Top 16 Psychological Thriller Novels

Unreliable narrators, slow-burn dread, and twists that rearrange everything you thought you knew, with modern blockbusters sharing the shelf with genre-defining classics. Which grips hardest?

1. 1
   Gone Girl

   Gillian Flynn's twisty tale of a marriage and a wife's disappearance.
   1000pts
2. 2
   The Silent Patient

   Alex Michaelides's bestseller about a woman who stops speaking after killing her husband.
   898pts
3. 3
   The Silence of the Lambs

   Thomas Harris's chilling thriller pairing an FBI trainee with cannibal Hannibal Lecter.
   835pts
4. 4
   The Talented Mr. Ripley

   Patricia Highsmith's study of a charming con man turned killer.
   734pts
5. 5
   Shutter Island

   Dennis Lehane's mind-bending mystery set on a hospital for the criminally insane.
   659pts
6. 6
   Verity

   Colleen Hoover's dark thriller about a ghostwriter who uncovers a chilling manuscript.
   659pts
7. 7
   We Need to Talk About Kevin

   Lionel Shriver's harrowing account of a mother reckoning with her son's massacre.
   571pts
8. 8
   In the Woods

   Tana French's atmospheric Dublin Murder Squad debut haunted by a childhood trauma.
   571pts
9. 9
   The Girl on the Train

   Paula Hawkins's thriller told by an unreliable commuter who witnesses a crime.
   467pts
10. 10
    Misery

    Stephen King's claustrophobic thriller of an author held captive by his number-one fan.
    467pts
11. 11
    Rebecca

    Daphne du Maurier's gothic suspense of a new bride haunted by her husband's late wife.
    343pts
12. 12
    The Woman in the Window

    A.J. Finn's Hitchcockian thriller about an agoraphobe who thinks she witnessed a crime.
    343pts
13. 13
    Behind Closed Doors

    B.A. Paris's debut exposing a seemingly perfect marriage's terrifying secret.
    343pts
14. 14
    The Secret History

    Donna Tartt's dark academia tale of a murder among elite classics students.
    190pts
15. 15
    Sharp Objects

    Gillian Flynn's debut about a reporter confronting family trauma while covering murders.
    190pts
16. 16
    Before I Go to Sleep

    S.J. Watson's thriller about an amnesiac who forgets everything each night.
    190pts