“Sullivan is channeling ‘Twin Peaks’ in his latest novel…[He] evokes the richness of a small-town community as well as the secrets-filled uneasiness simmering just below its placid surface.”
—The New York Times Book Review (Best Mysteries of the Month & Crime Novels We Love)
“Midnight in Soap Lake has it all—ripping dialogue, conspiracy theories, relatable and well-drawn characters, and suspense…”
—Cascadia Daily News
“With strange characters, a deranged villain, and a magical body of water, Midnight in Soap Lake is a bingeable, genre-bending story about grief, truth, and what really haunts us.”
—5280 Magazine
A lake with mysterious properties.
A town haunted by urban legend.
Two women whose lives intersect in terrifying ways.
Welcome to Soap Lake.
Available wherever books are sold, in hardcover, ebook, large print, and audiobook (wonderfully narrated by Kristen Sieh).
(Published by HarperCollins/Hanover Square Press/HQ UK)
Midnight in Soap Lake is Book Two in The Midnight Cycle, a series of stand-alone, thematically-linked novels.
Book Three of The Midnight Cycle–The Midnight Games–will be published in early 2027. It is set in Denver in the 1980s and tells the story of Detective Harry Moberg (the reclusive detective from Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore) in the days leading up to The Hammerman case. More to come…
Upcoming Events:
Feb. 7, 1 pm. American Association of University Women’s Writers Forum, Anacortes Public Library, Anacortes, WA.
Feb, 25, 6:30 p.m. Pacific Northwest Writers Association. “A Nicer Kind of Murder.” A presentation on the evolution of crime fiction. PNWA Writer’s Cottage, Issaquah, WA. Registration required.
March 28, 6 pm. Village Books, Bellingham, WA. Michelle Maryk (The Found Object Society), in conversation with Matthew Sullivan.
More details about Midnight in Soap Lake, including interviews and spoilers, can be found here.
“Midnight in Soap Lake made me fall in love with reading all over again! It’s everything I adore in books: a tangled mystery, rich characters, a terrifying villain, and a strange setting, in which everything harbours a secret. I’ll be handing copies of this one to my friends for years!”
–Stuart Turton, bestselling author of THE LAST MURDER AT THE END OF THE WORLD and THE 7½ DEATHS OF EVELYN HARDCASTLE
“Midnight in Soap Lake hooked me from page one! This twisty, smart thriller is brimming with complex characters, a page-turning plot and big questions of science, nature, marriage and murder. Matthew Sullivan expertly blends fact, fable and the evocative setting of Soap Lake in rural Washington state to create a spellbinding novel – I adored it!”
–Tara Conklin, NYT bestselling Author of COMMUNITY BOARD and THE LAST ROMANTICS
“Midnight in Soap Lake is a shimmering, shadowy tarn of a mystery, rippling with complex heroines, David Lynchian townspeople, sinister bogeymen (TreeTop is terrifying!), and a spectacularly rich storyline set in smalltown Washington State. Fans of Tana French, Jess Walter, and Kate Atkinson will absolutely love this novel.”
-Sharma Shields, Award-winning Author of THE CASSANDRA and THE SASQUATCH HUNTER’S ALMANAC
“In Matthew Sullivan’s unforgettable novel, Midnight in Soap Lake, those who live on the periphery of American life hold the very secret to its future. Amidst a mysterious mineral lake and puzzling murders, generational survival and hidden truths discovered between friends and family, Sullivan paints a deeply captivating portrait of Soap Lake, a small town teetering between its bright past and a mysterious decline happening in real time. Midnight in Soap Lake is an absolute joy to read. Soap Lake’s enchanting, rebellious characters had my heart from the first page.”
–Michael Zapata, author of THE LOST BOOK OF ADANA MOREAU
“Matthew Sullivan has crafted a brainy thriller that conjures the mischievous humor of Lynch, while imagining conspiracies more unspeakable than Chinatown. His spiderweb of a plot, deeply felt characters, and enchanting love of science will have me dreaming about Soap Lake for a long time. This is my kind of weird.”
–Nova Jacobs, author of THE LAST EQUATION OF ISAAC SEVEREY and THE STARS TURNED INSIDE OUT
“Midnight in Soap Lake is a swirling story for readers who like their dark tales moderated by compassion. Matthew Sullivan has created a town populated by a wild and motley cast—the flawed, the fallen, the damaged and deranged. The still waters of his fictional Soap Lake run deep with historical secrets, scandals and small-town tensions. And as all the colorful threads in this delightful novel converge, the tale heads for a dazzling, bittersweet conclusion.”
–Christopher J. Yates, author of BLACK CHALK and THE RABBIT CLUB
“Casts a chilling shadow… It’s this powerful sense of location that gives Midnight in Soap Lake its staying power.”
—The Seattle Times
“With the infectious charm of the decaying town and its quirky characters, ‘Midnight in Soap Lake’ is like a thrilling mixture of ‘Twin Peaks,’ ‘Northern Exposure’ and ‘Big Bang Theory.’ Sullivan’s lively writing keeps the story moving and the characters engaged on a personal level.”
—The Spokesman-Review
“Conspiracy theories and a local legend called Treetop all combine to make this a cracking read.”
—The Daily Mail (U.K.)
“…a fascinating mystery with small-town intrigue and a magical, scientific angle…”
—Booklist
“Murder, family secrets, mysterious water and a terrifying urban legend. It’s all lurking behind the small-town innocence of Soap Lake.”
—Columbia Basin Herald
About me:
Matthew Sullivan is the author of the novel Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore, which was an IndieNext pick, a Barnes & Noble Discover Pick, a GoodReads Choice Award finalist, and winner of the Colorado Book Award. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Daily Beast, The Spokesman-Review, Sou’wester and elsewhere, and his stories have been awarded the Florida Review Editor’s Prize and the Robert Olen Butler Fiction Prize. He grew up in a family of eight kids in Aurora, Colorado, and received his B.A. from the University of San Francisco and his M.F.A. from the University of Idaho. After working as a bookseller at Tattered Cover Book Store in Denver and Brookline Booksmith in Boston, he spent 20 years as a tenured instructor teaching writing, literature and film at a rural community college in the high desert of Washington State. He is married to a librarian, Libby, and now lives in Anacortes, WA, along the Salish Sea. His new stand-alone novel, Midnight in Soap Lake, pitched as “Twin Peaks meets Tana French,” is available now from Harper Collins/Hanover Square Press.
