Sagesmith

Forgot to mention Michael Connelly. His Harry Bosch books are brilliant. Loved 'The Black Box'.

Sandford's 'Virgil Flowers' is a great character. I've recently finished 'Mad River' which is all kinds of wonderful and Flowers is at his best in this.

Robert Crais and his Cole & Pike series are a great read. +1 for Jack Reacher - Lee Child is mining a rich vein with his irresistable former MP turned righteous vigilante. I'd add that Tim Weaver's David Raker P.I. is a great character too. 'Never Coming Back' and 'The Dead Tracks' are both absolutely superb thrillers.

I'm intrigued enough to give this a shot and get a Robert Crais book from Amazon. What's the best one to start with?

The Wilt series is an obvious starting point for Sharpe. My personal favourite, though, is Vintage Stuff. Absolutely, side-splittingly, hilarious. If you like Tom Sharpe and haven't read it, you're really missing a trick.

Just finished You're Next by Gregg Hurwitz and, have to say, what an incredible book that was. If you're a fan of crime thrillers and you've not got this on your must-read list then you're definitely missing a trick. I'll be investing, in the next week or two, in the rest of Mr Hurwitz's collection. His brilliant writing makes this a cut above your common or garden crime thriller. And though this phrase is woefully over-used, You're Next really is what could accurately be described as a page-turner. Moved on now to Gone Tomorrow, another in Lee Child's Jack Reacher series. I'm about 100 pages in and it's already grabbed me by the proverbials. Child gets you hopelessly entwined within the first few pages of this one. Excellent so far.

I'm just about to invest in my first Chris Carter book. Was going to plump for The Crucifix Killer or One by One. Both seem to be hugely popular on Amazon.

I love a good crime thriller. I'm more into the suspense than the gory descriptive stuff. But, like you, once I've read a particularly heavy crime thriller, I'll turn to something light to redress the balance. I usually go for something by Nick Spalding (Love From Both Sides is laugh out loud funny) or Tom Sharpe. Then its quickly back to sticking my nose in the next crime thriller.

My TBR 'pile' currently takes up four shelves of a large bookcase and I have another 'pile' waiting for me on my iPad's KIndle app (I'm putting reading these off till I get the Kndle Paperwhite on Christmas Day). The problem is, when you're a crime thriller fiction fan, some of the writers (*cough* James Patterson) write new books quicker than most people can read. Fortunately, I've discovered a love of a few new authors who aren't quite so prolific and whose novels tend to take a little longer to digest and enjoy than Patterson, the Big Mac of the crime fiction world.

I'm just finishing up 'You're Next' by Gregg Hurwitz. Brilliant book. Keeps you absolutely riveted. Lots of suspense and some really clever twists and turns. Premier division stuff, this. Will definitely be getting the others he has published.

I'm just about to finish The Black Box by Michael Connelly. And I've just bought Bad Luck And Trouble by Lee Child (£2 in Oxfam mint condition) but have so many others on the shelf and my TBR list already. I may take a break from Thrillers (having read four James Patterson, one Lee Child and the Michael Connelly books in the last seven days - I had a week's annual leave) and go for something humorous, maybe The Midden by Tom Sharpe, which is one of the few I haven't yet read and is sitting on the bookshelf screaming at me to pick it up. Have I told you how I got kicked out of an O Level exam for laughing too loud at a passage from a Tom Sharpe book I had recently read?

My wife keeps banging on about Odd Thomas. Dean Koontz isn't it? What's so special about that character then? I'm intrigued.

I like Patterson. He's not the greatest writer, for sure, But he's a supreme storyteller. Yeah, it's short, sharp paragraphs and massively fast-paced - more like a film script than a novel, in many ways. But if you're looking for a quick read that won't tax you too much then he's perfect for the job. I read a interview with him recently and, according to the man himself, he writes an 80-page synopsis of the story, twist, characters and setting and then his co-writer writes the rest (with him editing their scripts on a daily basis and sending back revisions).

I read a mixture of analogue and digital books and I am currently reading all my eBooks through the Kindle app on my iPad. Both my wife and I will be getting a Kindle Paperwhite for Christmas. I just wondered if some of you would be kind enough to highlight some of the differences between the experience using the iPad Kindle app and the experience I can expect from the Kindle Paperwhite? Thanks very much, in advance.

We've seen Alex Cross and a variety of other 'stars' of contemporary thrillers given the Hollywood treatment. I just wondered which main character from a contemporary thriller, mystery or crime thriller book you believe would make a great transition to celluloid? And why? Just for fun.

Thanks. The full title (bit of a mouthful, thus the shortened version here) is Sagesmith6079 - a respectful nod to Winston Smith from Orwell's 1984.

Hi gardengirl. I'm currently reading The Black Box by Michael Connelly (and enjoying it immensely). Just finished The Hard Way by Lee Child and I'm about a quarter of the ay through Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. All lovely reads. Thanks for the kind welcomes everyone.

I'm reading The Black Box as I write. It's my first Michael Connelly book. Loving the writer's attention to detail. It makes everything, Hary Bosch especially, supremely believable. This is my first post, other than my 'hello'in the introductions thread. I've recently discovered, after years of deliberately ignoring the genre, that I love a good crime thriller and am devouring Patterson, Chiuld, Connelly - and lots of other 'new' authors. Hoping some of you can give me a shove in the right direction and introduce me to many, many more to add to my collection.

Hi Everyone, I've recently rediscovered my love for reading, both traditional and digital, and found to my surprise that I also love a bit of a crime thriller. I found this forum via your 'Thrillers' section and have already found a few new (to me) authors who I've taken an interest in. As far as my favourite authors go I have what is known in the vernacular as 'a mixed bag approach'. After devouring every single Enid Blyton tale I could lay my hands on as a kid I have developed my own varied tastes in literature. So among my favourites I would count people like Tom Sharpe, David Lodge, Brett Easton Ellis, Tama Janowitz, Michael Connelly, Lee Child, Ed McBain, James Patterson (average writer but brilliant storyteller), Val McDermid (who has a home in the same village as me), Jay McInerney, Arthur Miller, Jack Kerouac...I could go on forever. It's nice to be among fellow worshippers of the hallowed page. I'm a former journalist now earning a crust in PR. I am father to three children and happily married to a lovely wife. I have a huge affinity for the art of videogames, am a fan of non league football, play a Fender Stratocaster and a GIbson SG and really, really want to find enough time to sit down and start writing my own first novel (don't we all). Thanks for having me.