looking forward to for months. But if she’s going to spend all her time at home, at least she’s got her daughter there with her. And there’s some hot new eye candy next door to distract them both from their troubles. He appears to be single and just around Zona’s age. Could his arrival be the universe making amends for everything it’s put her through?
Maybe the universe isn’t feeling as generous as Louise hoped. There’s something lurking under that mans surface charm, something…dangerous? And who’s the woman they can hear him in all-out shouting matches with on the other side of the fence? When the woman seems to disappear without a trace, imaginations run wild. Or at least, Zona hopes it’s just her mother’s imagination…
The Gun Man Jackson Swagger by Stephen Hunter
Atria/Emily Bestler Books
Pulitzer Prize winner Stephen Hunter, “a true master at the pinnacle of his craft” (Jack Carr), returns with a classic Western—gunfights, horses, saloons, and looming above, the ominous presence of the railroad—about a Civil War veteran investigating the dark reality of a prosperous ranch.
In the frying pan of a drought-scorched 1890s Southwest, an old man shows up at the region’s only prosperous spread, the Callahan ranch, seeking work. Jack is flinty, shrewd, tough, and a natural with a gun. As an incentive to be taken on at his age, he shows the foreman an uncanny skill with one of Mr. Winchester’s latest models. He knows a sharpshooter would be valuable to Colonel Callahan and head gun man Tom Voth.
But he has his own mission. Aware that a young cowboy on the ranch has died mysteriously, Jack begins to investigate. He soon realizes that the death and the source of the Callahan wealth are dangerously entwined and that many of the dark forces of the American West are at play on the ranch. Soon enough, it’s the season of the six-gun and its fastest shootist.
Thomas & Mercer
A spiraling case of betrayal, corruption, and murder could destroy Eve Ronin if she exposes it in a gripping thriller by #1 New York Times bestselling author Lee Goldberg.
A fifty-five-gallon drum washes up in the Malibu Lagoon stuffed with the corpse of Gene Dent, the key player in a bribery scandal that ensnared several local politicians. LASD detectives Eve Ronin and Duncan Pavone know the case—and all the likely suspects—well. Just as they begin their investigation, the sheriff publicly reveals evidence linking the crime to LA’s mayor.
But Eve and Duncan realize the bombshell allegation, true or not, arises from corruption within the sheriff’s own office…because they helped cover it up years ago. If the sheriff goes down, so will they.
Eve is agonizing over her moral dilemma when a helicopter crashes in the hillside below her Calabasas home. It’s not a coincidence. Eve soon discovers among the twisted wreckage and dead passengers shocking connections to her own past…and they lead straight to a fight for her life.
Tuesday, October 21st
The Proving Ground by Michael Connelly
Little, Brown and Company
From #1 New York Times bestselling author Michael Connelly, the Lincoln Lawyer is back with a case against an AI company whose product may have been responsible for the murder of a young girl.
Following his “resurrection walk” and need for a new direction, Mickey Haller turns to public interest litigation, filing a civil lawsuit against an artificial intelligence company whose chatbot told a sixteen-year-old boy that it was okay for him to kill his ex-girlfriend for her disloyalty.
Representing the victim’s family, Mickey’s case explores the mostly unregulated and exploding AI business and the lack of training guardrails. Along the way he joins up with a journalist named Jack McEvoy, who wants to be a fly on the wall during the trial in order to write a book about it. But Mickey puts him to work going through the mountain of printed discovery materials in the case. McEvoy’s digging ultimate delivers the key witness, a whistleblower who has been too afraid to speak up. The case is fraught with danger because billions are at stake.
It is said that machines became smarter than humans on the day in 1997 that IBM’s Deep Blue defeated chess master Garry Kasparov with a gambit called “the knight’s sacrifice.” Haller will take a similar gambit in court to defeat the mega forces of the AI industry lined up against him and his clients.
The Hawk Is Dead by Peter James
Macmillan UK
‘What a fool I’ve been not to have read Peter James until The Hawk Is Dead! A great story’ – James Patterson, bestselling author of the Alex Cross series
Roy Grace never dreamed a murder investigation would take him deep into Buckingham Palace . . .
Her Majesty, Queen Camilla, is aboard the Royal Train heading to a charity event in Sussex when disaster strikes – the train is derailed.
A tragic accident or a planned attack?
When, minutes later, a trusted aide is shot dead by a sniper, the police have their answer.
Despite all the evidence, Roy Grace is not convinced The Queen was the intended target. But he finds himself alone in his suspicions.
Fighting against the scepticism of his colleagues and the Palace itself, Grace pursues his own investigation. But when there is a second murder, the stakes rise even higher, and Grace is at risk of being embroiled in a very public catastrophe – and in mortal danger.
Failure at this level is not an option. But time is running out before a killer in the Palace will strike again . . .
Roy Grace is back with his most difficult case yet in the gripping new instalment from number one bestselling author Peter James.
Impostor Syndrome by Andrew Mayne
Thomas & Mercer
Two fearless investigators unite to stop a media-savvy serial killer from carrying out a cataclysmic crime for all the world to see in a riveting thriller by a Wall Street Journal bestselling author.
The FBI calls on former agent Jessica Blackwood to look at a puzzling crime. A wildlife officer has found the body of a popular YouTuber encased in an obelisk made of salt in a remote refuge. When the agency is tipped off to a second body, that of a TikTok star chained to the bottom of Nevada’s Pyramid Lake—her hands clasped in prayer—Jessica recruits a trusted colleague of her own: Floridian underwater investigator Sloan McPherson.
It appears to be the work of a ritualistic serial killer preying on influencers. That tracks when a third victim—a fantasy-game live streamer—barely survives a pipe bomb attack. But in navigating the social media world of instafame, manipulation, and deception, Jessica and Sloan know how illusory appearances can be. As the threats multiply across the country, they fear they’re playing with something more extreme than they imagined: a killer’s endgame that could be nothing less than apocalyptic.
Doubleday
#1 New York Times bestselling author John Grisham is the acclaimed master of the legal thriller. Now, he’s back with his first-ever whodunit, even more suspenseful than his courtroom dramas, as a small-time lawyer accused of murder races to find the real killer to clear his name.
“A classic, compulsive, taut and thrilling novel from one of the great storytellers of our time. The Widow is John Grisham at his irresistible, unforgettable best.”—Chris Whitaker, author of All the Colors of the Dark
Simon Latch is a lawyer in rural Virginia, making just enough to pay his bills while his marriage slowly falls apart. Then, into his office walks Eleanor Barnett, an elderly widow in need of a new will. Apparently, her husband left her a small fortune, and no one knows about it.
Once he hooks the richest client of his career, Simon works quietly to keep her wealth under the radar. But soon her story begins to crack. When she is hospitalized after a car accident, Simon realizes that nothing is as it seems, and he finds himself on trial for a crime he swears he didn’t commit: murder.
Simon knows he’s innocent. But he also knows the circumstantial evidence is against him, and he could spend the rest of his life behind bars. To save himself, he must find the real killer….
William Morrow
From #1 New York Times bestselling author Joe Hill, a chilling tale of modern-world dangers, dark academia, and the unexpected consequences of revenge as six friends dabble in the occult and are tragically, horrifyingly successful… calling forth an evil entity that demands regular human sacrifice.
“A brilliantly Faustian fable with a heart as huge as a dragon’s, and a stinging twist in its tail. I devoured it.” —Ruth Ware, New York Times bestselling author of The Woman in Suite 11
Arthur Oakes is a reader, a dreamer, and a student at Rackham College, Maine, renowned for its frosty winters, exceptional library, and beautiful buildings. But his idyll—and burgeoning romance with Gwen Underfoot—is shattered when a local drug dealer and her partner corner him into one of the worst crimes he can imagine: stealing rare books from the college library.
Trapped and desperate, Arthur turns to his closest friends for comfort and help. Together, they dream up a wild, fantastical scheme to free Arthur from the cruel trap in which he finds himself. Wealthy, irrepressible Colin Wren suggests using the unnerving Crane journal (bound in the skin of its author) to summon a dragon to do their bidding. The others—brave, beautiful Alison Shiner; the battling twins Donna and Donovan McBride; and brainy, bold Gwen—don’t hesitate to join Colin in an effort to smash reality and bring a creature of the impossible into our world.
But there’s nothing simple about dealing with dragons, and their pact to save Arthur becomes a terrifying bargain in which the six must choose a new sacrifice for King Sorrow every year—or become his next meal.
Tuesday, October 28th
The Last Death of the Year by Sophie Hannah
William Morrow
The brilliant Belgian detective rings in the New Year with a chilling murder investigation on a Greek island in this all-new holiday mystery from Sophie Hannah, author of Hercule Poirot’s Silent Night.
New Year’s Eve, 1932. Hercule Poirot and Inspector Edward Catchpool arrive on the tiny Greek island of Lamperos to celebrate the holiday with what turns out to be a rather odd community of locals living in a dilapidated house. A dark sense of foreboding overshadows the beautiful island getaway when the guests play a New Year’s Resolutions game after dinner and one written resolution gleefully threatens to perform “the last and first death of the year.”
Hours later, one of the home’s residents is found dead on the terrace.
In light of the shocking murder, Poirot reveals to Catchpool the real reason he’s brought him to the island—the life of another community member has been threatened. Now both men resolve to ensure that the first murder will be the last.
Coyote Hills by Jonathan Kellerman & Jesse Kellerman
Ballantine Books
The electric new Clay Edison thriller from the New York Times bestselling, acclaimed father-son duo who write “brilliant, page-turning fiction” (Stephen King)
Clay Edison has left behind the Alameda County coroner’s office to strike out on his own as a private investigator. He’s perfectly happy working low-stakes embezzlement cases—that is, until PI Regina Klein calls him with a mystery only he can solve. The son of a wealthy couple has washed up dead on the shores of San Francisco Bay with drugs in his system and a head injury. The police are calling it an accident. But the parents are adamant something’s not right—and as Clay digs deeper, he uncovers a horrifying tangle of betrayal and lies.
The Tin Men by Nelson DeMille & Alex DeMille
FEATURED SELECTION
Simon & Schuster
At a top-secret Army training facility in the Mojave Desert, Special Agents Scott Brodie and Maggie Taylor plunge into a deadly web of military intrigue, AI technology, and robot soldiers as they unravel the shocking murder of a senior scientist in this gripping thriller from New York Times bestselling authors Nelson DeMille and Alex DeMille.
Army CID Special Agents Scott Brodie and Maggie Taylor team up for their toughest assignment yet as they are dispatched to Camp Hayden to investigate the death of Major Roger Ames, the chief scientist in charge of the top-secret war games being conducted between a platoon of Army Rangers and a fleet of “lethal autonomous weapons.” Brodie and Taylor find themselves at ground zero of the next generation of warfare, and must untangle the complex web of alliances, animosities, and secret agendas among the men and women of the isolated facility.
In a place cut off from the world and exposed to the harsh desert elements, everyone is a suspect—from the zealous camp commander who pushes his men to the limit, to the Rangers slipping into madness due to isolation, grueling training, and rampant abuse of performance-enhancing drugs, to the late Major Ames’s own research colleagues. Brodie and Taylor must uncover layers of deception to find the hidden hand behind the murder of Major Ames, and the real purpose of the activities at Camp Hayden and its terrifying arsenal of next-generation weapons.
This gripping thriller, the final novel from the legendary Nelson DeMille, coauthored with his son Alex DeMille, is a masterful blend of suspense and cutting-edge technology. It is a page-turning and thought-provoking exploration of the implications of AI in modern warfare and is a must-read for fans of military thrillers.