The Mother at Number 5 by Jill Childs
This might be the first domestic thriller that had me almost yelling at the page for the protagonist to stop and think about what she was about to do. After sharing drinks with a stranger at a vacation resort and spilling far too many personal details, Ros comforts herself with the thought that she'll never see the other woman again. There's no need to worry about the secrets she told her. Then Lotte buys a house just down the street and enrolls her daughter at the same school Ros's children attend. The ending was a surprise and the journey to get there was an intriguing one.
The Homemaker by Shari J. Ryan
My favorite domestic thrillers are the ones that involve new mothers. This book, with its description of a new mother who is told that she doesn't have a baby, works extremely well. That back cover copy is vague and had me expecting something else but once I started reading it really was as "unputdownable" as the book's Amazon listing promised. It wasn't until halfway through that I started to even suspect what was really going on.
Hot Pot Murder by Jennifer Chow
I was just as intrigued by the many descriptions of food as I was by the murder mystery. There are plenty of suspects, all with some sort of motive, and the stakes are very high. Yale and her cousin Celine are trying figure out who was behind the fatal accident at a restaurant owners association dinner and to make a success of their food stall at the night market. I jumped into this series with the second book and was able to quickly figure out who was who and what was going on, but I definitely want to check out the first book.
Disclosure -- The publishers provided me with advance review copies. This post contains affiliate links.
