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  1. Genres
  2. ›Thriller

Best Thriller Books

Suspense and thriller novels

1,424 summaries

Showing 73–96 of 1,424

  1. Needful Things

    Stephen King

    ★ 3.9 (210k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    In the quiet town of Castle Rock, a mysterious new shopkeeper grants everyone their deepest desires, but the price is paid in escalating pranks and betrayals that spiral the community into a maelstrom of self-destruction.

  2. Then She Was Gone

    Lisa Jewell

    ★ 4.0 (209k) average on GoodreadsMystery

    A decade after her daughter vanished, a mother finds herself drawn to a new man whose child bears an unsettling resemblance to her lost girl, reigniting the chilling mystery of what truly happened.

  3. Left Behind

    Tim LaHaye

    ★ 3.8 (204k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    After millions vanish, an airborne Boeing 747 becomes a terrifying symbol of global chaos as the Rapture leaves humanity struggling with unexplained disappearances and the start of the apocalypse.

  4. The Good Girl

    Mary Kubica

    ★ 3.8 (197k) average on GoodreadsMystery

    A judge's daughter disappears after a one-night stand, leading to a kidnapping where the line between captor and captive blurs, as her mother and a detective uncover a shattering family secret.

  5. Doctor Sleep

    Stephen King

    ★ 4.1 (196k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    Decades after the Overlook Hotel, a haunted and sober Dan Torrance must use his fading 'shining' to protect a young girl with an explosive gift from a nomadic cult that feeds on the dying breaths of psychic children.

  6. The Lincoln Lawyer

    Michael Connelly

    ★ 4.2 (193k) average on GoodreadsMystery

    A cynical defense attorney, who operates from the back of his Lincoln, finds his world of legal manipulation upended when a high-profile case forces him to confront a pure evil that threatens to consume his own life.

  7. Death Note, Vol. 1: Boredom

    Tsugumi Ohba

    ★ 4.4 (192k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    A brilliant but bored student discovers a supernatural notebook that allows him to kill anyone by writing their name, sparking a deadly game of cat and mouse with a reclusive detective.

  8. Cell

    Stephen King

    ★ 3.6 (192k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    When cell phone calls turn ordinary people into rabid, murderous zombies, a graphic artist navigates a post-apocalyptic New England to find his son.

  9. Unwind

    Neal Shusterman

    ★ 4.2 (192k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    In a future where unwanted teens are harvested for their body parts, three fugitives—a rebel, a musician, and a true believer—must unite to survive being 'unwound'.

  10. Firestarter

    Stephen King

    ★ 3.9 (190k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    With the government after her, a young girl with fire powers must control her gift and escape those who would turn her into a weapon.

  11. Darkly Dreaming Dexter

    Jeff Lindsay

    ★ 3.9 (190k) average on GoodreadsMystery

    Dexter Morgan is a charming blood splatter analyst for the Miami police. He also kills serial murderers as a vigilante. When a new murderer with a similar method appears, Dexter faces the dark reflection of his own justice.

  12. Timeline

    Michael Crichton

    ★ 3.9 (190k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    When archaeologists find a way to travel to 14th-century France, their study of history turns into a fight for survival against knights, castles, and a corporation trying to control the past.

  13. The Girl With All the Gifts

    M.R. Carey

    ★ 3.9 (190k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    In a world after the apocalypse, a smart young girl named Melanie, who is a zombie, dreams of a future she might not have, making her captors question her unique existence.

  14. Patriot Games

    Tom Clancy

    ★ 4.1 (188k) average on GoodreadsMystery

    When a vacationing CIA analyst thwarts a terrorist attack on the British Royal Family, he unwittingly drags his own family into the crosshairs of a vengeful and ruthless IRA splinter group.

  15. The Waste Lands

    Stephen King

    ★ 4.2 (186k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    Roland's quest for the Dark Tower is complicated by a paradox of erased memories and a descent into a ruined city where an insane, riddle-loving train offers their only escape.

  16. Pretty Little Liars

    Sara Shepard

    ★ 3.9 (184k) average on GoodreadsMystery

    Four high school juniors, haunted by the disappearance of their manipulative best friend Alison, find their scandalous secrets exposed by an anonymous blackmailer who claims to know everything.

  17. The Circle

    Dave Eggers

    ★ 3.4 (183k) average on GoodreadsTechnology

    A young woman's dream job at a powerful tech company spirals into a terrifying loss of privacy and identity as the corporation's quest for ultimate transparency consumes everything in its path.

  18. The Dead Zone

    Stephen King

    ★ 3.9 (181k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    A man awakens from a coma with the psychic ability to foresee the future, forcing him to decide whether to assassinate a presidential candidate to prevent an apocalypse.

  19. The Exorcist

    William Peter Blatty

    ★ 4.2 (181k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    In the terrifying 40th-anniversary edition, a desperate mother and two priests battle a malevolent supernatural entity for a little girl's soul.

  20. Pretty Girls

    Karin Slaughter

    ★ 4.0 (177k) average on GoodreadsMystery

    A woman's search for her sister, missing for twenty years, uncovers a grotesque web of secrets, showing that the past is not just haunting—it is actively hunting.

  21. Different Seasons

    Stephen King

    ★ 4.3 (177k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    Stephen King's 'Different Seasons' tells four stories: a man's prison escape, a boy's bond with a Nazi, four friends finding a corpse, and a woman's determination to give birth. The collection explores human strength, evil, and growing up.

  22. American Dirt

    Jeanine Cummins

    ★ 4.3 (176k) average on GoodreadsLiterary Fiction

    After her journalist husband exposes a cartel boss, a Mexican bookstore owner and her son are thrust into a harrowing journey as migrants, desperately fleeing north on 'la bestia' to escape the cartel's vengeful reach.

  23. Artemis

    Andy Weir

    ★ 3.7 (175k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    On the moon's only city, a small-time smuggler named Jazz Bashara dives into a high-stakes heist that plunges her into a dangerous conspiracy for control of Artemis itself, forcing her to gamble everything for survival.

  24. Thinner

    Richard Bachman

    ★ 3.7 (175k) average on GoodreadsFantasy

    After a Romani elder's curse causes a morbidly obese lawyer to waste away following a hit-and-run, he must desperately fight a supernatural affliction that promises a slow, agonizing death.

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