The Girl on the Train – and other express encounters in literature
Moira Redmond takes a journey through her favourite fiction written to the rhythm of the rails. Which train scenes make your heart beat faster?
Blood On Snow review – Jo Nesbø introduces a hitman with a heart
A killer is employed to take out his boss’s wife in the chart-topping novelist’s pacy thriller. Just don’t expect another Harry Hole
British directors could still make a splash at Cannes, says festival director
Thierry Frémaux hints that Ben Wheatley’s High Rise and Terence Davies’ Sunset Song are still in the mix for the festival, which still has places to fill for the official selection
Fiction for teenagers – reviews
Thriller momentum is combined with burning real-life issues in this crop of teen fiction
Thrillers are politically conservative? That’s not right
Val McDermid says that while crime fiction is naturally of the left, thrillers are on the side of the status quo. Jonathan Freedland votes against this reading
Sherlock’s swansong: the ideal Holmes expedition
The Reichenbach Falls hold a special place in the hearts of Sherlock Holmes devotees, and none more so than the author Sarah Perry, who travelled to Switzerland to see the scene of the master sleuth’s demise for herself
Toxic review – Jamie Doward’s rip-roaring tale of murder and dirty money
A money-laundering expert unearths a plot to bring down the global banking system in the Observer journalist’s wonderfully tangled debut
A Pleasure and a Calling review – Phil Hogan’s unsettling tale of a creepy estate agent
Possessing the keys to countless homes, Hogan’s protagonist inveigles his way into people’s lives, dispensing vigilante justice as he goes
Are these the best book-to-film adaptations?
A survey of 3,000 fans found Harry Potter and James Bond the UK’s favourite big-screen books. Help us come up with a less mainstream list
The Laughing Monsters review – Denis Johnson’s ugly world of espionage
This convoluted and cosmpolitan tale of double-crosses in Africa has some acute things to say about the modern spying game
Second Life by SJ Watson review – the dark side of internet relationships
The author of Before I Go to Sleep is back with another disturbing tale of a woman mired in confusion and dishonesty
J-Lo sparks quest to find ‘first editions’ of The Iliad
Reference to Greek epic poem in Jennifer Lopez thriller The Boy Next Door propels Homer up AbeBooks’ search rankings
Library users firmly focused on fiction
The UK’s most borrowed titles reveal a thirst for thrillers, crime novels and children’s fiction, with Jamie Oliver the only non-fiction title among the top 100
Rebooting Raymond Chandler: five things we learned from John Banville
John Banville on writing a new Philip Marlowe novel 80 years after Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep
Her review: Harriet Lane’s sinister thriller about two north London female ‘frenemies’
Harriet Lane’s tense tale of a secret grudge and stalkerish revenge keeps its secrets till the final pages