Top ten books about voyeurs

Peter Swanson is the author of three novels: The Girl With a Clock For a Heart, a LA Times Book Award finalist; The Kind Worth Killing, winner of the New England Society Book Award, and finalist for the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger; and his most recent, Her Every Fear.

For the Guardian, he tagged ten books about voyeurs, including:

The Executioners by John D MacDonald (1957)

The voyeur of this novel is Max Cady, a psychotic ex-convict, out to get revenge on Sam Bowden, the family man who helped put him away for rape. What is so menacing about MacDonald’s story – filmed twice under the title of Cape Fear – is the way in which Cady just hangs around, keeping an eye on Bowden, his wife and three children, among them a 14-year-old daughter just beginning to become a woman. Before he strikes, he simply (and legally) watches. MacDonald, an underrated thriller writer, shows the helplessness and terror inherent in such a situation.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Visit Peter Swanson's website, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.

My Book, The Movie: The Kind Worth Killing.

The Page 69 Test: The Kind Worth Killing.

Writers Read: Peter Swanson (February 2015).

--Marshal Zeringue