The Christmas season is upon us and all around are cheerful rom-coms and meet cutes. But what if you are like me and enjoy more dark and intriguing storylines, a little thrill to go along with all the holiday cheer and no, I’m not referring to The Grinch Who Stole Christmas. So sit back, prop your feet up, grab your furry reading companion, a soft blanket and a nice relaxing hot beverage and dig into these Christmas themed thriller’s from past years to the present.
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The Christmas Guest
by Peter Swanson
An American art student in London is invited to join a classmate for the holidays at Starvewood Hall, her family’s Cotswold manor house. But behind the holly and pine boughs, secrets are about to unravel, revealing this seemingly charming English village’s grim history.
Ashley Smith, an American art student in London for her junior year, was planning on spending Christmas alone, but a last-minute invitation from fellow student Emma Chapman brings her to Starvewood Hall, country residence of the Chapman family. The Cotswold manor house, festooned in pine boughs and crammed with guests for Christmas week, is a dream come true for Ashley. She is mesmerized by the cozy, firelit house, the large family, and the charming village of Clevemoor, but also by Adam Chapman, Emma’s aloof and handsome brother.
But Adam is being investigated by the local police over the recent brutal slaying of a girl from the village, and there is a mysterious stranger who haunts the woodland path between Starvewood Hall and the local pub. Ashley begins to wonder what kind of story she is actually inhabiting. Is she in a grand romance? A gothic tale? Or has she wandered into something far more sinister and terrifying than she’d ever imagined?
Over thirty years later the events of that horrific week are revisited, along with a diary from that time. What began in a small English village in 1989 reaches its ghostly conclusion in modern-day New York, many Christmas seasons later.
Dying for Christmas
by Tammy Cohen
A novel full of twists, surprising turns and suspense.
Out Christmas shopping one December afternoon, Jessica Gould meets the charming Dominic Lacey and impulsively agrees to go home with him for a drink. What follows is a Twelve Days of Christmas from hell as Lacey holds Jessica captive, forcing her to wear his missing wife’s gowns and eat lavish holiday meals. Each day he gifts her with one item from his twisted past—his dead sister’s favorite toy, disturbing family photos, a box of teeth. As the days pass and the “gifts” become darker and darker, Jessica realizes that Lacey has a plan for her, and he never intends to let her go.
But Jessica has a secret of her own … a secret that may just mean she has a chance to make it out alive.
The Christmas Murder Game
by Alexandra Benedict
Twelve clues. Twelve keys. Twelve days of Christmas. But how many will die before Twelfth Night?
The annual Christmas Game is afoot at Endgame House, the Armitages’ grand family home. This year’s prize is to die for–deeds to the house itself–but Lily Armitage has no intention of returning. She hasn’t been back to Endgame since her mother died, twenty-one years ago, and she has no intention of claiming the house that haunts her dreams.
Until, that is, she receives a letter from her aunt promising that the game’s riddles will give her the keys not only to Endgame, but to its darkest secrets, including the identity of her mother’s murderer.
Now, Lily must compete with her estranged cousins for the twelve days of Christmas. The snow is thick, the phone lines are down, and no one is getting in or out. Lily will have to keep her wits about her, because not everyone is playing fair, and there’s no telling how many will die before the winner is declared.
The Family Game
by Catherine Steadman
A rich, eccentric family. A time-honored tradition. Or a lethal game of survival? One woman finds out what it really takes to join the 1%.
Harry is a novelist on the brink of stardom; Edward, her husband-to-be, is seemingly perfect. In love and freshly engaged, their bliss is interrupted by the reemergence of the Holbecks, Edward’s eminent family and the embodiment of American old money. For years, they’ve dominated headlines and pulled society’s strings, and Edward left them all behind to forge his own path. But there are eyes and ears everywhere. It was only a matter of time before they were pulled back in . . .
After all, even though he’s long severed ties with his family, Edward is set to inherit it all. Harriet is drawn to the glamour and sophistication of the Holbecks, who seem to welcome her with open arms, but everything changes when she meets Robert, the inescapably magnetic head of the family. At their first meeting, Robert slips Harry a cassette tape, revealing a shocking confession which sets the inevitable game in motion.
What is it about Harry that made him give her that tape? A thing that has the power to destroy everything? As she ramps up her quest for the truth, she must endure the Holbecks’ savage Christmas traditions all the while knowing that losing this game could be deadly.
The Secret Santa
by Trish Harnetiaux
You’re invited to a lavish Christmas party in an isolated mansion.
And your hosts will do anything to keep you from finding out their secrets…
When husband and wife Henry and Claudine organize their company’s Christmas party in a remote mansion, they expect it to be a night to remember.
But the festive mood quickly turns sour when a sinister gift is unwrapped in the Secret Santa gift exchange.
As heavy snow traps the guests inside the mountainside lodge, it quickly becomes clear that one of the party is out for revenge.
It’s no longer just about enduring the evening. It’s about making sure you get out alive.
A lavish locked-room mystery with a seasonal edge.
The Deaths of December
by Susi Holliday
It looks like a regular advent calendar.
Until DC Becky Greene starts opening doors…and discovers a crime scene behind almost every one.
The police hope it’s a prank. Because if it isn’t, a murderer has just surfaced – someone who’s been killing for twenty years.
But why now? And why has he sent it to this police station?
As the country relaxes into festive cheer, Greene and DS Eddie Carmine must race against time to catch the killer. Because there are four doors left, and four murders will fill them…
It’s shaping up to be a deadly little Christmas.
Mistletoe And Murder
by Laura Stewart
Murder interrupts Christmas at a Scottish hotel, but which of the guests are guilty?
Amelia Adams has turned the Scottish mansion she inherited into a luxurious hotel. The holiday season is looking busy with the upcoming wedding of a self-made millionaire to his young fiancée—and a wide assortment of guests.
When Amelia gets a mysterious call from a stranger who says he has something to tell her, she is intrigued. But as a string of shocking events unfold, Amelia must turn her attention from merriment to murder . . .
The Santa Killer (Kindle Edition)
by Ross Greenwod
The Santa Killer is coming to town…
One night less than two weeks before Christmas, a single mother is violently assaulted. It’s a brutal crime at the time of year when there should be goodwill to all. When DI Barton begins his investigation, he’s surprised to find the victim is a woman with nothing to hide and no reason for anyone to hurt her.
A few days later, the mother of the woman attacked rings the police station. Her granddaughter has drawn a shocking picture. It seems she was looking out of the window when her mother was attacked. And when her grandmother asks the young girl who the person with the weapon is, she whispers two words.
Bad Santa.
The rumors start spreading, and none of the city’s women feel safe – which one of them will be next?
He’s got a list. It’s quite precise. It won’t matter even if you’re nice.
The Christmas Party
by Mikayla Davids
A family reunion. A shocking secret. A night to die for…
On a snowy December night, the Bailey family are gathered at an isolated hotel in the English countryside. They’re reuniting for the first time since the accident that shattered their lives ten years ago.
It’s a time for love and forgiveness. But more than one guest has an ulterior motive:
The perfect daughter
The alcoholic
The single mother
The liar
The handsome husband
The adulterer
The beautiful sister
The jealous sibling
The murderer…
As the clock strikes midnight, one member of the party is found dead at the foot of the grand marble staircase.
Everyone is a suspect. But which one of them is a killer?
Last Christmas
by Maria Frankland
Things can’t get much worse for Neil. He’s already losing the fight with drinking and depression, and has also lost the argument for where he and his wife Sacha are going to spend Christmas this year.
Due to illness, it’s going to be Sacha’s father’s last Christmas, and her mother wants the family all together. This includes Neil’s two brothers-in-law, and there’s no love lost between any of them, or between Sacha and one of her two sisters.
Three days in a confined space and an excess of alcohol intensifies several long-held resentments within the family.
Being in one another’s company is intolerable, and it’s apparent that Sacha’s father might not be the only family member ‘celebrating’ his final Christmas.
The House In The Woods
by Mark Dawson
Four murders. Two detectives. One mystifying crime.
On Christmas Eve, DCI Mackenzie Jones is called to a shooting at a remote farmhouse. Ralph Mallender believes his father lies dead inside. When three more bodies are discovered, it’s clear a festive family gathering has turned into a gruesome tragedy.
At first it seems like an open and shut case: a murder suicide committed by Ralph’s volatile brother Cameron. Then new evidence makes Mack suspect the man who reported the crime is in fact the perpetrator.
But Mack isn’t the only one with a stake in the case. Private investigator Atticus Priest has been hired to get Ralph acquitted. That means unearthing any weaknesses in Mack’s evidence.
Irascible, impatient and unpredictable, Atticus has weaknesses of his own. Mack knows all about them because they share a past – both professionally and personally. This time round, however, they aren’t on the same side. And as Atticus picks at the loose ends of the case, everything starts to unravel in a way neither of them could ever have predicted…
The Girl And The Black Christmas
by A. J. Rivers
When a mysterious package containing a severed hand is left at FBI agent Emma Griffin’s doorstep, Emma is suddenly pulled into one of the buried mysteries of her past.
Emma is looking forward to spending the holidays with the family she’s built around herself.
Bellamy, Eric, Dean, and Xavier are coming to Sherwood to celebrate the season with her and Sam, and she’s looking forward to spending some time relaxing and sharing traditions, old and new.
Before the festivities can begin, she takes a trip to Feathered Nest to bring some closure, but before they can leave, an email brings an uncomfortable reminder that there are always more questions to be answered.
Soon she discovers there is someone wanting to ensure that there is no peace or joy for Emma this year. The reminders of a past she doesn’t talk about and twisted gifts leave her in a brutal holiday rush to find the truth that was buried many years ago. Before the Bureau. Before Feathered Nest. Before this life.
This holiday, no matter how far Emma runs, death, disappearances, and mysteries follow.
What should be the most wonderful time of the year may turn into a nightmare she can’t escape.
The Christmas Appeal
by Janice Hallett
The Christmas season has arrived in Lower Lockwood, and the Fairway Players are busy rehearsing their festive holiday production of Jack and the Beanstalk to raise money for a new church roof. But despite the season, goodwill is distinctly lacking among the amateur theater enthusiasts with petty rivalries, a possibly asbestos-filled beanstalk, and some perennially absent players behind the scenes.
Of course, there’s also the matter of the dead body onstage. Who could possibly have had the victim on their naughty list? Join lawyers Femi and Charlotte as they investigate Christmas letters, examine emails, and pore over police transcripts to identify both the victim and killer before the curtain closes on their holiday production—for good.
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