A Final Reckoning

After compiling the results from “108 best mystery, crime fiction and thriller lists this year (mostly from the U.S., but some from the U.K., Ireland, Canada, Australia and India),” Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine editor George Easter has tallied up the titles that received the most favorable mentions. “This is an attempt,” he writes, “to find some consensus on what exactly are the best mysteries, crime novels and thrillers of the year 2024.”

By Easter’s computations, The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead), received the most nominations—37. The count is tied for second place, with Chris Whitaker’s All the Colors of the Dark (Crown) and Richard Osman’s We Solve Murders (Pamela Dorman) both scoring 35 mentions. Here are the other books filling out his top 10:

3. The Hunter, by Tana French (Viking)
4. Listen for the Lie, by Amy Tintera (Celadon)
5. Guide Me Home, by Attica Locke (Mulholland)
6. First Lie Wins, by Ashley Elston (Pamela Dorman)
7. The Waiting, by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown)
8. The Return of Ellie Black, by Emiko Jean (Simon & Schuster)
9. Tie — Smoke Kings, by Jahmal Mayfield (Melville House); and The Sequel, by Jean Hanff Korelitz (Celadon)
10: The Midnight Feast, by Lucy Foley (Morrow)

I’ve read most, though not all, of these works. And I enjoyed a number of the other releases among those 74 titles in Easter’s “bests” catalogue, including Stuart Turton’s The Last Murder at the End of the World (Sourcebooks Landmark), C.B. Bernard’s wonderful Ordinary Bear (Blackstone), Francis Spufford’s Cahokia Jazz (‎Scribner), and Nilanjana Roy’s Black River (‎Pushkin Vertigo). A few more I still have to tackle in the coming weeks, before I feel pressured to turn away from 2024 titles and focus mostly on those due out in this new year.

Click here to see Easter’s complete record.

Rant and Raves

As we move hesitantly into a new year, let us thank all of those print publications, Web sites, and blogs that served up “best crime fiction of 2024” lists for the rest of us to read—and sometimes shake our heads at in disagreement. The number of such recommendations has now fallen off severely, but there are a few left to highlight.

The entertainment site Screen Rant, for instance, this week posted a top-10 list of thriller novels from the last dozen months:

• First Lie Wins, by Ashley Elston (Pamela Dorman)
• The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead)
• All the Colors of the Dark, by Chris Whitaker (Crown)
• Listen for the Lie, by Amy Tintera (Celadon)
• We Solve Murders, by Richard Osman (Pamela Dorman)
• The Return of Ellie Black, by Emiko Jean (Simon & Schuster)
• Middle of the Night, by Riley Sager (Dutton)
• Society of Lies, by Lauren Ling Brown (Bantam)
• House of Glass, by Sarah Pekkanen (St. Martin’s Press)
• The Boyfriend, by Freida McFadden (Poisoned Pen Press)

Other year-end choices come from Crimeworm, Do Some Damage’s Scott D. Parker, and Jackie Farrant of Raven’s Crime Reads. Tarrant adds this delightfully worded note, which matches my own experience of 2024: “So, although it’s been a depleted year of reviewing for me, I have read a lot of books—some brilliant, some good, some disappointing, and some where a tree has totally died in vain!”

Saving More Bests for Last

Just when it seemed we’d finally run out of “best crime fiction of the year” lists (other than those still waiting to be posted in The Rap Sheet), here comes a new slew of interesting picks. Noteworthy among those are two more sets of “bests” from Crime Fiction Lover contributors—Mike Parker and Vicki Weisfeld; the selections of Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine editor George Easter and his colleague Hank Wagner; and the Toronto Star’s Steven W. Beattie.

In addition, reviewer Kevin R. Tipple surprises us with his 10 favorites of 2024 (including Harry Hunsicker’s The Life and Death of Rose Doucette and Terry Shames’ The Troubling Death of Maddy Benson). Prolific writer James Reasoner offers a dozen new and older books he particularly relished amid the 167 (!) he read this year. Reading Reality’s Marlene Harris chooses her 20 faves, fewer than half of which can be classified as mystery or crime fiction. Equally mixed are choices by blogger Michael Popple, of The Unseen Library. And Steven Barge’s year-end assessment, in In Search of the Classic Mystery Novel, features several titles (Oskar Jensen’s Helle and Death and Adam Oyebanji’s Two Times Murder, for instance) that I would like to add to my own reading stack soon. He also gives special praise to Martin Edwards’ latest Rachel Savernake yarn, Hemlock Bay.

Finally, Kate Jackson shares the results of the 2024 Reprint of the Year awards competition. (Novelists Ruth Fenisong, Seishi Yokomizo, Mary Roberts Rinehart, Ellery Queen, and Christianna Brand all come in for some level of acclaim). And we don’t want to miss mentioning Brian Lindenmuth’s picks of “Best Crime Comics of 2024.”

READ MORE: “Our Favorite Crime and Mystery Books of 2024” (Mystery Tribune); “Bill’s Best of 2024 Fiction,” by Bill Selnes (Mysteries and More from Saskatchewan); “Favorite 2024 Debut Novels,” by Lucinda Surber and Stan Ulrich (Stop, You’re Killing Me!).

Slimmer Pickings

With 2024 quickly fading in the rearview mirror, and the new year almost upon us, there are fewer “best books of the year” lists still to be mentioned. But don’t overlook author Eric Beetner’s picks in the blog Criminal Minds, which include Henry Wise’s Holy City, Laura McHugh’s Safe and Sound, and two new Old West mysteries by Steve Hockensmith, Hired Guns and No Hallowed Ground.

Meanwhile, former Mystery Scene reviewer Ben Boulden touts Thomas Perry’s Hero and Joyce Carol Oates’ Flint Creek: Stories of Mystery and Suspense, as well as other new releases from the last dozen months. And TomKat, over at Beneath the Stains of Time, both recaps his favorite and least favorite crime-fiction reprints from 2024, and looks ahead to classic works set for reissuing in 2025.

Be aware, too, that The Rap Sheet will post another entry in its “Favorite Crime Fiction of 2024” series—this one from Jim Thomsen—later this afternoon. Keep a weather eye out for it!

Monitoring the Mavens

I continue to track the release of “best crime fiction of 2024” lists. New to this inventory are critic Sharon Richardson’s choices, which follow those of her fellow Crime Fiction Lover contributors Erin Britton and Paul Burke; Marilyn Brooks’ “Best Mysteries of 2024” picks; Criminal Element’s lengthy collection of favorites from the last 12 months; Elle magazine’s selections of mystery and thriller novels; and three related records from CrimeReads, of “The Best YA Mystery, Crime, and Horror Fiction of 2024,” “The Best True Crime Memoirs of 2024,” and “The Best Crime Movies of 2024.”

READ MORE: “Sonja van der Westhuizen: Top Five Crime Novels of 2024” (Crime Fiction Lover); “DeathBecomesHer: Top Five Books of 2024,” by Sandra Mangan (Crime Fiction Lover); “The Best Non-fiction Crime Books of 2024” (CrimeReads).

What to Read Next?

While I struggle to assemble The Rap Sheet’s 2024 collection of “favorite crime fiction” posts, other publications and Web sites are declaring their own best-of-the-year recommendations.

Just two weeks after announcing the winners of its annual awards, Crime Fiction Lover is starting to roll out its critics’ comments on what new books from this genre they liked over the last dozen months. Seemingly ubiquitous UK reviewer Paul Burke (who already contributed to Crime Time’s recent discussion on the subject of “bests”) has narrowed his preferences to five titles only:

• The Bells of Westminster, by Leonora Nattrass (Viper)
• The Last Days of Johnny Nunn, by Nick Triplow (No Exit Press)
• Bay of Thieves, by Megan Davis (Zaffre)
• The Silent Killer, by Trevor Wood (Quercus)
• Murder Under the Midnight Sun, by Stella Blómkvist (Corylus)

Burke also hosts, on his Crime Time PM podcast, a panel of a distinguished writers (Trevor Wood, Sam Holland, Antony Johnstone, Jo Furniss, Rob Parker, and Michael Wood) addressing this hot topic. They go further to mention releases they are looking forward to reading in 2025. (Yay, two more to come by Vaseem Khan!)

For its own part, CrimeReads is out with fresh selections of “The Best Espionage Fiction of 2024,” “The Best Historical Fiction of 2024,” “The Best International Crime Fiction of 2024,” “The Best Debut Crime Novels of 2024,” and “The Best Traditional Mysteries of 2024.”

Among the diverse works (not all of them published this year) mentioned as favorites by Aunt Agatha’s reviewer Vicki Kondelik are What Time the Sexton’s Spade Doth Rust, by Alan Bradley, and To Slip the Bonds of Earth, by Amanda Flower. Jeremy Black’s top picks of 2024 include Simon Mason’s The Case of the Lonely Accountant, Martin Edwards’ Hemlock Bay, and Janice Hallett’s The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels. Among others, Bookreporter touts The Stars Turned Inside Out, by Nova Jacobs, and The Last One at the Wedding, by Jason Rekulak, while National Public Radio critic Maureen Corrigan gives thumbs up to Francis Spufford’s Cahokia Jazz, Rachel Kushner’s Creation Lake, and Liz Moore’s The God of the Woods.

READ MORE: “2024’s Best Mysteries, Thrillers, and True Crime,” by Jamie Canaves (Book Riot); “The Best Spy Books of 2024 According to Spy Fans,” by Shane Whaley (Spybrary); “Booklist Editors’ Choice: Best of 2024”; “My Favorite Non-fiction Reads 2024,” by Ayo Onatade (Shotsmag Confidential).

Final Stretch Faves

It’s difficult to ignore the many highly subjective “best crime and mystery novels of the year” selections making the rounds just now. So I won’t. These 10 picks come from CrimeReads:

• Crooked Seeds, by Karen Jennings (Hogarth)
• Wild Houses, by Colin Barrett (Grove)
• One of Our Kind, by Nicola Yoon (Knopf)
• Shanghai, by Joseph Kanon (Scribner)
• Ordinary Human Failings, by Megan Nolan (Little Brown)
• Guide Me Home, by Attica Locke (Mulholland)
• Butter, by Asako Yuzuki (Ecco)
• Havoc, by Christopher Bollen (Harper)
• What Doesn’t Kill Us, by Ajay
Close (Saraband)
• Black River, by Nilanjana Roy
(Pushkin Vertigo)

Several of my personal preferences from 2024 are found in the “Notable Selections” section of CrimeReads’ end-of-year feature, among them Francis Spufford’s Cahokia Jazz (Scribner), Chris Whitaker’s All the Colors of the Dark (Dutton), Liz Moore’s The God of the Woods (Riverhead), and Nicholas Meyer’s Sherlock Holmes and the Telegram from Hell (Mysterious Press).

* * *

This top-11 picks list comes from Mystery Tribune magazine:

• Alter Ego, by Alex Segura (Flatiron)
• Think Twice, by Harlan Coben (Grand Central)
• Graveyard Shift, by M.L. Rio (Flatiron)
• Pony Confidential, by Christina Lynch (Berkley)
• Blind to Midnight, by Reed Farrel Coleman (Blackstone)
• The Woman Who Lied, by Claire Douglas (Harper)
• The Expat, by Hansen Shi (Pegasus Crime)
• Butter, by Asako Yuzuki (Ecco)
• The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels, by Janice Hallett (Atria)
• Smoke Kings, by Jahmal Mayfield (Melville House)
• Lilith, by Eric Rickstad (Blackstone)

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And let us turn our eyes, as well, to the choices made by Craig Sisterson, the organizer of New Zealand’s Ngaio Marsh Awards and a reviewer for Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine. His 16 favorites include Tom Baragwanath’s Paper Cage (Knopf), Kellye Garrett’s Missing White Woman (Mulholland), James Lee Burke’s Clete (Atlantic Monthly Press), Charity Norman’s Home Truths (Allen & Unwin UK), and Eryk Pruitt’s Blood Red Summer (Thomas & Mercer).

READ MORE: “Best Mysteries & Thrillers of 2024,” by Lauren Shade (Novel Suspects); “Best Mystery Audiobooks of 2024” (Spotify).

“Pulse-Quickening Picks”

And now we come to Alison Flood, book critic for The Observer, whose choices of the “best crime and thrillers of 2024” are newly posted:

• Guide Me Home, by Attica Locke (Viper)
• Nightwatching, by Tracy Sierra (Penguin)
• Has Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter? by Nicci French
(Simon & Schuster)
• Bonehead, by Mo Hayder, (Hodder & Stoughton)
• We Solve Murders, by Richard Osman (Penguin)

This follows another set of picks, from Laura Wilson of The Guardian (The Observer’s sister paper), which includes two of the same releases: Nightwatching and Bonehead.

Top of the Line

I’ve known Wall Street Journal book critic Tom Nolan for many years now. We have a mutual appreciation for the work of American detective novelist Ross Macdonald. Although I don’t usually read the Journal, I have gotten into the habit of e-mailing Tom every December, asking that he please send me his picks of the year’s best mystery and crime novels as soon as they appear on the newspaper’s Web site. (They are otherwise hidden behind a paywall.) He is typically quick to respond with a scan of the page on which said titles appear.

Tom’s favorite mysteries of 2024 won’t be revealed in the physical broadsheet until tomorrow. But here’s an advance peek:

• The Drowned, by John Banville (Hanover Square Press)
• The Alaska Sanders Affair, by Joël Dicker (HarperVia)
• The Hunter, by Tana French (Viking)
• Close to Death, by Anthony Horowitz (Harper)
• The Stars Turned Inside Out, by Nova Jacobs (Atria)
• The Sequel, by Jean Hanff Korelitz (Celadon)
• Tell Me Who You Are, by Louisa Luna (MCD)
• The Hollow Tree, by Philip Miller (Soho Crime)
• The Devil Raises His Own, Scott Phillips (Soho Crime)
• A Talent for Murder, by Peter Swanson (Morrow)

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Boston-based critic Steve Donoghue, whose book reviews have appeared in The Christian Science Monitor and The Washington Post, presents two rolls of recommendations for 2024. The first choices are of mystery fiction and are rated according to preference:

1. The Wharton Plot, by Mariah Fredericks (Minotaur)
2. A Chain of Pearls, by Raemi Ray (Tule)
3. The Last Hope, by Susan Elia MacNeal (Bantam)
4. Under the Paper Moon, by Shaina Steinberg (Kensington)
5. The River We Remember, by William Kent Krueger (Atria)
6. Peking Duck and Cover, by Vivien Chen (Minotaur)
7. The Saint, by Carin Gerhardsen (Mysterious Press)
8. Death by Misadventure, by Tasha Alexander (Minotaur)
9. The Phantom Patrol, by James Benn (Soho Crime)
10. Tooth and Claw, by Craig Johnson (Viking)

While his second list covers the thrillers field:

1. Arctdotus, by L.J. Vitanza (L.J. Vitanza)
2. An Honorable Assassin, by Steve Hamilton (Blackstone)
3. The Heiress, by Rachel Hawkins (St. Martin’s Press)
4. Night Sweats, by Beau Savage (Grim Heart)
5. Shadow Game, by Vin Strong (Kindle only)
6. The Sicilian Inheritance, by Joe Piazza (Dutton)
7. Code of Arms, by Jack Slater (Independently published)
8. W.E.B. Griffin: Zero Option, by Peter Kirsanow (Putnam)
9. Safe Enough, by Lee Child (Mysterious Press)
10. The Chaos Agent, by Mark Greaney (Berkley)

Ranked, Rated, and Refined

Didn’t I just say there are “top crime fiction of the year” picks popping up all over? Two more selections were added to the mix yesterday. This first one comes from BOLO Books blogger Kristopher Zgorski, and begins with what his “overall favorite novel of the year”:

• What You Leave Behind, by Wanda M. Morris (Morrow)
• All the Colors of the Dark, by Chris Whitaker (Crown)
• The Dancer, by Óskar Guðmundsson (Corylus)
• Every Time I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies, by Catherine
Mack (Minotaur)
• The Grey Wolf, by Louise Penny (Minotaur)
• Hall of Mirrors, by John Copenhaver (Pegasus Crime)
• I Dreamed of Falling, by Julia Dahl (Minotaur)
• A Very Bad Thing, by J.T. Ellison (Thomas & Mercer)
• What Happened To Nina? by Dervla McTiernan (Morrow)
• Who to Believe, by Edwin Hill (Kensington)

Top Debuts of the Year:
• The Busy Body, by Kemper Donovan (John Scognamiglio)
• You Know What You Did, by K.T. Nguyen (Dutton)
• Voyage of the Damned, by Frances White (Mira)

Read all of Zgorski’s about these titles by clicking here.

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Australian reviewer Jeff Popple, a contributor to Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine, serves forth his own 13-strong rundown of preferred crime novels and thrillers from the last dozen months.

Crime Novels:
• Midnight and Blue, by Ian Rankin (Orion)
• The Mercy Chair, by M.W. Craven (Constable)
• The Waiting, by Michael Connelly (Orion)
• Shadow City, by Natalie Conyer (Echo)
• Don’t Let the Devil Ride, by Ace Atkins (Morrow)
• Tipping Point, by Dinuka McKenzie (Harper Collins)
• Witness 8, by Steve Cavanagh (Headline)
• The Creeper, by Margaret Hickey (Penguin)

Thriller Novels:
• Look In the Mirror, by Catherine Steadman (Quercus)
• The Instruments of Darkness, by John Connolly (Hachette)
• Black Wolf, by Juan Gómez-Jurado (Macmillan)
• The Enigma Girl, by Henry Porter (Quercus)

A Bevy of Bests

Predictably opinionated lists of the “best” crime, mystery, and thriller fiction published in 2024 are now appearing prodigiously. The New York Times offers two new selections. This first comes from critic Sarah Weinman, who names these 10 crime novels as her favorites:

• The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead)
• Cahokia Jazz, by Francis Spufford (Scribner)
• The Hunter, by Tana French (Viking)
• Hall of Mirrors, by John Copenhaver (Pegasus Crime)
• Blessed Water, by Margot Douaihy (Zando/Gillian Flynn)
• Smoke Kings, by Jahmal Mayfield (Melville House)
• Swallow the Ghost, by Eugenie Montague (Mulholland)
• Rough Trade, by Katrina Carrasco (MCD)
• May the Wolf Die, by Elizabeth
Heider (Penguin)
• Nothing but the Truth, by Robyn
Gigi (Kensington)

At the same time, that newspaper dropped the following rundown of reviewer Sarah Lyall’s “Best Thrillers of 2024”:

• Havoc, by Christopher Bollen (Harper)
• The Sequel, by Jean Hanff
Korelitz (Celadon)
• Bright Objects, by Ruby Todd (Simon & Schuster)
• The Winner, by Teddy Wayne (Harper)
• The Hunter, by Tana French (Viking)
• Nobody’s Hero, by M.W. Craven (Flatiron)
• The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels, by Janice Hallett (Atria)
• What Happened To Nina? by Dervla McTiernan (Morrow)
• The Night Guest, by Hildur Knútsdóttir (Tor Nightfire)
• The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead)

The fact that these rolls contain two of the same books puts me in mind of something Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine editor George Easter observed not long ago, that the boundaries separating psychological suspense, mystery/detective fiction, and thriller fiction have become blurred in recent years.

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Speaking of exciting, tense, and dangerous tales, CrimeReads’ Molly Odintz has posted her picks of what she says are “The Best Psychological Thrillers of 2024”:

• What Happened to Nina? by Dervla McTiernan (Morrow)
• The Most Famous Girl in the World, by Iman Hariri-Kira
(Sourcebooks Landmark)
• You Will Never Be Me, by Jesse Q. Sutanto (Berkley)
• While We Were Burning, by Sara Koffi (Putnam)
• The Many Lies of Veronica Hawkins, by Kristina Pérez (Pegasus)
• The Snap, by Elizabeth Staple (Doubleday)
• Madwoman, by Chelsea Bieker (Little, Brown)
• The Last One at the Wedding, by Jason Rekulak (Flatiron)
• Such a Bad Influence, by Olivia Muenter (Quirk)

* * *

Meanwhile, Deadly Pleasures takes a shot at designating the “Best Espionage Fiction of 2024.” Half a dozen titles are featured:

• The Seventh Floor, by David McCloskey (Norton)
• First Strike, by Stephen Leather (Independently published)
• A Reluctant Spy, by David Goodman (Headline)
• The Wealth of Shadows, by Graham Moore (Random House)
• The Scarlet Papers, by Matthew Richardson (Penguin)
• The Best Revenge, by Gerald Seymour (Hodder & Stoughton)

* * *

For the last several weeks, the Amazon-owned social cataloging Web site Goodreads has been polling its readers to determine which books they believe deserve its 2024 Choice Awards. Winners in 15 categories were announced today, and in the Mystery & Thriller category, The God of the Woods (Riverhead), by Liz Moore, has come out on top.

Click here to see the other 19 contenders in this division. All of this year’s Goodreads Choice Award winners are identified here.

* * *

Last but not least, the Web site/magazine She Reads has announced the winners of its Best of 2024 Awards, as chosen by readers. There were 21 categories of contestants. This year’s Best Mystery, Thriller & Suspense honors go to The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead), which beat out 11 other finalists: Black River, by Nilanjana Roy (Pushkin Vertigo); Darling Girls, by Sally Hepworth (St. Martin’s Press); First Lie Wins, by Ashley Elston (Pamela Dorman); Kill for Me, Kill for You, by Steve Cavanagh (Atria); Listen for the Lie, by Amy Tintera (Celadon); Nightwatching, by Tracy Sierra (Pamela Dorman); The Midnight Feast, by Lucy Foley (Morrow); The Return of Ellie Black, by Emiko Jean (Simon & Schuster); Watch Where They Hide, by Tamron Hall (Morrow); What Happened to Nina? by Dervla McTiernan (Morrow); and What You Leave Behind, by Wanda M. Morris (Morrow).

Note, too, that another incontestable crime novel—All the Colors of the Dark, by Chris Whitaker (Crown)—was chosen in this contest as the “Best Book Club Pick of 2024.”

For Your Listening Pleasure

What’s more fun than having one crime-fiction critic choose his or her favorite books of 2024? Well, having six of them do so at once!

In late November, the Web site Crime Time gathered together half a dozen of Britain’s foremost crime, mystery, and thriller reviewers—Maxim Jakubowski, Jake Kerridge, Ayo Onatade, Victoria Selman, Paul Burke, and Barry Forshaw—for an hour-long “debate” about which novel, published in this genre over the last 12 months, was the most enjoyable. They agreed that Best of the Year accolades belong to The Peacock and the Sparrow (No Exit Press), by ex-CIA operations officer I.S. Berry—an espionage novel that was released in the States in 2023 (and went on to win the Edgar Award for Best First Novel by an American Author), but which debuted this year in the UK.

Going beyond that, though, they each identified other personal favorites from 2024. Most members of the group have already offered their picks elsewhere (look for Kerridge’s here, for instance, and Ayo’s here). But Barry Forshaw provided a quite abbreviated list in the Financial Times; he’s produced a longer version in association with the Crime Time debate. Here are his top-10 choices:

• Hunted, by Abir Mukherjee (Vintage)
• The Peacock and the Sparrow, by I.S. Berry (No Exit Press)
• The Waiting, by Michael Connelly (Orion)
• Guide Me Home, by Attica Locke (Profile)
• The first two novels in Simon Mason’s Finder series, Missing Person: Alice and The Case of the Lonely Accountant (Riverrun)
• The Bells of Westminster, by Leonora Nattrass (Viper)
• White City, by Dominic Nolan (Headline)
• The Last Days of Johnny Nunn, by Nick Triplow (No Exit Press)
• Day One, by Abigail Dean (Hemlock Press)
• Bay of Thieves, by Megan Davis (Zaffre)

Click here to listen to the entirety of these critics’ discussion.

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While we’re on the subject of “bests,” I think I forgot to highlight this mystery and thriller list from U.S. bookseller Barnes & Noble:

• The Grey Wolf, by Louise Penny (Minotaur)
• All the Colors of the Dark, by Chris Whitaker (Crown)
• The Blue Hour, by Paula Hawkins (‎Mariner)
• We Solve Murders, by Richard Osman (Pamela Dorman)
• This Is Why We Lied, by Karin Slaughter (Morrow)
• The Truth About the Devlins, by Lisa Scottoline (Putnam)
• The Hunter, by Tana French (Viking)
• The Last One at the Wedding, by Jason Rekulak (Flatiron)
• Southern Man, by Greg Iles (Morrow)
• Spirit Crossing, by William Kent Krueger (Atria)
• Middle of the Night, by Riley Sager (Dutton)
• One Perfect Couple, by Ruth Ware (Gallery/Scout Press)
• The Butcher Game, by Alaina Urquhart (Zando)
• The Last Murder at the End of the World, by Stuart Turton (Sourcebooks Landmark)
• Karla’s Choice, by Nick Harkaway (Viking)
• Everyone on This Train Is a Suspect, by Benjamin Stevenson (Mariner)
• Home Is Where the Bodies Are, by Jeneva Rose (Blackstone)
• The Fury, by Alex Michaelides (Celadon)
• The Sequel, by Jean Hanff Korelitz (Celadon)
• The Seventh Floor, by David McCloskey (Norton)
• Exposure, by Ramona Emerson (Soho Crime)

Barnest & Noble being a sales-oriented enterprise, its recommendations must be taken with a grain of salt. Nonetheless, the books I have read from this roster are good ones, so perhaps the whole thing deserves a modicum of trust.

Twice the Trouble

Let’s add another two contributions to our growing quantity of nominees for the “best crime, mystery, and thriller fiction of 2024.” This first list comes from Britain’s Guardian newspaper, in which author-reviewer Laura Wilson’s selections today appear:

• What a Way to Go, by Bella Mackie (Borough)
• The Kellerby Code, by Jonny Sweet (Faber & Faber)
• The List of Suspicious Things, by Jennie Godfrey (Hutchinson Heinemann)
• Nightwatching, by Tracy Sierra (Viking)
• The Peacock and the Sparrow, by I.S. Berry (No Exit)
• Karla’s Choice, by Nick Harkaway (Penguin)
• Bonehead, by Mo Hayder (Hodder & Stoughton)
• Hunted, by Abir Mukherjee (Vintage)
• All the Colours of the Dark, by Chris Whitaker (Orion)
• Midnight and Blue, by Ian Rankin (Orion)
• The first two novels in Simon Mason’s Finder series, Missing Person: Alice and The Case of the Lonely Accountant (Riverrun)

There are a couple of titles here that I don’t even recognize, which means Wilson has gone beyond the usual ring of popular authors in her quest for quality storytelling. And though I have read all of Mason’s DI Wilkins series (a new installment of which is expected next month), I have yet to sample his Finder mysteries. Make that another assignment for the coming year!

Next up: Library Journal critics Liz French and Lesa Holstine offer their own “best crime fiction” choices for public consideration:

• The Secret War of Julia Child, by Diane R. Chambers
(Sourcebooks Landmark)
• The Wharton Plot, by Mariah Fredericks (Minotaur)
• Pony Confidential, by Christina Lynch (Berkley)
• The Murder of Mr. Ma, by John Shen Yen Nee and S.J. Rozan
(Soho Crime)
• The Murderess, by Laurie Notaro (Little A)
• The Briar Club, by Kate Quinn (Morrow)
• When They Last Saw Her, by Marcie R. Rendon (Bantam)
• Murder Road, by Simone St. James (Berkley)
• The Puzzle Box, by Danielle Trussoni (Random House)
• The Last Murder at the End of the World, by Stuart Turton (Sourcebooks Landmark)

Again, there are books mentioned here that I would like to check out later. It’s a sign of how significantly women authors have risen in stature within the crime- and mystery-fiction community that only two male writers are represented on this latter list.

Earning Ayo’s OK

Why should everyone else have all the fun? Our friend Ayo Onatade, an editor at the UK-based e-zine Shots and the principal author of its Shotsmag Confidential blog, has finally weighed in with her own list of favorite crime-fiction reads from 2024:

• The Peacock and the Sparrow, by I.S. Berry (No Exit Press)
• The Waiting, by Michael Connelly (Orion)
• Karla’s Choice, by Nick Harkaway (Penguin)
• Hotel Lucky Seven, by Kotaro Isaka (Vintage)
• Imposter Syndrome, by Joseph Knox (Transworld)
• Guide Me Home, by Attica Locke (Profile)
• Moscow X, by David McCloskey (Swift Press)
• Hunted, by Abir Mukherjee (Vintage)
• White City, by Dominic Nolan (Headline)
• Holmes and Moriarty, by Gareth Rubin (Simon and Schuster)
• The Hitchcock Hotel, by Stephanie Wrobel (Penguin)
• Butter, by Asako Yuzuki (HarperCollins)

Honorable Mentions:
• The Instruments of Darkness, by John Connolly
(Hodder and Stoughton)
• A Beginners Guide to Breaking and Entering, by Andrew Hunter Murray (Cornerstone)
• Holmes, Margaret and Poe, by James Patterson and
Brian Sitts (Century)
• Midnight and Blue, by Ian Rankin (Orion)

What’s frustrating about selections such as this one, from people whose taste I trust, is they inevitably leave me regretful that I never got around to reading some of the works mentioned. It seems I’ll still be catching up with books from this year as we dive into 2025.

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Also out with “bests” rundowns are the London Times and Sunday Times. Their list of the top 10 crime novels published this year includes Between Two Worlds, by Olivier Norek (MacLehose Press); One Perfect Couple, by Ruth Ware (Simon & Schuster); Cover the Bones, by Chris Hammer (Wildfire); and The Final Act of Juliette Willoughby, by Ellery Lloyd (Macmillan). Meanwhile, their 10 best thrillers picks encompass I.S. Berry’s The Peacock and the Sparrow (No Exit Press), Don Winslow’s City in Ruins (Hemlock Press), Abigail Dean’s Day One (Hemlock Press), Deon Meyer’s Leo (Hodder and Stoughton), and more.

Agatha’s Appraisals

If the pattern of previous years holds true for 2024, we can look forward to several lists of subgenre “bests” coming from the Aunt Agatha’s blog. Today brings us the opening installment, which I believe was written by Robin Agnew (there’s no byline at the end, as is typically the case). The first two thirds of that post look back at some of her favorite cozy mysteries and historical whodunits from the last 11 months, with the final third devoted to her “Best of 2024” write-ups. Those final 10 top picks are:

• A Collection of Lies, by Connie Berry (Crooked Lane)
• It’s Elementary, by Elise Bryant (Berkley)
• The Dark Wives, by Ann Cleeves (Minotaur)
• The Last Word, by Elly Griffiths (Mariner)
• Close to Death, by Anthony Horowitz (Harper)
• Death at the Sanatorium, by Ragnar Jónasson (Minotaur)
• Pony Confidential, by Christina Lynch (Berkley)
• Gathering Mist, by Margaret Mizushima (Crooked Lane)
• One Wrong Word, by Hank Phillippi Ryan (Forge)
• Agony Hill, by Sarah Stewart-Taylor (Minotaur)

In addition, she has handed out two “honorable mentions”—one to Louise Penny’s The Grey Wolf (Minotaur), the other to Carlene O’Connor’s You Have Gone Too Far (‎Kensington).

Cogdill’s Final Pitch

Following up on her recent YouTube discussion with Sara DiVello about distinctive works published in this genre over the last 11 months, longtime South Florida Sun Sentinel book critic Oline H. Cogdill has posted an official “Best Mystery Fiction Books of 2024” list. Her 31 choices are split between general releases, debut novels, and compilations of short mystery and crime fiction.

• The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead)
• The Waiting, by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown)
• The Puzzle Box, by Danielle Trussoni (Random House)
• Havoc, by Christopher Bollen (Harper)
• Guide Me Home, by Attica Locke (Mulholland)
• Alter Ego, by Alex Segura (Flatiron)
• Don’t Let the Devil Ride, by Ace Atkins (Morrow)
• The Hitchcock Hotel, by Stephanie Wrobel (Berkley)
• The Rivals, by Jane Pek (Vintage)
• What You Leave Behind, by Wanda M. Morris (Morrow)
• Double Barrel Bluff, by Lou Berney (Morrow)
• Missing White Woman, by Kellye Garrett (Mulholland)
• California Bear, by Duane Swierczynski (Mulholland)
• Agony Hill, by Sarah Stewart Taylor (Minotaur)
• Broiler, by Eli Cranor (Soho Crime)
• I Dreamed of Falling, by Julia Dahl (Minotaur)
• Safe and Sound, by Laura McHugh
(Random House)
• The Lost Van Gogh, by Jonathan Santlofer (Sourcebooks Landmark)
• The Murder of Mr. Ma, by John Shen Yen Nee and S.J. Rozan (Soho Crime)
• Trouble Island, by Sharon Short (Minotaur)
• The Wharton Plot, by Mariah Fredericks (Minotaur)

Debuts:
• Expectant Detectives, by Kat Ailes (Minotaur)
• Knife River, by Justine Champine (Dial Press)
• Twice the Trouble, by Ash Clifton (Crooked Lane)
• Smoke Kings, by Jahmal Mayfield (Melville House)
• Booked for Murder, by P.J. Nelson (Minotaur)
• Blood in the Cut, by Alejandro Nodarse (Flatiron)

Short Story Collections:
• Back in Black: An Anthology of New Mystery Short Stories,
edited by Don Bruns (Blackstone)
• The Best American Mystery and Suspense 2024, edited by
S.A. Cosby (Mariner)
• Eight Very Bad Nights: A Collection of Hanukkah Noir, edited by
Tod Goldberg (Soho Crime)
• Highway Thirteen, by Fiona McFarlane (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

As expected from Oline, this is a very fine selection. It includes two or three titles that might make it onto my own top-10 round-up for 2024, and reminds me of a few others that I never quite got around to reading, such as The Hitchcock Hotel, Safe and Sound, and Don’t Let the Devil Ride. Oh well, I’ll have those to look forward to in 2025.

What Stood Out This Year?

Trying to stay on top of “best books of the year” selections becomes increasingly difficult, as we near the end of 2024 and they are released in greater profusion. Among the latest offerings is The New York Times’ “100 Notable Books of 2024” list, which includes the following crime, mystery, and thriller titles:

• Black River, by Nilanjana Roy (Pushkin Vertigo)
• Creation Lake, by Rachel Kushner (Scribner)
• The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead)
• The Hunter, by Tana French (Viking)
• The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels, by Janice Hallett (Atria)
• The Sequel, by Jean Hanff Korelitz (Celadon)
• Smoke Kings, by Jahmal Mayfield (Melville House)
• Wild Houses, by Colin Barrett (Grove Press)

As Deadly Pleasures editor George Easter observes, these choices represent just the beginning of the Times’ end-of-year assessments in this genre. “In early December,” he writes, “we should see a Best Mysteries list from Sarah Weinman and a Best Thrillers list from Sarah Lyall.” I shall count the days until both appear.

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Meanwhile, National Public Radio has posted its 2024 “Books We Love” choices in the Mysteries & Thrillers field. Fifty-two works are mentioned, including Richard Osman’s We Solve Murders (Pamela Dorman), Kate Quinn’s The Briar Club (Morrow), Francis Spufford’s Cahokia Jazz (Scribner), Attica Locke’s Guide Me Home (Viper), Eric Rickstad’s Lilith (Blackstone), and The Murder of Mr. Ma, by John Shen Yen Nee and S.J. Rozan (Soho Crime).

* * *

Last but not least, voting is now underway in the She Reads Best of 2024 Awards contest. There are 18 categories of contestants, with the following dozen jockeying for Best Mystery, Thriller & Suspense honors:

• Black River, by Nilanjana Roy (Pushkin Vertigo)
• Darling Girls, by Sally Hepworth (St. Martin’s Press)
• First Lie Wins, by Ashley Elston (Pamela Dorman)
• Kill for Me, Kill for You, by Steve Cavanagh (Atria)
• Listen for the Lie, by Amy Tintera (Celadon)
• Nightwatching, by Tracy Sierra (Pamela Dorman)
• The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead)
• The Midnight Feast, by Lucy Foley (Morrow)
• The Return of Ellie Black, by Emiko Jean (Simon & Schuster)
• Watch Where They Hide, by Tamron Hall (Morrow)
• What Happened to Nina? by Dervla McTiernan (Morrow)
• What You Leave Behind, by Wanda M. Morris (Morrow)

Go here to cast your ballot. I don’t see any information on the site regarding the deadline for making your opinions known, so it’s probably smartest to act with dispatch.

Definitional Disagreements

Earlier this week, The Washington Post released its “10 best mystery novels of 2024” list. It follows that up now with critic Stephanie Merry’s choices of “the 10 best thrillers of 2024”:

• All the Colors of the Dark, by Chris Whitaker (Crown)
• The Hunter, by Tana French (Viking)
• Exposure, by Ramona Emerson (Soho Crime)
• Farewell, Amethystine, by Walter Mosley (Mulholland)
• First Lie Wins, by Ashley Elston (Pamela Dorman)
• The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead)
• Guide Me Home, by Attica Locke (Mulholland)
• Hunted, by Abir Mukherjee (Mulholland)
• Listen for the Lie, by Amy Tintera (Celadon)
• The Winner, by Teddy Wayne (Harper)

Deadly Pleasures editor George Easter, who pointed me toward Merry’s selections, calls this “a good list,” but says “it also points out how loosely the term ‘thriller’ is used these days. I’ve read five of the books listed and I wouldn’t call any of those a ‘thriller,’ with the possible exception of Hunted. To me the term ‘thriller’ means action, deadline and danger as one would find in a Mark Greaney novel. But, of late, many people have begun to use that term in describing psychological suspense and mystery/detective fiction. It has become a meaningless term. I blame it on publishing houses’ marketing departments.” I can’t argue with those insights.

Plaudits from the Post

As someone who strives to read the finest, most interesting crime, mystery, and thriller fiction in any given year—partly in anticipation of recommending books around the holiday season—it’s a frustration, indeed, to realize that you’ve neglected any that rank highly with other readers. A case in point: Elizabeth Heider’s May the Wolf Die, which was published this last July. Kirkus Reviews called that story of murders in Naples, Italy, “offbeat and entertaining,” and “a lively procedural with a high-powered heroine.” Criminal Element described it as “a thriller infused with insider knowledge—of complicated quasi-governmental machinations that underlay the plot as well as detailed descriptions of Naples.” Yet I never quite got around to adding Heider’s debut novel to my teetering bedside pile.

And now, wouldn’t you know it? May the Wolf Die has scored a spot on The Washington Post’s “10 best mystery novels of 2024” list. Sigh … I can only hope to find time for that work in the near future, and will watch for the sequel Heider says she’s penning.

Meanwhile, here are all 10 of critic Karen MacPherson’s Post picks:

• Circle in the Water, by Marcia Muller (Grand Central)
• Echo, by Tracy Clark (Thomas & Mercer)
• The Grey Wolf, by Louise Penny (Minotaur)
• May the Wolf Die, by Elizabeth Heider (Penguin)
• The Princess of Las Vegas, by Chris Bohjalian (Doubleday)
• A Refiner’s Fire, by Donna Leon (Atlantic Monthly Press)
• We Solve Murders, by Richard Osman (Pamela Dorman)
• The Rivals, by Jane Pek (Vintage)
• What Time the Sexton’s Spade Doth Rust, by Alan Bradley (Bantam)
• Where They Last Saw Her, by Marcie R. Rendon (Bantam)

Two other novels that also belong in this category instead figure into Post reviewer Carol Memmott’s list of “the 10 best works of historical fiction in 2024”: The Comfort of Ghosts, by Jacqueline Winspear (Soho Crime); and Precipice, by Robert Harris (Harper).

At the insistence of its owner, Jeff Bezos, The Washington Post may have chickened out from endorsing Kamala Harris for president over convicted felon and adjudicated rapist Donald Trump earlier this month. But I’m pleased to see that paper still allows its literary critics freedom to voice their opinions of what deserves reading.

A Lucky Number, After All

I shall never be able to keep up with Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine editor George Easter when it comes to cataloguing all of this year’s lists of “best” crime, mystery, and thriller fiction. Every so often, though, I do want to highlight selections that seem special, from sources or individual reviewers I trust.

Such a case is Daily Telegraph critic Jake Kerridge’s new register of what he contends are the 13 top crime thrillers of 2024:

• Midnight and Blue, by Ian Rankin (Orion)
• The Bad Seeds, by C.J. Skuse (HQ)
• Imposter Syndrome, by Joseph Knox (Doubleday)
• Vengeance, by Salma Mir (Point Blank)
• The Night of Baba Yaga, by Akira Otani (Faber & Faber)
• City in Ruins, by Don Winslow (Hemlock Press)
• Against the Grain, by Peter Lovesey (Sphere)
• Death at the Sign of the Rook, by Kate Atkinson (Doubleday)
• We Solve Murders, by Richard Osman (Viking)
• Guilt by Definition, by Susie Dent (Zaffre)
• Farewell Dinner for a Spy, by Edward Wilson (Arcadia)
• Karla’s Choice, by Nick Harkaway (Viking)
• The Peacock and the Sparrow, by I.S. Berry (No Exit)

Kerridge declares Berry’s debut novel “my thriller of the year,” but it actually came last year on this side of the Atlantic.

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Speaking of thrillers, the Financial Times’ Adam Lebor has compiled his own top-five choices of 2024 works in that same category:

• Every Spy a Traitor, by Alex Gerlis (Canelo)
• Karla’s Choice, by Nick Harkaway (Viking)
• The Peacock and the Sparrow, by I.S. Berry (No Exit)
• Moscow X, by David McClockey (Swift Press; a 2023 U.S. release)
• Midnight in Vienna, by Jane Thynne (Quercus)

READ MORE: “Chicago Public Library Best Mystery & Thriller Fiction of 2024” (Deadly Pleasures).