100 books like In the Blood

I had the opportunity to listen to Karin Slaughter speak at the Bouchercon Conference in St. Pete, Florida and this was her new release.

The book sounded wonderful, and my signed copy is on my keeper shelf. Pieces of Her has a crazy, explosive opening and breakneck pace with questions that pile on questions, and we hold on for dear life. I was so enthralled by this story that I bought a second copy for a friend and put it in her hands saying, “You have to read this.” She loved it and so did Netflix because it is now a series. 

 One of the most gripping stories I’ve read in a long time, this book sticks with you long after you put it down. I raced through it in less than six hours, unable to put it down until I reached the end, which, of course, I never saw coming.

From the vivid descriptions to the expertly crafted characters to the unrelenting suspense, I was blown away by this book and absolutely cannot wait to read more work by this author. What surprised me the most were the moments of comic relief which at times were enough to get me to laugh right out loud, even with all the dark drama going on. I can’t wait to dive into another of Freida’s fabulous stories! 

This book had me completely fooled. I didn’t see the ending coming but found it completely believable and just so delicious.

Unraveling the clues, deciding what is truth and what is lies was just so much fun. The ending surprised and delighted me. This is just a wonderful read, all around, or in my case an audiobook that had me listening at every opportunity.

I think I picked this one up in a bookstore because of the back cover blurb. I found the writing much more in the literary fiction category which is to say it is beautiful and very well written.

What I especially appreciated in this story was the way the setting, the Bottoms, became such an important feature. Really, the setting is a character all its own and I appreciated learning about a place that was so specific and different from where I was raised.

That is not to say that the twist did not take me completely unaware because they definitely did.

I’m a BIG Greg Iles fan—he (in my opinion) writes a lot like Stephen King, but instead of horror, leans more into the twisty-thriller category that I find electrifying.

For those unfamiliar with Iles’ work, this book is a great place to start, as it has the right amount of everything that makes a great read: twists and turns, a likable protagonist in an awful situation, and page-turning goodness that will keep you glued to the couch. It explores the dark side of obsession, giving this story that "erotic" label that pushed me toward my new genre.

Welcome to the sweet romance of Isa, a dancer, and Alex, a baseball player, teenagers in New York with very different upbringings. Isa is a blonde, half-Cuban/half white, private school girl from a well-off family that’s falling apart behind the scenes. Alex is Dominican, attends public school, and divides his time between his divorced parents. He’s also a secret poet and leaves his poems for Isa to find on the subway train where they first met. Both have professional sports potential, but the reality is more complicated. The couple navigates challenges with their families and neighborhoods, including mental health and gangs, and you’ll be rooting for them the entire time. The author has a beautiful poem in the Rhyme and Rhythm anthology that I mentioned above.

This is another novel written expressly for teenagers, and all the better for it.

Inflected by the author’s own autobiographical experiences—like Craig, the novel’s narrator, Vizzini spent a week in a psychiatric hospital as a teenager—It’s Kind of a Funny Story was the first work of fiction I’d read that articulated the adolescent experience through the language of mental health. It was here that I learned “depression” isn’t an abstracted emotion but the very real neurochemical imbalance that impels Craig to call the suicide hotline after abandoning his SSRIs.

There’s an uncanny familiarity to the circumstances of Craig’s breakdown—namely in how he struggles to remain above water at a famously rigorous college preparatory high school—and a fundamental earnestness to his story’s confessions that gilds even its grimmest moments with a fifteen-year-old's sense of impressionable wonder.

Nellie Bly was one of the great muckraking reporters in American history. She pretends to be insane and is admitted to the “mad house.” Along the way, she exposes the horrible treatment of those suffering from mental illness, but of her treatment in a boarding home, where spoiled beef was served.

Many at the Women’s Lunatic Asylum on Roosevelt Island suffered no mental illness; they simply didn’t know how to speak English, she wrote. “I left the insane ward with pleasure and regret—pleasure that I was once more able to enjoy the free breath of heaven; regret that I could not have brought with me some of the unfortunate women who lived and suffered with me, and who, I am convinced, are just as sane as I was and am now myself.”

Her reporting led to a grand jury investigation and reforms inside the asylum.

The Risk Pool shows the importance of accepting and loving our fathers for who they are instead of resenting them for who they never could be. Sam Hall, the irresponsible wreck of a dad in this warm-hearted and funny book, is by any definition a terrible father, yet his relationship with his son Ned feels real in ways that most fictionalized father-son relationships don’t. Forced to care for Ned when Ned’s mother is hospitalized with mental illness, Sam introduces his son to pool halls, bars, bookies, drunks, and the occasional petty crime. Though aware of his father’s many faults, Ned can’t help but be charmed by Sam’s easy-going life, and even when Sam disappears for years, the bond remains strong.  

I rarely encounter writing that deals so unflinchingly with the darkest aspects of human nature in such a beautifully nuanced way. This book does not shy away from heavy, even transgressive themes, including mental illness, parental negligence, sexual predation, and grooming.

It centers around teenage sisters Edie and Mae, who are sent to stay with their estranged father after their mother’s failed suicide attempt—but their close alliance fractures due to their separate fixations on each parent. Told from multiple POVs, I found the novel’s structure as intricately woven as a spider’s web. The final act, which leaps ahead fifteen years, is an absolute stunner.