10 Revenge Stories to Get Your Blood Boiling

Acclaimed international bestseller Catherine Dunne’s thrilling US debut is the story of two wronged women bent on revenge at all costs, and “a page-turner that’s both poignant and satisfying” (Booklist).

Revenge is sweeter than regret…

Dublin. Calista is young, beautiful, and headstrong. When she falls in love with the charming, older Alexandros and moves to his native Cyprus, she could never imagine that her whirlwind courtship would lead to a dark and violent marriage. But Calista learns to survive. She knows she will find peace when she can finally seek retribution.

Madrid. Pilar grew up with very little means in rural Spain and finally escaped to a new life. Determined to leave poverty behind her, she plunges into a life of working hard and saving money. Enchanted by an older man, Pilar revels in their romance, her freedom, and accruing success. She’s on the road to achieving her dreams. Yet there is one thing that she is still searching for, the one thing she knows will make her truly happy.

Sweeping across the lush European backdrops of Spain, Greece, and Ireland, The Years That Followed is a gripping, modern telling of a classic story. As two wronged women plot for revenge, their intricately crafted schemes send shockwaves through their families that will echo for many generations to come.

“Like the best filmmakers, Li draws you to the edge of your seat and keeps you there.” —The New York Times Book Review

After a long-buried, harrowing incident, a woman whose promising film career was derailed contemplates revenge in this thriller about power, privilege, and justice “that is compelling, courageous, and brutal in the best possible way” (Liz Nugent, author of Little Cruelties).

A Hollywood has-been, Sarah Lai’s dreams of success behind the camera have turned to ashes. Now a lecturer at an obscure college, this former producer wants nothing more than to forget those youthful ambitions and push aside any feelings of regret…or guilt.

But when a journalist reaches out to her to discuss her own experience working with the celebrated film producer Hugo North, Sarah can no longer keep silent. This is her last chance to tell her side of the story and maybe even exact belated vengeance.

As Sarah recounts the industry’s dark and sordid secrets, however, she begins to realize that she has a few sins of her own to confess. Now she must confront her choices and ask herself, just who was complicit?

Bold and hypnotic, Complicit transports us “into the film industry’s dark and deep-seated culture of rampant sexism and unbridled male ego…and the terrible cost of staying silent. An utterly compelling read” (Liv Constantine, author of The Last Mrs. Parrish).

“Impossible to resist, impossible to predict, impossible to put down…this is an author at the top of her game.” —Erin Kelly, author of Watch Her Fall

The author of the “masterfully plotted, compulsive page-turner” (The Guardian) Our House takes you on a haunting and nail-biting journey of tragedy and revenge.

The Heights is a tall, slender apartment building among warehouses in London. Its roof terrace is so discreet, you wouldn’t know it existed if you weren’t standing at the window of the flat directly opposite. But you are. And that’s when you see a man up there—a man you’d recognize anywhere. He may be older now, but it’s definitely him.

But that can’t be because he’s been dead for over two years. You know this for a fact.

Because you’re the one who killed him.

With Louise Candlish’s signature dark and twisty prose, The Heights shows “the ferocity of maternal love” (Hannah Beckerman, author of If Only I Could Tell You). It is a unputdownable thriller that will keep you guessing until the final page.

The name of the game is revenge—no matter the cost—in this emotionally charged thriller reminiscent of The Wife Between Us and The Perfect Nanny.

Kerrie O’Malley, jobless and in an unfulfilling relationship, can isolate the singular moment in her life when things veered off course—the night she was irrevocably wronged by someone she looked up to. Eighteen years later, when Kerrie sees the very woman who destroyed her life on television, a fire ignites inside her. The stakes are high. The risks are perilous. But she’ll stop at nothing to achieve the retribution she deserves.

Jordana Pierson is a gilded New Yorker who appears to have it all: wealth, glamour, a successful and handsome husband, and a thriving wedding concierge business. Her record is spotless. Her business is flourishing. No one knows the truth about her and the dark shadows of her past.

No one, that is, except Kerrie.

Exploring just how far someone will go for vengeance, Pretty Revenge is a riveting, compulsively readable novel bursting with twists and turns and plenty of suspense.

From New York Times bestselling author Jodi Picoult, a powerful novel that explores the unbreakable bond between parent and child, and questions whether you can reinvent yourself in the course of a lifetime—or if your mistakes are carried forever.

Fourteen-year-old Trixie Stone is in love for the first time. She’s also a straight-A high school student, pretty and popular, and the light of her father’s life... Comic book artist Daniel Stone would do anything to protect his daughter. But when a single act of violence shatters her innocence, seemingly mild-mannered Daniel’s convictions are put to the test—while his own shockingly tumultuous past, hidden even from his family, comes to light. Now, everything Trixie’s ever believed about her hero, her father, seems to be a lie as Daniel ventures to hell and back, seeking revenge. Will the price be the bond they share?

Revealing an “exceptional, unflinching, and utterly chilling” (The Washington Post) portrait of today’s youth culture, Jodi Picoult pulls readers inside a shattered family facing the toughest questions of morality and forgiveness.

The #1 international bestseller praised as “one of the most arresting thrillers I’ve read in years” (#1 New York Times bestselling author Lisa Gardner), Woman of the Dead is the darkly thrilling tale of Brünhilde Blum, a successful undertaker whose happiness is dashed by a tragedy that sets her on a path of revenge.

For the past eight years, Blum has had a good life—a life that masks the terrible secrets of her past. She is a successful undertaker, a doting mother, and the loving wife of a decorated police officer.

Then in one devastating moment, a hit-and-run changes everything. As Blum’s grief over the death of her husband, Mark, overwhelms her, only her two little girls can drag her back to the land of the living. Time passes quietly until while packing up Mark’s office, Blum discovers a recorded conversation from a case he was investigating. She soon learns Mark’s death was no accident—it was murder—and Blum dives headfirst into the abyss to find out why and have her revenge.

Woman of the Dead, the first book in a trilogy, is an unforgettable thriller about the lengths one passionate woman will go to for vengeance and the tug-of-war between good and evil that exists in all of us. Vivid, tense, and written with breakneck narration, this novel introduces Bernhard Aichner as a rising star in crime fiction.

The “extraordinary” (Booklist) novel of a cursed man’s quest to find the source of his nightmare and to reverse it before he becomes…nothing at all. This #1 New York Times bestseller from Stephen King, writing as Richard Bachman, “pulsates with evil…[and] will have you on the edge of your seat” (Publishers Weekly).

“You can’t do anything… It’s gone too far. You understand, Halleck? Too…far.

Attorney Billy Halleck seriously enjoys living his life of upper-class excess. He’s got it all­—an expensive home in Connecticut, a loving family…and fifty extra pounds that his doctor repeatedly warns will be the death of him. Then, in a moment of carelessness, Halleck commits vehicular manslaughter when he strikes a jaywalking old woman crossing the street. But Halleck has some powerful local connections, and gets off with a slap on the wrist…much to the fury of the woman’s mysterious and ancient father, who exacts revenge with a single word: “Thinner.” Now a terrified Halleck finds the weight once so difficult to shed dropping effortlessly—and rapidly—by the week. Soon there will be nothing left of Billy Halleck…unless he can somehow locate the source of his living nightmare and reverse what’s happened to him before he utterly wastes away…

From the author of the “raw, ingenious, and utterly fearless” (Wendy Walker, USA TODAY bestselling author) Temper comes a dynamic psychological thriller about two women who give bad men exactly what they deserve—perfect for fans of Killing Eve and Chelsea Cain.

Scarlett Clark is an exceptional English professor. But she’s even better at getting away with murder.

Every year, Dr. Clark searches for the worst man at Gorman University—professor, student, or otherwise—and plots his well-deserved demise. Thanks to her meticulous planning, she’s avoided drawing attention to herself…but as she’s preparing for her biggest kill yet, the school starts probing into the growing body count on campus. Determined to keep her enemies close, Dr. Clark insinuates herself into the investigation and charms the woman in charge. Everything’s going according to her master plan…until she loses control with her latest victim, putting her secret life at risk of exposure.

Meanwhile, Gorman student Carly Schiller is just trying to survive her freshman year. Finally free of her emotionally abusive father, all Carly wants is to focus on her studies and fade into the background. Her new roommate has other ideas. Allison Hadley is cool and confident—everything Carly wishes she could be—and the two girls quickly form an intense friendship. So when Allison is sexually assaulted at a party, Carly becomes obsessed with making the attacker pay...and turning her fantasies about revenge into a reality.

“A gorgeously-written ragestorm of a thriller” (Wendy Heard, author of The Kill Club), They Never Learn is a feminist serial killer story that you won’t be able to put down.