An energetic, enthralling tale of dangerous family secrets.
In this thriller, a Seattle widow’s search for a mysterious item may lead her to her husband’s killer.
Lauren Kaine can’t wipe the images of her husband William’s death out of her head. A black Audi had chased the couple, ultimately leading to William’s plummeting from a bridge and drowning in the river below. The only clue to who wanted him dead is his final words to Lauren: “They want the card.” Sure enough, an anonymous caller later demands that Lauren give him this card, only she has no idea what it is. Maybe it’s connected to William’s estranged brother, Ryan, a truck driver and an alcoholic eight years sober. Someone offers Ryan a hefty paycheck to recover something from William, who worked at an internet security company. Ryan is willing to do so—he can barely afford his meager apartment—but, like Lauren, he doesn’t know exactly what he’s looking for. Meanwhile, Lauren sees a strange, older man and black cars following her everywhere, and her unknown antagonist soon hurls threats against both her and her teenage son, Mason. While a mystery drives Paine’s engrossing story, there’s poignant melodrama as well. Lauren, for example, has a restraining order against Ryan for a shocking 13-year-old incident, and Mason copes not only with his dad’s death, but also with coming out to his mother. In addition, Ryan’s struggles with addiction coincide with Lauren’s bouts with debilitating, nearly uncontrollable rage. The author’s pithy writing generates short chapters, an unwavering pace, and sharp, visual details, such as Lauren’s anger turning things red, from a computer screen to entire rooms. Still, the narrative cranks up suspense with recurrent sights of strangers whose unrelenting presence and tight-lipped motives make them all the more chilling. The story’s ending boasts several big reveals—some that readers will easily guess but a couple of doozies, too.
An energetic, enthralling tale of dangerous family secrets.Pub Date: June 10, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-9992183-6-5
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Dark Swallow Books
Review Posted Online: April 26, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Recommended reading for every paranoid suburbanite who’s considering a move to the city, or to the Arctic wilds.
Character assassination reigns supreme, if not uncontested, in a Long Island suburb.
April Masterson loves her husband, corporate attorney Elliott; their 7-year-old, Bobby; and her YouTube channel, “April’s Sweet Secrets.” What she doesn’t love is whoever’s texting her warnings about how Bobby isn’t really in their backyard while she’s busy filming her videos or withering critiques of her baking show or veiled accusations about her past and threats about her present. Her best friend, former prosecutor Julie Bressler, may be bossy and opinionated, but surely she’d never turn on April this way. Who else might know enough to send April goodies like a picture of her kissing Mark Tanner, Bobby’s soccer coach? Though April struggles to get Elliot to take her ordeal seriously, even when she shows up at his office for a lunch date, he’s protected by his receptionist, Brianna Anderson, whose attachment to her boss goes far beyond loyalty. Then Julie turns on her; Maria Cooper, her friendly new next-door neighbor, turns on her; and in the most mind-boggling scene, Doris Kirkland, April’s mother, whose dementia has brought her to a nursing home, turns on her. McFadden releases an escalating series of toxins so deftly into the suburban atmosphere that it’s practically an anticlimax when someone gets killed and April instantly becomes the prime suspect. But that’s only a setup for the tale’s boldest move: switching its narrator from April to a fair-weather friend who frames the whole nightmare in dramatically different terms. As a special gift to her savviest fans, the author throws in an even more jolting epilogue that’s as hard to forget as it is to believe.
Recommended reading for every paranoid suburbanite who’s considering a move to the city, or to the Arctic wilds.Pub Date: March 3, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249600
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
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
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