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Thrillers and Suspense January 2021
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| Take it Back by Kia AbdullahStarring: Londoner Zara Kaleel, who left behind her high-powered legal career to work as a rape counselor; disabled teen Jodie, who is referred to Zara after accusing a group of Muslim boys of assaulting her.
Read it for: the well-developed characters; Zara's compelling efforts to navigate her fraught position -- as a Muslim herself, she faces censure from all sides of the case as she tries to advocate for her client. |
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| Double Agent by Tom BradbyWhat it is: the intricately plotted sequel to Secret Service, which continues the story of MI6 agent Kate Henderson.
Her mission: to investigate allegations that the Prime Minister might be a Russian agent, a case which could end her career for good.
Is it for you? Part of Agent Henderson's case involves child abuse, which some readers might want to know about going in. |
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| Fool Me Twice by Jeff LindsaySeries alert: Fool Me Twice is the 2nd entry in the series of thrillers starring likeable rogue Riley Wolfe, an ambitious master thief always up for a challenge.
The prize: This time, Riley is strong-armed into stealing a priceless Raphael painting from deep in the Vatican by "an arms dealer who scares the crap out of other arms dealers."
The problem: It's not just any Renaissance painting -- Riley's target is a fresco, meaning he has to find a way to steal an actual wall. |
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| You Will Never Know by S.A. PrentissStarring: Jessica Thorton, a bank teller who has built a good life for herself despite a difficult past; Jessica's second husband, Ted Donovan; her daughter, Emma; and Craig, Ted's son from his first marriage.
What goes wrong: The murder of one of Emma and Craig's classmates on a night when neither teen has an alibi reveals the fault lines in the Thorton-Donovan family and threatens to destroy everything Jessica has worked so hard to build.
Try this next: The First Mistake by Sandie Jones, which also features an intensifying pace and flawed characters trying to keep their families from collapsing under the weight of suspicion and shifting loyalties. |
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The Wrong Family
by Tarryn Fisher
Have you ever been wrong about someone?
Juno was wrong about Winnie Crouch.
Before moving in with the Crouch family, Juno thought Winnie and her husband, Nigel, had the perfect marriage, the perfect son, ;the perfect life. Only now that she's living in their beautiful house, she sees the cracks in the crumbling facade are too deep to ignore.
Still, she isn';t one to judge. After her grim diagnosis, the retired therapist simply wants a place to live out the rest of her days in peace. But that peace is shattered the day Juno overhears a chilling conversation between Winnie and Nigel.
She shouldn't get involved.
She really shouldn't.
But this could be her chance to make a few things right.
Because if you thought Juno didn't have a secret of her own, then you were wrong about her, too..
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| Blackout by Marc ElsbergWhat it is: a fast-paced and compelling German novel that is part eco-thriller and part techno-thriller and which throws into stark relief the fragility of modern civilization.
What goes down: thanks to a group of hackers, the entire European electrical grid. As the blackouts spread and the stalled nuclear plants start leaking radiation, characters across the continent must fight for survival as society begins to collapse around them. |
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The Legacy
by Yrsa Sigurðardóttir
Required to both question and protect a traumatized 7-year-old girl who is the only witness to a murder, rookie detective Huldar and psychologist Freyja navigate elusive clues left behind by an unusually slippery killer.
By the award-winning author of The Silence of the Sea.
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| Fever Dream by Samanta SchweblinWhat it is: the haunting, character-driven story of a young mother reflecting on her life and her fate as she dies slowly in a hospital bed.
Why you might like it: The unreliable narrator's tale is as compelling as it is disturbing, and features spare writing that serves to heighten its already menacing tone.
About the author: Fever Dream is the first novel by Man Booker Prize-nominated Argentine-Spanish author Samanta Schweblin, who has also published three collections of short stories. |
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The Swimmer
by Joakim Zander
Departing from the crime fiction that Scandinavian authors are famous for, this Swedish debut nevertheless offers tension aplenty. It's the story of the links between a burned-out American former spy and a young Swedish woman, who with her ex-boyfriend is on the run after learning some explosive information: the U.S. government sanctions torture. The connections between them -- and with a lobbyist in Brussels who possesses a rather loose grasp of ethics -- slowly become clear in this literate and "increasingly tight web of intrigue and suspense" (Kirkus Reviews).
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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