Those of us who love crime fiction have a wonderful month coming up in August. Let’s just take the month off and read! You’ll want to see this list of Treasures in My Closet. The August releases look great. And, there are a number of domestic thrillers in the list at the bottom, for those of you who are fans.

As always, when Louise Penny has an Armand Gamache novel coming out, I kick off my list with that title. How did Penny know about all the rain we would be experiencing in the U.S. that seems to make A Better Man so timely? Gamache is back as head of homicide at Sûreté du Quebec, sharing the job temporarily with Jean-Guy Beauvoir. Flood waters are rising in the province, and in the midst of the crisis, a father asks Gamache for help in locating his daughter. As time goes on, the social media attacks against Gamache get crueler. This book sounds so timely. (Release date is Aug. 27.)

Donna Andrews’ fans will enjoy Terns of Endearment. The family is all together on a cruise when a woman goes overboard. Before Meg Langslow and her father can push for an investigation, the ship stalls on its way to Bermuda. It will take an uprising from the passengers, and Meg’s investigatory skills to discover what’s happening on the ship. (Release date is Aug. 6.)

Rhys Bowen’s Georgie and Darcy are now married in Love and Death Among the Cheetahs. Darcy surprises Georgie with a trip to Kenya for their honeymoon, but they find themselves amongst a British upper class group known for drinking, drugs, and wife-swapping. Then, the newlyweds discover one of the group has been murdered. ( Release date is Aug. 6.)

C.J. Box has another Rocky Mountain crime tale, The Bitterroots. He continues the story of former lawman Cassie Dewel as she takes on a strange case that leads her to a ranching town with more than its share of dark secrets. Cassie is now a private investigator in Montana. When a close acquaintance calls on her to take a distasteful case – Blake Kleinsasser, the wealthy son and designated heir of a prosperous ranching family, has been accused of assaulting his niece, and his lawyer wants the details investigated, Cassie takes the job reluctantly. But, when she visits the town where the Kleinsassers live, it seems everyone in the area owes some kind of loyalty to the family, or has a reason to fear them. (Release date is Aug. 13.)

Careful What You Wish For is Hallie Ephron’s suspense novel about a professional organizer with a deadly problem she may not be able to clean up. Ellen Harlow is married to a hoarder. Her rule, a client is only allowed to declutter his or her own stuff, has kept Emily’s marriage intact. But, the marriage is struggling under the weight of her husband’s “collection”. She does have two new clients to distract her. Her initial meeting with a young wife takes a detour when, after too much wine, they end up fantasizing about how much more pleasant life would be without their spouses. But, the next day, Emily finds herself in a mess that might be too big for her to clean up. Now, she could lose her freedom, her marriage, and possibly her life. (Release date is Aug. 6.)

Sometimes, I pick the books for the Treasures annotation just on a whim. The book sounds a little different. The Reckless Oath We Made by Bryn Greenwood fits that category. The back jacket says, “A provocative love story between a tough Kansas woman on a crooked path to redemption and the unlikeliest of champions.” Zee isn’t anyone’s idea of a fairy tale princess, at almost six foot with a redhead’s temper, a shattered hip, and a long list of responsibilities. But, Gentry considers himself a knight, complex with sword, armor, a code of honor, and two years earlier, the voices he hears called him to be Zee’s champion. He’s barely spoken to her since, but when abduction tears her family apart, she turns to Gentry, who is prepared to come to her aid. (Release date is Aug. 20.)

Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Ellen Hart brings back Jane Lawless in Twisted at the Root. When new evidence shows up, Jane’s father, lawyer for a man who went to prison for killing his husband, asks Jane to investigate. She finds two families of suspects, all who have secrets and reasons to lie to keep those secrets. (Release date is Aug. 13.)

Here’s this month’s nonfiction title, Chase Darkness with Me by Billy Jensen. Journalist Billy Jensen spent fifteen years investigation unsolved murders. Each story he wrote still was an unsolved case, with the killer out there. But, after the death of his friend, crime writer and author of I’ll Be Gone in the Dark, Michelle McNamara, Billy came up with a plan to investigate past the point when the cops had given up. It’s a plan to solve the murders himself. (Release date is Aug. 20.)

Julia Keller’s latest novel set in Acker’s Gap, West Virginia, The Cold Way Home, is based on a true chapter in the troubled history of early treatment for psychiatric illness. All that remains of Wellwood, a psychiatric hospital for the poor that burned to the ground decades earlier is a chunk of a stone wall deep in the woods. It’s here that Bell Elkins, prosecutor turned private investigator, discovers a dead body marred by a ghastly wound that can only mean murder. Bell and her partners must confront the tangled history of Wellwood and its dark legacy while they try to solve the mystery of what happened in those woods. (Release date is Aug. 20.)

Gumshoe Rock is Rob Leininger’s fourth book in the Gumshoe series featuring PI in training, Mort Angel. Mort’s known for finding body parts of missing people. This time, a skull is dropped in his girlfriend’s convertible. It’s the skull of the chief IRS agent for northern Nevada, and of course it has nothing to do with Mort or the embezzlement case he’s investigating. Of course not. (Release date is Aug. 6.)

In a town ravaged by the opioid crisis, two sisters refuse to believe that their brother committed suicide. The Wolf Wants In by Laura McHugh is a powerful novel of our times. (Release date is Aug. 6.)

I like to introduce readers to debut novelists. I’ve already heard buzz about Alex North’s debut thriller, The Whisper Man. A father and son are caught in the crosshairs of an investigation to catch a serial killer preying on a small town. After his wife’s death, Tom Kennedy takes his son, Jake, to a new house and town for a fresh start. But, twenty years earlier, a serial killer in Featherbank abducted and murdered five residents. Until he was caught, Frank Carter was nicknamed “The Whisper Man” for he lured his victims out by whispering at their windows at night. When Tom and Jake settle into their new home, a young boy vanishes. Rumors are ignited because the disappearance is familiar. While the detectives look for the boy, Jake hears whispering at his window. (Release date is Aug. 20.)

In Robert Pobi’s City of Windows, there’s a sniper loose in New York City during the worst blizzard on record. As the victims pile up, the city’s only hope is Dr. Lucas Page, a former FBI agent with a unique gift for analyzing crime scenes. Lucas Page, though, left the FBI after a life-altering tragedy, and is reluctant to come back. But what if Page is exactly the man the killer wants? (Release date is Aug. 6.)

Hazel Prior’s Ellie and the Harpmaker is another debut novel. Dan Hollis lives a happy, solitary life carving exquisite Celtic harps in his barn in the countryside of the English moors. Ellie Jacobs is a lonely housewife, her days filled with walks and poetry she writes in secret. One day, she comes across Dan’s barn. Dan gives her a harp made of cherrywood to match her cherry socks. He stores it for her, ready for whenever she’d like to take lessons. Ellie visits Dan almost daily, drifting deeper into his world. But, then she discovers a secret that could endanger their friendship or change their lives forever. (Release date is Aug. 6.)

Here’s the historical novel I’m anticipating. It’s E.R. Ramzipoor’s debut, The Ventriloquists, set in Brussels in 1943. It’s inspired by true events in which a ragtag gang of journalists and resistance fighters risk everything for an elaborate scheme to undermine the Reich. August Wolff, a high-ranking Nazi responsible for propaganda against the Allies, forces a journalist and his comrades to paint the Allies as monsters, or be killed. However, they decide to publish a fake edition that pokes fun of Hitler and Stalin, giving power back to the Belgians by daring to laugh in the face of their oppressors. The Ventriloquists agree to die for a joke, and they have only eighteen days to tell it. (Release date is Aug. 27.)

Hank Phillippi Ryan’s latest standalone is a complex, twisted story, The Murder List. Rachel North is a law student married to a successful lawyer, a prominent figure in Boston’s defense community, a man who is on “The Murder List” to take capital cases. She’s interning for a prosecutor who is often her husband’s adversary. And, nothing you read or Rachel believes is as it appears. (Release date is Aug. 20.)

Trust Me When I Lie is Benjamin Stevenson’s debut thriller. Producer Jack Quick’s new true crime docuseries is about Curtis Wade, convicted of a young woman’s murder four years earlier. Jack’s viewers believe flimsy evidence and police bias influenced the final verdict, but, off-screen, Jack himself has his doubts. When the series finale is wildly successful, a retrial sees Curtis walk free. And, then another victim turns up dead. To set things right, Jack goes back to discover what really happened. Jack may have sprung a killer from jail, but he’s also the one who can send him back. (Release date is Aug. 13.)

As much as I would like to, I can’t cover everything. Here are some other treasures you might want to pick up in August.

Aguirre, Ann – The Third Mrs. Durst (Aug. 8)
Ames, Elizabeth – The Other’s Gold (Aug. 27)
Barz, Vivian – Forgotten Bones (Aug. 1)
Beck, Haylen – Lost You (Aug. 6)
Dalbuono, Nadia – The Hit (Aug. 6)
Davis-Goff, Sarah – Last Ones Left Alive (Aug. 27)
de la Cruz, Melissa – The Birthday Girl (Aug. 6)
Delaney, JP – The Perfect Wife (Aug. 6)
Frey, Rea – Because You’re Mine (Aug. 6)
Hassman, Tupelo – gods with a little g (Aug. 13)
Jewell, A.B. – The Man Who Wouldn’t Die (Aug. 6)
Johnston, Scott – Campusland (Aug. 13)
Lefteri, Christy – The Beekeeper of Aleppo (Aug. 27)
LoTempio, T.C. – The Time for Murder is Meow (Aug. 8)
Lovestam, Sara – The Truth Behind the Lie (Aug. 27)
Lutz, Lisa – The Swallows (Aug. 13)
Nathan, Alex – The Warlow Experiment (Aug. 20)
Obreht, Tea – Inland (Aug. 13)
Ogawa, Yoko – The Memory Police (Aug. 13)
Powers, Zach – First Cosmic Velocity (Aug. 6)
Rao, Mahesh – Polite Society (Aug. 20)
Royal, Priscilla – The Twice-Hanged Man (Aug. 6)
Scranton, Roy – I Heart Oklahoma! (Aug. 13)
Smith, Sherri – The Retreat (Aug. 13)
Vargas, Fred – This Poison Will Remain (Aug. 20)