It also has a backstory: Jay McInerney and Bret Easton Ellis are contemporaries and friends, and their characters often cross over into each other’s books. While not technically a thriller, this book is still horrifying in its own way.

That’s the kind of twist-if it can be called that-that I aspire to. Patrick Bateman is an iconic character, and a serial killer…or is he? I love that we don’t know for sure, because it’s the kind of book that has started a lot of conversations. This is the kind of book I read and think “how does he do that?” I still don’t know. While my books do include murder, it’s rare I have any graphic violence like this book does, but the humor, and the points he makes, always fascinated me. The book is satire, a brutal commentary on the materialistic 80’s world of New York investment bankers. In part, this book is the reason what inspired me to have an unnamed narrator in My Lovely Wife.Įllis has a way of blending absolutely horrific acts of violence with laugh-out-loud humor. The genre didn’t become popular for many years, but Daphne du Maurier certainly wrote one of the first.

Rebecca is probably one of the earliest books that today would be categorized as a domestic thriller. It was also one of the first books I read with an unnamed narrator, which I found fascinating. This was one of the first thrillers I read that was written by a woman and had a female protagonist. Even today, I still think about this ending when I write my own. Obviously I won’t spoil it here, but one of the best endings I’ve ever read. The cat-and-mouse game that follows is fast-paced, packed with surprises, and it kept me up late more than once. At the beginning of the book, he’s found.

Patrick is a lawyer who has stolen a lot of money from a client and now lives in hiding in South America. I’ve read a number of Grisham books, but this is the one I’ve reread countless times.

Samantha downing author