Books like 'Whip Crack'
Readers who enjoyed Whip Crack by Alex Smith also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
mystery serial killer thriller crime suspense law-enforcement police-procedural kidnapping
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Six Graves by Angela Marsons
Rated: 4.75 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsIt’s a typical teenage bedroom with posters covering the walls and clothes littering the floor. But the girl lying on her bed, wearing a delicate chain around her neck, is lifeless. A circle of red stains her white vest top and Kim feels a sharp stab of sadness... -
One by One by Chris Carter
Rated: 4.48 of 5 stars · 25 ratings'I need your help, Detective. Fire or water?' Detective Robert Hunter of the LAPD's Homicide Special Section receives an anonymous call asking him to go to a specific web address - a private broadcast. Hunter logs on and a show devised for his eyes only immediately begins. But the caller doesn't want Detective Hunter to just watch, he wants him to participate, and refusal is simply not an option... -
Deadly Fate by Angela Marsons
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe woman’s bright blonde hair floats in the breeze. She almost looks like she could be resting on the soft green grass. But her brown eyes stare unblinking up at the sky, and the final cut across her mouth is dark with blood... -
The Executioner by Chris Carter
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 25 ratingsFROM THE AUTHOR OF THE SUNDAY TIMES NUMBER ONE BESTSELLER THE CALLER. Inside a Los Angeles church, on the altar steps, lies the blood-soaked body of a priest. Later, the forensic team discover that, on the victim's chest, the figure 3 has been scrawled in blood. At first, Detective Robert Hunter believes that this is a ritualistic killing. But as more bodies surface, he is forced to reassess... -
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Losing Leah Holloway by Lisa Regan
Rated: 4.45 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsFive years ago, Claire Fletcher escaped her abductor. But some scars never fade, and surviving was just the beginning…When Claire sees a car full of children careen into a river, she rushes to the rescue. But the driver, a mother named Leah Holloway, prefers to drown. For Claire and her ex, Detective Connor Parks, it doesn’t add up... -
The Killing Code by J.D. Kirk
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsWhat would you do if there weren't any consequences?After twenty years on the force, Detective Chief Inspector Jack Logan thinks he has seen it all.He is wrong.When a nurse is murdered on her way home from nightshift, Jack and his team go on the hunt for her killer... -
The Girl and the Secret Society by A.J. Rivers
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsEvil has many faces. This one you will never see coming.This is the bizarre and shocking case of Lakyn Monroe.In the midst of filming her show, Lakyn vanished without a trace.Four months have passed, and the unusual disappearance of the internet celebrity has garnered nationwide attention... -
The Blossom Twins by Carol Wyer
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsTheir parents thought they were hiding… One beautiful summer’s evening, thirteen-year-old twins Ivy and Erin Westmore snuggle down in a tent in their back garden, giggling and sharing secrets. When their mother goes to wake the girls the next morning, their tent is empty. The alarm is raised and Detective Natalie Ward is put onto the case... -
Stone Cold Dead by Alex Smith
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsGetting blood from these stones will be all too easy.In the middle of one of Norfolk’s most brutal winters a frozen body is discovered on the legendary Stone of Ling. With Robert Kett out of action the case falls to DC Kate Savage and DI Pete Porter, and it quickly becomes clear to them that the young man wasn’t just killed, he was sacrificed.And he isn’t alone... -
Glimpse Of Death by Leslie Wolfe
Rated: 4.44 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsLibrarian Note: Alternate Cover Edition for ASIN: B06XXLFCPC.A RIVETING SERIAL KILLER THRILLERHer beautiful face, serene and immobile, resting on her folded arm. Her long, luscious hair, undulating gently in the evening breeze. Her eyes half-closed, a hint of a smile on her pale lips, as if to welcome an unseen lover... -
Three Little Pigs by Alex Smith
Rated: 4.44 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsHe will find the truth. Even if it kills him. Five months ago, DCI Robert Kett’s wife Billie was snatched from a London street. Five months of no leads, no evidence, and no suspects. Until now...Categorized as:
crime kidnapping law-enforcement police-procedural suspense thriller adult audiobook -
Corpse Road by David J. Gatward, Aubrey Parsons
Rated: 4.44 of 5 stars · 18 ratings* Duration: 7 hours and 9 minutes *To catch the hunter, become the prey.When the body of a female backpacker is found on the Yorkshire moors, the killer seems obvious, the motive clear.If only.Because Grimm and his team are up against not just a murderer, but a predator, and when the key suspect disappears, it's only a matter of time before another body is found... -
Fatal Witness by Robert Bryndza
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsDetective Erika Foster is back in FATAL WITNESS – with a chilling new serial killer case in Robert Bryndza's multi-million bestselling crime thriller series!How do you find a killer who has destroyed all the evidence?Detective Erika Foster is on a late-night walk near her new house in Blackheath when she stumbles upon the brutal murder of Vicky Clarke, a true-crime podcaster... -
The Killing House by Claire McGowan
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsLong-buried secrets are being unearthed. And they're very close to home...Forensic psychologist Paula Maguire returns yet again to her hometown to investigate a spine-chilling case in THE KILLING HOUSE, the sixth novel in Claire McGowan's series. The Paula Maguire series is the perfect read for fans of Michael Connelly and Peter May... -
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Flesh and Blood by Caroline Mitchell
Rated: 4.44 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsA string of suicides. A community in terror. And a chilling conspiracy only DI Amy Winter can crack.A wave of apparent suicides hits a string of seaside resorts, but when a police officer is named as the latest to die, DI Amy Winter suspects there may be more than mere coincidence to these tragic deaths... -
Dead Ground by M.W. Craven
Rated: 4.44 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsDetective Sergeant Washington Poe is in court, fighting eviction from his beloved and isolated croft, when he is summoned to a backstreet brothel in Carlisle where a man has been beaten to death with a baseball bat... -
The Silent Wife by Andy Maslen
Rated: 4.44 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsHer career on the line and an innocent woman charged with murder. Can she save them both?As bogus corruption charges loom over her, DS Kat Ballantyne finds herself deskbound and stuck with cold cases. Her hated boss, DI Carver, has given her just one week to explain how £50,000 found its way into her bank account. If she can’t, she’ll be lucky to have a desk at all... -
Won't You Save Me by Wendy Dranfield
Rated: 4.60 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsDetective Dean Matheson has returned to his hometown to begin his new job and put the traumatic events of his past behind him – but his fresh start won’t last long when the local area is hit by a series of strange disappearances and twisted killings …A nameless girl badly beaten and dumped in front of the mysterious new church. A shocking murder scene discovered in the apartment over the diner...Categorized as:
suspense crime law-enforcement police-procedural thriller mystery small-town audiobook -
Left For Dead by Caroline Mitchell
Rated: 4.39 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA victim on display. A detective on the rails.Shopping with her sister, DI Amy Winter is admiring a Valentine’s Day window display of a perfect bride encrusted in diamonds and resplendent in lace—until she notices blood oozing from the mannequin’s mouth.This is no stunt. A post-mortem reveals the victim was left to die on her macabre throne for all to see... -
Signature by Jeff Carson
Rated: 4.39 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsChief Detective Wolf and Special Agent Kristen Luke are back — and they’re going up against a sadistic killer whose signature works span the Four Corners region of Colorado and are now spilling into Rocky Points. Signature is the latest pulse-thumping thriller in Jeff Carson’s popular David Wolf mystery-thriller series...Categorized as:
crime law-enforcement police-procedural suspense thriller action-adventure adult audiobook -
Shallow Ground by Andy Maslen, Steve West
Rated: 4.39 of 5 stars · 18 ratings10 hours, 20 minutes Detective Ford has a cold-blooded killer to catch. But can he escape his own dark secrets?Barely a month since his promotion to Inspector, DI Ford is called in to investigate the murder of a young nurse and her son in a small flat in Salisbury. There are few clues, and no apparent motive, but Ford can sense that there’s a serial killer at work... -
Secrets on the Fens by Joy Ellis, Henrietta Meire
Rated: 4.39 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsOne moonlit night, the bodies of two young people are discovered lying entwined on a blanket in the woods. The young man is clutching a red rose. It appears to be a lovers’ suicide pact . . .Until Detective Nikki Galena and DS Joseph Easter look more closely. Romeo and Juliet, as they decide to call them, were murdered somewhere else and brought to the woods... -
Her Dying Secret by Lisa Regan
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsShe gently opens the woman’s tightly clenched fist, uncurling each finger to reveal a square of folded paper hidden in her palm...Categorized as:
suspense crime law-enforcement police-procedural thriller mystery fiction small-town -
The Roubaud Connection by Estelle Ryan
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsBrutal murders. An ancient treasure. A rogue state.A young acquaintance of nonverbal communications expert Doctor Genevieve Lenard begs her to look into the disappearance of his friend...Categorized as:
crime thriller law-enforcement police-procedural kidnapping mystery fiction social-commentary -
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The Secret Admirer by Carol Wyer
Rated: 4.43 of 5 stars · 14 ratings‘I tried to talk to you today but you snubbed me and walked away. It wasn’t wise to give me the brush-off, Gemma. I can be a truly good friend but I also make the perfect enemy.’ Sasha’s eighteen-year-old daughter Gemma was all she had in the world. Sasha fell pregnant with Gemma when she was still at school, and the two are as close as sisters... -
If She Ran by H.K. Christie
Rated: 4.43 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsThree months. Three missing women. One PI determined to discover the truth.Back from break, PI Martina Monroe clears the air with her boss at Drakos Security & Investigations and is ready to jump right into solving cold cases for the CoCo County Sheriff’s Department... -
Dawn Girl by Leslie Wolfe
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsA GRIPPING SERIAL KILLER THRILLERHer blue eyes wide open, glossed over. A few specks of sand clung to her long, dark lashes. Her beautiful face, immobile, covered in sparkling flecks of sand. Her lips slightly parted as if to let a last breath escape...Categorized as:
crime kidnapping law-enforcement police-procedural suspense thriller action-adventure adult -
Five Days Post Mortem by L.T. Vargus, Tim McBain
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsHer body floats. A bloated thing half atop the river. Naked. Pale. Mouth and eyes open wide. When two fishermen discover a corpse floating in the Clackamas river, profiler Violet Darger heads to rural Oregon to hunt another serial killer. What she discovers in the woods might change the course of her life... -
Bad Dog by Alex Smith
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsSome legends can kill you. When a young woman is brutally murdered in the Norfolk countryside, the locals blame Black Shuck—a legendary wild dog. There’s only one problem: the wounds weren’t made by an animal. DCI Robert Kett is battling a black dog of his own... -
Shadow Falls by Wendy Dranfield
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsYou thought your little girl was safe at summer camp. You were wrong…The little girl drags her eyes open, realizing she’s starting to fade. She tries calling out—“Daddy?”—using all her remaining strength... -
The Talisker Dead by J.M. Dalgliesh
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsPulling on the threads of your past... is enough to kill you...When a teenage islander goes missing on Burns Night, D.I. Duncan McAdam takes a strong interest despite the apparent lack of concern shown by the boy's father. When a woman's body is soon discovered in Talisker Bay, with a single stab wound to the chest, Duncan and his team realise they have a killer on the island... -
Perfect Silence by Helen Sarah Fields
Rated: 4.32 of 5 stars · 19 ratings'Relentless pace, devilish cleverness and a laser-sharp focus on plot.' Chris BrookmyreWhen silence falls, who will hear their cries?The body of a young girl is found dumped on the roadside on the outskirts of Edinburgh. When pathologists examine the remains, they make a gruesome discovery: the silhouette of a doll carved in the victim's skin...Categorized as:
crime law-enforcement suspense thriller police-procedural kidnapping mystery fiction -
Unquiet Souls by Liz Mistry
Rated: 4.42 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsWhat is the link between the abduction of a little girl and a dead prostitute? When the body of a prostitute is found, followed by the discovery of children locked in an attic, DI Gus McGuire, newly returned to work, is given the case. But what at first appears to be a simple murder soon turns into an international manhunt for the members of a twisted child trafficking ring...Categorized as:
crime law-enforcement thriller police-procedural kidnapping mystery fiction audiobook -
The Missing Girls by Carol Wyer
Rated: 4.36 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsOne girl found dead. Another girl gone... Long shadows danced on the tin walls. Inside the trunk lay Carrie Miller, wrapped in plastic, arms folded across her ribcage, lips sealed tight forever... When, a girl’s body is found at a Midlands storage unit, it is too decomposed for Detective Robyn Carter to read the signs left by the killer... -
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Chosen Prey by John Sandford
Rated: 4.23 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsA New York Times bestseller! Lucas Davenport returns in the most harrowing and unexpected Prey novel yet—the story of a congenial man, and his most uncongenial obsession...An art history professor and writer and cheerful pervert, James Qatar had a hobby: he took secret photographs of women and turned them into highly sexual drawings. One day, he took the hobby a step further and..Categorized as:
crime kidnapping law-enforcement police-procedural suspense thriller action-adventure adult -
The Watson Girl by Leslie Wolfe
Rated: 4.28 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsAn entire family is murdered and, by a quirk, a young girl is left unharmed. For fifteen years, she believed the killer had been caught, and he’s now on death row, awaiting execution. While trying to be content with her adoptive family, she’s living in relentless uncertainty and the fear of remembering what really happened that night when she was five years old. She’s The Watson Girl...Categorized as:
crime kidnapping law-enforcement police-procedural suspense thriller action-adventure adult -
The Hunter of the Dark by Donato Carrisi
Rated: 4.28 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA brutal killer is on the streets of Rome. He leaves no trace. And shows no mercy.A series of gruesome murders leaves the police force in Rome reeling, with no real clues or hard evidence to follow. Assigned to the case is Sandra Vega, a brilliant forensic analyst, struggling to come to terms with the crimes and her own past... -
Taker of Lives by Leslie Wolfe
Rated: 4.28 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA GRIPPING CRIME THRILLER How can you outrun a killer you won’t see coming?They are the most violent, blood-thirsty, and vicious of criminals. While hunting for them, FBI profilers call these monsters UNSUBS, short for unknown subjects of ongoing investigations...Categorized as:
crime kidnapping law-enforcement police-procedural suspense thriller action-adventure adult -
Dark is the Grave by T.G. Reid
Rated: 4.28 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA dead cop. A damaged detective. A copycat killer on the loose.When the chief suspect in the notorious Peek-a-boo cop killer case blew himself up, almost taking lead investigator DCI Duncan Bone with him, the psychologically damaged detective thought his days on the force were over...Categorized as:
crime suspense law-enforcement police-procedural thriller mystery fiction contemporary -
Love You Dead by Peter James
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsAn ugly duckling as a child, Jodie Bentley had two dreams in life—to be beautiful and rich. She's achieved the first, with a little help from a plastic surgeon, and now she's working hard on the second. Her philosophy about money is simple. You can either earn it or marry it. Marrying is easy, it's getting rid of the husband afterwards that's harder, that takes real skill... -
You Are Dead by Peter James, Daniel Weyman
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsYou are Dead is the eleventh thrilling crime novel in Peter James' Roy Grace series, read aloud by Daniel Weyman.They were marked for deathThe last words Jamie Ball hears from his fiancée, Logan Somerville, are in a terrified mobile phone call. She has just driven into the underground car park beneath the block of flats where they live in Brighton. Then she screams and the phone goes dead... -
Fatal Lies by Mary Stone
Rated: 4.57 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsSex, lies, and murder.Two months after the murder of her fashion-model cousin and her own near kidnapping, Sky Stryker is more determined than ever to expose the dark side of the fashion industry and memorialize her cousin’s life. Even if it means dredging up her own long-suppressed but never forgotten horrific nightmares.Then another model is attacked, beaten within an inch of her life...Categorized as:
kidnapping crime law-enforcement police-procedural mystery murder serial-killers fiction -
The Girl in the Grave by Helen Phifer
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsWhen the body of a teenage runaway is found hidden inside someone else’s grave in a small-town cemetery in The Lake District, an urgent call is made to Forensic Pathologist Beth Adams. Still traumatised by a recent attempt on her own life, one look at the beautiful girl’s broken body is enough to bring Beth out of hiding for the first time since her attack...Categorized as:
crime suspense thriller law-enforcement police-procedural mystery psychological fiction -
Once Forsaken by Blake Pierce
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsWhen Special Agent Riley Paige finally decides to take a well-needed rest from the FBI, a request for help comes from the most unlikely source: her own daughter. April’s best friend is devastated by the death of her sister, a freshman at Georgetown. Worse, she is convinced that the suicide was staged, and that her sister was murdered at the hands of a serial killer... -
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Secret Prey by John Sandford
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsThe company chairman lay dead in the woods, his orange hunting jacket punctured by a bullet at close range. Around him stood the four executives with whom he had been hunting, each with a reason not to be sorry about the man's death. A classic murder mystery, it would seem: the kind where the detective gathers everyone together at the end and solves the case...Categorized as:
crime law-enforcement police-procedural suspense thriller action-adventure adult audiobook -
Expose by Danielle Girard
Rated: 4.44 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsExamining the dead will help her solve present crimes and uncover past secrets in this page-turner thriller for fans of Patricia Cornwell and Rizzoli and Isles.With her vindictive ex-husband out of prison, San Francisco medical examiner Annabelle Schwartzman is trying harder than ever to move on with her life—by focusing on her job to speak for the victims who can’t...Categorized as:
crime suspense kidnapping law-enforcement police-procedural thriller mystery fiction -
No Escape by Mary Burton
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsHe Was Taught How To Kill Even behind bars, serial killer Harvey Day Smith exudes menace. Psychologist Jolene Granger has agreed to hear his dying confession, vowing not to let the monster inside her head... -
The Dare by Carol Wyer
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsJane’s daughter is a good girl. What is she hiding? When thirteen-year-old Savannah Hopkins doesn’t come straight home from school, as she always does, her mother Jane immediately raises the alarm. Leading the investigation is Detective Natalie Ward whose daughter Leigh is the same age as Savannah... -
Alter Ego by Brian Freeman
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsWhen a freak auto accident kills a driver on the remote roads outside Duluth, Jonathan Stride is disturbed to discover that the victim appears to be a "ghost," with a false identity and no evidence to suggest who he really was. Alarmingly, a gun is found in the car--and the gun has recently been fired... -
One Left Alive by Helen Phifer
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratings‘One of those rare books that really is unputdownable . A must read.’ NetGalley reviewer ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐A gentle breeze blew her blonde hair across her face, her glazed eyes staring blankly into the sunset. Her small frame looked lost hanging from the large oak tree. On the branch next to her was a worn child’s rope swing. She looked too young and beautiful to be dead...
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