Easter Bunny Boilers: 8 thrillers for the Easter Holidays

The 'Bunny Boiler' psychological thriller often has jealousy or envy at it's heart. These emotions  provoke dramatically  unhinged behaviour leaving the viewer or reader astounded by what the human mind can make happen.   During Easter  I thought an alternative to cute Easter bunnies was in order - Well we are The Crime Warp aren't we? So here you have my top eight 'Bunny Boilers' in no particular order.
1/ Fatal Attraction

The play is currently at
The Theatre Royal Haymarket

This film/play was perhaps the first of it's kind, with an actual 'Bunny Boiler' scene in it.  

On Amazon the DVD is £3.25 or
  £12.75 for Blueray

A single sexual indiscretion with a woman who becomes unhinged by jealousy and targets his family with increasing violence when he refuses to continue the dalliance had me on the edge of my seat throughout.

Couldn't bear to put a real bunny being boiled.
 I'm not that warped

The iconic scene of the much loved family pet rabbit being boiled was the horrific psychological hook that set up the tension for what was to follow.

2/Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

Buy on Amazon Kindle £2.98
PB on Amazon £3.85

This book has already been reviewed by Jackie on the blog so I'm not going to go into it in any detail. Basically Gone Girl is an enigmatic psychological thriller involving a husband and wife.  It has many breathtaking and thrilling twists and turns and the motive is jealousy. 

Ben Affleck /Rosamund Pike in Gone Girl
Release Date Oct 2014

Also, the film version starring Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike is to be released in October 2014

Chelsea Cain

 3/The Gretchen Lowell series by Chelsea Cain

Buy on Amazon Kindle ££3.59
Amazon PB £5.59

Gretchen Lowell, Chelsea Cain's beautiful but deadly female psychologist psychopath has featured in the blog before (Criminal Reads for Valentines Day 2013).  

Amazon Kindle £3.59
Amazon PB £6.39

Buy on Amazon Kindle£2.99
PB £13.09

With each Gretchen Lowell book I find myself more intrigued by the psychological link between her and Detective Archie Sheridan, despite all she's put him through.  Gretchen is one serious contender for 'Bunny Boiler' of the year

 4/Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier  

1938 edition of Rebecca.
1 used available on Amazon£6.28 for New PB on Amazon

Daphne Du Maurier

 When I first read Rebecca I was initially lulled into a false sense of security by Du Maurier's gentle writing.  Then, quite quickly that slow gentle tone took on a brooding and threatening aura as the story unfolded.  The sense of unease that pervades Mrs De Winter tries to unravel the mystery of  her new home Manderley(which in itself takes on the role of a character so oppressive is it's aura), her aloof husband and his previous wife Rebecca is aminous.    

Laurence Olivier and
Joan Fontaine in the
Original 'Rebecca' Film

Alfred Hitchcock

Which makes it fitting that the king of suspense Alfred Hitchcock was first to dramatize Rebecca in 1940.
 1940 DVD available on Amazon £4.50
1997 DVD      "           "      "       £3.80 
Interestingly Rebecca has been dramatised as a musical on Broadway - not sure how that grabs me.

John Lutz

 

Amazon Kindle £0.84 !!
PB £7.11

  5/ Single White Female by John Lutz  
When Alli advertises for a new flatmate she gets much more than she expects.  Her new flatmate Hendra Carlson seems perfect until she becomes obsessively  envious of Alli and begins to take over her life.   

Amazon DVD £4.85

This one's very high up on the 'Bunny Boiler' radar: - thrilling and scary whether you read it or watch the 1992 film version of it starring Bridget Fonda.
6/ Before I Go To Sleep by SJ Watson

Amazon Kindle £3.49
Amazon PB £3.86

SJ Watson

SJ Watson, graduate of the Faber Academy Writing School   and author of Before I go to Sleep was featured on the Richard and Judy Book awards.  This is  his first novel and it takes the psychological thriller to another dimension.  

Nicole Kidman and Colin Firth
in Before I go To Sleep
Release Date 2014

Every night Christine goes to bed knowing that by the morning her memories will have disappeared and she will have no recollection of those she loves or even what she did the previous day.  When a Psychologist manages to contact her and begins treating her secretly we are drawn into her world where nothing is as it seems - possibly not even her husband.    Beautifully crafted, wonderfully brooding and full of twists.  It is due out on film starring Nicole Kidman and Colin Firth sometime in 2014. 
7/ The Hand That Rocks The Cradle 

Amazon DVD £4.81
BlueRay£7.03

 Starring Rebecca De Mornay and Annabella Sciorra this 1992 film is as scary as they come.  A young mother inadvertently employs a psycopathic, bereaved woman who has recently lost her own child to become her nanny.  
One of the most 'Bunny Boiler' type scene's for me was when the nanny breast feeds the baby who then rejects her real mother's milk. At that point I felt terror right down to my tummy. The other more vilent thriler scenes although scary lacked the symbolism of that one scene.  After all the full quote reads "The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world" or in this instance the family.
8/Into The Darkest Corner by Elizabeth Haynes

Elizabeth Haynes

Amazon Kindle £2.99
Amazon PB £5.59

This is Haynes first novel and is a tense sinister thriller about domestic violence in the same vein as the film Sleeping With The Enemy starring Julia Roberts.  Catherine escapes from an abusive relationship and after four years begins to believe she may be safe from her abuser... as we all suspect that is not the case.  This is a 
powerful novel illustrating sensitively the long term effects of abusive relationships and that escaping the reationship is oly the beginning.  Haynes begins with a powerful scene and I'm sure like me you will frequently flip back to the prologue as you read the book.  A chilling read of bunny boiling standards.  I've also heard that it's being made into a film sometime this year- can't wait to compare the two.