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Thrillers come in many styles, from mind-numbingly psychological to high-octane crime. Here are the most gripping ones of all time.
‘Strangers on a Train’ by Patricia Highsmith (1950)
Patricia Highsmith is better known for “The Talented Mr. Ripley,” but “Strangers on a Train” might be her “greatest book, reeling us in from the very beginning,” said Collider. During a chance meeting between two men on a train, one suggests that they each murder someone the other wants gone. Highsmith’s “genius lies in” shifting the focus “away from the murders themselves” and toward the “psychological burden that follows.” ($17, W. W. Norton & Company, Amazon)
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Join more than 350,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with a selection of The Week’s most interesting, enlightening and entertaining stories - plus daily puzzles.
Join more than 350,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with a selection of The Week’s most interesting, enlightening and entertaining stories - plus daily puzzles.
The consequences of an incident between three boyhood friends in 1970s Boston ripple for decades. When one of the trio’s teen daughters is murdered 25 years later, the book becomes an “enthralling study” in “remorse, revenge and the long tail of emotional trauma” told in Dennis Lehane’s “inimitably tender and profane style,” said The New York Times. ($20, HarperCollins, Amazon)
‘In the Woods’ by Tana French (2007)
Tana French has established herself as one of the greats in the thriller genre, and her debut novel, “In The Woods,” remains one of her finest. Detective Rob Ryan is called to investigate a murder in the same woods where his childhood friends disappeared. It’s a “stone-cold stunner” of a book, “audacious, beautiful and entirely confident,” said Electric Lit. ($19, Penguin Books, Amazon)
‘The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’ by Stieg Larsson; translated by Reg Keeland (2008)
Swedish writer Stieg Larsson’s “Millennium juggernaut” began with this book, one of the century’s “more indelible literary creations,” The New York Times said. The book introduces goth-punk Swedish computer hacker Lisbeth Salander, whose “technical brilliance is matched only by her antisocial tendencies.” ($19, Vintage Crime/Black Lizard, Amazon)
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Theara Coleman has worked as a staff writer at The Week since September 2022. She frequently writes about technology, education, literature and general news. She was previously a contributing writer and assistant editor at Honeysuckle Magazine, where she covered racial politics and cannabis industry news.
