Books like 'The Ugly Duckling'
Readers who enjoyed The Ugly Duckling by Iris Johansen also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
contemporary mystery action / adventure psychological horror thriller suspense crime revenge drama
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The Body Keeper by Anne Frasier
Rated: 4.42 of 5 stars · 19 ratingsThe Thriller Award–winning series continues as Detective Jude Fontaine finds a decades-old connection to missing children that will freeze her blood.A boy’s frozen body is found trapped in the ice of a Minneapolis lake. The horrifying discovery leads Detective Jude Fontaine and her partner, Uriah Ashby, to more bodies in the ice, all of twelve-year-old boys missing for twenty years... -
![Our Stolen Pieces by James Hunt]()
Our Stolen Pieces by James Hunt
Rated: 4.44 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsWhen the morning after a slumber party reveals two missing girls, a newly minted Detective and a young veteran are assigned the case. Recently partnered, the pair of detectives must set aside their troubled pasts to recover the pair of girls who may have been coerced by a stranger who had kidnapped before... -
![Heartbreak Bay by Rachel Caine]()
Heartbreak Bay by Rachel Caine
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsThey’re hunting a killer so silent, so invisible, that his unspeakable crimes are the only proof he exists.A car submerged in a remote pond. The bodies of two girls strapped into their seats. The mystery of their mother, vanished without a trace, leads Gwen Proctor and Kezia Claremont into dangerous territory... -
![The Dollmaker by Mary Burton]()
The Dollmaker by Mary Burton
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsDr. Tessa McGowan had never seen anything quite like it. But the mutilated bodies on her exam table tell a stunningly macabre tale: someone with a twisted mind is kidnapping women and altering their faces to resemble real, life-size dolls. As a forensic pathologist, it’s her job to aid the agent leading the case—even if that agent is her estranged husband...Categorized as:
crime female-mc law-enforcement second-chances suspense action-adventure adult audiobook -
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![Memories of Tomorrow by Dean Koontz]()
Memories of Tomorrow by Dean Koontz
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsWhat strange science made Nameless who he is? What catastrophes have been erased from his memories? In the stunning conclusion of this series, the dark past comes flooding back, and Nameless must decide how much he really wants to know.In Indiana, a murderous psycho has kidnapped his own six-year-old stepson, Jamie, and secreted him away in a subterranean cave. It’s become their bunker... -
![Finding Claire Fletcher by Lisa Regan]()
Finding Claire Fletcher by Lisa Regan
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsIn the first book in bestselling author Lisa Regan’s new series, a one-night stand sets a detective on the trail of a terrifying unsolved crime.With his career on thin ice and fresh ink on his divorce papers, Sacramento PD Detective Connor Parks goes searching for solace at the bottom of a bottle…and winds up in the arms of a beautiful woman... -
![The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest by Stieg Larsson]()
The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest by Stieg Larsson
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 92 ratingsThe stunning third and final novel in Stieg Larsson’s internationally best-selling trilogyLisbeth Salander—the heart of Larsson’s two previous novels—lies in critical condition, a bullet wound to her head, in the intensive care unit of a Swedish city hospital... -
![Criminal by Karin Slaughter]()
Criminal by Karin Slaughter
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 30 ratingsKarin Slaughter's new novel is an epic tale of love, loyalty, and murder that encompasses forty years, two chillingly similar murder cases, and a good man's deepest secrets. Will Trent is a brilliant agent with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. Newly in love, he is beginning to put a difficult past behind him... -
![Gallery of the Dead by Chris Carter]()
Gallery of the Dead by Chris Carter
Rated: 4.32 of 5 stars · 19 ratings‘Thirty-seven years in the force, and if I was allowed to choose just one thing to erase from my mind, what’s inside that room would be it.'That’s what a LAPD Lieutenant tells Detectives Hunter and Garcia of the Ultra Violent Crimes Unit as they arrive at one of the most shocking crime scenes they have ever attended... -
![The Cabinet of Dr. Leng by Douglas Preston, Lincoln Child]()
The Cabinet of Dr. Leng by Douglas Preston, Lincoln Child
Rated: 4.42 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsAgent Pendergast faces his latest challenge in this next installment of the #1 NYT bestselling series by acclaimed authors Preston and Child, the second in the Leng Trilogy.Following the events of Bloodless, FBI Special Agent A.X.L. Pendergast and Constance Greene return. Against all odds, Constance has found a way back to the place of her origins, New York City in the late 1800s... -
![Looking Glass by Andrew Mayne]()
Looking Glass by Andrew Mayne
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsProfessor Theo Cray caught one of the most prolific serial killers in history using revolutionary scientific methods. Cut off from university research because of the shroud of suspicion around him after the death of his former student and the aftermath of catching his quarry, Cray tries to rebuild his life but finds himself drawn into another unsolved case...Categorized as:
crime law-enforcement suspense thriller action-adventure adult amateur-sleuth audiobook -
![Two Footsteps by Belle Brooks, Karen Harper]()
Two Footsteps by Belle Brooks, Karen Harper
Rated: 4.67 of 5 stars · 6 ratings"My life is in the Wolf's hands." He is the Wolf. I am his Red. The game has begun and he wants me dead. But who is the Wolf? And why has he chosen me? He whistles a tune that's haunting. He glares at me through eyes that are vacant. I feel his heart beating, yet I know he has no soul. He moves like the wind...I can't hear his footsteps. I want this to end. He's playing with my mind... -
![The Sandman by Lars Kepler, Neil Smith]()
The Sandman by Lars Kepler, Neil Smith
Rated: 4.23 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsThe #1 internationally best-selling thriller from the author of The Hypnotist tells the chilling story of a manipulative serial killer and the two brilliant police agents who must try to beat him at his own game.Late one night, outside Stockholm, Mikael Kohler-Frost is found wandering. Thirteen years earlier, he went missing along with his younger sister... -
![Genesis by Karin Slaughter]()
Genesis by Karin Slaughter
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 30 ratingsWhen a tortured young woman enters the trauma center of an Atlanta hospital, Dr. Sara Linton is thrust into a desperate police investigation with Special Agent Will Trent and his partner, Faith Mitchell. Though guarding their own wounds and their own secrets, Sara, Will, and Faith find that they are all that stand between a madman and his next victim... -
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![Police by Jo Nesbø]()
Police by Jo Nesbø
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 28 ratingsWhen a police officer is found murdered at the scene of an old unsolved murder case that he was involved in investigating, it can hardly be a coincidence. When the same thing happens to two other officers in a matter of months the pattern is as clear as it is terrifying. None of the old cases were ever solved. The killings are extremely brutal and the police have no leads... -
![The Moonlight Child by Karen McQuestion]()
The Moonlight Child by Karen McQuestion
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 33 ratingsA gripping and emotional novel that will leave you wondering about the neighbors next door...On a cold January night, Sharon Lemke heads outside to see a lunar eclipse when she notices something odd at the house behind her backyard. Through her neighbor's kitchen window, she sees what appears to be a little girl washing dishes late at night... -
![Killman Creek by Rachel Caine]()
Killman Creek by Rachel Caine
Rated: 4.18 of 5 stars · 34 ratingsEvery time Gwen closed her eyes, she saw him in her nightmares. Now her eyes are open, and he’s not going away.Gwen Proctor won the battle to save her kids from her ex-husband, serial killer Melvin Royal, and his league of psychotic accomplices. But the war isn’t over. Not since Melvin broke out of prison. Not since she received a chilling text…You’re not safe anywhere now... -
![The Whispering Room by Dean Koontz, Elisabeth Rodgers]()
The Whispering Room by Dean Koontz, Elisabeth Rodgers
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 24 ratings16 hrs 52 minsJane Hawk—fiction's most relentless, resourceful, stunning new heroine—continues her battle against a murderous conspiracy in the riveting sequel to The Silent Corner. "No time to delay. Do what you were born to do. Fame will be yours when you do this... -
![Blood Moon by Alexandra Sokoloff]()
Blood Moon by Alexandra Sokoloff
Rated: 4.24 of 5 stars · 19 ratingsBook II in the Thriller Award-nominated Huntress/FBI seriesTwenty-five years have passed since a savage killer terrorized California, massacring three ordinary families before disappearing without a trace... -
![Blood on the Tracks by Barbara Nickless]()
Blood on the Tracks by Barbara Nickless
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsA young woman is found brutally murdered, and the main suspect is the victim’s fiancé, a hideously scarred Iraq War vet known as the Burned Man. But railroad police Special Agent Sydney Rose Parnell, brought in by the Denver Major Crimes unit to help investigate, can't shake the feeling that larger forces are behind this apparent crime of passion... -
![Die Again by Tess Gerritsen]()
Die Again by Tess Gerritsen
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsThe latest enthralling case in Tess Gerritsen's New York Times bestselling Rizzoli & Isles series, the blockbuster books behind the smash hit TNT series.Boston Detective Jane Rizzoli is on the case of a big game hunter found dead in his apartment, alone with the body of a beautiful white snow leopard he had recently been commissioned to procure and stuff for a high-profile museum in the area... -
![Missed Connections by Alexandria Clarke]()
Missed Connections by Alexandria Clarke
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsHow far would you go for revenge? Veronica Bauer isn’t above homicide. Twelve years after a ruthless attack killed her mother and put her father in prison, she embarks on a mission to bring the real culprits to justice. As bodies start to drop, Detective Sheila Arden is assigned to the gruesome case, but she soon discovers that the truth is more complicated than she thought... -
![Indelible by Karin Slaughter]()
Indelible by Karin Slaughter
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 31 ratingsGillian Flynn says, "Karin Slaughter is simply one of the best thriller writers working today."Two armed men enter the police station in tiny Heartsdale, Georgia, and open fire. When the shooting stops, an officer is dead, Police Chief Jeffrey Tolliver is seriously wounded, and the survivors—including a class of grade-school children and medical examiner Sara Linton—are held hostage... -
![Broken by Karin Slaughter]()
Broken by Karin Slaughter
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 31 ratingsWhen Special Agent Will Trent arrives in Grant County, he finds a police department determined to protect its own and far too many unanswered questions about a prisoner's death. He doesn't understand why Officer Lena Adams is hiding secrets from him. He doesn't understand her role in the death of Grant County's popular police chief. He doesn't understand why that man's widow, Dr...Categorized as:
crime drama female-mc law-enforcement suspense thriller 21st-century action-adventure -
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![Catch Me by Lisa Gardner]()
Catch Me by Lisa Gardner
Rated: 4.18 of 5 stars · 28 ratingsDetective D. D. Warren has four days to stop a killer in this “shocking…‘must read’”* from #1 New York Times bestselling author Lisa Gardner—one of Library Journal's Best Thrillers of the Year.Charlene Grant believes she is going to die. For the past few years, her childhood friends have been murdered one by one. Same day. Same time... -
![A Killer's Mind by Mike Omer]()
A Killer's Mind by Mike Omer
Rated: 4.16 of 5 stars · 32 ratingsA chilling thriller of serial murder and dark secrets that will leave you wondering, is the past really in the past?Three Chicago women have been found strangled, embalmed, and posed as if still alive. Doubting the findings of the local PD’s profiler, The FBI calls on forensic psychologist Zoe Bentley to investigate... -
![In the Barren Ground by Loreth Anne White]()
In the Barren Ground by Loreth Anne White
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsIn the Barrens, a vast wilderness in northern Canada bordering the Arctic Circle, night consumes every hour of the winter. Humans are scarce; ferocious predators roam freely. Locals say spirits do, too. Rookie cop Tana Larsson doesn’t mind the dark and quiet. Five months pregnant and hoping to escape the mistakes of her past, she takes a post in Twin Rivers, population 320... -
![The Coffin Dancer by Jeffery Deaver]()
The Coffin Dancer by Jeffery Deaver
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 32 ratingsDetective Lincoln Rhyme, the foremost criminalist in the NYPD, is on the hunt for an elusive murderer, the Coffin Dancer. He's a brilliant hitman who changes his appearance even faster than he adds to his trail of victims, only one of whom has lived long enough to offer a clue: the assassin has an eerie tattoo on his arm of the Grim Reaper waltzing with a woman in front of a casket... -
![Find Her by Lisa Gardner]()
Find Her by Lisa Gardner
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 31 ratingsLisa Gardner's runaway New York Times bestseller--a fast-paced thrill ride featuring Detective D. D. Warren. Seven years ago, carefree college student Flora Dane was kidnapped while on spring break. For 472 days, Flora learned just how much one person can endure... -
![I Know a Secret by Tess Gerritsen]()
I Know a Secret by Tess Gerritsen
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsIn the twelfth gripping novel featuring Jane Rizzoli and Maura Isles, the crime-solving duo—featured in the smash-hit TNT series Rizzoli & Isles—are faced with the gruesomely staged murder of a horror film producer.The crime scene is unlike any that Detective Rizzoli and medical examiner Maura Isles have ever before encountered... -
![The Last Thing to Burn by Will Dean]()
The Last Thing to Burn by Will Dean
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsA woman being held captive is willing to risk everything to save herself, her unborn child, and her captor’s latest victim in this claustrophobic thriller in the tradition of Misery and Room. On an isolated farm in the United Kingdom, a woman is trapped by the monster who kidnapped her seven years ago... -
![The Summer Children The Collector, Book 3 by Dot Hutchison]()
The Summer Children The Collector, Book 3 by Dot Hutchison
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsSeries including The Butterfly... -
![The Secrets of the Shadows by Helen Phifer]()
The Secrets of the Shadows by Helen Phifer
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsSophie was afraid of the man in the shadows. He terrified her, but he would always disappear when someone else came. But one day in June 1984, she didn't escape. He took her. When a young woman is found draped over a gravestone in a chilling murder, police officer Annie Graham experiences a familiar sense of dread... -
![The Girl in the Snow by Alexandria Clarke]()
The Girl in the Snow by Alexandria Clarke
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsA retired FBI agent. A heartstopping tragedy. Carolina Caccia, a divorced mother of two, confronts her worst fears when her son goes missing during a family ski trip. As she discovers her son has been taken, she must revisit her dark past to rescue her child...Categorized as:
suspense law-enforcement crime thriller female-mc mystery contemporary season-winter -
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![The Pretty Dead Girls by Skylar Finn]()
The Pretty Dead Girls by Skylar Finn
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsWhen two young girls go missing from a small Georgia town, the crime remains unsolved for nearly thirty years.When Savannah moves home to the small town of Humble, Georgia, she has no intention of getting involved in a kidnapping investigation. But when her older brother Mac becomes the main suspect, Savannah launches a secret investigation in order to clear her brother’s name...Categorized as:
suspense law-enforcement crime female-mc mystery romance psychological police-procedural -
![Vanish by Tess Gerritsen]()
Vanish by Tess Gerritsen
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 36 ratingsA blessed event becomes a nightmare for pregnant homicide detective Jane Rizzoli when she finds herself on the wrong side of a hostage crisis in this timely and relentless thriller from the New York Times bestselling author of Body Double. A nameless, beautiful woman appears to be just another corpse in the morgue... -
![Live to Tell by Lisa Gardner]()
Live to Tell by Lisa Gardner
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 28 ratingsA savage crime has rocked a working-class neighbourhood of Boston; four members of a family have been brutally murdered. The father is lying in an intensive care unit, his survival in doubt. He is the principal suspect. Female police detective D.D. Warren, however, is not one to take things at face value... -
![Unseen by Karin Slaughter]()
Unseen by Karin Slaughter
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 28 ratingsKarin Slaughter’s novels featuring Special Agent Will Trent are utterly riveting and masterfully drawn. Her latest thriller, Unseen, pits detectives, lovers, and enemies against one another in an unforgettable standoff between righteous courage and deepest evil... -
![The Apprentice by Tess Gerritsen]()
The Apprentice by Tess Gerritsen
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 33 ratingsThe Surgeon has been locked up for a year but his chilling legacy still haunts the city, and especially Boston homicide detective Jane Rizzoli. But now a new killer is at work and Rizzoli senses something horrifyingly familiar about this murderer's modus operandi... -
![A Caller's Game by J.D. Barker]()
A Caller's Game by J.D. Barker
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsDIE HARD meets TALK RADIO in this heart-pounding, relentlessly fast-paced thriller from the New York Times bestselling author of The Fourth Monkey—master of suspense, J.D. Barker. "I'm going to offer you a choice." Controversial satellite radio talk show host, Jordan Briggs, has clawed her way to the top of the broadcast world... -
![Small Spaces by Sarah Epstein]()
Small Spaces by Sarah Epstein
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsWe don’t pick and choose what to be afraid of. Our fears pick us.Tash Carmody has been traumatised since childhood, when she witnessed her gruesome imaginary friend Sparrow lure young Mallory Fisher away from a carnival. At the time nobody believed Tash, and she has since come to accept that Sparrow wasn’t real. Now fifteen and mute, Mallory’s never spoken about the week she went missing...Categorized as:
crime female-mc law-enforcement suspense thriller action-adventure book coming-of-age -
![Triptych by Karin Slaughter]()
Triptych by Karin Slaughter
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 36 ratingsIn the city of Atlanta, women are dying—at the hands of a killer who signs his work with a single, chilling act of mutilation. Leaving behind enough evidence to fuel a frenzied police hunt, this cunning madman is bringing together dozens of lives, crossing the boundaries of wealth and race. And the people who are chasing him must cross those boundaries too... -
![The Analyst by John Katzenbach]()
The Analyst by John Katzenbach
Rated: 4.12 of 5 stars · 30 ratings'Happy fifty-third birthday, Doctor. Welcome to the first day of your death. You ruined my life. And now I fully intend to ruin yours.'You have exactly one fortnight, starting tomorrow morning at 6 a.m., to discover who I am. When you succeed you must purchase one of those tiny ads at the bottom of the New York Times front page, and print my name there.'If you do not succeed, then .. -
![Stranger in the Woods by Anni Taylor]()
Stranger in the Woods by Anni Taylor
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsPhotographer Isla Wilson is thrilled she’s landed her dream job, but the clients who hired her are getting stranger by the day. It sounded so perfect - a month‘s assignment at the misty, sprawling Scottish Highlands property of brilliant architect Alban McGregor, and his wife, Jessica. But deep in the woods, there is a chilling playhouse... -
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![What Hurts the Most by Willow Rose]()
What Hurts the Most by Willow Rose
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsASIN B018A097LO moved to the most recent edition hereYou will never guess the ending!Am I pretty? Imagine being asked that question standing face to face with a killer. What would you answer? While her life is going from bad to worse, journalist Mary Mills receives a phone call from her father telling her that her brother has been arrested for murder...Categorized as:
crime female-mc law-enforcement suspense thriller action-adventure adult amateur-sleuth -
![The Dark Corners of the Night by Meg Gardiner, Hillary Huber]()
The Dark Corners of the Night by Meg Gardiner, Hillary Huber
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsListening Length: 11 hours and 45 minutesI am the legion of the night …He appears in the darkness like a ghost, made of shadows and fear—the Midnight Man. He comes for the parents but leaves the children alive, tiny witnesses to unspeakable horror. The bedroom communities of Los Angeles are gripped with dread, and the attacks are escalating... -
![The Kept Woman by Karin Slaughter]()
The Kept Woman by Karin Slaughter
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 33 ratingsHusbands and wives. Mothers and daughters. The past and the future. Secrets bind them. And secrets can destroy them. The author of Pretty Girls returns with an electrifying, emotionally complex thriller that plunges its fascinating protagonist into the darkest depths of a mystery that just might destroy him... -
![The Vanished Ones by Donato Carrisi]()
The Vanished Ones by Donato Carrisi
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsWe call them the sleepers...At the elite Missing Persons bureau of the Federal Police, Mila Vasquez is tasked with finding the hundreds of lost people who have vanished from their former lives. However, the longer they are gone, they more they are forgotten by the world. Now they are returning... -
![Malevolent by Jana Deleon]()
Malevolent by Jana Deleon
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsFrom New York Times bestselling author Jana DeLeon, the first in a new thriller series. Everyone wondered about Shaye Archer’s past. Including Shaye. Shaye Archer’s life effectively began the night police found her in an alley, beaten and abused and with no memory of the previous fifteen years, not even her name... -
![The Mercy of Snakes by Dean Koontz]()
The Mercy of Snakes by Dean Koontz
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsA series of suspicious deaths in a retirement home draws Nameless into the confidence of a terrified former resident—and into the dark heart of a shocking conspiracy. In part five of the Nameless series, it’s time to hunt.Oakshore Park is Michigan’s most exclusive assisted-living community. Presided over by two killer angels of mercy, it’s also the go-to facility in assisted dying...
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