If you’re in the mood for suspenseful stories that keep them on the edge of your seats, this list of  fiction centered around crime and mystery will give you a taste of what the continent has to offer.

These books will take you from the streets of Accra during the Year of Return, where old secrets collide with new realities in Kobby Ben Ben’s No One Dies Yet to a sleepy Egyptian village in  Ashraf El-Ashmawi’s The House of the Coptic Woman, where tensions erupt after a series of haunting murders.

Some of the characters navigate the complexities of hidden identities and moral dilemmas. In Adam Oyebanji’s A Quiet Teacher, Greg Amimbola can no longer run away from his past as a spy when someone turns up dead in the school premises. Amaka Mbadiwe is a fearless vigilante taking on powerful men who hurt women in Leye Adenle’s When Trouble Sleeps. Sometimes, we can’t help but root for the villain as with Oyinkan Braithwaite’s My Sister the Serial Killer where Korede must grapple with her sister Ayoola’s murderous tendencies, balancing her love for her sister with the moral dilemmas and inconveniences of covering up her killings. Meanwhile, H. J. Golakai’s The Lazarus Effect follows journalist Vee Johnson as she investigates the disappearance of a young girl—an inquiry that pulls her deeper into Cape Town’s missing children cases.

Some of the stories explore the darker side of society. In Femi Kayode’s Gaslight, the enigmatic world of a Nigerian megachurch is exposed when a beloved bishop is accused of his wife’s murder. Iris Mwanza’s The Lions’ Den, set in 1990s Zambia, exposes the systemic homophobia of the legal system where a young queer dancer disappears without a trace. Koli Jean Bofane’s Casablanca Story investigates the murder of a woman in a working-class district of Casablanca.

For readers looking for something really out there, try A Spy in Time by Imraan Coovadia. Enver Eleven is a young recruit working for a time-traveling crime unit in a post-apocalyptic South Africa. When his colleague Shanumi Six is kidnapped, he sets out on a mission through time—from Rio de Janeiro in 1967 to Johannesburg in 2271— to find her, even as he unspools conspiracies that could change the course of history.

The list is short but exciting. It presents a quick snapshot of African crime fiction!

Enjoy!