Suspense

The usually solid Evan Smoak, a former government assassin in the Orphan program, is not at the top of his game. His sharp senses and training are gone, and to get back into shape and help those with nowhere else to turn, Evan agrees to find a missing dog. A mission not worthy of his skills quickly becomes deadly when he stumbles upon a dead body and is almost shot by a female assassin, The Wolf. She is formidable and focused on completing her assignment with training similar to his own, even if that means eliminating Evan and everyone he cares about and feels responsible for keeping safe. It’s jarring seeing Evan be “ordinary” at first, but his journey back to being himself is both intense and satisfying. The series has always been a blend of Batman, the Equalizer, and Vince Flynn’s Mitch Rapp, and Lone Wolf reinforces why it continues to be great nine novels in. Newcomers to Evan’s adventures should feel fine starting here before diving into the others.

Isaka’s third book in this semi-series—the first, Bullet Train, was made into a popular film featuring Brad Pitt and Sandra Bullock—takes a bit of a departure. Yes, we’re focused on a genius hit man, in this case Kabuto. He’s beholden to the Doctor, an actual doctor who hilariously uses medical terminology as code to describe the hits. They’re oftentimes bizarre, wildly creative, or just plain funny. But Kabuto is over it. He wants out, except the Doctor isn’t ready to lose such talent and forces Kabuko to pay his way out, taking down some other professional assassins as his swan song. But for all the time we spend in Tokyo’s criminal underground, this book is more grounded in Kabuko’s life as a family man with a teen son and a wife, who are convinced his work is in office supplies! Kabuto’s relationship with his wife is uniquely fraught; he keeps a journal of phrases useful to appease her, while his son is remarkably loving towards his browbeaten dad. Featuring a professional killer who cringes because he ate the last of his wife’s favorite pudding, this book is poignant, sweet, and full of surprises. No need to read the earlier novels to appreciate this title.

What do we know about lying? That one lie often begets others. That lies find a way of escaping their boundaries. And that knowledge of a lie can give you power over the liar. DCI Julia Day is leading the investigation into the case of a young woman who’s gone missing. A brilliant detective, Julia is slightly suspicious of this case—the pieces don’t quite fit together—when she’s carjacked and forced to agree to lie about the alleged perpetrator. Except the story hardly ends there. As the investigation unravels, more cold cases come alive and more lies are exposed. McAlister brilliantly leads us into the lives of parents, driven mad by grief, and Julia’s own relationship with her daughter, the well-spring of so many falsehoods. Readers will appreciate a police procedural that is deeply embedded in character. That moves adroitly between the lives of cops and civilians. And that explores the difficulty of making sound moral choices. McAlister is the author of Wrong Place Wrong Time, a Reese’s Book Club Pick.