Judge Stone by Viola Davis and James Patterson (Century £20, 432pp)
Judge Stone is available now
Oscar-winning actress Davis, star of the television series How To Get Away With Murder, joins forces with the legendary Patterson to sculpt a spellbinding story about a black female judge in Alabama, Mary Stone, who finds herself on the bench for a hugely controversial trial.
Doctor Bria Gaines has conducted an abortion on 13-year-old Nova Jones without her mother’s permission. The black teenager gets ill and admits what’s happened – then all hell breaks loose.
Gaines is arrested for murder, Nova’s mother is incandescent, and the affair escalates into a national scandal. The ghosts of the Klan loom everywhere. On the surface it is an open-and-shut case, but is it? In the tradition of To Kill A Mockingbird, this is a tale that is impossible to put down, elegant, thoughtful and terrifying.
The Hiding Season by A. C. Glass (Century £16.99, 400pp)
Heartbroken after the collapse of her marriage, Maya Landry takes refuge in an exclusive gated community in Bozeman, Montana, determined to get her life back.
But her recovery falls apart when she stumbles upon the dead body of an American Senator in one of the houses she looks after. She reports it to the police, but when they arrive back at the isolated property the body is gone, the house is spotless – and the police don’t believe her.
Enter shadowy FBI agent Riley Maguire who insists Maya leaves Bozeman immediately, or she will be killed because of what she knows. So begins a gripping journey, with Maya on the run – first to Texas and then to Chicago.
With an indomitable heroine, this is superb storytelling that tugs at the heartstrings, and leaves you begging for more.
It’s Not What You Think by Clare Mackintosh (HarperCollins £16.99, 400pp)
The mother of two young girls, Nadeeka Prasanna is convinced that her new man, Jamie – who is not the girls’ father – is having an affair and sets off to catch him out, but when she gets to their home she finds a detective inspector outside and police tape across her front door.
Inside, her new partner is lying dead in a pool of blood in the sitting room. He’s been murdered. At first the police believe she had nothing to do with the killing, but, gradually, their opinion changes as DCI Lauren Caldwell and her team investigate.
They discover that the detective she met at her front door is not a policeman at all. So the mystery deepens with Nadeeka increasingly alarmed. Packed with twists and turns, this intricate plot is exquisite.
