This is one of my all-time favorite crime novels, which is full of action and a fantastic child character named Polly: “She had a teddy bear in her arms and murder in her eyes.” It follows Nate—who is marked to die by the Aryan Brotherhood right before he’s released from prison—and his 11-year-old daughter, Polly, who doesn’t really know him and is now on the run with him as her last living family.

Now in theaters, the film clearly kept the tone of the novel, and stars Taron Egerton and Ana Sophia as Nate and Polly.

Watch the trailer: She Rides Shotgun (2025) Official Trailer

This is one of the year’s highly anticipated adaptations because it’s based on a very popular series and has a stellar cast—at least it is for certain generations who grew up watching a lot of films in the ’90s/early aughts, including James Bond.

Richard Osman’s series has four books, with the fifth, The Impossible Fortune, releasing in September. Set in an English retirement community, readers follow a group of elderly people in a true crime group who solve cold cases they think the police aren’t capable of solving. There’s also a local detective who doesn’t think their hijinks are that much fun.

Netflix has adapted the first book into a murder mystery film that will stream on August 28th, starring Helen Mirren, Celia Imrie, Pierce Brosnan, and Ben Kingsley. And that’s not even where the big names end, that’s just the main sleuthing group. Actors like David Tennant and Tom Ellis are also in the film. The cold case is a murder mystery from the ‘70s, but a current murder is what puts them all in danger…

Watch the trailer: The Thursday Murder Club | Official Teaser | Netflix

Bonus book recommendations: If you love a group of retired-age sleuths and want to amp up the thrills, check out Tess Gerritsen’s The Spy Coast series starter, which follows a group of retired spies. And if you want a similar tone to The Thursday Murder Club, with a group of sleuths, pick up The Postscript Murders by Elly Griffiths.

Charlie Huston’s early aughts thriller has the “wrong place, wrong time” trope. Former baseball player Hank Thompson is now a New York bartender left in charge of his neighbor’s cat when he’s viciously attacked, making it clear he has something someone wants. Problem? He has no clue what it is, nor how to convince all the people after him that they got the wrong guy.

The same-titled film has an August 29th theatrical release date and was written by Huston himself, with Darren Aronofsky directing. The thriller, while totally different in tone from The Thursday Murder Club, also has an impressive list of stars: Austin Butler, Regina King, Zoë Kravitz, Matt Smith, Liev Schreiber, Vincent D’Onofrio, Bad Bunny, and Carol Kane (I was SO excited to see her in an episode of Poker Face).

Watch the trailer: CAUGHT STEALING – Official Trailer

Bonus book recommendations: The Dime by Kathleen Kent is a procedural, but it’s on the action thriller side, and, most importantly, detective Betty Rhyzyk ends up the target of ruthless criminals and has no idea why.

The final adaptation I have for you this month is based on a graphic novel from 2015 that involves a deep cover agent that is basically a ghost with no identity who gets set up for murder and has her cover blown.

Amazon Prime Video has adapted the graphic novel into a six-episode thriller series that will premiere on August 15th, starring Daniel Dae Kim. It also has Piper Perabo, who was so good in the USA Network’s Covert Affairs series that this project seems perfect for her. Anywho, the series follows an ex-US intelligence operative in South Korea trying to reunite with the daughter who thought he was dead. The issue is his past comes to haunt him in the form of a young assassin tasked with killing him.

Watch the trailer: Butterfly – Official Trailer | Prime Video

Bonus book recommendation: At the core of this story is a family drama that involves a parent and an estranged child, with the past coming back trope, which made me think of The Lost Ones by Sheena Kamal. Nora Watts is minding her own business and trying to have a very quiet life when she’s instead thrust into trying to find her missing teenage daughter, who she put for adoption as a baby, and things get intense on her search.