March’s Best New Thrillers

The Cornwalls Are Gone, by James Patterson and Brendan DuBois
Army intelligence officer Amy Cornwall is skilled at dealing with scenarios that would make most people blanch. But nothing in her professional career prepares her for the sense of dread she experiences when she comes home to find her husband and young daughter missing. Contacted by the kidnapper, she is told there is only one way to save her family: she must somehow secure the release of an unnamed captive. She has two days to accomplish her mission, and if she fails, her family will be killed. Amy has no choice but to go rogue, using her training, contacts, and desperation to find out who took her family and why.

Cemetery Road (B&N Exclusive Edition), by Greg Iles
Marshall McEwan escaped Bienville when he was young, heading off to Washington D.C. to become a journalist. When his father’s death and his family’s struggling newspaper force him to return home, he finds a transformed town flush with sketchy money and controlled by Max Matheson’s shadowy Bienville Poker Club, and discover’s Max’s old flame Jet has married the man’s son. After Max is implicated in the murder of his wife, he insists Jet serve as his defense lawyer. She secretly teams up with Marshall to investigate the whole web of lies, corruption, and murder, acting as the confidential informant to the journalist. Soon, the whole town seems to turn against Marshall, refusing to deal with the horrifying truth he’s threatening to reveal. The B&N exclusive edition includes a note from Greg Iles to his readers.

Beautiful Bad, by Annie Ward
In Meadowlark, Kansas, police officer Diane Varga responds to a 911 call made from the home of Ian and Maddie Wilson. She finds the house empty, the kitchen trashed and covered in blood, and no sign of the couple or their young son. As Varga investigates, flashbacks tell the story of how Ian and Maddie met, their often rocky relationship, Ian’s work as a security consultant in Nigeria, his struggles with PTSD, as well as Maddie’s own battle with anxiety and depression following a terrible accident. The story slowly builds to revelations about what actually went on in the house before and after an emergency call that was cut off, and how it all relates back to the very beginnings of the relationship.

The Persian Gamble, by Joel C. Rosenberg
Rosenberg’s sequel to The Kremlin Conspiracy spins a thrilling story that feels like a secret history unfolding in real time. In a bold move against NATO, Russia plans an invasion of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania while simultaneously signing a mutual defense pact with North Korea, which has only pretended to give up its nuclear program. Oleg Kraskin, son-in-law to Russian president Luganov, sees the potential end of the world in his father-in-law’s plot and passes information about his schemes to former secret service agent Marcus Ryker. They link up with the CIA’s Moscow station chief Jenny Morris in a desperate attempt to stop the mad president’s plans.

The Perfect Alibi: A Novel, by Phillip Margolin
Star athlete Blaine Hastings is convicted of rape despite his passionate, angry denials, largely due to the incontrovertible DNA evidence. While he’s in prison a second rape is committed, with DNA evidence pointing to the same culprit—which should be impossible. With a new lawyer, Blaine gets a fresh trial and is released on bail. His original lawyer is soon found dead. Fearing for her safety, the original rape victim hires young attorney Robin Lockwood, a skilled MMA fighter who is also handling another client charged with murder, despite clear evidence the act was committed in self-defense. Soon, Lockwood comes to suspect the two cases are connected, but she’ll have to act quickly to prove her theory before someone else winds up dead.

My Lovely Wife, by Samantha Downing
When the body of a young woman named Lindsay is discovered in an abandoned motel, it’s shocking—especially to the narrator of the book, who, along with his wife Millicent, had previously kidnapped her as part of a twisted attempt to inject sick thrills into their stale marriage. Millicent was supposed to kill Lindsay quickly and dispose of her body, but confesses she decided it would be better if the crime scene mimicked those of a notorious local serial killer. While the husband is intrigued by the possibility of hiding a murder spree behind another string of killings, the downside to this trick is the increased attention the crime receives.

Dark Tribute: An Eve Duncan Novel, by Iris Johansen
Johansen’s 24th Even Duncan novel kicks off with deceptive calm. Eve’s ward, violin prodigy Cara Delaney, leaves a celebrated performance and travels to Atlanta to meet her friend Jock in hopes of convincing him their intense bond should evolve into something romantic. At the hotel they’re both staying at, however, Cara’s whole world is turned upside-down when she’s abducted by a man bent on against Eve and her husband Joe Quinn. While Eve and Joe scramble to chase down clues, Cara must use all of her wits to survive.

The Woman in the Dark, by Vanessa Savage
After accidentally overdosing in the wake of her mother’s death, Sarah and her husband Tom decide to move their family into Tom’s childhood home. Sarah insists her brush with suicide was an accident, and that the change of scenery will be a wonderful way to leave grief behind. When they arrive, however, they find the house has been abandoned for 15 years after its last occupants were brutally murdered. They move into what the locals call the “Murder House” anyway. As Tom becomes obsessed with the crime, odd objects from the house’s past begin to turn up on their doorstep. When Sarah learns the murderer has just been released from prison—and that the sole survivor is in town too—she begins to doubt her husband’s stories of his own childhood in the house. As her struggle with depression worsens, Sarah grows desperate to protect her children from what increasingly seems like a supernatural evil within the residence. Or is it all in her head?