Why am I passionate about this?
My first books were set in and around San Francisco, an area I knew well and with plenty of opportunities for crime stories. When we moved to Montana twenty years ago, people asked when I’d write one there. I resisted setting dark stories in my own city, where my kids were growing up. Reading about the Bakken Oil Formation in North Dakota, a boom of wealth and expansion and a subsequent bust, offered a perfect storm—the kind that drives desperation, where locals conflict with newcomers, where money—new and old—drives people to make bad decisions. After a visit to the area, the fictional town of Hagen, North Dakota, and the Badlands Thriller Series was born.
Danielle's book list on thrillers set in small towns with big secrets
Why did Danielle love this book?
Death in the Family (book one of the Shana Merchant series) hooked me from the start.
Living and working in New York, Detective Shana Merchant barely survived being abducted by a serial killer. Hoping to leave grisly murder cases behind, she's taken a job in her fiancé's sleepy hometown in the Thousand Islands region of Upstate New York.
Faced with a murder on an isolated island owned by a wealthy family, Shana knows nothing about life on the water and the wealthy locals are not about to let her in on their secrets. As a brutal nor’easter storms into the bay, Shana is caught in a game of act and mouse that will have you flipping pages well after bedtime.
2 authors picked Death in the Family as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.
A storm-struck island. A blood-soaked bed. A missing man. In this captivating mystery that's perfect for fans of Knives Out, Senior Investigator Shana Merchant discovers that murder is a family affair.
Thirteen months ago, former NYPD detective Shana Merchant barely survived being abducted by a serial killer. Now hoping to leave grisly murder cases behind, she's taken a job in her fiancé's sleepy hometown in the Thousand Islands region of Upstate New York.
But as a nor'easter bears down on her new territory, Shana and fellow investigator Tim Wellington receive a call about a man missing on a private island.…