The complex friendship among three flawed but engaging characters anchors this satisfying psychological thriller.
A holiday in the Hamptons for three friends turns into an engrossing tale of murder.
Typically, the worst aftereffects of a girls’ weekend are nasty hangovers and swollen credit cards. But in this gripping thriller, much darker things happen. When May Hanover—a Chinese American assistant district attorney turned law professor in New York—agrees to spend a long weekend with two old friends in East Hampton, it’s a welcome reunion, and for May, a break from prepping for the next semester while planning her wedding to fiance Josh. The trio first met about 15 years ago at an arts camp, and May has stayed in touch with Lauren Berry, an accomplished Black classical musician. But until recently, she hadn’t heard from Kelsey Ellis, the golden-blond daughter of a rich man, since Kelsey married a rising star chef who was subsequently murdered—a death that many online true-crime aficionados attribute to her. That’s not the only scandal in the trio’s baggage: Lauren’s longtime relationship with a married oilman got her fired from a plum job when it was exposed. And the usually rational May was the subject of a humiliating viral video of her threatening to call the police after a confrontation with a Black man on the subway. But this weekend is about leaving those troubles, and their long tail on the internet, behind. When the women drive to Sag Harbor to barhop, another car steals the parking space they were waiting for, and, among themselves, they make fun of the attractive couple in it. But Kelsey goes a little further, tucking a note on a cocktail napkin under the windshield wiper: “He’s cheating. He always does.” It seems like a prank, but then a tourist is reported missing who looks like the handsome driver. Questions are raised and tempers flare among the friends; in the midst of it, Kelsey’s stepbrother Nate arrives. He’s cool and charming—and May’s ex-boyfriend. As the police start asking questions, May’s compulsion to investigate kicks in, although she’s digging into her own past, along with those of the friends she thought she knew. Burke builds an intricate structure of secrets layered within secrets, revealed for maximum suspense.
The complex friendship among three flawed but engaging characters anchors this satisfying psychological thriller.Pub Date: Jan. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9780593537084
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Oct. 10, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2024
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.
Two killers are on the loose. Can they be stopped?
In this ambitious mystery, the prolific and popular King tells the story of a serial murderer who pledges, in a note to Buckeye City police, to kill “13 innocents and 1 guilty,” in order, we eventually learn, to avenge the death of a man who was framed and convicted for possession of child pornography and then killed in prison. At the same time, the author weaves in the efforts of another would-be murderer, a member of a violently abortion-opposing church who has been stalking a popular feminist author and women’s rights activist on a publicity tour. To tell these twin tales of murders done and intended, King summons some familiar characters, including private investigator Holly Gibney, whom readers may recall from previous novels. Gibney is enlisted to help Buckeye City police detective Izzy Jaynes try to identify and stop the serial killer, who has been murdering random unlucky citizens with chilling efficiency. She’s also been hired as a bodyguard for author and activist Kate McKay and her young assistant. The author succeeds in grabbing the reader’s interest and holding it throughout this page-turning tale of terror, which reads like a big-screen thriller. The action is well paced, the settings are vividly drawn, and King’s choice to focus on the real and deadly dangers of extremist thought is admirable. But the book is hamstrung by cliched characters, hackneyed dialogue (both spoken and internal), and motives that feel both convoluted and overly simplistic. King shines brightest when he gets to the heart of our darkest fears and desires, but here the dangers seem a bit cerebral. In his warning letter to the police, the serial killer wonders if his cryptic rationale to murder will make sense to others, concluding, “It does to me, and that is enough.” Is it enough? In another writer’s work, it might not be, but in King’s skilled hands, it probably is.
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.Pub Date: May 27, 2025
ISBN: 9781668089330
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
Soapy, suspenseful fun.
A remembered horror plunges a pregnant woman into a waking nightmare.
Tegan Werner, 23, barely recalls her one-night stand with married real estate developer Simon Lamar; she only learns Simon’s name after seeing him on the local news five months later. Simon wants nothing to do with the resulting child Tegan now carries and tells his lawyer to negotiate a nondisclosure agreement. A destitute Tegan is all too happy to trade her silence for cash—until a whiff of Simon’s cologne triggers a memory of him drugging and raping her. Distraught and eight months pregnant, Tegan flees her Lewiston, Maine, apartment and drives north in a blizzard, intending to seek comfort and counsel from her older brother, Dennis; instead, she gets lost and crashes, badly injuring her ankle. Tegan is terrified when hulking stranger Hank Thompson stops and extricates her from the wreck, and becomes even more so when he takes her to his cabin rather than the hospital, citing hazardous road conditions. Her anxiety eases somewhat upon meeting Hank’s wife, Polly—a former nurse who settles Tegan in a basement hospital room originally built for Polly’s now-deceased mother. Polly vows to call 911 as soon as the phones and power return, but when that doesn’t happen, Tegan becomes convinced that Hank is forcing Polly to hold her prisoner. Tegan doesn’t know the half of it. McFadden unspools her twisty tale via a first-person-present narration that alternates between Tegan and Polly, grounding character while elevating tension. Coincidence and frustratingly foolish assumptions fuel the plot, but readers able to suspend disbelief are in for a wild ride. A purposefully ambiguous, forward-flashing prologue hints at future homicide, establishing stakes from the jump.
Soapy, suspenseful fun.Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9781464227325
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
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