The Best Mystery Books: 2023 Upcoming Titles

Set in 1850s Gold Rush California, this historical mystery follows Eliza Ripple, who began working at the local brothel as a means of gaining financial security after her husband died. When the dead bodies of young women start appearing outside of town, Eliza, fueled by her love reading and Edgar Allan Poe’s detective Dupin, recruits her best friend, Jean, to try to catch the killer.

The Reynolds family name has become synonymous with murder and mystery ever since mogul Clive Reynolds went missing 20 yeas ago. After receiving a cryptic note, photographer Morgan Mori reluctantly returns home to Black Harbor and into the web of their family secrets. The night she photographs the latest Reynolds holiday get-together, Morgan becomes witness to a shocking crime that could crack open the cold case.

This is the third entry in Higashino’s Detective Kyoichiro Kaga series that has been translated into English. After a man is found stabbed on a famous bridge in the center of Tokyo, Detective Kaga is assigned to the team investigating the murder. When a prime suspect is located, the Tokyo Police Department thinks this could be a simple open and shut case. But as Kaga looks into the suspect,  his investigation takes him down unexpected roads and reveals the dark truth of what really happened and why.

Both a surreal mystery and an intimate exploration of mental health, Liar, Dreamer, Thief follows Katrina Kim, who forms an obsession with her co-worker Kurt as one of her many coping methods. While riffling through his things one day, Katrina finds evidence that someone is aware of what she’s been doing and she runs to her ritual spot at the bridge to soothe herself. But when she arrives, she finds Kurt, who slams her with a horrifying accusation before jumping to his death. Spiraling from his indictment, Katrina revisits everything she knows about him — only to discover that Kurt was watching her, too. As she dives further into Kurt’s life, she faces more shocking revelations about her own. 

In this gripping debut, detective Cara Kennedy sets out to investigate a teen’s murder in Point Mettier, Alaska, where all 205 citizens live in a single high-rise building. After a blizzard causes the only tunnel into the building to close indefinitely, Cara is stuck among the odd and suspicious residents, each of which seems to have their own secrets to hide. 

Winslow follows up his powerful debut, In West Mills, with another historical mystery set in segregated West Mills, North Carolina. In the compelling follow-up, former resident who has recently moved back to town is determined to help solve the triple homicide of three siblings. Though the crime is the first reported murder in the area in decades, the white authorities don’t seem to have any interest in solving the case. When Jo Wright realizes her childhood sweetheart, the half-sibling of the murder victims, could be named a prime suspect, she sets out to prove his innocence.

Federal Investigator Aaron Falk travels to his small home town in Southern Australia with plan to enjoy his vacation and attend the christening of a friend’s baby. What he doesn’t realize is that the timing coincides with the one-year anniversary of the disappearance of Kim Gillespie, who went missing during a town festival with no leads. After Kim’s daughter makes a plea for information, Aaron finds himself drawn to the case and slowly begins to infiltrate his way into Kim’s circle of friends and family.

Last Seen in Lapaz marks the third installment in the Emma Djan Investigation series. After a whirlwind romance leads to the disappearance of a young Nigerian woman and the brutal murder of her boyfriend, Emma Djan embarks on a dangerous undercover mission to uncover what really happened and track down the missing woman.

Now a successful podcaster and film professor, Bodie Kane has worked hard to leave her difficult past behind, including a family tragedy and the murder of a classmate at the New Hampshire school she attended. When the boarding school offers Bodie the chance to teach a two-week course, her memories of that year begin to resurface, and she can’t help but start investigating the details of the murder, realizing she may be more connected to the case than she though.

The first novel from Gillian Flynn’s new imprint, Scorched Grace tells the story of Sister Holiday, a chain-smoking, heavily tattooed, queer nun, who joins a convent in New Orleans. After Sister’s convent becomes the target of an arson spree, she puts her sleuthing skills to work and launches her own investigation to pinpoint the culprit before it’s too late.

Growing up, Katie Shaw seemed to live a charmed life — until the day a violent stranger changed the fate of her family forever. Years later, Katie still struggles to live with  the guilt surrounding what happened to her brother, Chris. Her life is upended once again when she gets a phone call that Chris has gone missing. At the same time, Detective Laurence Page uncovers a connection between the recent murder of a professor and the gruesome attack Chris suffered as a teenager.

Kit Darling is a maid with a habit of snooping. It’s always been a harmless hobby — until Kit sees something dark in the home of her brand-new clients: a secret that could destroy the privileged couple expecting their first child. When homicide cop Mallory Van Alst is called to the scene of a bloody attack at a luxury waterfront home, she knows there is little chance the victim is alive, even though there is no body. With the homeowners gone and their maid missing, Mal sets out to uncover the secret that altered everyone’s lives.

In this science fiction murder mystery, a man goes missing on a remote outpost of a human colony on Jupiter. When Investigator Mossa follows his trail, it leads her to Valdegeld, the location of the colony’s erudite university, where her former girlfriend, Pleiti, works. Pleiti is an expert on Earth’s pre-collapse ecosystems. When Mossa shows and requests her assistance in her latest investigation, the two of them team up to uncover the mystery.

Vera Wong is a lonely elderly lady who lives above her mostly forgotten tea shop in the middle of San Francisco’s Chinatown. One morning, she comes downstairs to find a curious thing — a dead man in the middle of her tea shop, holding a flash drive in his hand. After calling the cops, Vera decides to keep the flash drive to figure out which of the customers of her shop is the murderer. What she doesn’t expect is to begin form friendships with her customers.

Cold case detective Elise Sutton prefers to maintain a careful sense of order in both her work life and professional one. But that all changes one day in a department store when Elise is forced to make a decision in which to save one life, she has to take another. Though Elise is hailed as a hero by many, she feels steeped with guilt — until she connects with Wade Austin, the man whose life she saved. But Elise soon realizes Wade is far from who he appears to be.