I go to the amazon.com site on the first of the month to see which mysteries and thrillers their editors have chosen as the best of the month. There are normally two such lists — one for standalone and one for series novels. This month there was only the standalone list, which I posted on July 1. I checked back for a few days, but no 2nd list. Then my son’s wedding kept me busy for a couple of weeks. I went to the site last night and — voila’ — there was the second list! So here it is.

Best Mystery, Thriller & Suspense – New and Continuing Series

GOOD NIGHT, FOREVER, Jeffrey Fleishman (Blackstone, $27.99). Los Angeles is not itself. Rain falls hard every day. Homeless men are set on fire in their tents. Detective Sam Carver chases leads into a maze of militias and neo-Nazis. But before he gets too deep into the case, a past that has haunted him for years returns in the name of Dylan Cross. The killer who got away. Carver knows she has murdered again, but no one believes him. She leaves him clues, writes him notes, tempts him. She wants him to betray everything he is. He is drawn to her by the damage and demons they both carry. But he is certain that when they meet again, only one will survive. This is a love story of delusion and obsession, and how the dark things we desire reveal the truths that made us. Publishers Weekly Starred Review

SOULLESS: Inspector Mislan and the Faceless Girl, Roslan Mohd Noor (Arcade Crimewise, $26.99). Early morning in Jalan Alor, one of the city’s red-light and tourist hotspots controlled by the Triads. A junkie’s scream of horror and the commotion that follows brings down the police, first a patrol car, and then, after what the officers see, Inspector Mislan and Detective Sergeant Johan from Special Investigations. The body in the duffle bag had been dumped in a back alley. The junkie who found the bag thought he’d hit the jackpot. The rats probably thought the same. But it was acid that took the young woman’s face and burned the flesh on her fingers, and something unknown caused the marks on her skin of what appears to be torture. Publishers Weekly Starred Review

SHOULD I FALL, Scott Shepherd (Mysterious Press, $25.95). When John Frankel’s ex-wife is discovered dead on the floor of his Manhattan studio apartment, the NYPD Detective instantly becomes the prime suspect in her murder. Then more information surfaces, linking his gun to the fatal bullet, a motive is discovered, and Frankel flees the city, all of which further convinces his colleagues of his guilt. In spite of the mounting evidence, Frankel’s bride-to-be, Rachel Grant, and her father, Austin Grant, formerly of Scotland Yard, are certain of his innocence. But with the police under orders to use whatever force necessary to stop what they view as a dangerous criminal, the duo will have to act fast, before the manhunt goes violently wrong. The investigation and relentless chase after Frankel takes them across the country, from the tropical shores of Hawaii to a deadly midnight rendezvous in a cemetery in northern Maine. And as that game of cat-and-mouse unfurls, so too does a complex murder plot with multiple victims – the ultimate solution of which will keep readers baffled and breathless until the very end. Library Journal Starred Review

HARLEM SUNSET, Nekesa Afia (Berkley, $16.00). Harlem, 1927. Twenty-seven-year-old Louise Lloyd has found the perfect job! She is the new manager of the Dove, a club owned by her close friend Rafael Moreno. There Louise meets Nora Davies, one of the girls she was kidnapped with a decade ago. The two women—along with Rafael and his sister, Louise’s girlfriend, Rosa Maria—spend the night at the Dove, drinking and talking. The next morning, Rosa Maria wakes up covered in blood, with no memory of the previous night. Nora is lying dead in the middle of the dance floor. Louise knows Rosa Maria couldn’t have killed Nora, but the police have a hard time believing that no one can remember anything at all about what happened. When Louise and Rosa Maria return to their apartment after being questioned by the police, they find the word GUILTY written across the living room wall in paint that looks a lot like blood.

CHRYSALIS, Lincoln Child (Doubleday, $29.00). Like millions of people around the world, Jeremy Logan (famed enigmalogist, or investigator of unexplained things) has grown to rely on his incredible new tech device. Made by Chrysalis, the global multi-billion dollar tech company, the small optical device connects people in a stunning new way, tapping into virtual reality for the first time on a wide scale. And yet, when Logan is summoned by Chrysalis to investigate a disturbing anomaly in the massive new product rollout, Logan is shocked to see the true scope of the massive company. He also quickly realizes that something in Chrysalis’s technology is very wrong, and could be potentially devastating. The question is what, and where, is the danger coming from?

DEATH DOESN’T FORGET, Ed Lin (Soho Crime, $27.95). Taipei is rocked by the back-to-back murders of a recent lottery winner and a police captain just as the city is preparing to host the big Austronesian Cultural Festival, which has brought in indigenous performers from all around the Pacific Rim to the island nation of Taiwan. Jing-nan, the proprietor of Unknown Pleasures, a popular food stand at Taipei’s largest night market, is thrown into the intrigue. Is he being set up to take the rap, or will he be the next victim? The fallout could jeopardize Jing-nan’s relationship with his girlfriend, Nancy, who is herself soon caught up in the drama, and is increasingly annoyed at Jing-nan’s failure to propose to her. Jing-nan also has to be careful not to alienate his trusty workers Dwayne and Frankie the Cat, who are facing their own personal trials. Dwayne struggles to reconnect with his roots as a person of aboriginal descent, while septuagenarian Frankie helps a fellow veteran with dementia, intertwining stories that illuminate decades of Taiwanese history.

THE BINDING ROOM, Nadine Matheson (Hanover Square, $27.99).
When Detective Anjelica Henley is called to investigate the murder of a popular preacher in his own church, she discovers a second victim, tortured and tied to a bed in an upstairs room. He is alive, but barely, and his body shows signs of a dark religious ritual. With a revolving list of suspects and the media spotlight firmly on her, Henley is left with more questions than answers as she attempts to untangle both crimes. But when another body appears, the case takes on a new urgency. Unless she can apprehend the killer, the next victim may just be Henley herself.

THE HIDDEN ONE, Linda Castillo (Minotaur, $27.99). Over a decade ago, beloved Amish bishop Ananias Stoltzfus disappeared without a trace. When skeletal remains showing evidence of foul play are unearthed, his disappearance becomes even more sinister. The town’s elders arrive in Painters Mill to ask chief of police Kate Burkholder for help, but she quickly realizes she has a personal connection to the crime. The handsome Amish man who stands accused of the murder, Jonas Bowman, was Kate’s first love. Forced to confront a painful episode from her past, Kate travels to Pennsylvania’s Kishacoquillas Valley, where the Amish culture differs dramatically from the traditions she knows. Though Bishop Stoltzfus was highly respected, she soon hears about a dark side to this complex man. What was he hiding that resulted in his own brutal death? Someone doesn’t want Kate asking questions. But even after being accosted and threatened in the dead of night, she refuses to back down. Is she too close to the case – and to Jonas – to see clearly? There’s a killer in the Valley who will stop at nothing to keep the past buried. Will they get to Kate before she can expose the truth? Or will the bishop’s secrets remain hidden forever?

THE RETREAT, Sarah Pearse (Pamela Dorman Books, $27.00). They couldn’t wait to stay here. An idyllic wellness retreat has opened on an island off the English coast, promising rest and relaxation—but the island itself, known locally as Reaper’s Rock, has a dark past. Once the playground of a serial killer, it’s rumored to be cursed.
But now they can’t leave. A young woman is found dead below the yoga pavilion in what seems to be a tragic fall. But Detective Elin Warner soon learns the victim wasn’t a guest—she wasn’t meant to be on the island at all.
And they would do anything to escape. The longer Elin stays, the more secrets she uncovers. And when someone else drowns in a diving incident, Elin begins to suspect that there’s nothing accidental about these deaths. But why would someone target the guests at this luxury resort? Elin must find the killer—before the island’s history starts to repeat itself.
Most came to recharge and refresh. But someone’s here for revenge. Library Journal Starred Review

HACK, Mark Pawlosky (Girl Friday Books, $16.95). Coming off a successful investigation into a major banking scandal, Newshound reporter Nik Byron arrives in Washington, DC, with high hopes for his career. But a disruptive corporate merger and a vengeful boss quickly dash his plans. Relegated to scut work and the graveyard shift, Nik’s career and emotions are in a tailspin. That is, until a late-night explosion levels a high-tech office park—home to some of the nation’s top clandestine programs—and provides Nik with an opportunity to reverse his fortunes. As Nik tries to unravel the mystery at the heart of the explosion, he suddenly finds himself confronting domestic terrorists, rogue American and Chinese spies, mercenaries, and a brilliant but temperamental computer expert. With the help of a small team of colleagues and his new girlfriend, Samantha Whyte—the chief investigator for the Northern Virginia Sheriff’s Department, who has her own secrets to conceal—Nik follows a bloody trail of bodies from DC to the upper Midwest.

THE MURDER BOOK, Mark Billingham (Atlantic Monthly Press, $26.00). Tom Thorne finally has it all. In Nicola Tanner and Phil Hendricks, Thorne has good friends by his side. His love life is newly reformed by a promising relationship and he is happy in the job he has devoted his life to. As he sets off hunting the woman responsible for a series of grisly murders, Thorne has no way of knowing that he will be plunged into a nightmare from which he may never wake. A nightmare that has a name. Thorne’s past threatens to catch up with him and a ruinous secret is about to be revealed. If he wants to save himself and his friends, he will have to do the unthinkable. Tom Thorne finally has a lot to lose. Publishers Weekly and Booklist Starred Reviews

PORTRAIT OF AN UNKNOWN WOMAN, Daniel Silva (Harper, $29.99). Legendary spy and art restorer Gabriel Allon has at long last severed ties with Israeli intelligence and settled quietly in Venice, the only place where he has ever truly known peace. His beautiful wife, Chiara, has taken over the day-to-day management of the Tiepolo Restoration Company, and their two young children are discreetly enrolled in a neighborhood scuola elementare. For his part, Gabriel spends his days wandering the streets and canals of the watery city, bidding farewell to the demons of his tragic, violent past. But when the eccentric London art dealer Julian Isherwood asks Gabriel to investigate the circumstances surrounding the rediscovery and lucrative sale of a centuries-old painting, he is drawn into a deadly game of cat and mouse where nothing is as it seems. Gabriel soon discovers that the work in question, a portrait of an unidentified woman attributed to Sir Anthony van Dyck, is almost certainly a fiendishly clever fake. To find the mysterious figure who painted it—and uncover a multibillion-dollar fraud at the pinnacle of the art world—Gabriel conceives one of the most elaborate deceptions of his career. If it is to succeed, he must become the very mirror image of the man he seeks: the greatest art forger the world has ever known.
Kirkus & Booklist Starred Reviews