100 books like The Murder of Roger Ackroyd

My long-held obsession with Victorian sensationalist fiction is probably why I write psychological thrillers.

The Woman in White has always been an inspiration and for me one of its most intriguing characters is Laura Fairlie, whose emotional frailty, like that of so many women, makes her prey to the hideous machinations of abusers who seek to control her. Unlike modern women however, she is not merely at the mercy of people, she is at the mercy of the restrictive laws of the society in which she lives.

And yet, with the help of determined friends, her extraordinary stoicism, and some pretty outlandish coincidences she manages to survive against the odds. Hurrah!

You can’t mention du Maurier’s Rebecca without mentioning Manderlay. The estate is essential to the entire spooky tale. I loved the way the house on a cliff feels sentient and antagonistic without the story ever venturing into the paranormal or supernatural. The reader is in the narrator’s head the entire time, and we’re left wondering what she’s imagining and what’s real. It’s such a well-crafted, haunting story. 

I also enjoyed the exploration of realistic morally gray characters: Maxim, Rebecca, Mrs. Danvers, and Jack. Everyone was at odds with the second Mrs. DeWinter, and their motivations were all complex and wonderfully twisted. 

Although a suspense novel rather than a mystery, this one utilizes plenty of tricks to keep you enthralled and guessing. It starts with a “Strangers on a Train” kind of premise, the exchanging of murders by people who just met. Then it takes off, morphing into unexpected incarnations, each one exciting and satisfying.  If you become a fan, and I’m betting you will, be warned. Swanson uses similar plot developments in his other books. This is by far his best one.

This psychological thriller is one where Oprah could stand in front of all its characters and say, “You made a bad choice! And you made a bad choice!”

It’s a slow-burn kind of story that eventually blew my mind so much I gasped—audibly. I liked that the book gives readers a chance to see a scenario where the choices made aren’t excusable, but are still wrapped into a deliciously entertaining and slightly disturbing story.

A multiple POV thriller that kept me up all night. This book awed me with its multiple POVs combined with unreliability and timeline jumps.

As the book shifted from one POV to the other and from one timeline to another, I loved how the author weaved in the backstories of the characters by showing the impact it had on the present timeline.

The writing. The style, the words used, and the way the sentences spun the story is something I still think about, years after I first read this book. It drew me in, lulled me into a false sense of security, then sprung a small nugget of what really happened. A brilliant tactic.

First, I found the writing in this book phenomenal, especially the dialogue. I feel like each bit of dialogue revealed something new about the character or pulled me deeper into the plot. It’s witty and dark. Honest would be a good word to describe it.

The characters felt so human to me–simultaneously loveable and deplorable, true to human nature. But it was the twist midway through the novel that really drew me in—the shift in reality. It changed the book for me, molding it into something unique, something I’d never read before.

It’s a novel I come back to time and time again, especially when I need inspiration.

This book kept me on the edge of my seat, biting my nails, and err… made me forget to go to sleep. This book to me is the epitome of books that make you go wait, what??

I want to highlight the menacing ambiance and constant edge in the tone of the story by giving the character such vulnerability that made me squirm. I loved the pacing of this story as the main character is hurled from the one bad situation into another.

Yet again, this book taught me to re-think assumptions, because it proved all of them wrong. I love the uniqueness of this trope especially when it first came out but the originality of it captivated me entirely.

One of the wonderful things about Young Adult books is that many authors understand the longing that young female readers have for heroines with real personality who overcome the challenges of their times or particular situations. Such stories move to the pinnacle of my “oh-my-gosh-I-loved-this!” list when they include a romance and by the end, the heroine is acknowledged as an equal to her partner. While L.M. Montgomery is known best for her unforgettable Anne of Green Gables (who could have been on this list), my particular favorite quirky heroine of hers is Valancy Stirling in The Blue Castle. 

The romance in this book is just as unconventional as Valancy herself, there’s a marriage of convenience, a beautiful setting for introverts, an island cabin and cats. What’s not to love?

I’m already envisioning this mystery as a TV series, which isn’t a stretch since Richard Osman’s had a long career in television. The idea of folks in a retirement community getting together to solve crimes isn’t new, but it’s always a hoot (reminds me of an episode of NCIS where Ducky was involved in “The Sherlocks”).

Osman doesn’t disappoint with his crew of senior sleuths in Coopers Chase, notably Elizabeth, the group’s leader, who isn’t intimidated by anything or anyone, and Joyce, her sidekick, a former nurse.

Short chapters and a shifting point of view made for a very fast read and, more importantly, made my daily wait in the carpool line seem like seconds instead of 45 minutes.

Islands in fiction are often remote and isolated, their inhabitants cut off from any outside help and having to rely upon only themselves for survival or escape. A U.S. Marshal goes to an island to investigate the disappearance of a murderous patient from a hospital for the criminally insane, in another terrifyingly clever book chock full of twists and turns. I’m drawn to stories that are gothic and hugely atmospheric and mysterious, and this book has all of that and more. Lehane described it as “a hybrid of the works of the Brontë sisters and Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” and I can’t think of a better way to describe it! I’m always trying to wrongfoot and surprise a reader with shock reveals that they hopefully don’t see coming – I definitely did not see the end of Shutter Island coming at all!