November’s New Mysteries and Thrillers

In a blend of mystery, noir, myth, and horror, Alma returns to her Wisconsin hometown, the place where her sister died after a battle with addiction in high school. She begins investigating when she sees a girl in white, and others claim to see the girl, too: all over town, always silent, and not matching the descriptions of the many girls who’ve gone missing here for years. Alma’s investigation uncovers secrets this community has kept under wraps for too long, secrets that might explain the disappearances.

Alexandra Vasti’s books always have such fun titles: Ladies in Hating, Earl Crush, Ne’er Duke Well. Swipe Bite is a mystery romance between an icy vampire corporate heiress and a human software engineer, who are forced to work together when a killer sabotages their hugely successful human-vampire dating app and turns it into a literal bloodbath.

You may know Fiona McPhillips from her fantastic 2024 debut, When We Were Silent. Her next novel is set in Ireland’s EDM scene, where one of the country’s first female electronic DJs and producers abruptly leaves the rave circuit when her friend goes missing after one of her crew’s huge parties in the woods. Years later, the friend’s body is found in the mountains, and evidence suggests it was no accident.

From the author of The Hitchcock Hotel and Darling Rose Gold, this thriller follows a desperate writer whose publishing dreams have been dashed for decades. But this time, he’s written the perfect book, and all he needs is the perfect agent. He has one in mind, never mind that she’s rejected him before. Because he knows where she’s spending her holidays, and his book is about her. She won’t say no. She can’t say no. Because he won’t take no for an answer.

In this debut dystopian thriller, a disillusioned web developer heads to the Catskills for a survival school lead by an enigmatic leader known only as “A.” While instructing her students on basic survival skills, A speaks of Day Zero, her prophecy that civilization will collapse and be reborn. When Day Zero actually happens just as she predicted, it becomes evident that A will do anything—anything—to bring her vision for survival to fruition.

This is the first book in a cozy cyber-noir duology set in the year 3025, where technology has raised the dead via fancy holographic hardware. But humanity wasn’t ready for all that, and flicker ghosts end up being secondary citizens. One of these ghosts, Hildy, and her friends find themselves in the middle of a highly publicized mystery when one of their own goes missing. There’s a headless ghost called the Graverobber emerging from holographic billboards and snatching the resurrected, and it’s up to Hildy + friends to figure out who the Graverobber is.

Adam Oyebanji has written a few mysteries and sci-fi thrillers, including Braking Day and Esperance. His latest sci-fi thriller is set aboard a generation ship, where a mysterious kidnapping occurs: a junior officer says they were abducted from outside a bar and released 24 hours later with no memory of what happened. What’s originally written off as a drunken delusion leads to an explosive investigation into murder and terrorism.

In this Polynesian mystery, a teen who can hear and feel the sea’s prophetic thoughts gets a warning that her brother is going to drown. She gets a plan together to get him safely off his island home, but that plan is thwarted when his girlfriend goes missing, and he’s found with blood on his hands and no memory of what happened.

In an expansion of his father John le Carré’s literary universe, Nick Harkaway’s latest sees George Smiley crossing the Atlantic—for the first time—into Cold War America. The Circus, home of British Intelligence, has an invaluable asset in Moscow, an officer in the Red Army collecting Soviet secrets. But Smiley uncovers a counter-intelligence operation after what looks like the random shooting of a British soldier, one that leads him to Los Angeles and his own personal nemesis, a Russian master spy who might have her own agent in place that’s about to blow up London’s spot.

From the bestselling author of The Devotion of Suspect X, this twisty mystery follows a woman who’s just returned to her hometown to plan her wedding when her father is murdered. Rather than leave the crime solving to those pesky police, her uncle—a former Las Vegas magician and master illusionist—takes matters into his own hands, and his niece’s former classmates emerge as the prime suspects.