We might associate thrillers with cops and detectives solving mysteries in gritty urban settings, but the latest must-read thriller novels take place in exotic or otherwise foreign locales. It’s a refreshing change of pace, whether the protagonist is going undercover as a writer at the retreat in Lake Atitlan, Guatemala, in search of her vanished daughter or hunkering down at a spa resort in the Indian Himalayas after a job loss only for there to be a murderer among the guests. Two of our top thriller novels are set in the far-flung but still-trendy Maldives: one with a plot built around a reality television show gone awry and another about a girlfriends’ getaway timed with not only one woman’s divorce but also the anniversary of a tragedy in their shared past.
Now that August has arrived, these page-turners are the perfect reads to take on a lengthy plane ride or, if circumstances have you staycationing this year, to your favorite stretch of local shoreline.
The Midnight Feast by Lucy Foley
Summer Solstice seems like the perfect time to debut a luxury hotel in the British countryside where everyone’s wearing linen and sipping CBD cocktails, right? Foley’s seventh thriller novel takes you into The Manor’s opening weekend, presenting various points of view, from the newly minted kitchen help to a sleuthing attendee who’s pretty sure this resort is not what it seems, not to mention that of the owner herself. The antagonists include a group of people in the adjacent forest bitter about the land-use battle that’s still raging—and what about that fire and body found just as the party’s getting started?
One Perfect Couple by Ruth Ware
Trying out for a reality television show filming in the Maldives is a literal ticket out for Lyla (bogged down with a research project) and Nico (an actor searching for his next big break) of the rut in their relationship, or so they think. They’ll compete against four other couples at Ever After Island—which is utterly void of anyone else—to win a cash sum. All they have to do is survive the challenges thrown at them, which escalate once the fresh-
The Paris Widow by Kimberly Belle
On their last day in Paris after a whirlwind Europe vacation, a couple from Atlanta swoons over galettes in a café—only to have a bomb go off a few minutes later. Now her husband—a collector of rare artifacts—is missing, and the wife does not want to go home until she finds him, dead or alive. For fans of art thrillers, this one offers a lens into the dark world of blood antiquities, essentially illicit trafficking of cultural artifacts where the provenance is deeply shady. This is Belle’s ninth thriller novel and much as in the others, she digs into the idea that we may never really know our spouses.
Bad Tourists by Caro Carver
Three middle-aged women united by a decades-old murderous tragedy in England embark on a five-star, no-holds-barred luxury trip to the Maldives, staying at the fictitious Sapphire Island Resort. The trip also marks one of their pending divorces, and there’s a charming single Spanish male among the guests. But when a woman in another villa appears to be in danger, they reach out to help, not yet understanding how twisted their stay is going to become or who is going to end up dead on the beach.
Death in the Air by Ram Murali
In Murali’s first novel, vulnerability enters Ro Krishna’s life when a job in Prague goes belly up and a new friend whom he meets at another friend’s 40th birthday in Bermuda dangles an opportunity: why not unwind at the Samsara in the Indian Himalayas? (Spoiler alert: Samsara is the Sanskrit word for the karmic cycle of death and rebirth.) As a first-generation child of Indian parents, he figures this is the ideal spot for some R&R. Much like the Hulu show “Nine Perfect Strangers,” each guest is in search of enlightenment. But will it come at a cost? Because people are ending up dead.
The Deepest Lake by Andromeda Romano-Lax
What’s a mother to do when her daughter, an aspiring writer, goes missing after working at a famous writer’s retreat in Lake Atitlan, Guatemala? Rose signs up for that same writing retreat, vowing to learn more about Eva Marshall, the woman who runs it, and slips into the façade of a writer enamored by Marshall. As a seasoned novelist, Romano-Lax takes readers into Rose’s point of view and also that of her daughter, Jules, to get to the bottom of this great mystery, which is as deep as the lake where Jules presumably drowned.
Ladykiller by Katherine Wood
Everybody’s got that friend they would do anything for but who also routinely annoys them. That’s how Abby feels about Gia, which explains her unease with accepting an all-expenses-paid trip to celebrate Gia’s birthday in Sweden despite feeling snubbed by Gia’s shotgun marriage and affluent upbringing. However, Gia is not in Sweden to greet her, nor is she at her Greek Island estate. Abby sets off to find her. Wood’s thriller novel is interwoven with excerpts of Gia’s memoir-in-progress, helping Abby find clues as to where she fled.
Look in the Mirror by Catherine Steadman
This story in this great mystery book is told from two points of view: those of Maria, a nanny tasked to watch a family who just doesn’t show up to their British Virgin Islands mod estate, and Nina, who just learned that her recently deceased father left her a home in the B.V.I. that she knew nothing about. Nina is super curious about this aspect of her father’s past, and so is Maria, who has a particular fascination with what’s behind the locked door and why she can’t enter.
The Unwedding by Ally Condie
Set in wildly gorgeous Big Sur, California, Ellery is riding solo on what was to be an epic 20th wedding anniversary trip—and forced to observe wedding celebrations at her accommodations, the fictitious Resort at Broken Point. That friction between sad and happy comes to a screeching halt when a mudslide closes the resort and the groom is found dead, along with another guest. No one is happy and everyone is scared. Worse, no one can leave.
Missing White Woman by Kellye Garrett
Detective novelist Garrett creates a thriller set in New York City and under the guise of a romantic weekend for Breanna and Ty, who basecamp in a four-story luxury row house in Jersey City. But instead of flipping pancakes and omelets together the morning after their first night, Breanna wakes up to a woman’s body in the foyer and her husband gone. As the Internet is obsessed with that woman’s vanishing, Breanna picks up the pace and tries to solve the mystery herself in this great thriller novel.
