I Need Some Mystery/Thriller/Crime Recommendations Based on These Authors

[sun surfer]

I'm setting up an e-reader for someone as a Christmas present. It's really up in the air whether this person will use it or not, though it'd be good if she did, so we're trying to have it as ready-to-go as possible. So we're going to pre-load it with some e-books of the kind she likes. I know about gift cards and such, but we still want a few on there to begin with because otherwise she may never bother even using the gift card. The problem is, I have no idea which books to get her!

She's a voracious reader and recently has stuck mostly to mysteries, thrillers and crime books, mainly of the mass market variety and often of the somewhat procedural variety I think.

She'll also read the occasional Stephen King or Dan Brown and love them, and sometimes a book such as The Lovely Bones or Memoirs of a Geisha; she also voraciously read the Harry Potter series, but for the vast majority of her reading now, it's the mass market procedural crime thriller types that she sticks to. She's particularly interested in Psychological Thrillers in theory, but I'm not sure how well that fits her favourite authors since I haven't read them. I also don't think she likes things too too gory or strange, but I don't really know. I think she definitely likes murders and crime and killers, and she's probably not a fan of "cozies" or ones with much comedy....I think she likes more serious ones.

I surreptitiously went through one of her bookshelves and currently reading stack the other day and jotted down the authors I saw the most. They include:

James Patterson
John Sandford
Jonathan Kellerman
Faye Kellerman
Jeffrey Deaver
Lisa Gardner
Lisa Unger
Janet Evanovich
Patricia Cornwall
Harlan Coben
J.A. Jance
Lee Child
Erica Spindler
Sandra Brown

So that should give you an idea of her likes. Of those, I'd say I saw Patterson, Kellerman, Deaver and Sandford the most, but I was only quickly looking at one bookcase where I think she's put many of her more recent reads. I think she read a lot of Grisham in the past as well, but apparently not recently as I didn't see any on the shelves I looked at.

I'm already definitely getting her the Girl With a Dragon Tattoo trilogy since she saw the first film and loved it and I know she hasn't read them. I'm also thinking of getting her the Hunger Games trilogy depending on what else I come up with. She may not like it, but she liked the first film and loved the Harry Potter books so I figure it's worth a try as I know it's something she hasn't read yet.

But I need more "in her zone" books. The problem is that she reads so much, and so much of the same, that I wouldn't chance getting her any e-books by the authors I listed. She'd probably already have read it. So what I'm looking for is recommendations of other authors similar to those authors that you'd recommend, and especially their best book or the book to start with since I'd probably only get her one book per author not knowing if she'll like it or not. Or if you know of any other really great mystery/thriller/crime books you think she may like but may not have read yet. And she's read a LOT in this genre, so the less likely she is to have read it the better.

[plumboz]

Have a look at Brad Meltzer for thrillers, and, since she likes some lighter stuff (Evanovich), Donald E. Westlake wrote some of the funniest crime novels ever with his Dortmunder series.

[Synamon]

Jeffrey Deaver's Kathryn Dance books came to mind when I read your description of what she likes. Authors that she might not have discovered yet are John Hart who wraps a mystery in a great story and Josephine Tey's Alan Grant mysteries which are out of print classics you can find in the Canadian public domain.

ETA: I just saw Dan Brown in your list, Peter May's Enzo Macleod books are in the same vein, with puzzles to unravel.

[sun surfer]

Thanks for the fast suggestions so far.

I didn't know Evanovich was humour but I'm still wary of getting her anything humour...she's mostly into more serious stuff.

She already reads Deaver (that was actually her current read when I looked, heh).

I'll look at Meltzer and John Hart, they sound great.

She's probably already read Tey....I think she only reads newer stuff now because she's already gone through so much of the old. I know she's gone through Agatha Christie since if you ask her her favourite authors that's always one of them (though her current crime tastes seem to be much stronger than Christie). But if it's free, I might add Tey.

Oh yeah, I forgot, I also may get her a Dennis Lehane. She loved the film Shutter Island so it could work out.

[Polarpenguin]

Mark Billingham's Tom Thorne books

[MickeyC]

Recommend you go to Literature Map (http://www.literature-map.com/) and check it out. You enter an author's name and hit return. The screen goes blank then reappears with that author's name in the middle and lots a authors arrayed around him. The closer an author's name is to the one you entered, the more like him/her they are

[tilia]

Maybe Val McDermid. The Mermaids Singing is the first in a series (featuring a police woman and a criminal psychologist). She has some good stand-alone books as well.

[wallcraft]

I suggest Robert Crais (Wikipedia). The Monkey's Raincoat was his first Elvis Cole novel, and was nominated for the Edgar, Anthony, Shamus, and Macavity awards and won both the Anthony and Macavity for Best Novel of the Year.

[daffy4u]

J. D. Robb's "In Death" series (up to 40+ books now)

[jgaiser]

Craig Johnson
James Elroy
Lawrence Block
Truman Capote (In Cold Blood)
Raymond Chandler
Lee Child
G.K. Chesterson (Father Brown??)
Reed Farrel Coleman
Michael Connelly
Sue Grafton
Dashiel Hammett
Georgette Heyer
Laurie R. King
John Le Carre
Ed McBain

[Synamon]

Originally Posted by sun surfer

She's probably already read Tey....I think she only reads newer stuff now because she's already gone through so much of the old. I know she's gone through Agatha Christie since if you ask her her favourite authors that's always one of them (though her current crime tastes seem to be much stronger than Christie). But if it's free, I might add Tey.

I'd read the old stuff and missed Tey, so maybe she did too.

You could stick the first couple Agatha Christie books on there since they are public domain, in case she's tempted to re-visit an old friend. I quite enjoyed re-reading the first Poirot (The Mysterious Affair at Styles), I'd forgotten how funny the tongue-in-cheek comments at Watson's expense were.

Not many mysteries are PD, but you could throw in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and a couple of Wilkie Collins (The Woman in White, Moonstone) for filler.

[poohbear_nc]

P.D. James
Carol O'Connell

[bigbird1227]

John Verdon - Shut Your Eyes Tight - excellent psychological thriller

[melmac]

Originally Posted by sun surfer

Oh yeah, I forgot, I also may get her a Dennis Lehane. She loved the film Shutter Island so it could work out.

If you are going to try Lehane and seeing as she like crime then I would go with his Kenzie-Gennaro series

A Drink Before the War (1994)
Darkness, Take My Hand (1996)
Sacred (1997)
Gone, Baby, Gone (1998)
Prayers for Rain (1999)
Moonlight Mile (2010)

[elemenoP]

My husband and I both enjoyed the thriller "Child 44" by Tom Rob Smith. I see it's a trilogy but I haven't read the others.

eP