A haunting story of betrayal and forgiveness that packs an unexpectedly emotional punch.
Huntley’s (We Could Be Beautiful, 2016) second domestic thriller turns its attention to an all-consuming friendship between two middle-aged women—one of whom may not be exactly who she seems.
Newly settled in Kona, Hawaii—part of a last-ditch attempt to save her flailing marriage—Nancy Murphy is desperate to reinvent herself into a new person, an exciting person whose husband did not cheat on her with his assistant manager from Costco. That means uncharacteristically dragging herself to yoga class. “I’d read online that yoga had transformed many peoples’ lives, and I needed a transformation,” Nancy says. She finds it through Ana, a woman so at peace she's a parody of a yoga teacher, and instantly falls under her charismatic spell. Free, unencumbered by children or marriage, spontaneous and spiritual and girlishly fun, Ana is everything Nancy isn’t. And yet they recognize each other as kindred spirits—and soon the two fall into an easy intimacy, soaking in Ana’s hot tub, browsing used bookstores, and eating at hippie health food buffets, circling the island distributing sandwiches to homeless people so they might “create space for better destinies.” With Ana, Nancy has an escape from her old self. “I’m going to call you Nan from now on,” Ana informs her. “Don’t you see how the letters of our names match up perfectly? Nan and Ana! Yin and yang!” But as Nancy becomes ever more absorbed by their friendship, Ana becomes more demanding, dangerously threatening the very foundations of Nancy’s world. As in her first book, Huntley is a keen social observer, empathetic and biting at once. And while the plot itself is somewhat predictable—a familiar cloud hangs over the friendship from the start—the plot is hardly the point. Instead, it serves as necessary scaffolding, a vehicle for Huntley’s gripping psychological portrait of a woman at a personal crossroads.
A haunting story of betrayal and forgiveness that packs an unexpectedly emotional punch.Pub Date: July 25, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-54221-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: May 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
Very slow off the mark, though once blackmail and murder enter the picture, Scottoline moves things along with her customary...
In Scottoline’s latest family-centered thriller (Accused, 2013, etc.), Jake Buckman lets son Ryan drive the family car on a back road. Very bad idea.
The car hits someone, and she’s dead. Faced with the prospect of his teenager’s life being ruined, Jake tells him to get back in the car, and they drive away. “[D]on’t tell Mom,” Jake warns; he loves his wife, but Pam has the personality you’d expect of a superior court judge (judgmental), and their marriage is still recovering from Jake’s decision to start his own business, which has made him a mostly absentee husband and father. He’s now “one of the top-ten ranked financial planners in southeastern Pennsylvania,” though his planning skills aren’t evident as Jake ineptly tries to cover their tracks. He also has a terrible time keeping his son from confessing once they learn that the dead girl is Ryan’s high school classmate Kathleen Lindstrom. It takes more than 100 pages for the plot to involve anything other than Jake’s nerves, Pam’s suspicions and Ryan’s guilty wails, all of which are believable but not very interesting. Sleazy blackmailer Lewis Deaner livens things up, especially after he turns up murdered. If the police find those cellphone pictures Deaner had of Jake and Ryan at the scene of the crime, Jake will be a suspect. And once Ryan has blurted out the truth to his mother, furious Pam might be just as happy to see Jake in jail. The killer’s identity isn’t much of a surprise, since he’s the only character with any individual traits apart from the Buckmans and the cops, but the final twist comes out of nowhere, 10 pages from the end.
Very slow off the mark, though once blackmail and murder enter the picture, Scottoline moves things along with her customary professionalism, if scant credibility.Pub Date: April 8, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-250-01009-4
Page Count: 352
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: March 1, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2014
With frank language and patient plotting, this gangly teen crush grows into a confident adult love affair.
Eleven years ago, he broke her heart. But he doesn’t know why she never forgave him.
Toggling between past and present, two love stories unfold simultaneously. In the first, Macy Sorensen meets and falls in love with the boy next door, Elliot Petropoulos, in the closet of her dad’s vacation home, where they hide out to discuss their favorite books. In the second, Macy is working as a doctor and engaged to a single father, and she hasn’t spoken to Elliot since their breakup. But a chance encounter forces her to confront the truth: what happened to make Macy stop speaking to Elliot? Ultimately, they’re separated not by time or physical remoteness but by emotional distance—Elliot and Macy always kept their relationship casual because they went to different schools. And as a teen, Macy has more to worry about than which girl Elliot is taking to the prom. After losing her mother at a young age, Macy is navigating her teenage years without a female role model, relying on the time-stamped notes her mother left in her father’s care for guidance. In the present day, Macy’s father is dead as well. She throws herself into her work and rarely comes up for air, not even to plan her upcoming wedding. Since Macy is still living with her fiance while grappling with her feelings for Elliot, the flashbacks offer steamy moments, tender revelations, and sweetly awkward confessions while Macy makes peace with her past and decides her future.
With frank language and patient plotting, this gangly teen crush grows into a confident adult love affair.Pub Date: April 10, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5011-2801-1
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2018
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
