I’m still on a huge thriller kick, seeking a book to match the love I’ve had for The Girl on the Train since I first read it two years ago. Paula Hawkins’ novel is one of the few mega-popular titles that I loved just as much as everyone else. Nothing has really impressed me that much since, but most of my choices are solid and a fun way to occupy a few hours. Here’s a rundown of the some of the recent ones I’ve read and enjoyed.

The Woman in the Window by A. J. Finn

Anna is agoraphobic and fills her time with talking to people in her online support group, playing chess, watching old movies, drinking too much alcohol, and spying on her neighbors through the window. When she sees the woman across the street with a knife sticking out of her stomach, she tries to notify the police – but they don’t believe her. The woman’s husband presents a different woman as his wife, and their teenage son, whom Anna had met and formed a rapport with when he visited before, refuses to speak about much of anything. This is a psychological thriller very much in the vein of The Girl on the Train, featuring an unreliable narrator who witnesses a horrible crime but won’t be taken seriously by anyone involved. Finn takes his time developing Anna’s character, which can make the book seem slow at times. Before the event that caused Anna’s agoraphobia, she was a child psychologist with a husband and a young daughter. Now she and her husband are separated, and her daughter is with him, leaving Anna alone in the house. She helps other people in her online support group with their own agoraphobia, while simultaneously recognizing that she’s unable to help herself. The suspense builds slowly and deliberately, directing readers first at one suspect and then another, including Anna herself, and while many readers probably won’t be surprised by the ending, it’s executed well and quite satisfying.

Luckiest Girl Alive by Jessica Knoll

Ani FaNelli experienced something horrible as a teenager at Bradley School, a prestigious boarding school near Philadelphia. As an adult, she’s tried to reinvent herself with a high-paying job, fancy clothes, and an impressive and handsome fiance. She’s made herself into a hard person, and it’s easy to dislike her, at least initially. She comes across as a bully, invested too much in her own appearance, the appearance of others, and of course, wealth. But there are flashes of someone kinder underneath, and this person is revealed slowly over the course of the book as we learn exactly what happened to Ani in high school. There’s a twist to the story about halfway through the book, and it’s this twist, violent and shocking, that the world within the story actually knows about, and the one that Ani is preparing to talk about publicly for a documentary. This is less of a thriller and more of a psychological study of a woman and how different traumas can affect a person. There’s no big reveal near the end, but it’s satisfying in other ways. Knoll reveals, bit by bit, what happened to Ani and how she’s been coping (and not coping), so by the end, we have the full picture. In that way, it has a bit of a mystery element to it, but readers shouldn’t go into this one expecting another Gone Girl. It’s disturbing, yes, but in a very different way.

The Child by Fiona Barton

I was a bit disappointed by the first Fiona Barton book I read, The Widow. It’s difficult to say why without spoiling the ending, but the experience did give me lower expectations for her second book. Luckily, this one is pretty solid. When the body of a baby is discovered in a backyard, buried many years ago, it brings the lives of three women together: a mother, her grown daughter, and the journalist investigating the case, each with her own secrets and motivations. The identity of the child, and its relationship with the mother and her daughter, is teased out over the course of the book. The story is told from three different perspectives, each woman’s voice and personality distinct from the others, all of them arresting. This is a mystery with solid answers to its main questions: who is the child, and what (or who) is responsible for its death?  The path the story takes isn’t always predictable, but it does make sense – there are no twists simply for shock value. With good writing and a satisfying ending, I recommend The Child for anyone looking for an entirely female-driven mystery.