Fantastic Fiction that We Are Reading in California
Discover the best fantastic fiction books Californians are reading now! Explore our curated list of top fantasy and sci-fi picks captivating readers across California.
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Jury of One
by David Ellis
"Life Sentence," David Ellis's follow-up to his Edgar-winning debut, "Line of Vision," inspired great admiration from lovers of courtroom suspense. In "Jury of One," Shelly Trotter, the daughter of the state's governor and a children's-rights advocate, is thrust into a world in which she's completely unschooled--the criminal court.
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The Intelligencer
by Leslie Silbert
Novice private investigator Kate Morgan teams up with a European financier who is investigating a centuries-old manuscript that documents the final days of an Elizabethan-era murder victim.
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The Zero Game
by Brad Meltzer
The "New York Times" bestselling author of "The Millionaires" and "The First Counsel" returns to Washington, D.C., with the story of an insider's game that turns deadly.
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Hard Revolution
by George P. Pelecanos
"Derek Strange is a rookie cop, the job he's dreamed of since he was a boy. His brother, Dennis, has not been as fortunate; home from the service with a disability pension and zero prospects, he is a man with good intentions but bad habits. Derek has always looked out for Dennis, but no amount of brotherly love can save him from the dangerous world of Alvin Jones, a local bottom-feeder, hustler, and stone killer who draws him into his web of violence." "While the rookie cop navigates the rocky terrain of a city in turmoil, a family in crisis, and his love for a woman he has driven away, Frank Vaughn, a cop at the opposite end of his career, investigates the vicious hit-and-run of a young black man. Vaughn's personal life is a shambles, but he's good police; he pursues the killers with sharklike intent. Meanwhile, in Memphis, a prophet is murdered, igniting a volcanic chain of events that will leave the nation's capital burned, divided, and decimated, forever changing the lives of its working-class inhabitants."--BOOK JACKET.
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Hate Crime
by William Bernhardt
Bestselling author William Bernhardt is an unsurpassed master at blending psychological suspense with gripping, surprise-filled legal action. Now, Bernhardt and his crusading attorney Ben Kincaid return in a thrilling story of love, hate, and the power of a courtroom to separate deception from the truth. In Tulsa, Ben Kincaid has built a national reputation as a stalwart defense attorney who will fight tirelessly for his clients. In Evanston, Illinois, Johnny Christensen has built a national reputation as a sadistic bigot who beat and stabbed a gay man and left him to die. When Johnny's mother comes to Ben and begs him to defend her son, he has one secret reason for saying no. But while Ben turns down the case, his younger, beautiful partner, Christina McCall, does not. Traveling to Chicago and facing an explosion of controversy and deadly violence surrounding the trial, Christina steps into a case that is already nearly lost. Her client's only defense is his claim that he left his victim bludgeoned but alive. To prove that someone else committed the actual murder, Christina needs a little bit of evidence--and a good motive to go with it. When unforeseen circumstances force Ben Kincaid to enter the trial, the defense attorney sees only one way to prove Johnny's innocence. But Ben's plan means luring a killer out of the woodwork--even though he may kill again. . . . A novel of gut-wrenching twists and surprises, this thriller brilliantly explores the passions between lovers--and the passions behind society's most heinous crimes. Once again, the remarkable William Bernhardt makes us challenge every assumption, second-guess every judgment, and feel the terror of the truth.
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Dead Ringer
by Ken Douglas
"Maggie Nesbitt is pregnant and depressed, because her husband isn't the father of her unborn child. She's thinking about abortion when she's attacked on the beach. She barely gets away, then gets the shock of her life the next morning when she sees that she has been killed on the news and that her nude body had been dumped in the trash behind a beachside bar. She finds out the body behind the bar is the twin sister she'd been told had died when she was two weeks old. She also learns her twin was divorced from a horrid man and that she had an eight-year-old daughter, Jasmine. Maggie, showing a bump on her head she got while getting away from her attackers, claims partial amnesia and steps into her dead twin's life. This way she can have her baby, give it a home, and save Jasmine from having to go and live with her father. But she doesn't know her twin saw someone do murder. And that someone thinks he's killed the wrong woman."--Publisher description
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Blood Hollow
by William Kent Krueger
A Native American boy is the suspect in the killing of a high school girl in Minnesota.
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The Bone Parade
by Mark Nykanen
Ashley Stassler is not your average artist. He has been wildly praised for a series of bronze sculptures that group families together, depicting them in moments of excruciating physical and emotional pain-but the art world has no clue as to how he creates such authentic, gruesome, seemingly tortured human representations. He assigns each family a number, and now he's up to number nine. What's in store for family #9? Cruelty and savagery that you can't even imagine... The Bone Parade introduces a villain who is as methodical, calculating, and detached as any found in the best fiction. It's gripping. It's chilling. You might be too afraid to read on, but you'll never be able to tear your eyes away.
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Aphrodite
by Russell Andrews
Bestselling author Russell Andrews returns with a new thriller about a small-town cop who must get to the bottom of one of the greatest conspiracies of his time.
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Scorpion
by Jack Stewart
DEA agent Bill Broxton is assigned to protect the Prime Minister of Trinidad from an assassin. He doesn't know that his fiancée is the killer.
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Shadow Account
by Stephen W. Frey
Investment banker Conner Ashby is doing all right for himself--until he receives a wayward email and is plunged into a terrifying nightmare.
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The Con Man's Daughter
by Ed Dee
When his thirty-five-year-old daughter is kidnapped, former NYPD detective Eddie Dunne, suspecting the disappearance is related to his previous employment with a crime boss, finds the case complicated by his former partner's grisly murder.
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Dead I Well May be
by Adrian McKinty
This New York Irish bad-boy thriller--brimming with violence, greed, and sexual betrayal--brings a gripping new voice to the literary turf of Michael Connelly, Chuck Palahniuk, and Dennis Lehane.
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The Murder Stone
by Charles Todd
To Francesca Hatton her grandfather was always a loving, caring protector, but following his death it isn't long before skeletons start rattling cupboard doors. Murder is one of the charges laid at his door & there is curious request in his will about a 'murder stone'. Francesca resolves to uncover the truth.
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Now May You Weep
by Deborah Crombie
New York Times Notable Book of the Year author Deborah Crombie has garnered tremendous praise -- and has been nominated for virtually every major mystery award -- for her piercing police procedurals featuring Scotland Yard detectives Duncan Kincaid and Gemma James, who are personally and professionally entwined. Now Gemma takes center stage when a lethal crime of passion turns a recreational trip to Scotland into pure bloody business. Though her reputation for delving into the heart of murder is matched only by that of her former partner and current lover, Duncan Kincaid, newly appointed Detective Inspector Gemma James has never thought to question her friend Hazel Cavendish about her past. So it is quite a shock when Gemma learns that their holiday retreat to a hotel in the Scottish Highlands is, in fact, a homecoming for native daughter Hazel -- and an event that has provoked strong reactions from the small community. Something is definitely amiss -- and that something is quite possibly Donald Brodie, the charming if intense Scotsman who is a guest as well. The truth comes out before long: Hazel and Brodie were once lovers, despite a vicious, long-standing feud between their families, rival local distillers of fine whisky. Their affair was fierce and passionate, and its fire might not have burned out completely. Certainly Brodie, now the domineering head of the family business, believes his "Juliet" still belongs to him alone -- and he's prepared to destroy Hazel's English marriage to make it so. A brutal murder puts Hazel's very life in peril when she's arrested for the crime. Hazel is the logical suspect, but Gemma knows nothing is simple in this place of secrets and long-seething hatreds. As even more damning evidence piles up against the friend Gemma never truly knew, the investigation into Hazel and Brodie's history begins to take darker, more sinister and tumultuous turns. Gemma knows she will need assistance to unravel this bloody knot -- and so she calls the one man she trusts more than any other, Duncan Kincaid, to join her far from home . . . and in harm's way.
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A Place of Hiding
by Elizabeth George
A wealthy Englishman is found murdered on an isolated beach of the Island Of Guernsey.
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An Unpardonable Crime
by Andrew Taylor
A student in early nineteenth-century England, young Edgar Allan Poe and his schoolmaster become caught up in a series of bizarre and violent events that has its origins in a bitter episode of corruption during the War of 1812.
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Blindside
by Catherine Coulter
In the wake of a series of kidnapping attempts, Savich, Sherlock, and FBI agent Miles Kettering--whose six-year-old son was one of the attempted victims--trace leads to a charismatic evangelist team.
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Remember when
by Nora Roberts
A two-part novel, the first written in the style of Nora Roberts, and the second written in the style of Nora Roberts' pseudonym, J.D. Robb.
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Naked in Death
by J. D. Robb
In 2059 technology rules the world but passion still rules the heart - and makes for a hunt for a ruthless killer.
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Cry No More
by Linda Howard
"Count your blessings; they can be snatched away in an instant. It is a sentiment Milla Edge knows too well. With an astonishing blend of savvy, instinct, and passion, Milla displays an uncanny gift for finding lost children. When all seems helpless, desperate souls from across the country come to her for hope and results. Driven by an obsessive desire to fill the void in other people's lives, Milla throws herself into every case-all the while trying to outrun the brutal emotions stemming from a horrific tragedy in her past. Traveling to a small village in Mexico on a reliable tip, Milla begins to uncover the dire fate of countless children who have disappeared over the years in the labyrinth of a sinister baby-smuggling ring. The key to nailing down the organization may rest with an elusive one-eyed man. To find him, Milla joins forces with James Diaz, a suspicious stranger known as the Tracker who conceals his own sinister agenda. As the search intensifies, the mission becomes more treacherous. For the ring is part of something far larger and more dangerous, reaching the highest echelons of power and influence. Caught between growing passion and imminent peril, Milla suddenly finds herself the hunted-in the crosshairs of an invisible, lethal assassin who aims to silence her "permanently. Intense emotion . . . potent suspense . . . pounding action. Linda Howard weaves these elements into page-turning fiction. "Cry No More is a seductive thriller of heartbreak and obsession that moves with a vengeance.
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Dragon Bones
by Lisa See
In a magnificent land where myth mixes treacherously with truth, one woman is in charge of telling them apart. Liu Hulan is the Inspector in China’s Ministry of Public Security whose tough style rousts wrongdoers and rubs her superiors the wrong way. Now her latest case finds her trapped between her country’s distant past and her own recent history. The case starts at a rally for a controversial cult that ends suddenly in bloodshed, and leads to the apparent murder of an American archaeologist, which officials want to keep quiet. And haunting Hulan’s investigation is the possible theft of ancient dragon bones that might alter the history of civilization itself. Getting to the bottom of ever-spiraling events, Hulan unearths more scandals, confronts more murderers, and revives tragic memories that shake her tormented marriage to its core. In the end, she solves a mystery as big, unruly, and complex as China itself. Praise for Dragon Bones “Stays with you long after the conventional thriller is forgotten.”—The Washington Post Book World “Lisa See is one of the classier practitioners of . . . the international thriller. . . . She draws her characters . . . with convincing depth, and offers up documentary social detail that reeks of freshly raked muck. See’s China is as vivid as Upton Sinclair’s Chicago.”—The New York Times Book Review