23rd Midnight — A Women's Murder Club Thriller

A Killer’s Legacy

23rd Midnight, the twenty-third Women’s Murder Club novel, builds its menace around a chilling idea: a serial killer’s reign of terror may end with his imprisonment, but his influence can outlast his freedom. An imprisoned serial killer, his murders seemingly behind bars and behind him, becomes the dark center of the novel when a copycat begins killing in his style, finishing the work the original started. The killer’s legacy lives on in a protégé who has studied and emulated him, and Lindsay Boxer and the Women’s Murder Club race to stop a murderer carrying on a mentor’s atrocities. A killer’s influence can outlast his freedom, and 23rd Midnight’s mentor-and-copycat premise gives the novel a creeping, building menace.

The mentor-and-protégé premise is the book’s chilling center. By pairing an imprisoned serial killer with a copycat continuing his work, Patterson and co-author Maxine Paetro tap a particular dread — the idea that evil can be taught, that a killer’s methods and madness can be transmitted to a follower who completes his work from outside the prison walls. A copycat completes a mentor’s work, and the novel’s menace comes from the sense of a killer’s influence reaching beyond his imprisonment, his protégé enacting the atrocities he can no longer commit himself. The mentor-and-copycat pairing gives 23rd Midnight a doubled menace, the imprisoned mastermind and the free protégé together.

Cindy in Danger

What gives 23rd Midnight its personal dimension is the involvement of Cindy Thomas, the Women’s Murder Club’s reporter, who is writing a book about the original serial killer. Cindy’s project draws her dangerously close to both the imprisoned mastermind and the copycat continuing his work, her journalistic investigation putting her in the killer’s orbit, and her personal involvement gives the novel emotional stakes. A reporter’s story can become a target, and Cindy’s book about the killer makes her a potential victim, her pursuit of the story drawing her into the danger. The personal involvement of Cindy gives 23rd Midnight a stake beyond the procedural, the threat reaching one of the club’s own.

The series has always given its four women individual storylines, and 23rd Midnight foregrounds Cindy, her book project the thread that connects the club to the killers and the danger. Cindy’s drawing into the killer’s orbit, her personal proximity to the mentor and the copycat, gives the novel its emotional engine, the threat to one of the club’s own raising the stakes. The series’ ensemble warmth — the friendship among Lindsay, Claire, Yuki, and Cindy — remains the grounding center, and Cindy’s danger gives the novel a personal urgency, the threat to a beloved character heightening the menace.

A Creeping Menace

23rd Midnight generates a creeping, building menace through its mentor-and-copycat premise. The imprisoned killer, his copycat protégé, and Cindy’s dangerous proximity combine into a thriller of building dread, the sense of a killer’s influence spreading and a reporter’s investigation drawing her toward danger. The creeping menace distinguishes the entry, the slow-building threat of a copycat completing a mentor’s work giving the novel a dark tension. Patterson and Paetro’s brisk, propulsive pacing — the series’ signature short chapters and forward momentum — carry the building menace, the novel moving quickly toward its confrontation.

The imprisoned-mastermind device is familiar, both in the series and the wider genre, and the short chapters limit the depth to which the killers or the menace can be explored. The disturbing serial-killer material — the murders, the copycat’s atrocities — gives the novel a dark tone. But the chilling mentor-and-copycat premise, Cindy’s personal involvement, and the creeping menace give the novel a building dread. The combination of a killer’s legacy, a copycat protégé, and a reporter in danger makes 23rd Midnight a chilling recent entry, the series’ formula applied to an unsettling premise.

A Chilling Entry

23rd Midnight is a solid, chilling Women’s Murder Club novel, and its strengths are the mentor-and-copycat premise, Cindy’s personal involvement, and the creeping menace. The imprisoned killer and his copycat give the novel a chilling pairing, Cindy’s danger gives it personal stakes, and the building menace gives it dread. The familiar device and the limited depth are considerations, but the chilling premise and Cindy’s involvement distinguish it.

Patterson and Paetro’s brisk pacing carries the building menace, and the ensemble warmth grounds it. 23rd Midnight is the series in a chilling, copycat-thriller mode, anchored by a killer’s legacy and a reporter in danger, a recent entry that gives the Women’s Murder Club an unsettling, mentor-and-protégé premise.

Where It Sits in the Series

23rd Midnight is the twenty-third Women’s Murder Club novel, following 22 Seconds and preceding The 24th Hour. It reads well in sequence, building on the ensemble’s long history, and it continues the series past its core twenty-two-book run. For readers tracking the club, it is a chilling recent entry.

Among the Women’s Murder Club books, 23rd Midnight stands out for its mentor-and-copycat premise and Cindy’s personal involvement, a chilling recent entry. It is a copycat thriller anchored by a killer’s legacy and a reporter drawn into danger, demonstrating the series’ continued vitality and giving the club an unsettling, building menace.

The decision to foreground Cindy Thomas gives 23rd Midnight a personal grounding that the imprisoned-mastermind device alone could not provide. Across the long series, the four women of the club have each taken turns at the emotional center, and putting the reporter in the killer’s orbit — through the very book she is writing — neatly ties the procedural threat to a character readers have followed for more than twenty novels. Her journalistic curiosity, admirable in itself, becomes the mechanism that draws danger toward her, and the novel wrings genuine tension from the gap between the reader’s mounting alarm and Cindy’s professional determination to get the story. It is a reminder that the Women’s Murder Club series, for all its reliance on lurid premises, anchors its appeal in the four friends at its core, and 23rd Midnight keeps that anchor firmly in view even as the copycat’s menace builds.

Our rating: 3.8/5 — A chilling recent Women’s Murder Club thriller in which an imprisoned serial killer’s copycat carries on his work and reporter Cindy Thomas, writing his story, is drawn dangerously close.