Shelf Life: Karin Slaughter

Welcome to Shelf Life, ELLE’s books column. In this ongoing series, authors share an assortment of their most memorable reads: the books that have shaped their lives as writers and as human beings. Every month, ELLE will feature authors with a new and upcoming release of their own, asking them which stories have impacted their work most—and which stories they recommend you pick up next. Whether you’re on the hunt for a book to move you, calm you, or change you, consider a recommendation from the writers in our series. Perhaps one of their favorite titles will become one of yours, too.

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Karin Slaughter was at work on her 2025 book We Are All Guilty Here when she came up with the idea for The Secrets We Hide, her latest novel. “The Secrets We Hide is dark, twisty, emotional, and full of secrets you won’t see coming,” she says of the new book. “It’s set in the small town of North Falls, Georgia. When newly minted sheriff Emmy Cliffton and her sister, ex-FBI agent Jude Archer,
discover a devastating crime scene, it’s up to them to discover the truth of what happened.”

With The Secrets We Hide, Slaughter’s aim was to create an electric story. “I wanted to use all the energy around big life changes to propel the plot forward. My goal was to write some very big and unexpected twists. I hope I did that successfully,” she says. Slaughter has written over 25 books, including the popular Will Trent series, which was adapted into an ABC show. Those who love The Secrets We Hide are likely to enjoy Jar of Hearts by Jennifer Hillier, Served Him Right by Lisa Unger, and King
of Ashes by S.A. Cosby, Slaughter tells ELLE.

Slaughter, who is based in Atlanta, is a native of Georgia, where many of her books take place. In 2013, she won a prestigious Edgar Award. Her 2018 thriller Pieces of Her became a Netflix series starring Toni Collette and Omari Hardwick. In November, Peacock will premiere The Good Daughter, based on another novel and starring Rose Byrne and Meghann Fahy. Over 40 million copies of her books have been sold. Slaughter founded Save the Libraries, a nonprofit that assists underfunded libraries.

Dive deep into her book recommendations below.

The book that:

…made me want to be a writer:

The Complete Stories of Flannery O’Connor. O’Connor is my all-time favorite. Her work is surprising, hilarious, and at times brutal. Reading her stories as a little girl in a very small southern town, it was exhilarating to see that a woman could get away with telling stories that weren’t the kind you’d tell in polite company. As I grew older, I understood that she was using violence to pry the scab off the human condition. I’ve always felt an author’s job is to hold up a mirror to society. O’Connor excelled at showing us who we really are.

…I read in one sitting; it was that good:

I recently reread Gone by Mo Hayder so I could write a new foreword for the book, and it went down easily in one sitting. It’s a riveting and deeply disturbing mystery that stays with you. Hayder was such a talented storyteller, and her Jack Caffery series is so good.

…is my favorite book of the year (so far):

London Falling by Patrick Radden Keefe. A riveting true-crime investigation that begins with the mysterious death of a London teenager and unravels into a story of lies, oligarch fantasies, gangland figures, and institutional failure. Following a grieving family’s search for answers, Keefe exposes the shadowy world beneath London’s glittering wealth while asking how far ambition, deception, and the hunger for status can carry a person before everything collapses.

…has the best plot twist:

The Waterfall by Margaret Drabble. I’m a bit on the fence about this because it infuriated me at the time, but it does lull you into thinking one thing, then totally knocks you sideways, so it meets the criteria.

…is the best vacation read:

Anything by Mary Kay Andrews. Her books are just a delight.

…is a classic, but I can’t stand it:

Orlando by Virginia Woolf. Good Lord God, I started that in 10th grade; it moved out of the house with me when I went to college, and I ended up abandoning it to the library sale by the time I moved into my first house. I just could not get into it after several painful tries.

…helped me through a breakup/loss/difficult experience:

Grief Is the Thing With Feathers by Max Porter. I read this after losing my ninth-grade teacher, who was my mentor well into adulthood. It’s hard to describe what the story is about, but it so deftly deals with the absurdity of grief that one need only read the first few pages to understand.

…recently surprised me:

Slammerkin by Emma Donoghue: Everyone knows Emma’s work from Room, but this earlier novel touches beautifully on the same themes of fear and isolation. Mary Saunders, born in 18th-century London, expands the meaning of a character-driven plot. She makes choices that are sometimes startling, oftentimes self-destructive, but for good or bad, she finds a way to accomplish something many modern women still struggle to do: control her own destiny.

…got me out of a reading slump:

I loved reading The Splendid and the Vile by Erik Larson, a fascinating look at Winston Churchill and London during the Blitz. There are so many parallels to world events right now that I think you have to be in the right frame of mind to read it.

I’d like to see turned into a TV show or movie:

I Came Back for You by Kate White because she asks and answers such interesting questions on the page, I think the story could really be entertaining to watch on screen.

…made me feel better about the world:

Master Slave Husband Wife by Ilyon Woo. It’s an unbelievable true story about two enslaved people—Ellen and William Craft—who manage by pure cunning and wit to escape the South. And once they reach freedom, they help others achieve the same dream. It’s such a compelling example of the human spirit triumphing over something incredibly evil.

The literary organization/charity I support:

Save the Libraries is the nonprofit organization I started to raise money and awareness for public libraries, which are such vital resources for our communities. I also support my local DeKalb Library system.

My favorite audiobook narrator:

Kathleen Early, and, yes, I am biased because she has narrated all my audiobooks. But her voice is a balm, so I stand by my choice.

I would describe my reading taste as:

Eclectic, because I grew up reading tons of different genres—romance, mystery, thriller, science fiction, nonfiction, all the fictions. Anything that’s compellingly told is interesting to me. I think I owe it to my librarians who had the idea that the more varied books you put into a kid’s hands, the more varied the mind will grow to be. Those ladies were stealthy geniuses.