The Best Thrillers of February 2018

Fifty Fifty, by James Patterson and Candice Fox
Patterson and Fox’s second foray into the world of Detective Harriet “Harry” Blue centers on Harry’s brother Sam, on trial for the murder of three young students. Things look grim for Sam, but Harry is convinced of his innocence, and not shy about working to prove it. Her determination gets her reassigned to the tiny outback town of Last Chance Valley, population 75. There, Harry discovers a diary that seems to chart a madman’s plan to massacre the entire town, one citizen at a time—and the first murder occurs shortly after her arrival. As her brother’s case comes down to the testimony of a woman being held hostage, Harry has to find a way to stop an entire town from being killed and clear her brother’s name.

Look for Me, by Lisa Gardner
In Gardner’s ninth D.D. Warren novel, foster teen Roxanna Baez is the only survivor when her family is gunned down in their home. Seeking answers to the massacre, Warren pursues the girl—and so does Flora Dane, who survived more than a year of torture and abuse when she was kidnapped by a sadistic trucker, and now dedicates herself to helping other victims. Dane sees a fellow survivor in Roxanna, and she and Warren grudgingly admit to a mutual goal and work the pursuit in their own ways, slowly uncovering the shocking truth behind the murders—and why teenager Roxanna feels like she has absolutely nothing to lose.

The Hush, by John Hart
Hart returns to the story of Johnny Merrimon, who at the age of 12 solved his sister and father’s murder and became something of a celebrity in the process in The Last Child. Ten years later, Johnny now lives on the valuable plot of acreage in North Carolina known as Hush Arbor, but he’s cash poor, battling a suit challenging his ownership, and dealing with acts of inexplicable violence and murder occurring on on the land. Desperate, the supernaturally-healing and gifted Johnny seeks out his old friend and lawyer Jack Cross. Because it’s not just legal problems that Johnny’s dealing with—it’s the dark presence he senses on his property, land that was once sacred.

Agent in Place, by Mark Greaney
In the seventh Gray Man novel, Court Gentry is now-former CIA, working as a freelance mercenary. He’s hired to kidnap the wife of the Syrian president as part of a scheme to topple a brutal regime. When he finds out her infant son has been left behind in Damascus, he goes undercover amongst mercenaries in the pay of the president in order to rescue him. In his fellow mercenaries, Court finds greed, selfishness, and little to like. The situation steadily deteriorates, pushing Court inexorably towards a desperate decision: he’ll have to go after the president himself, and pull off a near-impossible assassination in order to save the child without upending the whole geopolitical situation. Alone and surrounded, it’s the biggest challenge Court has ever faced.

The Deceivers, by Alex Berenson
CIA agent John Wells returns, called in by President Vincent Duto to investigate an explosion in Dallas responsible for nearly 400 deaths. ISIS claims credit for the atrocity, but Wells isn’t convinced they could have engineered the attack. A subsequent sniper attack killing two high-profile ministers points Wells towards a Moscow connection, and he becomes convinced Russia is orchestrating the attacks in support of right-wing Senator Birman’s presidential candidate’s campaign. As the country becomes increasingly agitated as nationalist sentiments are stirred, the false flag operations have their desired effect. Echoes of our own political reality add a sense of verisimilitude to this tense thriller.

The French Girl, by Lexie Elliott
Ten years after a group holiday in the Dordogne region of France when they met the beautiful, enigmatic Severine before she promptly disappeared, Kate and fellow former Oxford students are stunned to hear the woman’s remains have been discovered on the property itself. As a murder investigation revs up, Kate becomes increasingly wound up, remembering her time at the Dordogne farmhouse and the rough breakup with her former boyfriend Seb—in part over his fascination with Severine. Kate’s sanity starts to slip as she begins to see Severine’s ghost, and she wonders if she really knows her old friends as well as she thought she did. The old friends come together again, and a shifting web of alliances and old grudges drive Kate’s tension and rising paranoia— and the insistent French detective who’s arrived in London to investigate isn’t helping matters.

The Kremlin’s Candidate, by Jason Matthews
Matthews’ Red Sparrow trilogy (soon to make its way to cinemas with Jennifer Lawrence in tow) concludes with CIA agent Nate Nash scrambling to prevent the unmasking of Dominika Egorova, who has become a major U.S. asset in the Kremlin. Her cover is in danger because Russia’s own mole, Admiral Audrey Rowland, is on track to become CIA Director, which would entail his learning Egorova’s identity just as she’s captured the attention of Vladimir Putin himself. As Nash goes undercover to protect love interest Egorova, the CIA’s enemies back home are circling, attempting to force intelligence agencies to reform the black-hat practices they employ against the country’s enemies, and tightening the tension as Nash moves pieces on the board with no guarantee of success. Matthews’ experience as a former intelligence agent brings a frightening level of authenticity to the depiction of the techniques used to place assets in high-level positions in the government.

Chicago, by David Mamet
Mamet roars back into fine form with a story set in 1920s Chicago, an era when organized crime was almost a shadow government in the Windy City. A pair of murders drives the plot—one of a local celebrity involved in multiple shady activities, one of the girlfriend of Mike Hodge, hard-driving journalist and former World War I flying ace. Hodge digs into the murders with a tenacity and verbal acumen few could withstand, pitting himself against brutal criminals and corrupt police and politicians—some very real and very famous, most obscure or fictional. In a city where gangsters run amok, it’s the reporter for the Trib that turns out to be the most dangerous man in any given room.

The Plea, by Steve Cavanagh
Former con artist-turned-attorney Eddie Flynn returns in Cavanagh’s latest, and is in the thick of trouble right from the get-go. He’s called in by the FBI and ordered to help them with the case of a young tech billionaire, David Child, who has been arrested for the murder of his girlfriend. Although Child insists he is innocent, the evidence is grim. The FBI is looking to flip him, forcing him to assist in another investigation, and they want Eddie to convince him to take a guilty plea to give them the leverage they need. If Eddie fails or refuses, they promise to arrest his estranged wife Christine, who’s unknowingly involved in criminal activities. Eddie’s main problem—aside from the fact that he’s not actually Child’s lawyer—is that the more he talks to the rich kid, the more he believes Child is innocent. When attempts are made on Child’s life while he’s in custody, Eddie’s has to draw on all his grifter and legal experience to find out what’s going on—and to survive.

A Death in Love Oak, by James Grippando
The 15th Jack Swyteck novel is, unfortunately, extremely timely, kicking off at the University of Florida with the murder of a black student and president of a leading black fraternity. One of the suspects is the president of a white fraternity, reminding residents of a lynching that occurred in 1944—and how little progress seems to have been made. Asked for help by a friend of his father’s, Jack takes on the case while his wife leads an undercover FBI operation into a white supremacist terror group that might be connected to the murder. As the parallels between the 1944 murder and the new case become increasingly uncanny, Jack risks his career and reputation in order to chase down the truth in the swampy badlands of rural Florida.