Small towns can be a peaceful alternative to the hustle and bustle of a large city, a welcoming community of residents who work together to make life a little easier for one another. But as is revealed in these audiobooks, looks can be deceiving. These cozy hamlets have a darker side—sinister, claustrophobic, and brimming with secrets. The ghastly crimes and shocking reveals of these stories are all the more impactful thanks to the setting. Just imagine someone you grew up with and saw every day—someone you thought you knew everything about—is harboring a secret with the potential to shatter everything. Then, that tight-knit community might just feel too close for comfort.
After the death of her sister when she was a teenager, Camille Preaker turned to self-harm and destructive coping mechanisms before leaving without a backward glance. Now a reporter in Chicago, Camille gets a new assignment in the last place she wants to go: home. Sent to investigate the disappearance of a young girl and the death of another, Camille must face her strained relationship with her mother, a stepsister she barely knows, and the town that haunts her still. For a cutting and brutal take on the secrets small towns keep, Flynn delivers in spades, and Ann Marie Lee's intriguing narration only adds to the chilling experience.
Three years ago, Sophie broke up with her boyfriend Thomas, not knowing he was about to propose. In the years since, he’s moved on and married someone else while Sophie remains single. But when she inherits the house of one of Thomas’s aunts—where a couple mysteriously disappeared decades ago, leaving their baby behind—she’s thrust into a strange dynamic. Living among the family of her ex on a small, isolated island, she finds no shortage of secrets. Narrator Heather Wilds lends her voice, crafting a stirring, emotional take on small-town mysteries.
After two federal agents go missing, Ethan Burke is sent to Wayward Pines, a small town in Idaho, to investigate. On the way there, a car accident kills his partner and puts Burke in the hospital. It’s hardly the last strange occurrence. In Wayward Pines, peculiar happenings abound as Burke pokes around, finding odd residents, the body of one of the missing agents, and a road that spits him back into town no matter how many times he tries to escape. This tense, strange town will stay with you long after Max Meyers's narration ends.
Small-town secrets meet a great production and a star-studded cast in this Audible Original cozy. Emily Lane runs a Christmas-themed store in the small town of Fletcher’s Grove, where she sells wares to tourists all day. But the town isn’t as quaint as it appears. At night, Lane investigates murders that keep popping up around her. Actors Cobie Smulders and Raymond Ablack make this wintertime mystery a pure delight, perfect for winding down after a long day.
After the disappearance of her best friend Corinne, Nicolette “Nic” Farrell left her hometown of Cooley Ridge. Now, a decade later, she returns to fix up her family home in order to help pay for assisted living for her father. After her return, though, another girl close to Nic disappears and the town suddenly feels smaller than it did all those years ago. Gifted narrator Rebekkah Ross unfolds this mystery with mounting suspense as Nic realizes that long-hidden secrets must come out—or someone else may meet a similar fate.
In his younger years, Beauregard “Bug” Montage was known for his speed as a getaway driver for a variety of criminals. Now, he’s a husband and father, trying to make an honest living running a mechanic shop in his small town. But when he falls behind on his bills and his mother’s nursing home threatens to kick her out if he doesn’t pay up, his back is against the wall and he turns to what he’s best at: driving fast. One last job and he’ll be set, right? Bug is about to find out that there may be more to what he's agreeing to than he thought. Narrated by Adam Lazarre-White, this story is one you won't want to miss.
For a dystopian take on small-town secrets, add this thriller to your list. Moon of the Crushed Snow opens on a small Anishinaabe community in Northern Ontario. The locals don’t question the power outage at first—it happens pretty frequently, after all. But when the power and cell service stay off and the emergency generator is running out of gas, the townspeople start to panic. Without access to the larger world, they have no idea what’s happening out there or why. That is, until strangers show up looking for refuge. This tense, snow-covered, slow-burn story is narrated perfectly by Billy Merasty.
Narrated by Marin Ireland, Beartown serves up the perfect example of how small towns can go from close-knit to claustrophobic in the span of a second. It’s no exaggeration to say everyone in Beartown is invested in hockey. Now, with their junior ice hockey team set to compete in the national semi-finals, the town hangs everything on their success. But when the star player of the team is accused of assaulting the daughter of the team’s general manager, the town’s future crumbles and their sense of community goes with it. Some citizens turn against the hockey player, others against the girl who came forward to report her attack, while tension and frustration with the loss of their shining future grow.
Cal Hooper, a retired detective from Chicago, moves to a small town in Ireland to spend the rest of his life taking it easy. He plans to work on his fixer-upper of a house, go for leisurely strolls, and keep to himself. But he’s soon caught in the current of a local boy’s disappearance, finding in his new town something sinister lurking below the surface. Roger Clark narrates this one exceptionally, giving a rich voice to Cal's story.
Ellice is an Ivy League-educated corporate attorney working for Houghton Transportation Company in Georgia. When her boss (who she also happens to be sleeping with) asks her to meet him one morning, she doesn’t think much of it. But when she arrives, he’s dead. In a panic, Ellice retreats to her desk, pretending she didn’t see until someone else finds his body and calls the police. What the police find, though, leads them right back to Ellice and the secrets lurking in her small-town past. Susan Dalian heightens the stakes to each fresh conspiracy, peeling back the mystery as she narrates Ellice's harrowing journey into her past.
Ordinary Grace is set in a rural town in southern Minnesota where 13-year-old Frank Drum, the son of a Methodist minister, is determined to spend his summer playing sports, eating popsicles, and enjoying his freedom. But when a young boy is killed, Frank’s summer shatters around him. As tragedies begin to mount, Frank’s family, each reacting differently, is rattled all the same. Told from Frank’s perspective years after that fateful summer, it’s a story of secrets and an innocence that cannot survive them, narrated with depth and authenticity in Rich Orlow’s Midwestern accent.
The middle child of her family, 16-year-old Lydia Lee is under pressure from her parents to fit in, succeed, and make friends. Then, she’s found dead in a nearby lake. As her family struggles with the unexpected loss of their daughter and sister, their seemingly strong exterior breaks apart to reveal long-hidden secrets. Slowly revealing the story of what happened to Lydia, the narrative alternates between moments in the Lees' past in the 1950s and the present in the 1970s. Audie Award winner Cassandra Campbell brings tremendous heart to this touching family saga.
Growing up in Golden Cove, a small New Zealand settlement, Anahera “Ana” Rawiri left for a bigger life, marrying a rich man and moving to London as a concert pianist. But when her husband dies, she retreats back home to the dilapidated cabin she grew up in, to grieve and regroup. Once she's back, though, a young woman goes missing and the town’s isolation suddenly feels terrifying. Pulled into the search, Ana is reminded of when other young women in town went missing years before. Are they connected? Find out alongside Ana as the truth is revealed, satisfyingly unraveled by acclaimed performer Saskia Maarleveld.
When Naomi, Olivia, and Cassidy were 11, they invented The Goddess Game, an imaginary world to entertain themselves through a summer in the woods. But one day, a man interrupts their magic afternoon, stabbing Naomi in front of her friends. Fortunately, Naomi survives, and the girls’ testimony puts a serial killer behind bars. When she gets a call that the man died while incarcerated, Naomi should feel relieved. But, at Olivia’s urging that she has something important to tell her, Naomi goes back to her hometown, where secrets about what happened lie in wait. Narrated by Karissa Vacker, What Lies in the Woods houses a twisty story that will keep you absorbed the whole way through.
Small-town secrets meet small-town tensions in this intriguing mystery narrated by James Patrick Cronin. As the sheriff of Fallen Mountains, Pennsylvania, Red runs the whole department with only his secretary, Leigh, to lend a hand. Though he itches for retirement, his plans are cut short when the son of an influential family goes missing. With everyone in town on edge and keeping secrets, Red knows better than anyone that this might not be just another one of the man's usual disappearing acts.