A Book A Week

Jennette McCurdy took the literary world by storm with the 2022 release of her memoir I’m Glad My Mom Died. The former child star blended dark humor, a matter-of-fact writing style, and clear-eyed reflection on the traumas of her upbringing to tell her story in a way that captured the attention of both fans and casual readers alike. While I didn’t read the memoir myself, I was certainly aware of the cultural moment it became. So when I was offered a copy of McCurdy’s debut novel, Half His Age, I was curious to see whether that distinctive voice would translate successfully into fiction.

Seventeen-year-old Waldo has always had to fend for herself. Raised by a teenage mother trapped in a cycle of unemployment, addiction, and a revolving door of deadbeat boyfriends, Waldo has learned to survive by keeping her head down and her expectations low. She goes to school, works a dead-end job, and does her best to pass for normal. Money is scarce, her wardrobe is threadbare, and even basic self-care feels like a luxury. But she makes do.

When we first meet her, Waldo is going through the motions of an unfulfilling relationship with her high school boyfriend, more focused on the mechanics of intimacy than any real connection. It’s not satisfying, but it’s familiar. This, for better or worse, is the shape of her life. Waldo doesn’t dream of something more, because she’s never been given reason to believe more is possible.

That begins to change when she meets Mr. Korgy. For the first time, Waldo allows herself to imagine a different future. Korgy is a middle-aged creative writing teacher with a wife, a child, and the lingering disappointment of an abandoned writing career. Teaching was never the dream, but it’s where he landed. Waldo is immediately drawn to him. He’s attentive, candid, and challenges her to be just as honest on the page.

She can’t quite explain the pull, only that he represents everything absent from her world: experience, confidence, intellectual passion. Most of all, he seems to truly see her and to like what he sees. Waldo knows her feelings cross a line, but desire rarely obeys reason. And as her fixation deepens, she begins to suspect that Mr. Korgy’s interest might extend beyond the classroom as well.

Half His Age marks Jennette McCurdy’s fiction debut as bold, unflinching, and undeniably compelling. She writes with a plain, matter-of-fact directness that makes the novel a page-turner, even as its subject matter grows increasingly uncomfortable. It’s spare, unsentimental prose that refuses to soften the edges of what it’s depicting, and that restraint is part of what makes the book so effective.

It’s best to address the elephant in the room upfront. This is a novel centered on an inappropriate relationship between a teacher and his student, complete with explicit sexual encounters and clear emotional grooming. There are many moments that are difficult to stomach, so this will not be a book for every reader. The story's trajectory feels grimly familiar, and the impending disaster is visible from miles away.

That said, McCurdy resists turning the story into something simplistic or purely moralistic. Waldo is unmistakably a victim, but her history of neglect and instability distorts her understanding of what love, attention, and agency look like, leading her to actively yearn for the relationship she’s being exploited by. Korgy, meanwhile, is fully complicit, his shame and personal disappointment creating a hollow rationalization for behavior he knows is wrong. Together, they form a dynamic that is repellent and tragic in equal measure. It all left me deeply unsettled, particularly on Waldo’s behalf.

I hesitate to say that I enjoyed Half His Age, but I did appreciate what it tries to be. While the story itself feels well-trodden, McCurdy’s voice is clear, confident, and purposeful. This is sure to be a divisive debut that will provoke strong reactions on both sides. Even so, McCurdy’s transition to fiction is impressive. She's chosen not to take the easy approach to her writing, and that's got me curious to see where this journey will take her next. 

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 9)

Every month, Amazon sends me an email offering me a free ebook from their First Reads program. And every month, I dutifully browse the selections, choose a title (or two), and download it with genuine enthusiasm. Then, almost immediately, I forget it exists. Instead, it joins the many other well-intentioned downloads quietly haunting my Kindle library.

But that ends today. I’m making a conscious effort to read the books I already own instead of endlessly chasing shiny new releases that demand my attention. So I started with a First Reads pick that’s been languishing on my Kindle for far too long: Into the Fall by Tamara L. Miller.

It had been a peaceful night in the tent, all things considered. But when Sarah wakes the next morning, she can immediately sense that something is wrong. At first, she tries to stay calm. Her husband, Matthew, is an early riser, so it isn’t unusual that he’s not lying beside her. Still, as she replays the night before, Sarah can’t remember him coming to bed at all.

She does remember her daughter slipping into the tent, mumbling something about Daddy—but that could have been a dream. Or at least, she tells herself it was.

When Sarah steps outside and takes in their lakeside campsite, reality begins to settle in. Her two children are there. Matthew is not. Minutes stretch into hours, and as a storm gathers over the lake, Sarah is forced to confront a terrifying truth. Wherever her husband has gone, he may not be coming back.

Into the Fall has the makings of a compelling suspense novel. A missing person, simmering relationship drama, and a remote setting are all perfect ingredients for this kind of story. I breezed through the pages, eager to learn Matthew’s fate.

As I read on, though, a few issues with the execution became harder to ignore. Tamara L. Miller leans heavily on verbose description, which at times stalls the narrative momentum. The novel seems unsure of what it wants to be—literary suspense or straight-ahead thriller—and ends up landing uncomfortably between the two, never fully committing to either.

While I eventually adjusted to the writing style, I had more trouble with how the story’s reveals were handled. Much of the suspense hinges on how much Sarah did—or didn’t—know about Matthew, and the role she may or may not have played in his disappearance. The ending does ultimately answer the novel’s central questions, but it does so in a way that feels more explanatory than suspenseful, laying its cards on the table rather than letting the tension fully unfold. It’s a choice that slightly undercuts what could have been a more powerful payoff. Still, Into the Fall remains an accessible, quick read with an intriguing premise, even if it doesn’t fully capitalize on all the tension it sets up.

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 8)

For twenty years, Deedee has lived in the shadow of her kid sister’s disappearance. It was a summer night in 1999 when her nine-year-old sister, Roisin, entered the Hanging Woods. Everyone in their small Irish town knew the stories about that place. Children were warned away. No one went into the woods without a reason. But Roisin did, and she was never seen again.

Deedee can’t say for certain if that night is what led her to become a cop, but she knows it never truly left her. The unanswered questions, the guilt, the sense that something was missed, it’s all still there, quietly eating away at her. She’s spent years trying to hold herself together, and it’s getting harder to pretend she’s succeeded.

When Deedee crosses paths with Caitlin again, she wants nothing to do with her. Caitlin was Roisin’s best friend, the last person to see her alive. The disappearance marked Caitlin, too, though in a very different way, sending her down a path of petty crime and bad decisions she never quite escaped. Now, with her mother’s death, Caitlin has returned to the town she once fled.

Reluctantly drawn back into each other’s lives, Deedee and Caitlin are forced to reckon with a past they’ve spent years trying to bury. The Hanging Woods are still there, waiting. Whatever happened that night in 1999 was never finished, and the woods aren’t done with them yet.

In Darkrooms, Rebecca Hannigan delivers a psychological suspense novel steeped in blame, grief, and unanswered questions. The story hinges on two characters struggling under the weight of a shared history they can’t escape, even as they desperately try to move beyond it. Both Deedee and Caitlin feel layered and authentic, drawing the reader in despite their flaws and unlikable tendencies.

The first half of the novel unfolds slowly, with Hannigan taking a deliberate approach to atmosphere and world-building. She crafts a setting that simmers with quiet menace, and her literary prose kept me engaged even as I began to wonder where it was all leading. It isn’t until a twist reframes the story that the novel truly finds its momentum. From there, the book shifts from an introspective character study into a more propulsive mystery, driving the pace through the final stretch.

While I’m not entirely convinced the ending fully justifies the journey, Darkrooms is an impressive debut. Readers who enjoy the moody, character-driven suspense of authors like Tana French or Liz Moore will find plenty here to admire. Even when it falters, Hannigan’s control of mood and character proves that she is an author with a clear vision. I’ll be curious to see how she builds on that promise in future work.

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 7)

The best thrillers hook you from the very first page, setting up a situation so tantalizing you can’t help but keep reading. That’s long been the case with Alice Feeney’s books. She has a knack for devising irresistible hooks, writing stories you’re instantly drawn into. While she may not always stick the landing, Feeney never plays it safe. She always swings for the fences. Her latest thriller, My Husband’s Wife, is no exception. Its a twisty page-turner with an opening so audacious it may be the hookiest first chapter I read all year.

It’s been a big week for Eden Fox. She’s just moved into Spyglass, a historic home in the small coastal town of Hope Falls, and tonight marks her first gallery exhibition as an artist. Sure, it’s only the local gallery in her new hometown, but Eden can’t help believing this could be the break she’s been dreaming of. Naturally, her nerves are shot, so she turns to the one thing that always calms her: a run. As she moves, her worries fall away, leaving only the sound of her measured breath and her feet hitting the pavement in steady rhythm.

When Eden returns home, she feels refreshed and renewed—ready to face the day ahead. But when she slides her key into the lock of her new house, it doesn’t fit. She tries again. Still nothing. She left everything inside—her phone, her wallet—so, hoping her husband is still home, she rings the doorbell.

Relief flickers when she sees movement on the other side of the door. But when it opens, she’s greeted by a woman she doesn’t recognize—one who looks eerily like her. Eden demands to know who she is and why she’s in her home. The woman calmly insists the house is hers.

And when Eden’s husband appears at the door to see what the commotion is about, the situation turns even more terrifying. He insists that the stranger standing beside him is his wife.

From the very beginning of My Husband’s Wife, Alice Feeney presents readers with an impossible situation. It’s a case of stolen identity that had me glued to the pages from the start. She pairs this central mystery with the story of another woman who, six months earlier, inherited Spyglass, was diagnosed with terminal cancer, and encountered a mysterious medical company that claimed it could predict the exact date of a person’s death.

These two threads alternate, pulling readers across shifting perspectives and timelines until everything converges in a conclusion that feels both earned and inevitable. Feeney isn’t aiming for strict realism here, but if you’re willing to go with the flow, you’ll be rewarded. I’ve found her work to be hit or miss in the past, but My Husband’s Wife is a definite hit for me. Go in with as few preconceptions as possible and enjoy the ride. I certainly did.

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 6)

Ashley Elston burst onto the thriller scene a couple of years ago with First Lie Wins. Making the jump from her usual young adult genre proved to be a major success, as she delivered a twisted, multi-POV thrill ride that I devoured in a single sitting. Naturally, I was eager to see what she’d do next, and that arrived this week in the form of another standalone thriller, Anatomy of an Alibi. It’s yet another page-turner that hooked me from the very first chapter.

Like her first thriller, the less you know about Anatomy of an Alibi going in, the more you’ll enjoy it. As usual, I think the publisher’s blurb gives away a bit too much. The real fun here lies in the discovery. That said, the basic setup is simple enough to share without spoiling the twists that make this book work. The novel centers on two women, Camille and Aubrey, who both suspect that Camille’s hotshot lawyer husband, Ben, is hiding something. They hatch a risky plan: Aubrey will pose as Camille, distracting Ben while the real Camille spies on him. But when Ben is found murdered the very next day, both women are left scrambling to construct an airtight alibi.

Anatomy of an Alibi proves that Ashley Elston has a real knack for crafting twisty, page-turning thrillers. She leans into shifting perspectives, flashbacks, and well-placed red herrings, weaving them together into a suspenseful ride that kept me glued to the pages. Yes, things get a little over the top at times, but that’s part of the fun with a book like this. And while the ending didn’t quite land as strongly as I’d hoped, with some character motivations left frustratingly opaque, the journey to get there was more than worth it. Elston has clearly found her stride in the suspense genre, and she’s quickly earned a spot on my must-read list.

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 5)

I read a lot of books, so committing to a series can be surprisingly difficult. I’ve started countless series over the years, but it’s rare for me to follow through and read the second book. It’s not for lack of interest. There are just so many other options competing for my attention. In fact, I think James Patterson’s Alex Cross is the only series I’ve read completely from start to finish. Even longtime favorites like Patricia Cornwell’s Kay Scarpetta and John Sandford’s Prey series have seen me dip in and out rather than stay the course.

So when I picked up John McMahon’s Head Cases last year—the first in a new series featuring FBI Agent Gardner Camden—I was genuinely surprised. Not only did I enjoy it, but I also finished the book eager for more. Now the sequel, Inside Man, is here, and I have a strong feeling this is going to be one of those rare series I actually keep up with.

McMahon drops us back in with the FBI’s Patterns and Recognition (PAR) unit, led by the brilliant but socially awkward Gardner Camden. The team is deep into an investigation of a militia group stockpiling weapons when their informant is suddenly killed. At first glance, the murder seems connected to the militia, but the evidence doesn’t quite add up. Someone else appears to be pulling the strings.

As the PAR unit digs deeper, they uncover the informant’s connection to another man, one suspected of murdering and burying women across Florida. Have they stumbled onto a serial killer? And if so, how does that trail intersect with the domestic terrorism case already on their plate? As Camden works to untangle both threads, he’s pushed to his breaking point. He’s built his career on recognizing patterns others miss, but this case may finally overwhelm even his remarkable instincts.

With Inside Man, John McMahon proves that there are not only more stories to tell featuring Garner Camden, but that each installment can stand apart from the last. While Inside Man lacks some of the breakneck urgency of the cat-and-mouse chase that drove the first book, I didn’t mind seeing these characters operate in a different kind of story. In fact, I appreciated getting a clearer sense of how this specialized unit is meant to deploy across a wide range of FBI cases.

McMahon also gives his characters room to grow, allowing Camden to grapple with the realities of his mother’s illness, his daughter growing up (and possibly sharing some of his own remarkable abilities), and even the tentative beginnings of a romance. That added emotional depth enriches our connection to the series and makes Inside Man feel like more than just a follow-up. It feels like a meaningful step forward. It’s a direction that has me fully invested in wherever this series goes next.

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 4)

All good country songs are tinged with a bit of heartache, and Dahlia “Doll” Devine has lived through enough pain to write a thousand of them. But reliving those moments feels too raw to put pen to paper, which is probably why Dahlia prefers to sing the classics instead. Dolly, Loretta, Patsy—the country queens whose songs echo pieces of her own life. Her stage may be small, just a corner of a local Chicago pub, but it’s hers.

For a while, life finally looked promising. Then Dahlia’s boyfriend, Joey, vanished, taking their rent money with him. Suddenly, she’s homeless, alone, and desperate for a break. With nowhere else to turn, she leans on Alex McPhee, the pub’s owner and the man who once helped her escape a rough childhood. Dahlia hates asking for help again, but she knows Alex has always been there when she’s needed him most.

They say when it rains, it pours, and that couldn’t be truer for Dahlia. One night, her mother—the woman she hasn’t spoken to in over twenty years—shows up at the pub without warning. The next day, a panicked young woman arrives asking about her missing mother. Dahlia’s mother. Even though the suburban mom the girl describes sounds nothing like the woman who abandoned her years ago, Dahlia agrees to help track her down. But when a body turns up outside the pub, it becomes clear that this reunion is only the beginning of something much darker. 

With Wreck Your Heart, Lori Rader-Day transports readers to the hazy corner of a hole-in-the-wall honky-tonk, a place that feels worn-in, authentic, and alive. You can practically hear the jukebox humming as you wait for the band to take the stage for their next set. Rader-Day populates this world with the kind of colorful, lived-in characters you’d expect to find there, all anchored by a down-on-her-luck heroine chasing dreams that feel just out of reach.

I was so invested in this setting and its people that I didn’t mind the slower burn as the story built toward its central mystery. And once it did, I was completely hooked. While Wreck Your Heart carries the bones of a classic whodunit, it’s doing something richer than that. At its core, this is a deeply felt character study that just happens to be driven by a mystery, resulting in a novel that feels engaging, original, and full of heart.

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 3)

I’ve been looking forward to The Storm ever since I finished Rachel Hawkins’s last thriller, The Heiress, way back in January of 2024. Hawkins has established herself as the queen of the standalone popcorn thriller, and her yearly releases have become one of my favorite ways to kick off a new reading year. So when she hit pause on that schedule and didn’t release a new thriller in 2025, I found myself eagerly awaiting any scrap of news from one of my go-to authors.

Then, late last fall, I finally learned that Hawkins would be returning with a new thriller, The Storm, at the start of this year. Even better, my friends at St. Martin’s Press provided me with a copy to review. The wait was finally over! But would it be worth the wait?

I’m happy to report that I read this one in a single sitting, which is par for the course with a Hawkins thriller. The story is set around St. Medard’s Bay, Alabama—a coastal town with a notorious history of hurricanes and murder. Geneva Corliss is the current steward of the Rosalie Inn, a century-old hotel famous for surviving every deadly storm that’s ravaged the small town. The inn has seen better days, and times are tough for Geneva. Between keeping the Rosalie afloat and caring for her Alzheimer-riddled mother, she’s desperate for a break.

That break seems to arrive when August Fletcher, an author, chooses the Rosalie as his base while writing a true-crime book. His subject is Lo Bailey, the local girl infamously accused of murdering her lover, political golden boy Landon Fitzroy, during Hurricane Marie in 1984. Geneva isn’t particularly interested in solving a decades-old crime, but she can’t help imagining the windfall the inn could see if the book becomes a bestseller.

When August arrives, however, he isn’t alone. He’s joined by his subject, Lo Bailey. Lo claims she’s returned to her hometown to finally clear her name, but the closer Geneva grows to both Lo and August, the more she begins to wonder whether Lo is really there for justice…or revenge. As yet another storm bears down on St. Medard’s Bay, Geneva finds herself caught in a tempest of secrets, lies, and a past that refuses to stay buried.

As I’ve already mentioned, The Storm pulled me in from the very first page, and I couldn’t put it down until I’d finished it in one sitting. Hawkins relies on shifting perspectives, time jumps, and the ever-present threat of an approaching storm to generate suspense. It's a combination that propels the story forward at a relentless pace.

That said, I couldn’t shake the feeling that everything wrapped up a bit too neatly. I saw where the story was headed well before the major twists were revealed, and while I was thoroughly engaged in the moment, it didn’t quite linger with me after I turned the final page. Still, as a fast, entertaining popcorn thriller, The Storm delivers exactly what it promises. I was more than happy to spend an afternoon immersed in Rachel Hawkins’s writing, and I’m already looking forward to her next novel—hopefully arriving next year.

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 2)

I’m kicking off 2026 with a book that’s been on my radar since it was published at the start of last year (and how strange is it to think of 2025 as last year?). Tell Me What You Did by Carter Wilson is the first pick for the mystery/thriller book club I joined last year, making it the perfect choice to start my reading year. The novel promises a fresh take on the true-crime podcast angle that’s become so prevalent in contemporary crime fiction, and I was eager to see how Wilson would make it his own.

Poe Webb is the host of a wildly popular podcast where people anonymously confess to crimes they’ve committed. Each guest is given fifteen uninterrupted minutes to tell their story. Poe makes no promises that law enforcement won’t come knocking, but the lure of anonymity paired with instant notoriety has proven irresistible. Remarkably, both the confessors and the audience have embraced the format. There have been a few guests who veer into the unhinged, but Poe is usually able to leave the darkness behind once the recording ends.

What her listeners don’t know is that Poe has secrets of her own. When a man comes on the show and begins confessing to his crimes, Poe immediately senses something familiar about him. Then he reveals the truth. He killed a woman. Not just any woman. He killed Poe’s mother. Suddenly, the past comes rushing back with brutal force. Poe was there that night. She saw her mother die. There’s only one problem. This man can’t be her mother’s killer. That man is dead. Poe knows this for sure because she’s the one who killed him.

Tell Me What You Did sees seasoned thriller author Carter Wilson deliver his own original spin on the podcast trope that’s become so prevalent in crime fiction. There’s a delicious irony in Poe building a career around other people confessing their crimes while harboring the secret that she’s committed dark acts of her own. That tension creates a compelling and surprisingly fresh juxtaposition between hero and villain.

Do things veer into the unbelievable at times? Of course. But I was so invested in the cat-and-mouse game at the heart of the story that I found myself far less bothered by it than I might have been otherwise. All in all, Tell Me What You Did is a solid psychological thriller and an excellent way to kick off a new year of reading.

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 1)