The tall figure strolls along a suburban street in the muted glow of a streetlamp. There’s more than a hint of Rod Serling to this host, an erudite man who introduces a show, pops back in about midway to deliver wise words and ushers it out at the end.
Harlan Coben’s Final Twist on CBS (with next- day streaming on Paramount+), however, is a true-crime docuseries. Each of its five episodes offer what we expect: a murder that horrifies, interviews with police and relatives, plus footage of TV news and court proceedings. And it may be a cliché, but it’s inarguable: Truth is stranger than fiction.
“If any of the episodes of Final Twist had been written as a novel, you would have thrown the novel out the window,” says bestselling author Coben. “You would have said, ‘Oh, come on. There’s no way the woman could catfish her own father to kill somebody.’ And I found that utterly fascinating. I also like the idea — and I try to do this with my own novels — that while [these stories] may be entertaining, death itself is always something serious and to be respected. I don’t like the death to just be a puzzle.”
For Final Twist, Coben was excited to team up with executive producers Stu Schreiberg, Susan Zirinsky and Jeff Zimbalist, also the showrunner. “Such a great team,” he says. “They’re people who have done some wonderful documentary work I really admire.”
Coben in CBS's Final Twist
Years ago, Coben was on the Court TV series Murder by the Book, featuring fiction writers. Final Twist, though, is a foray into the world of nonfiction. “It is certainly a new venture for me,” he says. And although he’s dapper in his impeccably tailored suits and appears more natural on screen than you’d perhaps expect from an author, Coben admits he’s not thrilled seeing himself on camera. “It’s very hard to watch yourself on TV,” he says. “Like everything else, it’s a learning process. So, I would hope I would get better at it, but I’m not uncomfortable; I just don’t want to watch it.”
Final Twist echoes the patterns of Coben’s mysteries. There is one twist, then a second twist, then a sort of surprise at the end,” he explains. Sprinkled throughout are lines like: “Clearing a suspect doesn’t mean starting over. It means you’ve been handed a map written in disappearing ink. The truth is behind you, hidden in the lies that brought you to this dead end.” And “Truth doesn’t give a damn about what you want. Truth just sits there, silent in the shadows, waiting for your eyes to finally adjust.”
Coben wants his viewers, like his readers, to be surprised. He recalls finding himself still guessing about suspects while watching the edits; he became so engrossed that he forgot who did it. (To be fair, he reads about and conjures up more murders than most.)
Home movies, photos and surviving relatives of the victims remind everyone that those murdered were more than plots and stats. “There is always a moment, especially toward the end, when it becomes clear this is real. People’s lives were really destroyed by this,” Coben says.
Most of Coben's work, though, remains fiction. He’s written 35 bestsellers and sold more than 100 million copies in 46 languages. His books have been adapted into miniseries in France, Spain, Poland, the U.K., Argentina and, of course, the United States.
A New Jersey guy, Coben grew up with former Governor Chris Christie and is, naturally, a diehard Springsteen fan. Before this interview, he was emailing with Jon Landau, Springsteen’s manager and coproducer, to figure out which concerts on the current tour he could attend, and a Springsteen song will open episode three of his upcoming Netflix series, I Will Find You. While most of his limited series — The Stranger, Stay Close, Fool Me Once — have streamed on Netflix, last fall’s Lazarus was a Prime Video show.
Bill Nighy and Sam Claflin in Prime Video’s Lazarus
An involved executive producer, he signs off on casting. “We’re starting to cast for the Myron Bolitar project,” Coben says of the Netflix adaptation of his 12-book series. “David E. Kelley [who will executive produce] and our whole team are scouring for the right [actors to play] Myron and the rest.”
Clearly, Coben knows how to tell a story, regardless of medium. Final Twist has been renewed for a second season and is slated for Monday nights on CBS’s fall lineup, but he says he’s not planning beyond that.
“As long as the stories remain compelling and intriguing, and I think we have something to say, and we’re honoring the memory of the people who passed and the family members in a way I think is appropriate, I’d love to continue,” Coben says. “How long, I don’t know.”
This article originally appeared in emmy magazine, issue #8, 2026, under the title, "Mystery Master."
