Books like 'The Writing Retreat'

Readers who enjoyed The Writing Retreat by Julia Bartz also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.

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  • An Evil Mind by Chris Carter

    An Evil Mind by Chris Carter

    25 ratings
    A freak accident in rural Wyoming leads the Sheriff's Department to arrest a man for a possible double homicide, but further investigations suggest a much more horrifying discovery - a serial killer who has been kidnapping, torturing and mutilating victims all over the United States for at least twenty-five years...
  • Hunting Evil by Chris Carter

    Hunting Evil by Chris Carter

    20 ratings
    'Every story one day comes to an end.' As roommates, they met for the first time in college. Two of the brightest minds ever to graduate from Stamford Psychology University. As adversaries, they met again in Quantico, Virginia. Robert Hunter had become the head of the LAPD’s Ultra Violent Crimes Unit...
  • I Am Death by Chris Carter

    I Am Death by Chris Carter

    25 ratings
    AN EVIL MIND was Chris Carters's most acclaimed novel to date, described by the Daily mail as: 'A chilling, compulsive portrait of a psychopath, and proves that Carter is now in the Jeffrey Deaver class.' It spent three weeks in the Sunday Timestop ten and received brillant reviews and sales. This terrifying new standalone thriller reunites Hunter and Garcia in their most explosive case to date...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  suspense  thriller  adult  audiobook  book  contemporary
  • Such a Good Girl by Willow Rose

    Such a Good Girl by Willow Rose

    16 ratings
    FBI-profiler Eva Rae Thomas faces a devious plan in bestselling author Willow Rose’s blood-rushing thriller of murder and revenge.A girl falls from the penthouse floor of an apartment in Washington, D.C.Media Mogul Richard Wanton owns the apartment and is seen standing on the balcony when the girl falls...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  female-mc  suspense  thriller  adult  amateur-sleuth  book
  • Heartbreak Bay by Rachel Caine

    Heartbreak Bay by Rachel Caine

    24 ratings
    They’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...
  • Written in Blood by Chris Carter

    Written in Blood by Chris Carter

    20 ratings
    Don't miss GENESIS, the latest must-read serial killer thriller from master of the genre, Chris Carter. Available to order now. ‘Wonderful storytelling, with a superbly drawn killer, it underlines exactly how good Carter has become’ Daily MailTHE SUNDAY TIMES NUMBER ONE BESTSELLER    A serial killer who will stop at nothing…  The Killer His most valuable possession has been stolen...
  • The Good Lie by A.R. Torre

    The Good Lie by A.R. Torre

    25 ratings
    Six teens murdered. A suspect behind bars. A desperate father. In a case this shadowy, the truth is easy to hide.Six teenagers dead. Finally, the killer behind bars. But are the games just beginning?Psychiatrist Dr. Gwen Moore is an expert on killers...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  female-mc  spooky  suspense  thriller  abuse  adult
  • The Face of Death by Cody McFadyen

    The Face of Death by Cody McFadyen

    20 ratings
    In Shadow Man, Cody McFadyen took the suspense thriller where other writers have feared to tread. He introduced readers to a heroine every bit as dark and edgy as the serial killers she hunts: Special Agent Smoky Barrett. Now, in his latest novel, McFadyen brings Agent Barrett back to track down a killer who breaks all the rules...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  female-mc  suspense  thriller  adult  audiobook  book
  • Untitled by Dot Hutchison

    Untitled by Dot Hutchison

    24 ratings
    A fourth book is coming with a release date estimated Spring 2019...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  friendship  lgbtq  suspense  thriller  adult  audiobook
  • Der Insasse by Sebastian Fitzek

    Der Insasse by Sebastian Fitzek

    24 ratings
    Vor einem Jahr verschwand der kleine Max Berghoff.Nur der Täter weiß, was mit ihm geschah.Doch der sitzt im Hochsicherheitstrakt der Psychiatrie und schweigt.Max' Vater bleibt nur ein Weg, um endlich Gewissheit zu haben: Er muss selbst zum Insassen werden.Der InsasseUm die Wahrheit zu finden, muss er seinen Verstand verlieren...
  • The Summer Children The Collector, Book 3 by Dot Hutchison

    The Summer Children The Collector, Book 3 by Dot Hutchison

    25 ratings
    Series including The Butterfly...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  female-mc  friendship  lgbtq  suspense  thriller  abuse
  • Never Lie by Freida McFadden

    Never Lie by Freida McFadden

    38 ratings
    Newlyweds Tricia and Ethan are searching for the house of their dreams.But when they visit the remote manor that once belonged to Dr. Adrienne Hale, a renowned psychiatrist who vanished without a trace four years earlier, a violent winter storm traps them at the estate… with no chance of escape until the blizzard comes to an end...
  • Stranded by Sarah Goodwin

    Stranded by Sarah Goodwin

    16 ratings
    Eight strangers.One island.A secret you'd kill to keep.When eight people arrive on the beautiful but remote Buidseach Island, they are ready for the challenge of a lifetime: to live alone for one year.Eighteen months later, a woman is found in an isolated fishing village...
  • In the Barren Ground by Loreth Anne White

    In the Barren Ground by Loreth Anne White

    18 ratings
    In 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...
  • Chosen To Die by Lisa Jackson

    Chosen To Die by Lisa Jackson

    24 ratings
    HE'LL CHOOSE THEM... Detective Regan Pescoli has worked the "Star Crossed Killer" case for months, never imagining she'd be captured by the madman she's been hunting. Regan knows exactly what he's capable of - and avoiding the same fate will take every drop of her courage and cunning. ABDUCT THEM... Regan Pescoli is unlike any woman Nate Santana has met before...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  female-mc  suspense  thriller  adult  audiobook  book
  • A Dark Mind by T.R. Ragan, Kate Rudd

    A Dark Mind by T.R. Ragan, Kate Rudd

    24 ratings
    A serial killer is terrorizing Sacramento, preying on happily married couples and unleashing unspeakable cruelties upon his victims. The ordeal rekindles disturbing memories for private investigator Lizzy Gardner, who barely escaped a serial killer clutches only years ago...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  female-mc  suspense  thriller  adult  audiobook  book
  • Shadow Man by Cody McFadyen

    Shadow Man by Cody McFadyen

    25 ratings
    FBI agent Smoky Barrett is no stranger to the darker recesses of the human mind. But nothing could have prepared her for the day she had to watch her husband and daughter die at the hands of a serial killer. She bears the scars, mental and physical. Most people would run - from work, from life, from everything associated with the pain of a shattered existence...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  female-mc  suspense  thriller  adult  audiobook  book
  • Appetite for Innocence by Lucinda Berry

    Appetite for Innocence by Lucinda Berry

    26 ratings
    Be careful what you post online. Your next check-in might lead him right to you...A serial rapist is kidnapping teenage girls. But he’s not interested in just any teenage girls—only virgins. He hunts them by following their status updates and check-ins on social media. Once he’s captured them, they’re locked away in his sound-proof basement until they’re groomed and ready...
  • Local Woman Missing by Mary Kubica

    Local Woman Missing by Mary Kubica

    42 ratings
    People don’t just disappear without a trace....Shelby Tebow is the first to go missing. Not long after, Meredith Dickey and her six-year-old daughter, Delilah, vanish just blocks away from where Shelby was last seen, striking fear into their once-peaceful community. Are these incidents connected? After an elusive search that yields more questions than answers, the case eventually goes cold...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  lgbtq  spooky  suspense  thriller  abuse  adult
  • Small Spaces by Sarah Epstein

    Small Spaces by Sarah Epstein

    14 ratings
    We 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...
  • The Wire in the Blood by Val McDermid

    The Wire in the Blood by Val McDermid

    24 ratings
    Across the country, dozens of teenage girls have vanished. Authorities are convinced they're runaways with just the bad luck of the draw to connect them. It's the job of criminal profilers Dr. Tony Hill and Carol Jordan to look for a pattern. They've spent years exploring the psyches of madmen. But sane men kill, too. And when they hide in plain sight, they can be difficult to find..
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  female-mc  lgbtq  suspense  thriller  20th-century  adult
  • I Will Make You Pay by Teresa Driscoll

    I Will Make You Pay by Teresa Driscoll

    24 ratings
    Every Wednesday, like clockwork, the terror returns. It seems like an ordinary Wednesday, until the phone rings. A mysterious caller with a chilling threat. Journalist Alice Henderson hangs up, ready to dismiss it as a hoax against the newspaper. But the next Wednesday, the stalker makes another move—and it becomes clear that this is all about Alice...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  suspense  thriller  adult  audiobook  book  contemporary
  • Pop Goes the Weasel by M.J. Arlidge

    Pop Goes the Weasel by M.J. Arlidge

    24 ratings
    From the international bestselling author of Eeny Meeny comes the second thriller in the “truly excellent series”* featuring DI Helen Grace. A man’s body is found in an empty house. His heart has been cut out and delivered to his wife and children. He is the first victim, and Detective Inspector Helen Grace knows he will not be the last...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  female-mc  suspense  thriller  adult  alpha-mc  audiobook
  • Liar Liar by M.J. Arlidge

    Liar Liar by M.J. Arlidge

    24 ratings
    Detective Helen Grace gets caught in an inferno of death and destruction in the red-hot new thriller from the author of Eeny Meeny, Pop Goes the Weasel, and The Doll’s HouseDetective Helen Grace has never seen such destruction. Six fires in twenty-four hours. Two people dead. Several more injured. It’s as if someone wants to burn the city to the ground..
  • No Exit by Taylor Adams

    No Exit by Taylor Adams

    44 ratings
    A brilliant, edgy thriller about four strangers, a blizzard, a kidnapped child, and a determined young woman desperate to unmask and outwit a vicious psychopath.A kidnapped little girl locked in a stranger’s van. No help for miles. What would you do?On her way to Utah to see her dying mother, college student Darby Thorne gets caught in a fierce blizzard in the mountains of Colorado...
  • The Couple at No. 9 by Claire Douglas

    The Couple at No. 9 by Claire Douglas

    28 ratings
    It was the house of their dreams. Until the bodies were found . . . BODIES FOUND UNDER PATIOWhen pregnant Saffron Cutler moves into 9 Skelton Place with boyfriend Tom and sets about renovations the last thing she expects is builders uncovering a body - two bodies, in fact.POLICE INVESTIGATEForensics indicate the bodies have been buried at least thirty years. Nothing Saffy need worry herself over...
    Categorized as:
    crime  friendship  lgbtq  suspense  thriller  adult  audiobook  book
  • Wicked Little Words by Stevie J. Cole, B.T. Urruela

    Wicked Little Words by Stevie J. Cole, B.T. Urruela

    10 ratings
    Edwin Allen Mercer I want them all to read my words. And they do. Every last blood-stained sentence, they've read and praised me for. They love the gore and violence, the realness. And I get a sense of power with it all because I know a secret: the victims in my books—they’re real and have all died on my table. And maybe that’s why the last book had such awful reviews...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  suspense  thriller  adult  book  contemporary  fiction
  • Demon by Matt Wesolowski

    Demon by Matt Wesolowski

    10 ratings
    Scott King’s podcast investigates the 1995 cold case of a demon possession in a rural Yorkshire village, where a 12-year-old boy was murdered in cold blood by two children. Book six in the chilling, award-winning Six Stories series.In 1995, the picture-perfect village of Ussalthwaite was the site of one of the most heinous crimes imaginable, in a case that shocked the world...
    Categorized as:
    crime  thriller  suspense  spooky  dark  horror  mystery  fiction
  • Come with Me by Ronald Malfi

    Come with Me by Ronald Malfi

    16 ratings
    A masterful, heart-palpitating novel of small-town horror and psychological dread from a Bram Stoker nominee.Aaron Decker's life changes one December morning when his wife Allison is killed. Haunted by her absence--and her ghost--Aaron goes through her belongings, where he finds a receipt for a motel room in another part of the country...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  gothic  season-winter  spooky  suspense  thriller  adult
  • Sleep Tight by Anne Frasier

    Sleep Tight by Anne Frasier

    18 ratings
    WAKE UP, LITTLE DARLING. DO YOU LIKE WHAT YOU SEE?He's looking for the perfect woman. Someone who won't disappoint him, like so many have before. Someone who'll love him ... someone who won't have to die for her mistakes.GIVE UP, LITTLE DARLING....FBI agent Mary Cantrell has been called to Minneapolis to hunt down a killer...
  • What Lies in the Woods by Kate Alice Marshall

    What Lies in the Woods by Kate Alice Marshall

    21 ratings
    They were eleven when they sent a killer to prison . . .They were heroes . . . but they were liars.Naomi Shaw used to believe in magic. Twenty-two years ago, she and her two best friends, Cassidy and Olivia, spent the summer roaming the woods, imagining a world of ceremony and wonder. They called it the Goddess Game. The summer ended suddenly when Naomi was attacked...
  • The Likeness by Tana French, Heather O'Neill

    The Likeness by Tana French, Heather O'Neill

    43 ratings
    Listening length: 22 Hours and 18 MinutesIn this follow-up to Tana French’s runaway bestseller In the Woods, itʼs six months later and Cassie Maddox has transferred out of the Dublin Murder Squad with no plans to go back—until an urgent telephone call summons her to a grisly crime scene...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  female-mc  friendship  gothic  spooky  suspense  thriller
  • Ward D by Freida McFadden

    Ward D by Freida McFadden

    31 ratings
    Medical student Amy Brenner is spending the night on a locked psychiatric ward.Amy has been dreading her evening working on Ward D, the hospital’s inpatient mental health unit. There are very specific reasons why she never wanted to do this required overnight rotation. Reasons nobody can ever find out...
  • The Last Time I Lied by Riley Sager

    The Last Time I Lied by Riley Sager

    43 ratings
    Fifteen years ago, summer camper Emma Davis watched sleepily as her three cabin mates snuck out of their cabin in the dead of night. The last she--and anyone--saw of them was Vivian closing the cabin door behind her, hushing Emma with a finger pressed to her lips.Now a rising star in the NYC art scene, Emma turns her past into paintings.
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  female-mc  friendship  gothic  spooky  suspense  thriller
  • Rock Paper Scissors by Alice Feeney

    Rock Paper Scissors by Alice Feeney

    42 ratings
    Think you know the person you married? Think again…Things have been wrong with Mr and Mrs Wright for a long time. When Adam and Amelia win a weekend away to Scotland, it might be just what their marriage needs. Self-confessed workaholic and screenwriter Adam Wright has lived with face blindness his whole life. He can’t recognize friends or family, or even his own wife...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  gothic  season-winter  spooky  suspense  thriller  adult
  • Digital Velocity by Reily Garrett, Rylan Killian

    Digital Velocity by Reily Garrett, Rylan Killian

    6 ratings
    The deadliest weapons are the ones we never see. Keyboard prodigy, Lexi Donovan has risen from teenage orphan of the streets to complete independence with little help along the way. When a friend is threatened, Lexi’s anonymous message sends police into a firefight, leading to a wounded cop...
  • Tell Me Lies by Teresa Driscoll

    Tell Me Lies by Teresa Driscoll

    6 ratings
    From bestselling author Teresa Driscoll comes a chilling thriller of past secrets and present terror. Deep in a rural hideaway, it’s only the owls watching them…right? After a betrayal that sent their marriage into freefall, Hannah and Sam are desperate for a fresh start with their eight-year-old daughter Lily―and where better than picture-perfect Owl Cottage in beautiful Cornwall...
  • One Fear by Belle Brooks

    One Fear by Belle Brooks

    8 ratings
    “My one fear is now my reality.” He didn’t offer his name when he fulfilled his need to include me as a player in his game. I’m number thirteen. Just a number given to the bitches who wronged him. I was blindsided. Stolen from my life. In his devilled eyes, I have a debt to pay…he wants my final breath to see us even...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  suspense  thriller  abuse  action-adventure  adult  book
  • My Darling Girl by Jennifer McMahon

    My Darling Girl by Jennifer McMahon

    8 ratings
    A spine-tingling psychological thriller about a woman who, after taking in her dying, alcoholic mother, begins to suspect demonic possession is haunting her family.Alison has never been a fan of Christmas. But with it right around the corner and her husband busily decorating their cozy Vermont home, she has no choice but to face it. Then she gets the call...
  • Nightwatching by Tracy Sierra

    Nightwatching by Tracy Sierra

    8 ratings
    ***Note that many reviews contain spoilers***A razor-sharp thriller about a mother forced to the breaking point when her life and the lives of her children are threatened by an intruderHome alone with her young children during a blizzard, a mother tucks her son back into bed in the middle of the night. She hears a noise—old houses are always making some kind of noise...
  • Three Strikes by Kate Kessler

    Three Strikes by Kate Kessler

    10 ratings
    Three Strikes is the new novel in a thriller series where a criminal psychologist uses her own dark past to help law enforcement catch dangerous killers.Thanksgiving is approaching, and Audrey Harte has a lot to be thankful for -- her mother has recovered from surgery, her relationship with Jake is solid, her father is relatively sober, and her career is evolving in an exciting direction...
  • Black for Remembrance by Carlene Thompson

    Black for Remembrance by Carlene Thompson

    12 ratings
    Caroline Webb knows what it means to lose the person you love most. Twenty years ago, her five-year-old daughter, Hayley, was the light of her life, her treasure, her angle. Then came the terrible day when Hayley was kidnapped from her favorite swing. More than a month passed before her burned, lifeless body was found. All that remained was the silence of Caroline's heartache--and her guilt..
    Categorized as:
    crime  suspense  thriller  adult  book  contemporary  fiction  horror
  • Vicious by Kevin O'Brien

    Vicious by Kevin O'Brien

    12 ratings
    NO MOTIVE For more than two years, he held Seattle in a terror grip. A cold-blooded killer who abducted young mothers right in front of their sons and murdered them execution style. Then, as suddenly as the killings began, they seemed to stop.NO MERCY Susan Blanchette is looking forward to a relaxing weekend getaway with her fianc�, Allen, and young son, Matthew...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  suspense  thriller  adult  book  contemporary  espionage
  • White Russian by J.A. Konrath

    White Russian by J.A. Konrath

    12 ratings
    Just when you get out...Former Chicago cop Jack Daniels thought she'd left her former life behind. She'd traded her badge for a toddler, and her lifelong pursuit of heinous serial killers for a boring house in the suburbs....they pull you back in.Then Jack sees some pictures. Pictures of men who were supposed to be dead...
  • Forget Me Not by Claire Allan

    Forget Me Not by Claire Allan

    14 ratings
    ‘AMAZING’ Marian Keyes I disappeared on a Tuesday afternoon. I was there one minute and the next I was gone. They’ve never found my body… It’s six in the morning during the hottest summer on record when Elizabeth O’Loughlin, out walking her dog, comes across Clare, a victim of a horrific knife attack, clinging onto life at the side of the road...
  • Closet Full of Bones by A.J. Aalto

    Closet Full of Bones by A.J. Aalto

    14 ratings
    Ever since they were children, Gillian Hearth has been her sister Frankie’s guardian, her sounding board, and her best friend. Together, the Hearth sisters quietly bury their secrets and form a formidable team during any crisis. Purchasing the old Blymhill house with the hopes of turning it into an artists’ retreat, the sisters are finally living their dream...
  • All the Pretty Faces by Rita Herron

    All the Pretty Faces by Rita Herron

    14 ratings
    Josie DuKane is on shaky ground. Having narrowly escaped the notorious Bride Killer, she penned a tell-all memoir that dug up a town’s dark past. Now the book is being made into a movie, and Josie must visit the very place that will trigger an avalanche of unwanted memories—Graveyard Falls...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  female-mc  suspense  thriller  adult  audiobook  book
  • The Girls He Adored by Jonathan Nasaw

    The Girls He Adored by Jonathan Nasaw

    16 ratings
    For ten years, the charmingly disheveled veteran FBI Special Agent E.L. Pender has been investigating the apparently random disappearances of a dozen women across the country. The only detail the cases have in common is the strawberry blond color of the victims' hair, and the presence of a mystery man with whom they were last seen...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  suspense  thriller  adult  audiobook  book  contemporary
  • Either Side of Midnight by Tori de Clare

    Either Side of Midnight by Tori de Clare

    16 ratings
    WHAT IF THE BEST DAY OF YOUR LIFE TURNED INTO YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE? When nineteen-year-old Naomi Stone is snatched from her husband at knifepoint on the night of their wedding and taken to a deserted cemetery, she knows her life is finished. Drugged and disorientated, she loses consciousness as she lies in an open grave with a gun to her head...
  • Caged by Ellison Cooper

    Caged by Ellison Cooper

    16 ratings
    FBI neuroscientist Sayer Altair hunts for evil in the deepest recesses of the human mind. Still reeling from the death of her fiance, she wants nothing more than to focus on her research into the brains of serial killers. But when the Washington D.C...
    Categorized as:
    crime  dark  female-mc  suspense  thriller  adult  audiobook  book
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