Compelling Mystery Books with Amazing Twist Endings

The first of a trilogy, Pines is Blake Crouch’s loving homage to Twin Peaks and The X-Files. You may have seen the TV show starring Matt Dillon but, trust me, the books are better. And book one, Pines, is a doozy.

Ethan Burke heads to the sleepy town of Wayward Pines searching for two missing federal agents, but a sudden accident leaves him spinning and questioning everything he thought was real. The plot never lets up, mystery piles atop of mystery, and the twist at the end is incredible. The rest of the series is good, but Pines is magnificent.

A long time ago, someone recommended this title to me as ‘Taxi Driver set in Tokyo’ and I bought it immediately. Afterwards, I read everything I could by Murakami. Many of his books could populate this article, but In The Miso Soup is a worthy entry.

Kenji works as a personal ‘nightlife’ tour guide for Americans visiting Tokyo and, just before New Year’s, he’s hired by a man named Frank who wants to see the real underbelly of Japan’s capital. A study of the mid-90s alienation of Japan’s youth, In The Miso Soup is a twisting, unsettling thriller that transports you to the rain-soaked, night-shrouded, neon-lit streets of Tokyo.

Detailed and pacy, Murakami has the reader rooting for Kenji while making Frank – the man Kenji suspects is a serial killer – a truly compelling character. If you’ve never read Murakami, start here.

A modern mystery/thriller classic with an absolutely brilliant twist, if you haven’t read the book (or seen the equally brilliant film by David Fincher starring Rosamund Pike and Ben Affleck), you need to do yourself a favour and rectify this oversight immediately.

A wonderfully written and constructed thriller, Nick Dunne finds himself as the prime suspect in his wife’s disappearance after the police are initially on his side. Evidence stacks up against him, some through folly, others from his own choices, and some as mysterious to him as to anyone else. Instead of sweeping the rug from beneath us at the end, Flynn delivers the twist midway through the story and it’s sublime.

A cautionary tale regarding the perils of social media (back in its infancy) and asking us to examine how well we truly know someone, even those closest to us, Gone Girl is a fun, dirty, stressful and an exhilarating piece of fiction.

How best to describe S., borne from an idea from movie director (and infamous lover of mysteries and twists) J.J. Abrams and the pen of Doug Dorst. A book-within-a-book, S. is an experience all in itself.

The story you read is called The Ship of Theseus (yes, the same ship as ‘is the ship the same ship if you replace all the parts over time?’ paradox), and is itself a tale of subterfuge and hidden meanings. But within the margins is another story.

Two people – students who are leaving the book for one another to find and comment on – are striving to uncover the life of the mysterious author of The Ship of Theseus, the elusive V.M. Straka. Ominous and tantalizing, S. is like nothing else and comes highly recommended.

If you love thrillers that make you say “okay, just one more chapter”… until it’s suddenly 2 a.m., well, The Crash is exactly that kind of ride.

The setup is deliciously tense: a pregnant woman crashes her car during a brutal snowstorm and is rescued by a seemingly kind couple living in a remote cabin. Safe, right? Not quite. As the storm traps her there, little things start to feel… off. Questions pile up. Secrets slip through the cracks. And that creeping feeling that something is very, very wrong grows with every page.

What makes this book irresistible is how fast it moves. The chapters are short, the suspense is relentless, and every reveal pushes the story somewhere unexpected. Just when you think you’ve figured it out, boom, another twist lands.

If you’re in the mood for a propulsive, popcorn thriller with a jaw-dropping finale, this one will absolutely deliver.

A lush historical fiction, Where The Crawdads Sing is many things at once. An exploration of the natural world and those in touch with nature. It’s a coming-of-age story, and a study into discrimination and class. But it’s also a murder mystery and contains one hell of a plot twist.

Set in 1969, rumours of the “Marsh Girl” have haunted the small town of Barkley Cove for years. When popular local Chase Andrews is found dead, people suspect the wild and barefoot Kya Clark. Thought-provoking and moving, Where The Crawdads Sing is the epitome of a page-turner.

Yes, another book adapted by David Fincher (and starring Edward Norton, Brad Pitt and Helena Bonham-Carter) but one well-worth the read even if you’ve seen the movie. And, possibly, because you’ve seen it.

While treading more-or-less the same ground as the 1999 film, the book is more-than slightly different; particularly when it comes to the ending. Palahniuk’s Fight Club allows for a deeper dive into the psyche of the ‘Narrator’ while spending more time serving up satire regarding its very premise.

Dynamic and frantic, Fight Club contains one of fiction’s very best – and memorable – plot twists and is equally effective both as a movie or here in its original form.