This week, I talk with Mailan Doquang about her action packed jewel heist thriller Blood Rubies. She shares how her work as an architectural historian influenced the way she approached writing fiction, and we discuss our mutual love for anti-heroes.

Follow Mailan on Instagram

Check out Blood Rubies

Blood Rubies Synopsis

Seven days are all it takes for Rune Sarasin’s life to completely derail. It starts with a routine heist: lifting a pouch of rubies from the Bangkok hotel room of wealthy smuggler Charles Lemaire. Rune nearly gets caught when Lemaire’s goons give chase, but she manages to escape with her boyfriend Kit. Then Kit delivers some terrifying news: his teenage sister Madee has gone missing. They track her cell phone to the dangerous Khlong Toei slum, but the trail ends there. The night gets even worse when Rune realizes she lost the pouch of gems somewhere in the slum while searching for Madee.

Charles Lemaire is the wrong man to mess with. He is a perfectionist when it comes to both his attire and his crimes, and he isn’t afraid to kill to get what he wants. When he catches up to Rune and Kit, he gives Rune an ultimatum: return his rubies or she will never see her boyfriend again. Now Rune must race against time to either recover the lost gems or find something even more valuable with which to ransom Kit back from Lemaire. But she also still needs to find out what happened to Madee. As Rune investigates deeper into the shadows of the Khlong Toei slum, she uncovers a web of crime with consequences far more insidious than just one missing girl and a handful of stolen rubies.

This week, I talk with the co-host of Thrillers By the Book Club Podcast Olivia Day Wallace about our favorite tropes in thrillers!

Books We Talked About

Murder Road

Nightwatching

Alias Emma

My Darling Husband

The Mentor

I’m Not Done With You Yet

Th1rt3en

Fourth Monkey

Original Twin

Where You End

Blood Rubies

Counterfeit

Nena Knight Series

The Inheritance Games

Very Bad Things

House on the Cerulean Sea

On the Surface

Chloe Kates is Missing

Dark Corners

Everyone is Watching

How to Kill Men and Get Away with It

They Never Learn

If Something Happens to Me

First Lie Wins

Bluff

The Night Side

Pretty Things

Look Closer

Sometimes I Lie

None of This is True

Small Secrets

The Inmate

This Girl’s a Killer

Look in the Mirror

What We'll Burn Last

The Midnight Feast

You Will Never Be Me

Ladykiller

Everybody Knows

It Had to Be You

The Peacock and the Sparrow

Long Time Gone

This week, I talk with Kellye Garrett about her writing journey and her new thriller Missing White Woman. We discuss Kellye's early interest in writing, her inspiration for her Hollywood Homicide Series, and her writing process. Kellye also shares how her experience in TV writing influenced her novel writing, particularly in creating suspenseful chapters and realistic dialogue. We dive into the themes of Missing White Woman, including true crime Internet culture and the racial dynamics explored in the story.