AMISS2

A married couple attempts to move forward after a catastrophic incident in McCall’s sequel to Amiss (2019).

Wealth management advisor Paul is safely back home in Cold Spring Harbor, New York, with his wife, Carla, a fashion design student. Although the pair are happy to be reunited after their separation, they’re having a hard time dealing with recent events, depicted in the previous novel, in which Paul’s twin brother, Peter, assumed his identity while Paul was suffering from amnesia; Peter had knocked his sibling unconscious and thrown him off a boat. Peter took over his brother’s life, convincing Carla that he was her husband; now, she’s struggling to cope with the aftermath. She can’t bring herself to stay in their bedroom, due to memories of Peter’s deception, so she and Paul start sleeping separately. They seek out therapy together, but Paul loses patience with their slow progress and finds it hard to wrap his head around what his brother did to him. Meanwhile, the married couple are hiding big secrets from each other: Carla knowingly had multiple trysts with Peter in the past, and Paul had one of his own with the woman who recently rescued and sheltered him. McCall’s novel features some compelling ideas, particularly involving Paul’s conflicted feelings about Peter: “His own flesh and blood, twin brother with whom he shared a womb with, grew up with, stood by, stuck up for, and many times took the heat for.” However, the story suffers from a general lack of depth, as many scenes read like a mere summary of events. The characters also feel underdeveloped, in part due to the omniscient narration that tends to state characters’ feelings instead of showing them through action: “He became overwhelmed with intense sorrow”; “Carla was so visibly distressed.” Newcomers to the series would also do best to read the first installment first, as the story assumes that readers are already familiar with the world the characters inhabit.

A follow-up novel with some intriguing concepts that’s hampered by awkward execution.