With Christmas just around the corner and everyone on the hunt for great stocking fillers, I’ve got some great news for all crime and thriller fans...

Below are some special recommendations from the Penguin team:

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I always love Nicci French’s novels – it’s the contrast between the honesty and ordinariness of the characters, and the creepy, evil things that happen to them. So I loved reading Until it’s Over – one of their best, about a completely ordinary bicycle courier who suddenly finds herself a major suspect in a series of related murders. I think one of all our secret fears is that no one will believe us if we are the unwitting and innocent suspects of a crime, and Nicci French are always brilliant at exploiting everyone’s fear of not being believed, ramping up the terror to a great pitch in this novel.

Juliet Annan

My top Penguin crime title from this year is The Dead Room by Chris Mooney. I love this author and his novels have all the ingredients a great thriller should have – they’re relentlessly pacy, gripping, violent, atmospheric, gory and creepy! As soon as I start a Chris Mooney novel I physically can’t put it down. I can’t wait for the next in the series!

Kate Burke

Chris Mooney – if you are a crime/CSI fan then his books are for you! His storylines hook you in totally from the first page. There is an ongoing (working) relationship between the two main investigators – very CSI – which also keeps you gripped from book to book. Now on my third Chris Mooney thriller, I just wish he wrote a little faster, as a year between books just seems too long.

Emma White

When Lydia Langstone flees her brutal husband she has nowhere to turn other than the dilapidated boarding house at 7 Bleeding Heart Square. Home to her estranged father and an eccentric cast of sinister characters, she is unprepared for the dark, dangerous secret that awaits her there. What really happened to the original owner, and does the answer lie down one of the shadowy and labyrinthine streets she must now call home? I loved this atmospheric portrayal of London in the 1930s and was gripped by its sudden plot twists. It’s a cliché to say that I couldn’t put it down, but I finished it whilst walking down the street, so desperate was I to unravel its final mysteries.

Jessica Killingley

My favourite crime novel Penguin published this year is Raymond Chandler’s The Little Sister, which we reissued in hardback with its original cover. It is Chandler’s best take on California, Los Angeles and, particularly, Hollywood. The dream factory itself is exposed in all its lurid, ugly, selfish, backstabbing glory. Chandler had worked for film companies and could see Hollywood for what it was; he didn’t shrink from telling it like it is.

Colin Brush

My favourite thriller this year was We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson, which we published earlier this month. I loved it for its darkly comic storyline, and for its very human characterization, which makes it feel extremely honest and true to life in some respects, but totally absurd and off the wall in others. The chilling suspense keeps you hooked until the very last sentence.

Natalie Ramm