“A few years back, I had a terrible nightmare, one where I woke up from a dream only to realize I was still dreaming. I fully blame Riley Sager's Home Before Dark, which is about a woman named Maggie who decides to restore the supposedly haunted house her family briefly lived in when she was a child. It's also the same house that her father later made famous by writing a memoir about their experience. Sager's book-within-a-book format paralleled the past with the present so well that I questioned every single thing that went bump in the night, both in the novel, and in my own house.”

“Hidden Pictures might be one of the scariest books I've ever read. When Mallory starts babysitting a five-year-old boy named Teddy, everything seems fine at first. And then she discovers the pictures he's been drawing that depict violent crimes no child should even be aware of. Rekulak's book gave me legitimate chills—be sure to read this one with all the lights on.”

“Speaking of violent crimes, I often wonder whether it's worse for the accused to be sent to prison or a psychiatric facility. I used to think I'd choose the latter myself, but after reading Sarah Pekkanen’s The Locked Ward, I'm not so sure. When Georgia is sent to a psychiatric institution for violent offenders after being charged with a gruesome murder, it turns out that insisting she's not crazy only makes her seem ... crazier? Her twin sister Amanda is tasked with finding out the truth, making for a rollercoaster of a thriller.”

“But what if we're already certain who the villain is? When I learned that the very charming and funny Lucas Forester in Hannah Mary McKinnon’s Never Coming Home meticulously planned the murder of his super-wealthy, super-annoying wife, I horrified myself by actually rooting for him to get away with it. Who knows what this says about me (that's between me and my therapist), but this ambitious novel works because of McKinnon's well-crafted storytelling. Nothing about Lucas's plan is as it seemed, and the masterful plot twist at the end makes for a wonderfully satisfying read.”

“On the surface, S.A. Cosby’s All the Sinners Bleed is an extremely entertaining serial killer whodunnit. But dig just a little, and you'll discover it’s so much deeper than that. When Titus Crown, the first Black sheriff of a small southern town, is tasked with solving a string of grisly murders possibly connected to a local church, the timely and relevant social issues that affect every aspect of Titus's investigation add layers of complexity to what would have been an enthralling storyline all by itself. If you're like me, you'll inhale this book in one sitting and then think about it for weeks afterward.”

“When a luxurious girls’ weekend in the Hamptons goes wrong, you get Alafair Burke’s The Note. May, Kelsey, and Lauren are long-time friends who originally met in summer camp as teens. Now adults dealing with their own versions of ‘cancel culture,’ they reunite for a weekend in the Hamptons to commiserate. After a few too many drinks at the bar, one of them decides to leave a note on a strange couple’s car that says that the man is cheating on his girlfriend. It’s meant to be a prank, but when that same man later turns up dead, secrets from the women’s past and present collide, making for one heck of a wild ride.”

“There's a reason Danya Kukafka’s Notes on an Execution won the Edgar Award for Best Novel. Kukafka dives deep into the mind of Ansel Packer, a serial killer on death row, and what she discovers there is not at all what I expected. I cycled through several emotions as I read this brilliant, mesmerizing novel—ranging from horror to anger to grief — and if I had to pick my top ten favorite books of the past decade, this one would sit at the very top of the list.”