The Best Thrillers of 2024

Havoc

By Christopher Bollen

This deliciously nasty tale of resentment and revenge is set in a hotel in Egypt, where an elderly woman who enjoys secretly meddling in the lives of others has set up residence during Covid. The arrival of another guest — a boy of 8 who can match her, diabolical deed for diabolical deed — threatens to destroy her carefully constructed spider web of intrigue. Bollen writes with wit and style about an increasingly unhinged battle of wills between two unlikely opponents.

The Sequel

By Jean Hanff Korelitz

Korelitz delivers another sizzler of a story about literary theft and murder. Readers of her earlier book, “The Plot,” will welcome the return of the diabolical Anna Williams-Bonner. Posing as a grieving widow and promoting her novel — a fictionalized account of her husband’s death — she gets an unsettling note from an unknown person who appears to know too much about her past. Anna has a lot to hide, and a knack for eliminating her enemies.

Bright Objects

By Ruby Todd

In 1997, the residents of a small Australian town are waiting for the arrival of a comet that has not been seen for more than 4,000 years. Meanwhile, a young widow is desperate to find out who drove the car that killed her husband, and a number of townspeople are falling under the spell of a charismatic cult leader. The prose burns bright in this luminous novel.