Books like “Shutter Island”

What to read after “Shutter Island” by Dennis Lehane: a list matched by tropes, mood and atmosphere. Under each book you will see what it has in common.

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1
The Woman in the Window
A. J. Finn · 2018
Similar atmosphere: “Psychological Thriller”
Child psychologist Anna Fox lives alone, unable to leave her home, and spends her days watching her neighbours through a camera. When she sees something in the house across the street, no one believes her, and she is left to work out whether the danger is real or in her mind.
2
The Silent Patient
Alex Michaelides · 2019
Similar atmosphere: “Psychological Thriller”
Alicia Berenson shot her husband five times and then never spoke again. Six years later, psychotherapist Theo Faber takes a job at the secure unit where she is held, determined to make her talk. As he digs into her diary and her past, his own reasons for being there come into question.
3
The Girl on the Train
Paula Hawkins · 2015
Similar atmosphere: “Psychological Thriller”
Rachel rides the same commuter train every day and invents stories about a couple she sees from the window, until she learns the woman has vanished. Her memory of the night in question is full of gaps, and she cannot tell how much of what she believes is real.
4
Gone Girl
Gillian Flynn · 2012
Similar atmosphere: “Psychological Thriller”
On their fifth wedding anniversary, Amy Dunne disappears from a rented house and her husband Nick becomes the prime suspect. Two narrators tell very different versions of the same marriage.
5
A Flicker in the Dark
Stacy Willingham · 2022
Similar atmosphere: “Psychological Thriller”
As a child she helped put her father away for killing girls. Twenty years later she is a therapist about to marry, when young women in her town begin to disappear again and the old case follows her into the present.
6
Local Woman Missing
Mary Kubica · 2021
Similar atmosphere: “Psychological Thriller”
In a quiet suburb, a young mother vanishes while out running, and weeks later another woman and her six-year-old daughter disappear nearby. Eleven years on, the daughter suddenly returns, and what she brings back unsettles everyone who stayed behind.
7
Dark Places
Gillian Flynn · 2009
Similar atmosphere: “Psychological Thriller”
- Psychological Thriller
- Twist Ending
Years after her mother and sisters were killed and her teenage brother was convicted, Libby Day is approached by a group of true-crime enthusiasts who believe he is innocent. Short of money, she agrees to ask questions, and the answers force her to revisit what she remembers of that night.
8
The Couple Next Door
Shari Lapena · 2016
Similar atmosphere: “Psychological Thriller”
A couple leave their sleeping baby at home while they attend a dinner party next door, checking on her every half hour. They return to an empty crib. The police suspect the parents, and both of them start learning what the other has been hiding.
9
The Housemaid
Freida McFadden · 2022
Similar atmosphere: “Psychological Thriller”
A woman with no money and a criminal record takes a live-in job cleaning for a wealthy family. The wife is cruel, the husband is kind, and a locked door upstairs keeps drawing her attention as the household's rules grow stranger.
10
Before I Go to Sleep
S. J. Watson · 2011
Similar atmosphere: “Psychological Thriller”
Each morning Christine wakes with no memory of her life, and each day her husband explains who she is. When she starts a diary at a doctor's suggestion, she finds entries in her own hand that contradict what he tells her, and that suggest her past holds a crime.
11
Sometimes I Lie
Alice Feeney · 2017
Similar atmosphere: “Psychological Thriller”
Amber Reynolds is in a coma, though she can hear the people around her and cannot move or speak. In her mind she sifts through the days before the accident and the diary entries from years earlier that do not quite match the life she thought she had.
12
Rock Paper Scissors
Alice Feeney · 2021
Similar atmosphere: “Psychological Thriller”
A couple whose marriage is failing take a weekend trip to a remote chapel in the Scottish countryside. Cut off and cold, they each keep a secret, and the anniversary gift they open is not what either of them expects.