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Welcome to December, thriller fans!
It’s crazy how fast 2025 flew by, but before we flip the calendar over to 2026, there are still some really great thrillers and mysteries set to hit bookstores this month—and as always, I’ve compiled a full breakdown of every new title on the way.
Also, so you know what’s coming up here on The Real Book Spy Substack:
December will be a good month for content, but starting in January, you’ll see new content almost every single day. Back in August, when I made the switch over tp Substack, you may have noticed output was much higher for the first six weeks. Well, I’ve not gone anywhere; we’ve been planning our 2026 coverage as we wrap up 2025, and I am thrilled to confidently say that 2026 will be the biggest year in Book Spy history—with more reviews, interviews, lists, reading guides, and breaking, exclusive news than ever before.
If you haven’t already upgraded to a paid subscription, please consider doing that (click here) so you stay in the loop on all things mystery and thriller—because there’s a ton of great books on the way.
To that end, I’ll have the 2026 Reading Guide up soon, along with some teasers and some notable reviews for high-profile books that nobody else has gotten their hands on yet. I’ll also drop an interview or two, but the real headline here—and I buried the lead—is that our complete 2025 Holiday Guide is coming this week, so make sure you don’t miss that.
If you’re shopping for a reader in your life this Christmas, I’ll have you covered. So, yes, check back for that, and in the meantime, here’s everything coming to bookstores this month.
FEATURED SELECTIONS
This month, I’m highlighting three books that I personally think stand above the rest, but there’s a caveat. My first co-authored book, The Second Son, which I wrote with Simon Gervais (more below), comes out December 1st. I don’t want to make it a Featured Selection because, well, that’s awkward… BUT… I do think it’s one of the best books I’ve released, so please check that out ASAP.
So, which three am I featuring?
- W. E. B. Griffin Direct Action by Jack Stewart
- Dead Ringer by Chris Hauty
- Everybody Wants to Rule the World by Ace Atkins
More on those books, and everything else, below.
Happy Reading!
Tuesday, December 2
The Second Son by Simon Gervais and Ryan Steck
“An absolute knockout!” — Jack Carr, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Cry Havoc
A pulse-pounding yet soulful espionage thriller for fans of Brad Thor, Jack Carr, and Mark Greaney, delivering plot twists so explosive, it took two top suspense writers to pull it off.
Soldier-turned-sommelier Chase Burke may have traded his rifle for bottles of wine, but violence and conspiracy aren’t through with him yet. First, his intelligence analyst brother is killed in a covert op gone wrong and branded a traitor. Then a brutal ambush at the restaurant where Chase works leaves the woman he is romantically involved with―a congresswoman―clinging to life.
Scrambling to clear the family name and protect his secret love, Chase teams up with NYPD Detective Alice Doyle, a single mother fighting battles of her own. Together they uncover a powerful criminal syndicate whose unscrupulous influence sweeps the globe―and strikes painfully close to home.
As elite mercenaries close in, Chase is dragged back into the dangerous world he thought he’d escaped. Facing a mother losing her memory and a past that never forgets, he fights to win a zero-sum game where trust can be lethal. But when all seems lost, an unlikely ally could help turn the tide . . .
Nationally bestselling author Chris Hauty, one of the high-octane writers “to take the thriller world by storm” (The Real Book Spy), returns with a riveting stand-alone novel that explores what might have really happened at the JFK assassination.
Set in present-day, a disgraced former Secret Service office and a Jesuit professor join forces to delve into the mysteries surrounding the events of November 22, 1963. Fixated on deciphering the conspiracies behind the history-changing assassination, they are oblivious to the fact that the cabal is still active—and may face an end as bloody as the carnage in Dealey Plaza. Will they be able to uncover the truth in time? Or will they become two more footnotes in history?
Closing Time by Michael Ledwidge
The next pulse-pounding Michael Gannon thriller by the #1 New York Times bestselling coauthor of James Patterson’s Michael Bennett series
It’s springtime in Key West, and Michael Gannon is busy supporting his son’s dreams of making it in minor league baseball. But a late-night encounter with a seemingly harmless Australian at a dive bar turns deadly when Gannon unwittingly becomes the prime suspect in a convenience store shoot-out.
Seeking the mysterious Australian to clear his name, Gannon uncovers a deadly conspiracy involving a global banker on the run from a shadow paramilitary force that will go to any lengths to stop him.
From the Florida Keys to Wall Street, Gannon’s quest for answers takes him deep into the middle of a deadly game of power where one wrong move could be his last.
Closing Time is Michael Gannon’s most pulse-pounding and audacious adventure yet.
White Wolf by Eric Van Lustbader
In this cutting-edge installment of the acclaimed thriller series, New York Times bestselling author Eric Van Lustbader thrusts readers into a world where power is being redefined by a revolutionary communication program that renders modern encryption obsolete, one that will topple global power structures and give rise to technology-driven totalitarian states.
Evan Ryder races against time in a landscape where secrets can no longer hide behind digital walls. Ilona Shokova, the elusive, deadly assassin White Wolf, holds the key to mastering this unhackable method.
Two powerful, deadly women, one quest. Will either one of them survive?
In this pulse-pounding thriller, the future isn’t just written in code – it’s locked behind it.
Strap in for Lustbader’s next explosive novel in the Evan Ryder series; an action-packed rollercoaster that will keep you on the edge of your seat until the very last page.
Murder, She Wrote: The Body in the Trees by Jessica Fletcher; Terrie Farley Moran
The newest entry in the USA Today bestselling Murder, She Wrote series.
It’s leaf-peeping season in Cabot Cove, but for someone, it’s killing season!
A quartet of friends from Florida have come to Maine to experience a New England autumn, complete with hiking in the woods and fishing. When one of them goes missing, the town rallies to find the presumably lost but otherwise safe tourist. But when newspaper editor Dan Andrews is biking on the trail along a ridge, he looks down and sees a leg caught in the branches of a tree. Count on Jessica Fletcher to uncover the secret reason the victim came to town . . . and how it led to her murder.
Everybody Wants to Rule the World by Ace Atkins
Elmore Leonard meets Robert Ludlum in a rollicking comedic thriller set in 1985 from acclaimed author Ace Atkins, in which a suburban teen suspects his mom’s new boyfriend is the ultimate bad guy—a KGB agent.
It’s 1985, what will soon become known as “The Year of the Spy,” and fourteen-year-old Peter Bennett is convinced his mom’s new boyfriend is a Russian agent. “Gary” isn’t in the phone book, has an unidentifiable European accent, and keeps a gun in the glove box of his convertible Porsche. Peter thinks Gary only wants to get close to his mom because she works at Scientific Atlanta, a lab with big government contracts. But who is going to believe him? He’s just a kid into BMX and MTV.
But after another woman who works at the lab is killed, Peter recruits an unlikely pair of allies—a has-been pulp writer and muckraker named Dennis Hotchner and his drag performer buddy and heavy, Jackie Demure. Both soon become the target of an unhinged Russian hitman (Is it Gary? Maybe!) with a serious Phil Collins obsession.
Meanwhile, Sylvia Weaver, a young, Black FBI agent, investigates Scientific Atlanta in the wake of the employee’s murder and discovers a nest of Russian spies in the Southern “city too busy to hate.” Little does she know her investigation is being thwarted by a seriously compromised colleague in Washington, D.C., who is in league with a lovesick, hypochondriac KGB defector who is playing both sides of the Cold War to his benefit.
As Ronald Reagan and Soviet general secretary Mikhail Gorbachev prepare for a historic nuclear summit in Geneva, what happens in Atlanta might change the course of the Cold War, the twentieth century, and Peter Bennett’s freshman year of high school.
The Living and the Dead by Christoffer Carlsson
One of Publishers Weekly’s Most Anticipated Mysteries and Thrillers of the Fall
WINNER OF THE BEST NORDIC CRIME NOVEL (THE GLASS KEY AWARD) • WINNER OF THE BEST SWEDISH CRIME NOVEL AWARD • WINNER OF DENMARK’S PALLE ROSENKRANTZ PRIZE FOR BEST TRANSLATED CRIME NOVEL
Small towns sometimes have a voice of their own.
On a snowy winter night in 1999, Sander and Killian leave a house party together outside a small town in rural Sweden. The very best of friends, the two seventeen-year-olds imagine they will remain so forever. But by the next morning, a corpse is found in the trunk of a car, and each boy is a suspect in the murder. Each has something they want to conceal from the police. And from the other.
The hunt for the killer will take more than twenty years. It will see the lead detective leave the force forever. And it won’t end until a second body turns up in similar circumstances, and the tight-knit community’s secrets are finally brought to light.
In The Living and the Dead, renowned criminologist Christoffer Carlsson masterfully transports us to the fields and forests of western Sweden, a region of farmers and truck drivers torn apart by economic injustice and self-deceit—a world where the portal between the living and the dead is flung wide open and where no one is entirely innocent.
Watch Us Fall by Christina Kovac
“A stunning work of suspense that’s impossible to put down. Christina Kovac masterfully combines a twisty missing person mystery, a heartbreaking love story, and an insightful exploration of the nature of obsession and trauma. I loved this novel.” —Angie Kim, New York Times bestselling author of Happiness Falls and Miracle Creek
Lucy and her three best friends share a glamorous but decaying house in the heart of Georgetown. They call themselves “the Sweeties” and live an idyllic post-grad lifestyle complete with exciting jobs, dramatic love lives, and, most importantly, each other.
But when Addie, the group’s queen bee, discovers that her ex-boyfriend Josh has gone missing, the Sweeties’ worlds are turned upside down. In the days leading up to his disappearance, Josh, a star investigative journalist from a prominent political family, was behaving erratically—and Lucy is determined to find out why. All four friends upend their lives to search for him, but detectives begin to suspect that the Sweeties might know more than they’re letting on.
Friends and Liars by kit frick
From “edge-of-your-seat suspense” (Booklist) author Kit Frick comes an insidious thriller about four estranged friends trapped in a powerful family’s deadly games at a luxe estate in the Italian countryside.
It’s been five years since heiress Clare Monroe tragically died on New Year’s Eve at her family’s opulent Italian palazzo. Since that time, her college friends have harbored a dark secret—their lies and betrayals led to Clare’s untimely death.
What happened that fateful night was a horrible accident, but Luca, Harper, Sirina, and David are guilty, nonetheless. And their desperate decision to conceal the truth destroyed their once-close bond.
Now, the estranged friends are each the recipient of an invitation from the Monroes to return to the lakeside palazzo for a long-overdue memorial for Clare. Accepting the Monroes’ invitation means playing with fire, but they can hardly refuse.
Luca, Harper, Sirina, and David have barely settled into their idyllic accommodations on Lake Como before someone at the memorial party begins targeting them. Haunted by little “gifts” left in their rooms, taunting notes, and the unshakable sense of being watched, it soon becomes clear that someone on the guest list knows the whole truth about the night Clare died—and the secrets her friends have been keeping. Nothing is as it seems at the palazzo on the lake, and under their tormentor’s vengeful gaze, their secrets—and their lives—are in danger.
Tuesday, December 9
From the “master of the medical thriller” (The New York Times) Robin Cook, fan favorites Jack and Laurie return in another fast-paced spine chiller about a deadly bioweapon that could disrupt the world order as we know it.
When Laurie Montgomery temporarily steps down from her position as Chief Medical Examiner, she and Jack find themselves uncharacteristically free for a couple of weeks. And the timing couldn’t be better when they receive a call from Jack’s former medical school classmate, Robert Neilson, who is the sole family practitioner in Essex Falls, an idyllic town tucked away in New York State’s Adirondack Mountains. Serving also as the Hamilton County coroner, Dr. Neilson is in over his head trying to explain the sudden death of a young, healthy pest control worker on top of an outbreak of rapidly progressive Alzheimer’s-like cases, and he pleads with Jack and Laurie to come lend a professional hand. Unable to resist a good mystery and a vacation in one, Laurie and Jack agree to help and head upstate.
Essex Falls is beautiful enough and their accommodations are even better than they imagined. But they soon learn the town has suffered a major economic and social setback, which has shaken its residents to their cores. When the body of the pest control worker disappears without a trace just prior to an autopsy, Jack’s penchant for solving forensic conundrums launches him into a full-scale investigation that uncovers the most frightening modus operandi of his career so far.
Secrets You Can’t Keep by Debra Webb
From USA Today bestselling author Debra Webb comes crime analyst Vera Boyett’s next case—a triple homicide that tears a small town apart…and an accident that could do worse to her family.
A cabin in the woods. Three dead, one in critical condition. Property owned by not just any Tennessee local, but one of the richest men in the country.
Vera Boyett isn’t quite sure what it means. But that’s why Sheriff Gray “Bent” Benton called her: to figure it out. Criminal analysis is what she does best. Even when the town is in panicked shambles, even when the case is more delicate than most…and even when it’s not the only case on her plate.
Vera’s family is caught in a deadly mess of its own. And while her pregnant sister seems an unlikely culprit, each new detail seems to point to her guilt. Desperate to protect her, Vera vows to find out what really happened.
As evidence emerges in both cases, Vera and Bent work to unravel a dangerous web of secrets to get to the truth. But their investigations reveal more than they ever expected…
Tuesday, December 16
W. E. B. Griffin Direct Action by Jack Stewart
When the original Presidential Agent is gunned down during a mass shooting, Pick McCoy swears a brutal revenge in this revival of W. E. B. Griffin’s New York Times bestselling series.
Charley Castillo, the original Presidential Agent is in Virginia Beach to visit his son when two gunmen appear. Charley is able to thwart a deadly mass shooting, but he is hit and badly injured.
Meanwhile Pick McCoy is at the Naval Academy catching up with some old friends. When the news of the attack reaches him, he senses that this is no random event. While Charley clings to life, Pick searches for the men responsible and in the process uncovers a deadly plot that threatens to strike deep at the heart of American democracy.
The “heir to Clancy’s throne” (The Real Book Spy) returns with his most compelling, explosive techno-thriller ever.
Despite decades of treaties, military missions, and covert actions devoted to preventing it, Iran has finally assembled its first nuclear bomb and the U.S., with UN backing, has decided it’s time to take direct action. The first move is to blockade the Persian Gulf with a carrier strike group, but Iran strikes back quickly. With Russia’s backing, Iran launches a devastating attack and now the U.S. forces are in a race against the clock to survive until reinforcements arrive and a counter-strike launched.
While events grow desperate in the Middle East, a plot to kill the President is unfolding. Jake Harrison, a now AWOL Navy SEAL, is lured back into action by his former partner Christine O’Connor to find and stop the freelance assassin, a man who has long been Harrison’s nemesis.
With a deadly war brewing on two fronts—both overt and covert—the uneasy allies of Jake and Christine must use all their resources to circumvent the coming war. And as tensions threaten to boil over, Jake will be faced with the ultimate question: what is he willing to sacrifice for the revenge he wants?