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
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The novel offers mystery aplenty, but at its core, there is a deep and compassionate humanity.
Two old friends, relationship forged in fire and trauma, find themselves at the center of a murder mystery.
Frida Nilsen and Gabriel Miller are staying at the Ara, a comfortable desert hotel in Escalante, Utah, trying to decide whether both of them are ready to participate in a documentary about some mysterious point in their shared past. Late at night, Frida is standing on their suite’s private patio, smoking, when she overhears a fight between wealthy tabloid tycoon William Brenner and his young, glamorous wife, Sabrina. The next day, Sabrina’s body is found, her head caved in. When Frida tells the cops about the couple’s argument, William is arrested, but hours later, he returns to the Ara and seems to have both Frida and Gabriel in his sights. It turns out he recognizes Gabriel from a scandal 10 years prior, when his wife, Annie, went missing and was then discovered dead. Gabriel was never charged in her death, but papers like William’s had a field day stalking him and posting articles and photos that suggested his guilt. But unbeknownst even to William Brenner, Frida and Gabriel share a bond that’s deeper and darker than Annie’s death. They were born into a cult run by a charismatic dirtbag named Émile. Though they aren’t related by blood, this shared childhood and teenage trauma made them as close as siblings, and when they escaped, they had only each other. While Frida remains the narrator, chapters alternate back and forth between the present day and the past, offering a slow reveal from their childhood to their escape from the cult and the difficult years of adjusting to the real world. Michallon does incredible work building both characters and tension; Frida’s self-awareness and vulnerability clash with her strength and even hardness, but that’s what trauma has wrought. As Michallon poignantly writes, “This is who we are.…We start over together. Again. And again.”
The novel offers mystery aplenty, but at its core, there is a deep and compassionate humanity.Pub Date: July 8, 2025
ISBN: 9780593802762
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
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