PW’s Chart Toppers

Publishers Weekly is out with its choices of the “Best Books of 2023.” Its Mystery/Thriller list contains the following 12 titles:

• All the Sinners Bleed , by S.A. Cosby (Flatiron)
• Bright Young Women , by Jessica Knoll (Simon & Schuster/Rucci)
• The Devil’s Playground, by Craig Russell (Doubleday)
• The Eden Test , by Adam Sternbergh (Flatiron)
• Everybody Knows , by Jordan Harper (Mulholland)
• Excavations , by Hannah Michell (One World)
• Flags on the Bayou , by James Lee Burke (Atlantic Monthly Press)
• How Can I Help You , by Laura Sims (Putnam)
• A Most Agreeable Murder , by Julia Seales (Random House)
• The Most Secret Memory of Men , by Mohamed Mbougar Sarr (Other Press)
• Strange Sally Diamond , by Liz Nugent (Scout)
• Tell Me What I Am , by Una Mannion (Harper)

Wow, neither Excavations nor The Most Secret Memory of Men was even on my radar. I shall have to do some fine-tuning of that instrument for the future.

On top of all those, PW ’s top-20 Fiction list features a couple of releases that are frequently classified as crime or mystery fiction: Age of Vice , by Deepti Kapoor (Riverhead); and I Have Some Questions for You , by Rebecca Makkai (Viking).