November 2025 Mystery Kit-Psychological Thrillers/Mystery

What is a psychological thriller? According to AI, it is a literary genre that uses suspense, tension, and psychological conflict to explore the mind, often using a unreliable narrator. The genre delves into the psychology of its characters, exploring their fears, obsessions, and unstable emotional states. Deception and hidden agendas are key elements, often used to manipulate characters and the audience. This type of book also often overlaps with mystery and horror.

According to Amazon, here are some of the top selling psychological thrillers:
The Family Upstairs by Lisa Jewell
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
The Girl on the Train by Paula Hopkins
The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides
The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn
The Whispers by Heidi Perks
And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie
The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris
Shutter Island by Dennis LaHane

What will you be reading? What can you recommend?

Wiki if you will: https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/2025_MysteryKIT

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson has been on my TBR shelf for a while and is tagged as a psychological thriller, so I think maybe this is its chance.

Planning to read something by Freida McFadden. I've never read her before, but I have a niece who raves about her books. I'll have to ask her to recommend a specific title.

I have set aside The Nurse by Claire Allan for November.

Just a heads-up that I have created the 2026 Category Challenge group: https://www.librarything.com/ngroups/24919/2026-Category-Challenge. Stop by to get a head start on planning next year's challenge!

(Cross-posted to a bunch of threads; sorry if you see this a thousand times!)

I plan to read Peril at End House by Dame Agatha.

I would like to read Under Lying by Janelle Harris.

I can heartily recommend Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

This can be a twofer......the same topic as Scaredykit!

I am reading All Around Town by Mary Higgins Clark

I'm finally going to get to Wrong Place Wrong Time by Gillian McAllister.

I read The Midnight Feast by Lucy Foley
With an abundance of over-privileged young people, this seemed more like a YA novel. Not to my taste. I’ve had my fill of wealthy over-privileged people in the news recently.

I read The Maid's Diary by Loreth Anne White.

Just finished
SHE DIDN’T SEE IT COMING
by Shari Lapena.

>11 VivienneR: I tried listening to the audiobook. Couldn't finish it, but I've liked some of Foley's other books.

>14 beccac220: That's exactly what happened to me! Too bad, but I won't cross her off my author list - yet.

Hi all, just an FYI that CAT voting is in progress over at the 2026 group! Polls close on Saturday, November 15, so be sure to submit your votes by then to help choose next year's CATs: https://www.librarything.com/topic/374659#8995115.

(Cross-posting this at a bunch of threads.)

Simenon’s books aren’t usually tagged as psychological, but it is an important element, especially when Maigret investigates. In Mon ami Maigret it is doubly so, because Maigret is being shadowed in his work by an inspector from Scotland Yard, as a work experience, and thus he constantly questions himself if and how this presence affects his work.

>17 MissWatson: I agree. Simenon's work is very moody, and he really plays on subtly distorting ordinary situations to create a creepy atmosphere.

I read The Perfect Son by Frieda McFadden.

I read The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins. Psychological thrillers aren't usually my thing, but I enjoyed this one.

I read Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. I think I'm in the minority in that I did not enjoy this one.

Bad Move by Linwood Barclay
Barclay’s debut novel about making a bad choice is one of his funniest. One bad move led to one after another… Barclay is one of my favourite mystery authors.

December is posted https://www.librarything.com/topic/375419

I ended up with two for this challenge: Peril at End House and A Case of Mice and Murder.

Just finished The Suspect by Fiona Barton
Or, a red alert for parents: what not to allow your teenage children to do. It’s a tragic tale of what happened to young people on a trip to Bangkok and the worst part was that all the signs were there. It was quite drawn out but a gripping psychological mystery novel.

The Last House on Needless Street

This was a book bullet from lowelibrary and was basically impossible to put down. I think I ended up finishing it in two sittings. Like your average psychological thriller, it features unreliable narrator elements, (which I know is not everyone's cup of tea,) but that is really where the similarities end. It's hard to describe the experience of reading it without spoiling the best parts of the experience. Like April, I would recommend picking this book up without reading too much about it.

All Around Town by Mary Higgins Clark ★★★

When Laurie Kenyon, a twenty-one-year-old student, is accused of murdering her English professor, she has no memory of the crime. Her fingerprints, however, are everywhere. When she asks her sister, attorney Sarah, to mount her defense, Sarah in turn brings in psychiatrist Justin Donnelly. Kidnapped at the age of four and victimized for two years, Laurie has developed astounding coping skills. Only when the unbearable memories of those lost years are released can the truth of the crime come out—and only then can the final sadistic plan of her abductor, whose obsession is stronger than ever, be revealed.

This much-used trope was neither surprising nor twisty. Figured it out halfway through.