A gripping, socially conscious mystery in which timelines collide in a tangle of lies, murder, and conspiracy.
A hidden note, a stash of cash, and a dead father’s secrets launch a photojournalist and her family into a dangerous mystery in Boulden’s novel.
Rose Webster returns to Lake Amelia, New York, to recover from a workplace accident that has left her physically limited and emotionally disoriented. Still reeling from the back-to-back deaths of her father, Randall, who died of an unexpected heart attack, and her mother, Carly, who succumbed to cancer, Rose finds herself caught up in grief and stagnation. She’s also grappling with the revelation that her father had a child named Maxi with another woman—she’s a biracial lesbian in law enforcement who isn’t sure she wants a relationship with her more privileged journalist half-sister. While smudging Randall’s den with sage, Rose uncovers a sealed envelope containing $10,000 and a handwritten note suggesting someone had been in danger—and that her father, an attorney, may have been quietly investigating. Her older brother, Kirk (with whom she shares a warm but slightly distant relationship), and Maxi are largely uninterested at first, but Rose is captivated. With next to no clues, she takes up the mystery as a new kind of assignment, one that will help her to reclaim her sense of purpose. Alternating chapters set in 2010 follow Kelsey Jacobs, a woman working at Randall’s firm who overhears a Spanish-speaking immigrant worker at the Western Inlet Inn whispering about a disturbing incident and expressing fear for her daughter’s life. Kelsey’s efforts to help are met with resistance, and soon she’s being followed, run off the road, and silenced. Rose’s present-day inquiry gradually uncovers Kelsey’s story, deftly linking it to systemic abuse, corruption, and predation. Boulden, an Emmy-winning reporter and IPPY award-winning author, writes with a journalist’s keen eye for details (“A few drops of iced tea fell onto Kelsey’s lap when she raised her glass to her lips, making her question her choice of white linen slacks”). Her prose is grounded, deliberate, and emotionally resonant. Though the pacing is occasionally slow, the story delivers a classic whodunit wrapped in themes of moral courage and buried family dynamics.
A gripping, socially conscious mystery in which timelines collide in a tangle of lies, murder, and conspiracy.Pub Date: July 8, 2025
ISBN: 9798986038469
Page Count: 326
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: June 18, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Although it lacks the surgical precision of Slaughter’s very best nightmares, this one richly earns its title.
More than a decade after a Georgia man is convicted of a monstrous double murder, an uncomfortably similar crime frees him and resets the search for the guilty party.
In Clifton County, home to the Rich Cliftons and the other Cliftons, the disappearance of teens Madison Dalrymple and Cheyenne Baker during the Halloween festivities hits everyone in North Falls hard. Working with her father, Sheriff Gerald Clifton, Deputy Emmy Lou Clifton hears the clock ticking down as she races frantically to get leads on the two friends, who’d been secretly plotting to take off for Atlanta after some undisclosed big score. As a longtime friend of Madison’s mother, Hannah, Emmy hopes against hope to find the missing teens before they’re both dead. By the time Emmy’s hopes are dashed, two unpleasantly likely suspects with strong attachments to underage sex partners have emerged, and one of them ends up in prison. In a bold move, Slaughter jumps over the next 12 years to the case of Paisley Walker, a 14-year-old whose disappearance catches the eye of retiring FBI criminal psychologist Jude Archer, who promptly crosses the country to come to Clifton County and take charge—um, that is, consult—on this heartrending new investigation. Emmy, suddenly and shockingly deprived of counsel from the parents who’ve supported her all her life, doesn’t get along any better with Jude than with the larger circle of Cliftons and the Clifton-Cliftons. But together they identify one new suspect, then another, before a shootout that arrives so early you just know there are still more surprises to come.
Although it lacks the surgical precision of Slaughter’s very best nightmares, this one richly earns its title.Pub Date: Aug. 12, 2025
ISBN: 9780063336773
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2025
A fresh and clever whodunit with an engaging twist.
A 16-year-old savant uses his Groundhog Day gift to solve his grandfather’s murder.
Nishizawa’s compulsively readable puzzle opens with the discovery of the victim, patriarch Reijiro Fuchigami, sprawled on a futon in the attic of his elegant mansion, where his family has gathered for a consequential announcement about his estate. The weapon seems to be a copper vase lying nearby. Given this setup, the novel might have proceeded as a traditional whodunit but for two delightful features. The first is the ebullient narration of Fuchigami’s youngest grandson, Hisataro, thrust into the role of an investigator with more dedication than finesse. The second is Nishizawa’s clever premise: The 16-year-old Hisataro has lived ever since birth with a condition that occasionally has him falling into a time loop that he calls "the Trap," replaying the same 24 hours of his life exactly nine times before moving on. And, of course, the murder takes place on the first day of one of these loops. Can he solve the murder before the cycle is played out? His initial strategies—never leaving his grandfather’s side, focusing on specific suspects, hiding in order to observe them all—fall frustratingly short. Hisataro’s comical anxiety rises with every failed attempt to identify the culprit. It’s only when he steps back and examines all the evidence that he discovers the solution. First published in 1995, this is the first of Nishizawa’s novels to be translated into English. As for Hisataro, he ultimately concludes that his condition is not a burden but a gift: “Time’s spiral never ends.”
A fresh and clever whodunit with an engaging twist.Pub Date: July 29, 2025
ISBN: 9781805335436
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Pushkin Vertigo
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2025
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