5 Books Featuring (Possibly) Murderous Children

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I’m not a risk-taker. I’m careful and safety-conscious to a fault. But as a writer, I have the freedom to take infinite risks on the page. In my stories, I can explore things I never would in real life.

Often, I write about the things that scare me most. I want to understand them, to experience them in a safe and controlled way. In A MOTHER WOULD KNOW I asked myself the question: what I would I do if I suspected one of my children had done the unthinkable? How would I react?

As a mom, I’m fiercely protective of my children. But what if I was faced with something I shouldn’t protect them from?

Here are five other books with that same theme in mind.

The Good Son by Jacquelyn Mitchard

This heart-wrenching story begins with Thea picking her son Stefan up from prison where he’s served the last three years for murdering his girlfriend. Although her son was only seventeen when his girlfriend was killed and doesn’t recall any of it because he was severely under the influence of mind-altering drugs, she still has a difficult time reconciling the monstrous act with the son she raised. She waffles between feelings of resentment, betrayal, guilt and shame. But underneath it all is disbelief. There is a primal need inside of Thea to disprove her son’s involvement and to clear his name. Mitchard did an exquisite job with Thea’s character, and I empathized with her journey so much.

Baby Teeth by Zoje Stage

I’m glad I read this book after my kids were grown. Had they been little, I would have slept with my eyes open. In one of the most chilling and creepy books I’ve ever read, seven-year-old Hanna is sweet as pie to her dad Alex, but constantly torments her mom, Suzette. Since Alex never sees that side of Hanna, he has a hard time believing his wife’s accusations and it drives a wedge between them, which only further fuels Hanna’s manipulations. No matter how bad things become, though, Suzette loves her daughter and continues trying to help her, even to her own detriment.

The Good Father by Noah Hawley

In this emotional story, Dr. Paul Allen is grappling with the fact that his twenty-year-old son Daniel has attempted to assassinate a Democratic candidate at a rally. Dr. Allen is a good father, a man who has dedicated his life to helping others. His son has always been a good kid, and he doesn’t understand why he did this. What went wrong? While doing some investigating of his own, trying to exonerate his child, Dr. Allen embarks on a journey of truly getting to know his son. What I found most interesting about this story was the look inside the dynamics of a father/son relationship.

Keep You Close by Karen Cleveland

When our kids are small, we are their whole world. But as they grow and mature – venture out – their world grows. Their circle grows. And our influence lessens. I recall with great clarity the moment I realized that my kids had their own lives, apart from me. They’d come into their own and I no longer knew them as well as I used to.

That’s the theme of this book. How well do we really know our children?

Stephanie is a single mom to her son Zachary and works for the FBI, when one day she finds a gun in her son’s room. On the heels of that, she’s told that he may be working for a terrorist organization. She doesn’t believe it and she will stop at nothing to prove her son’s innocence.

We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver

What if you gave birth to a psychopath?

That’s the question this book asks. This harrowing tale is told through letters from Eva to her husband Franklin. In them, we learn the disturbing details about their murderous son Kevin. From the time he was little, Kevin displayed psychopathic behavior, but it all culminates in a school massacre when he is a teenager. This is an incredibly sad story, and my heart broke for Eva and what she went through.

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