MY MOST ANTICIPATED SEQUELS OF 2018

My ongoing reading slump got me thinking about and researching whether there would be any 2018 sequels to some of my favorite books from the past. I found so many that I want to share today and while I’m positive there will be more, I’m so excited about these…2018 can’t come soon enough for me in terms of anticipated reads!!  I’ve included the preceding book’s title (with my review if available)  before the 2018 sequel in case you missed it…

Publication date: January 23, 2018 by Pamela Dorman Books

Louisa Clark arrives in New York ready to start a new life, confident that she can embrace this new adventure and keep her relationship with Ambulance Sam alive across several thousand miles. She is thrown into the world of the superrich Gopniks: Leonard and his much younger second wife, Agnes, and a never-ending array of household staff and hangers-on. Lou is determined to get the most out of the experience and throws herself into her job and New York life within this privileged world.

Before she knows what’s happening, Lou is mixing in New York high society, where she meets Joshua Ryan, a man who brings with him a whisper of her past. In Still Me, as Lou tries to keep the two sides of her world together, she finds herself carrying secrets–not all her own–that cause a catastrophic change in her circumstances. And when matters come to a head, she has to ask herself Who is Louisa Clark? And how do you reconcile a heart that lives in two places?

This is book 3 after Me Before You (book 1) and After You (book 2), both of which I read before blogging. I absolutely loved Me Before You but I wasn’t at all crazy about the path the author made for Louisa in After You. I’m really hoping she brings back the Louisa we loved from Me Before You…after all she is calling it Still Me so I’m super hopeful

 

Publication date: Feb 6th, 2018 by Flatiron Books

Five women reluctantly pick up their backpacks and start walking along the muddy track. Only four come out the other side.

The hike through the rugged Giralang Ranges is meant to take the office colleagues out of their air-conditioned comfort zone and teach resilience and team building. At least that is what the corporate retreat website advertises.

Federal Police Agent Aaron Falk has a particularly keen interest in the whereabouts of the missing bushwalker. Alice Russell is the whistleblower in his latest case – in just a matter of days she was to provide the documents that will bring down the company she works for.

Falk discovers that far from the hike encouraging teamwork, the women tell a tale of suspicion, violence and disintegrating trust. But does it include murder?

Book 1 was The Dry and was one of my favorite debuts of 2017. Jane Harper can weave a fantastic puzzle and her setting details make you feel like you’re THERE!

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This seemingly anonymous book is Hangman by Daniel Cole! I couldn’t find a pic of this cover anywhere but I HAD to include this gem in my lineup

Publication Date: Feb 8th (I believe this is the UK pub date, I couldn’t find one for US so if anyone knows it let me know) 

Eighteen months have passed, but the scars the Ragdoll murders left behind remain.

DCI Emily Baxter is summoned to a meeting with US Special Agents Elliot Curtis of the FBI and Damien Rouche of the CIA. There, she is presented with photographs of the latest copycat murder: a body contorted into a familiar pose, strung up impossibly on the other side of the world, the word BAIT carved deep into its chest.

As the media pressure intensifies, Baxter is ordered to assist with the investigation and attend the scene of another murder to discover the same word scrawled across the victim, carved across the corpse of the killer – PUPPET.

As the murders continue to grow in both spectacle and depravity on both sides of the Atlantic, the team helplessly play catch up. Their only hope: to work out who the ‘BAIT’ is intended for, how the ‘PUPPETS’ are chosen but, most importantly of all, who is holding the strings

Book 1 is Ragdoll and was such a creative take on the serial killer novel. If you think (like me) you’re not in the mood for a serial killer book but you like intriguing puzzles, give this a try. It was one of the most entertaining books I’ve read all year!

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Publication date February 20th by Scribner

A high-speed train from Milan draws into the station in Rome, and an horrific discovery in one carriage rocks the city. Preliminary investigations are put in the hands of Deputy Police Commissioner Colomba Caselli.
     
The police receive a message claiming responsibility for the act and announcing more murders to come, and they duly turn their attention to a small terrorist group of Islamic extremists. But investigator Dante Torre does not believe this angle. For him, this feels like a smokescreen concealing the actions of a killer who has a far more terrible motivation to continue.
     
The trail leads to Berlin and Venice, where the waters of the Venetian Lagoon will turn blood red …

Book 1 was Kill the Father which had an intriguing Italian setting and such an intricate puzzle, along with 2 of the most likable detectives I’ve come across in recent crime fiction. I really can’t wait for this one!

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Publication date: Feb 27, 2018 by St. Martin’s Press

It’s been ten years since the events that changed Johnny Merrimon’s life and rocked his hometown to the core. Since then, Johnny has fought to maintain his privacy, but books have been written of his exploits; he has fans, groupies. Living alone in the wilderness beyond town, Johnny’s only connection to normal life is his old friend, Jack. They’re not boys anymore, but the bonds remain. What they shared. What they lost.

But Jack sees danger in the wild places Johnny calls home; he senses darkness and hunger, an intractable intent. Johnny will discuss none of it, but there are the things he knows, the things he can do. A lesser friend might accept such abilities as a gift, but Jack has felt what moves in the swamp: the cold of it, the unspeakable fear.

I can’t recommend John Hart enough! Book 1 is The Last Child, one of my all-time favorite books and if you enjoy your mysteries with gorgeous literary writing you MUST read that one.

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Publication date: March 8 by Transworld

Disconnected from his history and careless of his future, Detective Aidan Waits has resigned himself to the night shift. An endless cycle of meaningless emergency calls and lonely dead ends. Until he and his partner, Detective Inspector Peter ‘Sutty’ Sutcliffe, are summoned to The Palace, a vast disused hotel in the centre of a restless, simmering city. There they find the body of a man. He is dead. And he is smiling.
The tags have been removed from the man’s clothes. His teeth filed down and replaced. Even his fingertips are not his own. Only a patch sewn into the inside of his trousers gives any indication as to who he was, and to the desperate last act of his life…
But even as Waits puts together the pieces of this stranger’s life, someone is sifting through the shards of his own.
When the mysterious fires, anonymous phone calls and outright threats escalate, he realises that a ghost from his own past haunts his every move.
And to discover the smiling man’s identity, he must finally confront his own.

Ok, I have a little explaining to do for this one:) Book 1 is Sirens and is so fantastic that I find myself still thinking about the main character,  Aidan, and the jaw dropping mysteries of this one 8 months after reading it! Sirens  will likely have a place on my top 10 reads of 2017 and will actually be published in the US for the first time on Feb 20, 2018. However, if you just can’t wait that long (and why should you:) you can get your copy from Book Depository (free international shipping) right now and then you’ll be ready for the sequel The Smiling Man in March. I’m going to be pre-ordering that one from Book Depository myself because there’s no way I can wait for the US publication to find out what’s in store for Aidan Waits. This one is worth it guys, it’s just that good!

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Publication Date: June 2018 by Orenda 

Henning Juul sits in a boat on a dark lake. A man with a gun sits opposite him. At the man’s feet is a body that will be soon be dumped into the water. Henning knows that the same fate awaits him. And he knows that it’s his own fault. Who started the fire that killed Henning’s young son? How is his sister, Trine, involved? Most importantly, who can be trusted? Packed with tension and unexpected twists, Killed is the long-waited finale of the internationally renowned series featuring conflicted, disillusioned but always dogged crime reporter Henning Juul, and one of the most chilling, dark and moving crime thrillers you may ever read.

This is book 5 in the Henning Juul series but WAIT, the absolute best part about this series is you don’t have to read every title to catch up with the series. In fact, I’ve only read 2…Pierced and Cursed which are both amazing Nordic crime fiction books. Now, I also have book 3 Scarred which I will go back and read soon. What’s so great about this series aside from brilliant writing and a main character you will root for is that each book has a different mystery to solve while at the same time having the common mystery thread of who started the fire that killed Henning’s son. I’m so glad I discovered this author in 2017, I highly recommend this series if you enjoy crime fiction.

***I tried so hard to find out if Jane Casey has another Maeve Kerrigan book coming out next year but I couldn’t find anything…I hope that doesn’t mean she’s skipping a year:( This is an outstanding detective series and currently my very favorite so if anyone knows if she has a sequel coming out in 2018 please let me know!

Are you looking forward to any of these sequels? What am I missing? Feel free to let me know in the comments. 

HAPPY READING!