Books like 'Penitence'
Readers who enjoyed Penitence by Kristin Koval also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
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The Surrogate's Gift by L.G. Davis
Rated: 4.36 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsHer one good deed is about to turn into her worst nightmare.Becoming a surrogate for Marcia and Travis Thorpe is Grace’s chance to overcome her inner demons.Nothing can go wrong. Her life depends on it.Determined to focus on the pregnancy, she drops everything and accepts the Thorpes’ offer to move in with them until the baby is born. A simple decision. One big mistake... -
I Looked Away by Jane Corry
Rated: 4.27 of 5 stars · 19 ratingsYOU MADE A MISTAKE. BUT THEY'RE SAYING IT'S MURDER.From the Sunday Times bestselling author of My Husband's Wife, comes a beautifully written psycholgocial thriller for fans of Lisa Jewell and Clare Mackintosh.Every Monday, 49-year-old Ellie looks after her grandson Josh. She loves him more than anyone else in the world. The only thing that can mar her happiness is her husband's affair... -
Maura's Game by Martina Cole
Rated: 4.28 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsMaura Ryan was the queen of the criminal underworld when she pulled off the most audacious gold bullion robbery of all time. Since then she's retired from a life of crime to be with the only man she's ever loved. But enemies from her past are closing in and they're about to learn that they should never cross Maura Ryan. The dangerous lady is back and she's as lethal as ever . . -
Deceived by Stella Barcelona
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsTheir destinies have been set in motion by their ancestors. Taylor Marlowe Bartholomew carries three of the most notable names in New Orleans society. She hoped to forge her own path in the world as an Assistant District Attorney, but that dream is dying as obligations pull her into the family shipbuilding business... -
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Hidden Valley by Annie Seaton
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsHappily working on her family’s macadamia farm in the rolling hills of northern New South Wales, Dee Peters receives an enigmatic letter hinting of family secrets, and the prospect of her inheriting a cattle station in the Northern Territory outback... -
Angelica And Francesca by Kenneth Jarrett Singleton
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsAngelica and Francesca are the identical twin daughters of Pellrue, Duke of Doretay. Doretay is a state within a kingdom called Vidien, which Angelica's and Francesca's great uncle, King Oscar, rules. Pellrue attempts to keep control of his wicked, evil daughters as they keep entering his city and raising havoc by torturing and murdering the common citizens within... -
The Take by Martina Cole
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsFreddie Jackson thinks he owns the underworld when he gets out of prison. He's done his time, made the right connections, and now he's ready to use them. His wife Jackie just wants her husband home, but she's forgotten the rows, the violence, and the girls Freddie can't leave alone... -
The Brighton Mermaid by Dorothy Koomson
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsBrighton Beach, 1993Teenagers Nell and Jude find the body of a young woman and when no one comes to claim her, she becomes known as the Brighton Mermaid. Nell is still struggling to move on when, three weeks later, Jude disappears.Twenty-five years on, Nell is forced to quit her job to find out who the Brighton Mermaid really was - and what happened to her best friend that summer... -
The Perfect Block by Blake Pierce
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsIn THE PERFECT BLOCK (Book #2), rookie criminal profiler Jessie Hunt, 29, picks up the pieces of her broken life and leaves suburbia to start a new life in downtown Los Angeles. But when a wealthy socialite is murdered, Jessie, assigned the case, finds herself back in the world of picture-perfect suburbia, hunting a deranged killer amidst the false facades of normalcy and sociopathic women... -
The Baltimore Boys by Joël Dicker
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 28 ratingsSwiss Sensation Joel Dicker's compulsive follow-up to the phenomenally bestselling The Truth about the Harry Quebert Affair... -
Relentless Pursuit by Kathy Herman
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsRich with the Cajun flavors of south Louisiana, this final book in the Secrets of Roux River Bayou Series is a story of what it means to find true peace in an uncertain world. Sax Landry left home at seventeen to escape his father’s abuse, leaving his mother and sister to fend for themselves... -
The Night She Vanished by Wendy Dranfield
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsMy parents seem to be the perfect couple. But no one knows what I know... Everyone in the small Midwestern town of Henderson looks up to my perfect parents. With dependable jobs as a midwife and the town sheriff, they help this close-knit community feel safe. But the locals didn't grow up in my parents' house. They don't know what I know. And they wouldn't believe me if I told them.. -
The Insider by Craig Schaefer
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsMove over, Jack Reacher and Kinsey Millhone: cast-iron bodyguard Charlie McCabe is back in Craig Schaefer’s gritty sequel to The Loot.Hard-bitten bodyguard Charlie McCabe is lucky to be alive after her recent foray into Boston's criminal underworld... -
Diamond Sky by Annie Seaton
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsThe Kimberley can be a haven for those who can stand the heat, but its isolated beauty can also be deadly, if you're not paying attention... The remote Matsu diamond mine in the Kimberley is the perfect place for engineer Dru Porter to hide. Her insignificance in that vast and rugged landscape helps her feel invisible. And safe... -
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The List by Velvet Vaughn
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsFrom the author of The Fan and Committed is the first romantic suspense novel in the COBRA Securities series. The List is an intriguing mixture of pulse-pounding suspense and sizzling passion. It was just supposed to be a game... What started out as a harmless game between friends has turned deadly real. Fourteen men are dead, all from apparent accidents... -
All That Is Mine I Carry with Me by William Landay
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 9 ratingsA mother vanished. A father presumed guilty. There is no proof. There are no witnesses. For the children, there is only doubt. From the New York Times bestselling author of Defending Jacob. . . .One afternoon in November 1975, ten-year-old Miranda Larkin comes home from school to find her house eerily quiet. Her mother is missing. Nothing else is out of place. There is no sign of struggle... -
The Thorn Girl by Laura Elliot
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsA swallow flutters its wings into a dimly lit attic as Adele Foyle stumbles across the secret diary of the mother she has never met, and a shocking account of a crime committed over twenty-five years ago... -
Remember Me by Charity Norman
Rated: 4.31 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThey never found Leah Parata. Not a boot, not a backpack, not a turquoise beanie. After she left me that day, she vanished off the face of the earth.A close-knit community is ripped apart by disturbing revelations that cast new light on a young woman's disappearance twenty-five years ago... -
The Ex-Wife by Jess Ryder
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsYou’ve got everything she wants …Newly married Natasha has the perfect house, a loving husband and a beautiful little girl called Emily. She’d have it all if it wasn’t for Jen, her husband’s ex-wife who just won’t leave them alone …Then Natasha returns home one day to find her husband and Emily gone without trace... -
The Last Thing She Told Me by Linda Green
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsEven the deepest buried secrets can find their way to the surface...Moments before she dies, Nicola's grandmother Betty whispers to her that there are babies at the bottom of the garden.Nicola's mother claims she was talking nonsense. However, when Nicola's daughter finds a bone while playing in Betty's garden, it's clear that something sinister has taken place... -
Call the Canaries Home by Laura Barrow
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsThree estranged sisters reconnect in their Louisiana hometown to face an unresolved past in a heartfelt novel about family, grief, secrets, and forgiveness.Savannah was four years old when her twin sister, Georgia, went missing from their small Louisiana town, fracturing their family... -
Redemption Lake by Susan Clayton-Goldner
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsTucson, Arizona – Eighteen-year-old Matt Garrison is harboring two terrible secrets: his involvement in the drowning death of his 12-year-old cousin, and a night of drunken sex with his best friend’s mother, Crystal, whom he finds dead in a bathtub of blood. Guilt forces Matt to act on impulse and hide his involvement with Crystal.Detective Winston Radhauser knows Matt is hiding something... -
Our Little World by Karen Winn
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratings"I was intrigued by Our Little World from the chilling first paragraph. It's a coming-of-age novel complicated by a tragic and untimely death, and it's also a novel about two sisters you will never forget. I fell in love with the confidence of the writing and the colorful nostalgia of the mid-'80s details. Our Little World will transport and transfix you."—Elin HilderbrandJuly 1985... -
Chill by Stephanie Rowe
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsHE DISAPPEARED. Alaskan bush pilot Luke Webber did not exist until eight years ago. His brutal history still haunts him, but no one will ever know who he used to be. It needs to stay that way, or more people will die. SHE FOUND HIM. Isabella Kopas is on the run, a bullet in her shoulder and a murderer on her tail... -
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Roses Are Blood Red by Novoneel Chakraborty
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsI'll gift you a love story that every girl desires, but few get to live.'He'd told me once. And boy, did he stick to his words! Vanav Thakur is the perfect boyfriend that any girl can have. He ticks every box you can ever have for your Mr Right. Trust me on this... -
This Book Will Bury Me by Ashley Winstead
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 9 ratingsFrom the bestselling author of In My Dreams I Hold a Knife and Midnight is the Darkest Hour comes a chilling, compulsive story of five amateur sleuths, whose hunt for an elusive killer catapults them into danger as the world watches.It's the most famous crime in modern history. But only she knows the true story... -
Hard Time by A.J. Carella
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsWhen it comes to family, Kat will do anything. Even if that means going against everything she believes in, and risking her already fragile relationship with the man she loves. Faced with a problem that is too much for her alone, she enlists the help of her one time partner, Kyle. Together they must uncover a deadly secret before any more innocent lives are lost... -
American Devil by Oliver Stark
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsA violent killer is stalking New York's streets, and the trophies he will take from his victims are essential if he is to complete his masterpiece. That he also likes playing games with the police and his pray is a bonus. He can outwit everyone he comes up against... -
The Perfect Family Man by M.M. DeLuca
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsFive years ago, my little boy went missing. Now my husband’s vanished, too.I wish I could say that the tragedy of little Jack disappearing brought me and Nate closer together. But my husband is more distant from me now than he’s ever been. Perhaps that’s why I don’t ask him exactly where he’s going when he sets off on another business trip... -
Never Far Away by Michael Koryta
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsOnce a wife, mother, and witness to a gruesome crime, Nina Morgan has been in hiding for a decade as Leah Trenton. She left behind her Midwestern roots to move to the northernmost tip of Maine. She also left behind a family... -
The Halo Effect by Anne D. LeClaire
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsIn this tour de force, a father, shaken by tragedy, tries to avenge his daughter’s murder—and restore his family’s shattered life. It was supposed to be a typical October evening for renowned portrait artist Will Light... -
You Let Me In by Lucy Clarke
Rated: 4.05 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsSpine-tingling, chilling, and utterly compulsive, YOU LET ME IN is the stunning new novel from Richard & Judy Book Club author, Lucy Clarke Nothing has felt right since Elle rented out her house . . . I’M IN YOUR HOUSE There’s a new coldness. A shift in the atmosphere. The prickling feeling that someone is watching her every move from the shadows... -
Demolition Angel by Robert Crais
Rated: 4.05 of 5 stars · 21 ratingsCarol Starkey is a bomb squad veteran now doing time as a Detective-2 with LAPD's Criminal Conspiracy Section. Three years have passed since the detonation that killed Carol's partner and lover, but she is still severely scarred both mentally and physically... -
Hotel by Arthur Hailey
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsDuring five days in the midst of a hot, steamy Louisiana summer, the lives of a colorful cast of characters intertwine in a series of public, private, and personal dramas at the famed St. Gregory luxury hotel... -
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Family Money by Chad Zunker, Kris Koscheski
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 28 ratings* Duration: 7 hours and 24 minutes *A dead man’s secrets put a family in peril in a twisting novel of suspense by the Amazon Charts best-selling author of the David Adams series.Alex Mahan is married to his high school sweetheart, Taylor... -
When You Disappeared by John Marrs
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsWhen Catherine wakes up alone one morning, she thinks her husband has gone for a run before work. But Simon never makes it to the office. His running shoes are by the front door. Nothing is missing - except him.Catherine knows Simon must be in trouble. He wouldn't just leave her. He wouldn't leave the children.But Simon knows the truth - about why he left and what he's done... -
What Happened to the Bennetts by Lisa Scottoline
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsFrom #1 bestselling author Lisa Scottoline comes a pulse-pounding new novel.Your family has been attacked, never again to be the same.Now you have to choose between law…and justice.Jason Bennett is a suburban dad who owns a court-reporting business, but one night, his life takes a horrific turn... -
The Curfew by T.M. Logan
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsYour son said he was home. WHY DID HE LIE? It's time to preorder the brand new up-all-night thriller from the Sunday Times bestselling author of Richard and Judy pick The Holiday, now a major TV Drama.I should have known something was wrong. I should have sensed it. Felt it in the air, like the build-up of pressure before a thunderstorm, that heavy, loaded calm... -
We Used To Live Here by Daniel Hurst
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsEvery house has secrets. But not all of them stay buried forever...When the Burgess family move into their 'forever' home, it seems like they are set for many happy years together at their new address. Steph and Grant, along with their children, Charlie and Amelia, settle into their new surroundings quickly... -
Twelve Secrets by Robert Gold
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsBen Harper, true crime journalist, is about to unravel his most shocking story yet . . . his own.The day his older brother was murdered was the day Ben Harper's life changed forever.In one of the most shocking crimes in national history, Nick and his friend were stabbed to death by two girls their own age. Police called the killings random, a senseless tragedy... -
I Made a Mistake by Jane Corry
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIT STARTED WITH A KISS... AND ENDED WITH MURDER. The darkly addictive new novel from the Sunday Times bestselling author of I Looked Away, Blood Sisters and My Husband's Wife. --------------------------------------------------------In Poppy Page's mind, there are two types of women in this world: those who are faithful to their husbands, and those who are not... -
Breaking Point by Edel Coffey
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsOne mistake could cost her everything.Susannah has two beautiful daughters, a high-flying medical career, a successful husband and an enviable life. Her hair is glossy, her clothes are expensive; she truly has it all.But when - on the hottest day of the year - her strict morning routine is disrupted, Susannah finds herself running on autopilot... -
Blood and Fire by Shannon McKenna
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsRestless and impulsive, Bruno Ranieri has the temperament to fit right in with the McClouds. And just like the McCloud brothers, Bruno has a dangerous past to contend with - one that's about to come crashing back into his life...Bruno Ranieri has always lived at a chaotic pace, and that goes double lately... -
The Women by S.E. Lynes
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsThe night she moves in with Peter, she’s so happy, so exhilarated, so in love. Later, she will remember a much smaller feeling, a tiny one percent in her gut. And she will remember pushing that feeling aside…Samantha Frayn doesn’t know why Peter Bridges picks her – a nobody with bitten fingernails and a troubled childhood behind her – but she falls quickly... -
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No Hiding in Boise by Kim Hooper
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsWhen Angie is awakened by a midnight call from an officer with the Boise Police Department, she thinks there must be a misunderstanding. The officer tells her that her husband was involved in a shooting at a local bar, but how can that be possible when her husband is sleeping right next to her? Except when she turns to wake him, he isn’t there... -
The Wolf Hunt by Ayelet Gundar-Goshen
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsAward-winning author Ayelet Gundar-Goshen returns with a timely exploration of the fault lines in a community, a school, and a family, as a mother begins to suspect her teenage son of committing a terrible crime... -
Every Moment Since: A Novel by Marybeth Mayhew Whalen
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsA small Southern town. An ordinary Saturday night. A little boy disappears without a trace.Everyone in Wynotte, North Carolina, knows the name Davy Malcor. Knows the video clip of him juggling four balls, "All at the very same time!" Knows the Marty McFly jacket his mother made for his birthday that he wore proudly, and often... -
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri by Martin McDonagh
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsAfter months pass without a culprit in her daughter's murder case, Mildred Hayes pays for three signs challenging the authority of William Willoughby, the town's revered chief of police. When his second-in-command, Officer Dixon, a mother's boy with a penchant for violence, gets involved, the battle between Mildred and Ebbing's law enforcement threatens to engulf the town... -
Unspoken by Samantha Hayes
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsA secret is about to destroy a family in Sam Hayes' breathtaking follow-up to BLOOD TIES... Mary Marshall would do anything for her daughter Julia. A devoted grandmother to Julia’s children, she’s always been the rock her family can rely on. Until now. Mary has a past Julia knows nothing about, and it’s come back to haunt her. Julia's husband Murray French is walking a tightrope... -
Please Join Us by Catherine McKenzie
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsAt thirty-nine, Nicole Mueller’s life is on the rocks. Her once brilliant law career is falling apart. She and her husband, Dan, are soon to be forced out of the apartment they love. After a warning from her firm’s senior partners, she receives an invitation from an exclusive women’s networking group, Panthera Leo. Membership is anonymous, but every member is a successful professional...
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