Recommendations based on "Reconstructing Amelia"

4 starred reviews!Orange Is the New Black meets Walter Dean Myer’s Monster in this gritty, twisty, and haunting debut by Tiffany D. Jackson about a girl convicted of murder seeking the truth while surviving life in a group home.Mary B. Addison killed a baby.Allegedly. She didn’t say much in that first interview with detectives, and the media filled in the only blanks that mattered: a white baby had died while under the care of a churchgoing black woman and her nine-year-old daughter. The public convicted Mary and the jury made it official. But did she do it?There wasn’t a point to setting the record straight before, but now she’s got Ted—and their unborn child—to think about. When the state threatens to take her baby, Mary’s fate now lies in the hands of the one person she distrusts the most: her Momma. No one knows the real Momma. But does anyone know the real Mary?

“Then She Vanishes lifts the stone on a cold case disappearance and asks chilling questions about friendship, loyalty, love, and obsession.”—New York Times bestselling author Gilly Macmillan A twisty, compulsive thriller full of jolting shocks and startling secrets involving two sisters, a disappearance, a double murder, and a reporter determined to find the truth from the bestselling author of Local Girl Missing, Last Seen Alive, and Do Not Disturb. Everything changed the night she disappeared . . . On a summer's night in 1994, sixteen-year-old Flora Powell vanished from her sleepy seaside town without a trace. Their hearts shattered, Flora’s mother, her sister Heather, and Heather’s best friend Jess had to somehow carry on not knowing what happened. Twenty-five years later, tragedy strikes again when Heather walks into a stranger's house and allegedly kills two people in cold blood. Why would this loving wife and doting new mother commit such a heinous crime? Jess, now a reporter, returns to the hometown she left behind to cover the case and dig for answers. But this isn’t like any other story. Jess was like a sister to the Powell girls, until the summer that tore them all apart. What happened to the girl she used to know?  The question haunts Jess and propels her to find the key that may unlock the mysteries involving both sisters. But the search may reveal more . . . a darker side to this idyllic place she thought she knew.

A psychological thriller about a night of babysitting that turns fatal and a girl determined to figure out if the gas leak was an accident, perfect for fans of E. Lockhart's We Were Liars.“A masterclass in suspenseful storytelling”—Karen M. McManus, #1 New York Times bestselling author of One of Us Is LyingElla was supposed to have fun night with her friends until a crippling headache tied to a recent diagnosis cancels her plans and leaves her babysitting her cousin instead. But when she arrives at the house, she immediately knows something is wrong. The lights are off and the door is wide open. But it’s the creeping smell coming from the house that warns Ella of the real danger inside: a gas leak. In a panic, Ella charges into the house and calls 911. Her aunt and cousins lie unconscious on the floor—and Ella can’t rescue them all. As Ella tries to recover from the tragic accident, deadly lies begin to seep through the cracks of the investigation, and Ella’s side effects escalate. She’ll soon discover the gas leak might not have been an accident after all—and that someone might be out to kill her next.

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author Iris Johansen comes a new thriller that will have Eve Duncan questioning everything she thought she knew about her family and her pastOne woman held captive for decades...Another one freed by the truth...Forensic sculptor Eve Duncan knows what it's like to be haunted by the past. For years after her daughter Bonnie was stolen from her, she fought for closure. But now as she's striving to begin anew, she can't shake the feeling that something terrible is about to happen--or maybe already has. When her mother, Sandra, asks for help in finding a missing friend named Beth Avery, Eve is sure that she's hiding something. It's odd that Sandra would get involved at all, and the fact that she adamantly refuses to go to the police for help reinforces Eve's suspicions that something is very wrong.Eve learns that Beth has been locked away in a mental hospital for years, which makes it even harder to understand how she could have disappeared. As Sandra reluctantly reveals small pieces of the truth about Beth's identity, Eve is shocked to discover that their lives are strangely entwined, and Beth's disappearance now puts them all in grave danger. Desperate, Eve enlists a secret weapon to pick up Beth's trail: rogue profiler, Kendra Michaels. With an uncanny ability to detect clues and solve puzzles, Kendra begins to uncover the bizarre circumstances of Beth's escape from what should have been the safety of her hospital room. Beth is on the run, and as her mind clears--detoxing from the drugs that have held her prisoner--she begins to see the threads of a twisted plot within the powerful Avery family, threatening to destroy Beth and anyone else who might jeopardize the high-stakes game that is already in play.

The Skimm Reads calls it "a thriller that's part True Detective, part The Girl On the Train. All parts gripping."Husbands and wives. Mothers and daughters. The past and the future. Secrets bind them. And secrets can destroy them. The author of Pretty Girls returns with an electrifying, emotionally complex thriller that plunges its fascinating protagonist into the darkest depths of a mystery that just might destroy him. With the discovery of a murder at an abandoned construction site, Will Trent of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation is brought in on a case that becomes much more dangerous when the dead man is identified as an ex-cop. Studying the body, Sara Linton—the GBI’s newest medical examiner and Will’s lover—realizes that the extensive blood loss didn't belong to the corpse. Sure enough, bloody footprints leading away from the scene indicate there is another victim—a woman—who has vanished . . . and who will die soon if she isn’t found. Will is already compromised, because the site belongs to the city’s most popular citizen: a wealthy, powerful, and politically connected athlete protected by the world’s most expensive lawyers—a man who’s already gotten away with rape, despite Will’s exhaustive efforts to put him away. But the worst is yet to come. Evidence soon links Will’s troubled past to the case . . . and the consequences will tear through his life with the force of a tornado, wreaking havoc for Will and everyone around him, including his colleagues, family, friends—and even the suspects he pursues. Relentlessly suspenseful and furiously paced, peopled with conflicted, fallible characters who leap from the page, The Kept Woman is a seamless blend of twisty police procedural and ingenious psychological thriller -- a searing, unforgettable novel of love, loss, and redemption.  

She's standing at the front door. Covered in blood. Is she the victim of a crime? Or the perpetrator? When Sienna Hegarty, a troubled friend of his daughter, comes to Joe O'Loughlin's door terrorized, incoherent, and covered in blood, he vows to unearth the dark secrets her mind has buried. The police find a major piece of the puzzle at Sienna's house: her father, a retired cop, murdered.Tests confirm that it's Mr. Herharty's blood on Sienna. She says she remembers nothing. Investigators take aim at Sienna. O'Loughlin senses something different is happening, something subterranean and terrifying to Sienna. It may be something in her mind. Or it may be something real. Someone real. Someone capable of the most grim and gruesome murder, and willing to kill again if anyone gets too close.

For readers of Diane Chamberlain and Heather Gudenkauf comes a gripping novel of suspense about a mother determined to avenge her daughter’s murder—no matter the cost to her husband, to her family, and to herself.   When Jules Bright hears a knock on the door, the last person she expects to find is a detective bringing her the news she’s feared for the last three years.   Amelia Quentin is being released from prison.   Jules’s life now is very different from the one she knew before Amelia shattered it completely. Knowing the girl is coming back, Jules must decide what to do. Friends and family gather around, fearing for Jules’s safety. They know that justice was never served; each of them wants to make the Quentin girl pay.   The question is: What will Jules do?   And which of them—she or Amelia—has the most to fear?  Praise for The Girl Who Came Back“This is an emotionally charged story of justice, revenge and finding peace after a tragedy.”—The Parkersburg News and Sentinel Praise for Susan Lewis   “Powerful.”—Fresh Fiction, on No Place to Hide   “A real page-turner.”—Kirkus Reviews, on Too Close to Home   “Emotionally charged.”—RT Book Reviews, on Behind Closed Doors

Dr Abby DiMatteo - a second-year surgical student in Boston Bayside's elite cardiac team - is about to make a decision that will jeopardize her career. A car-crash victim's healthy heart is ready to be harvested, having been cross-matched to a private patient, forty-six year-old Nina Voss. Instead Abby makes sure the transplant goes to a dying seventeen-year-old boy who is also a perfect match. The repercussions leave her plagued with self-doubt. Suddenly a new heart appears, and the transplant is completed - but Abby makes a terrible discovery. The new heart has not come through the right channels. Defying the hospital's demands for silence, Abby begins her own investigation that reveals an intricate and murderous chain of deceptions ...

"A SMART AND SHOCKING THRILLER."--The Minnesota DailyWhen Cordelia Thorn ventures to Summer Green, Wisconsin, for a reunion with some old college friends, she finds trouble in paradise. Twenty-plus years have definitely changed things. Soap opera star Diana has become an alcoholic. Curt and Annie's marriage is falling apart. Orson is hostile and surly. And Theo, the most passionate of them all, suddenly dies--of an apparent heart attack.Alarmed, Cordelia sends for her old friend Jane Lawless to do some quiet snooping. Together they follow their hunches--into the not-so-carefree past and back to the troubled present, where they find a single match could blow up all their lives . . . . "Cordelia and Jane are at their wise-cracking, risk-taking best as they tail suspects, stake out a sleazy motel, and burn rubber in a high-speed chase. As in all of Hart's well-written, fast-paced novels, motives abound, clues appear and disappear, and suspects seem alternately harmless and menacing . . . . A SMALL SACRIFICE is another entertaining addition to Hart's collection."--Lambda Book Report"Hart tells the story of this fateful reunion with deep compassion, strong psychological insight, bravura wit, and a clever plot."--Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine

They called it a tragedy. He calls it murder. Vince Carter is a man hollowed out by grief and guilt. A retired cop who once saved strangers but couldn’t save his own wife, he now lives a solitary existence in a decaying cottage. But his self-imposed exile is shattered when police knock on his door with devastating news. The crash that killed his estranged daughter and her husband left one survivor: eight-year-old Melanie. Now, Vince is the only thing standing between his traumatized granddaughter and a cold, uncertain future. But as he navigates the wreckage of his family, Vince discovers a threatening voicemail that suggests this was no accident. Only his former colleague - Detective Liz Moorland - takes his theories seriously but her hands are full hunting a dangerous fugitive. When Vince uncovers a dark connection between Melanie’s crash and Liz’s case the threads tighten, and one heartbreaking truth emerges... Melanie saw something. And the killer knows it. Lest We Forgive is the atmospheric first novel in the Detective Liz Moorland series with chilling suspense, moody settings, and the raw emotion of family tragedy. Audiobook narrated by Aussie screen icon John Wood. Books 1-4 now optioned for screen!