First published 2026
Tilda Smith creates board games for a living, but she applies the same strategic thinking to her personal relationships. She has crafted elaborate rules for friendship, romance, and what she calls the end game. Every interaction becomes part of her carefully structured system where she always emerges victorious. The other people in her life remain unaware they are participants in Tilda's elaborate designs. She considers herself completely fair in how she manages these human games. One evening, a date crosses a line that triggers something dangerous in Tilda. She responds with violence that surprises even her. Soon she finds herself disposing of a corpse, stuffed into a laundry bag. Tilda must now determine appropriate consequences for players who fail to meet her standards. But someone else has been observing her moves. This mysterious watcher has initiated their own game with Tilda as the target. She faces a new challenge: can she outmaneuver this opponent before they expose her, or will she finally meet someone who plays better than she does?
Genres: mystery, crime, adult-fiction, thriller, psychological-thriller, dark
Vibes: dark, fast-paced, menacing, psychological, suspenseful, twisted
Tropes: cat-and-mouse, game-within-a-game, obsessive-protagonist, unreliable-narrator
304 pages · Hardcover · Berkley
Content warnings: murder, violence