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It’s a new month, which means I have a new roundup highlighting mystery, thrillers, and true crime books to absolutely have on your TBR. Hopefully, the weather is springing, and the outdoorsy readers can get their read-on in their favorite outside spot. If you’re an indoorsy reader—because spring means miserable allergies—may you have a lovely spot inside as you work through your criminally long TBR pile this April.
This month’s selection has a wide range of tropes, genres, subgenres, moods, and themes: Vera Wong is back with all her meddling and sleuthing; there’s a lawyer-led intelligence agency thriller; a landlady hires tenants to solve a murder; a twin takes her dead influencer sister’s identity; an autistic travel writer turns sleuth with his new crush; The Golden Girls star in a cozy murder mystery, and more.
And here’s a tip for spring cleaners: the audiobook formats pair wonderfully with getting chores done!
Vera Wong’s Guide to Snooping (on a Dead Man) (Vera Wong #2) by Jesse Q. Sutanto
For fans of amateur sleuths, multiple POV, and older protagonists (60s)!
Vera Wong, the meddling teahouse owner turned amateur sleuth, is back! Vera doesn’t want to be a bad person and ask the universe for another murder to occur for her to solve, but she does really want to solve another murder, so maybe send her a “bad guy” murder? Instead, while she’s reporting an identity theft scam to a policewoman (hopefully her future daughter-in-law), she takes a young woman under her wing and brings her to meet her new friend group—initially suspects in her first murder meddling case. While she starts with the goal of setting Millie up with a group member, she instead ends up helping Millie with the case of her missing friend…
If you want to start at the beginning of this fun series, pick up Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers.
The Snares by Rav Grewal-Kök
For fans of federal intelligence organizations, lawyer MCs, and thrillers!
At the end of George W. Bush’s presidency, federal prosecutor Neel Chima is brought into a new federal intelligence agency that is involved with home surveillance and foreign drone assassinations. It’s a complicated job for him on many levels—including because he’s part of a Sikh family and it’s separating him from his wife and children— but he believes that if the Freedom Center only kills a few targeted bad guys, then it will avoid wars and destroying entire cities full of people. That’s all before he makes a mistake at work, which plunges him deeper into this agency with unchecked power…
10 Marchfield Square by Nicola Whyte
For fans of neighborhood mysteries, unlikely paired amateur sleuths, and London setting!
In a block of apartments in London, a “minor criminal” is murdered, prompting Celeste van Duren, the landlady, to get two tenants to solve the case. Audrey is her cleaning lady and everyone likes her, and she knows all the tenants. Lewis doesn’t like anyone or anything. Now they have to team up, if they can get along well enough, and sleuth through all the tenants’ secrets…
Julie Chan is Dead by Liann Zhang
For fans of twins, social commentary (social media/influencers), satire, and psychological thrillers!
Julie Chan and her twin sister Chloe VanHuusen were separated as children and are practically estranged as adults. Chloe is a popular, wealthy influencer, and Julie is an unhappy cashier. When Julie finds Chloe dead, she ends up switching places with her twin and taking over her life. Rather than living a glamourous life, she is out of her depth and about to find out the true price of the influencer industry and her sister’s life…
How to Have a Killer Time in DC by Sam Lumley
For fans of fun, cozy mysteries with romance!
Oliver Popp is an autistic writer at a travel magazine who is about to have his life, and routines, flipped upside down. When he’s sent on an assignment to D.C. along with Ricky Warner, a free-spirit freelance photographer, Oliver finds himself crushing on Ricky. While they’re supposed to be in D.C. reporting on new tourist trends, they instead find themselves sleuthing when an old acquaintance of Oliver’s is killed…
Opal Watson: Private Eye by Brittany J. Thurman
For fans of middle grade mysteries, books based on podcasts, and child detectives!
Opal Watson spent the summer in New Orleans with her grandmother, so she isn’t aware of the mysterious noises bothering tenants in her Chicago apartment building until her friend fills her in. She may be nervous about starting a new school year, but her focus is quickly on solving the mysteries in her apartment building, a much bigger case than her past sleuthing for cat finding and locating lost objects!
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The Railway Conspiracies (Dee and Lao Mystery #2) by S. J. Rozan, John Shen Yen Nee
For fans of historical mysteries, Sherlock-inspired duos, characters based on real people in history, and action!
Lao She is an academic in London who ended up partnered with Judge Dee—after being asked to swap places with Judge Dee when he was in prison—to solve a murder. Now, this odd couple is back in London in 1924 when Judge Dee has to “intercept a transaction between a Russian diplomat and a Japanese mercenary.” After the job is complete, a thank you party is thrown, but when a banking official ends up poisoned afterward, there’s a new murder case to solve…
If you want to see how Judge Dee and Lao She got partnered together, pick up the first book in the series, The Murder of Mr. Ma!
Murder by Cheesecake (Golden Girls #1) by Rachel Ekstrom Courage
For fans of The Golden Girls and cozy mysteries!
Did you ever watch The Golden Girls and wish they were solving murders? Your wish has been granted! Rose’s St. Olaf family is in town for a wedding, and dead bodies aren’t on the gift registry, so when Dorothy’s date is found dead in the freezer, it’s a problem. Everyone is a suspect, and the ladies will have to name the killer quickly before the wedding–and more, cheesecake–is spoiled!
The Chow Maniac (Noodle Shop Mystery #11) by Vivien Chien
For fans of secret organizations and foodie cozy mysteries!
Three men—all part of the same Asian secret society, Eight Immortals—have died. Suspicious much? This is why Lydia, a private detective, asks her friend Lana, an amateur sleuth, for help. With delicious food, Chinese mythology, friends, assistants, and a police detective boyfriend, they’re sure to solve this mystery!
If you want to start at the beginning of this delicious series, pick up Death by Dumpling!
Pride or Die by CL Montblanc
For fans of YA high school set mysteries and queer clubs!
The LGBTQ+ Club at Hillview High gets banned, and its four members are placed on academic probation after they find the head cheerleader unconscious and bloody. Being that she’s the main school bully, the club members are immediately the main suspects. But they’re not going down without a fight, and they will figure out who is behind the attempted murder!
The Museum Detective by Maha Khan Phillips
For fans of armchair traveling, museum curators/archaeologist leads, and sarcophagus!
Dr. Gul Delani works in Karachi as a museum curator and is a top expert in archaeology and ancient civilizations. So it’s no surprise the police would call her when, during a drug bust, they find “a mummy—life-size, seemingly authentic, its sarcophagus decorated with symbols from Persepolis, the capital of the Achaemenid Empire.” She and her team throw themselves, no matter the cost, into solving this mystery…
The Volunteer: The Failure of the Death Penalty in America and One Inmate’s Quest to Die with Dignity by Gianna Toboni
For readers of journalist investigated true crime and people wanting to learn about capital punishment.
Gianna Toboni uses a central case—Scott Dozier, who demanded the state follow through with his killing—to look at capital punishment in the US, a history of death penalty killings, and what happens when death-row inmates are left in a state of limbo.