While you wait for The Tenant

The season of beach reads is in full swing. Some of you may love your romance beach reads, but several thrillers and mysteries are holding strong to their claim at the top of holds lists at the library this season. Freida McFadden's most recent novel The Tenant has readers waiting with great anticipation. 

In this tale Blake is promoted to Vice President of Marketing after his boss dies. With his boost in pay Blake and his fiancée, Krista, buy a brownstone. Just as quickly as Blake gets the job he is laid off and the couple is struggling to make ends meet with the new house payment.  

They are desperately looking for someone to rent their spare bedroom so they can pay the mortgage on time. By some luck a woman named Whitney knocks on their door and the couple’s relief is immense. However, they soon realize living with Whitney might not be as great as they first thought it would be.  

Late night noises, more than the typical noises you’d expect, awful smells coming from the kitchen and increasingly violent threats lead Blake to fear he may have invited the wrong person into his home. There may be worse to come.

While you wait to figure out what happens in McFadden’s thrilling bad roommate story, check out one of these fast-paced stories that’ll keep you guessing until the very end.  

Behind Closed Doors by B. A. Paris 

Both McFadden and Paris craft fast moving, suspenseful stories that are hard to put down and leave you wondering who can be trusted. Much like The Tenant, Behind Closed Doors opens with characters on an upward arc – life seems good, until suddenly it’s not.  

Grace knew her future would always involve her younger sister, Millie, who has Down Syndrome. Prepared to care for Millie for life, Grace wasn’t really searching for love but she wouldn’t turn it down if it came around. 

Enter Jack, a man who practically sweeps Grace off her feet when they meet in a chance encounter at a park. When Millie is moved to dance to the music of a band in the park Jack joins in much to Grace’s delight. 

Caught up in a whirlwind romance, Grace and Jack are soon married. It doesn’t take long before cracks in the once beautiful relationship begin to appear. On their honeymoon Jack reveals a psychopathic side previously hidden from Grace. Once they return home the extraordinary place they were to begin their life together becomes a living prison for Grace. She is unable to leave per Jack’s orders. With Millie soon to move into the home, Grace knows she has to do something to save her sister from the fate she’s encountered.  

Such a Quiet Place by Megan Miranda 

What do you do when you discover you cannot trust the people you thought you could? Even worse, what do you do when they are your neighbors and even your roommate?

In a college town’s picturesque neighborhood known as Hollow’s Edge two roommates, Harper and Ruby, live together in simplicity. With a lakefront view, a private pool and a well known a safe place to live, all seems well for the roommates as they settle into their life in this little community. 

Fast forward to just over a year later – Ruby is returning to her home with Harper, following Ruby's release from prison for an overturned murder conviction. A family, the Truett’s, from their once idyllic Hollow’s Edge neighborhood was murdered and all fingers pointed right at Ruby.  

Harper testified against Ruby at the murder trial. Now she fears what Ruby wants by trying to return to their house together. Is it or revenge or does she just need a place to live after being found innocent?  

Harper is determined to figure out what really happened the night the Truett’s were killed. Was Ruby truly a killer who was good at hiding her actions, or was someone else to blame? Harper is going to unveil the secrets her seemingly perfect neighborhood is trying so hard to keep.  

Survive the Night by Riley Sager 

Another author you may want to add to your list is Riley Sager. With intricate plotting and psychological suspense driving the stories, Sager has his own appeal that will be sure to keep you turning the pages late into the night. In addition to Survive the Night, you may also want to check out The House Across the Lake, which also leaves you questioning if you can really trust someone new in your life. 

Survive the Night, set in 1991, follows Olyphant University student, Charlie, who is devastated following the murder of her friend, the third victim of the person dubbed the Campus Killer. Grieving and dealing with the guilt that she may have let her friend be murdered, Charlie decides to go back home mid semester. 

Charlie posts a flyer looking for a ride to her Ohio home two states away. She meets a janitor from the university, Josh, who is heading the same way to care for his sick father. With everything falling into place, Charlie is ready to leave behind the place that brought her so much sorrow. 

As they start driving to Ohio conversation begins to flow. Charlie starts to wonder if Josh is the man he said he was. Was it a smart idea to trust a stranger to drive her back home? 

As the drive drags on and Charlie's sense of fear intensifies, the locked room feeling of a car hurtling down a highway will surely have you biting your nails, wondering who Josh really is. Will Charlie make it out safe? This is a frightening thriller that reminds you to not take rides from strangers! 

No One Can Know by Kate Alice Marshall 

Like The Tenant, down-on-their-luck characters are inhabiting a beautiful home in Kate Alice Marshall’s novel, No One Can Know. This story has its own spin on the bad events happening inside the house. From the very moment you open the book, and maybe even after you finish the last page, you’ll be suspicious of each character you meet.

Newly pregnant Emma and her husband, Nathan, are forced to return to Emma’s childhood home after Nathan loses his job. It’s a beautiful, spacious place, but the memories and the community that surround it have Emma on edge. She also has yet to reveal to her husband the full truth of why she left home, which will have to happen sooner rather than later now. 

More than a decade earlier Emma was the main suspect in the murder of her parents. The murder, still unsolved, haunts Emma who isn’t sure what happened the night of her parents’ murder. To no surprise, the community doesn’t welcome her back with open arms. However, Emma is determined to try and make the best of the situation.  

Shortly after Emma returns home, another disastrous event happens that draws back her estranged sisters, Daphne and Juliette. They are each hiding their own secrets about that fateful night more than a decade ago. What happens if their secrets get out?

With a complex web of characters, multiple perspectives and dual timelines, you are sure to question what you truly know and who can be trusted as the truth begins to reveal itself.

Enjoy these thrilling beach reads and make sure to sign up for the Summer Reading Challenge so you can log them all and be well on your way to a fun prize!