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THE BEST OF FRIENDS

A mother’s worst nightmare on the page. For those who dare.

A shocking shooting involving their teenage sons leads three best friends to first come apart, then come together to figure out what happened that fateful night.

Lindsey, Kendra, and Dani, longtime friends who’ve grown up together and raised children together, now face their biggest struggle. A sleepover among their three teenage sons has claimed the life of Kendra’s son, Sawyer, and sent Lindsey’s son, Jacob, into a coma with a self-inflicted bullet. As alternating chapters represent each woman’s viewpoint (though their voices sound remarkably similar), the friends try to piece together what happened. Dani’s son, Caleb, is physically unscathed, but he barely talks or responds to anything except the nightmares haunting his every moment. Each woman is moved by forces such as her relationship with her husband and other children. Dani particularly suffers, as her husband, Bryan, resolves to lawyer up, making Dani look to Lindsey and Kendra as if she’s got something to hide. Dani makes no attempt to conceal the fact that Bryan’s gun did the shooting, but she’s unwilling to admit the extent to which Bryan controls her and her daughter, Luna. As Kendra faces the loss of her son, Lindsey drifts through a twilight zone in between worlds, taking care of Jacob the best she can and wondering what would ever drive her happy-go-lucky son to try to end his own life. The ongoing investigation by Detective Martin Locke, a high school acquaintance of the women, intensifies questions about who’s to blame.

A mother’s worst nightmare on the page. For those who dare.

Pub Date: Aug. 18, 2020

ISBN: 978-1-5420-2214-9

Page Count: -

Publisher: Thomas & Mercer

Review Posted Online: June 2, 2020

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2020

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THE WOMAN IN SUITE 11

An enjoyable visit with an old character, but not one of Ware’s strongest.

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Travel writer Lo Blacklock is back. Ten years after the events of The Woman in Cabin 10 (2016), she's attending the opening of a lavish Swiss hotel when, once again, a mystery intervenes.

A decade after she almost died on a luxury cruise and ended up exposing a murder plot, travel journalist Laura “Lo” Blacklock is trying to get back into the business post-Covid-19 and post–maternity leave. When she's invited to an exclusive hotel launch by the Leidmann Group on the shores of Switzerland’s gorgeous Lake Geneva, her supportive husband, Judah, insists that she should go, and her old boss, Rowan, says that if Lo can score an interview with the reclusive Marcus Leidmann, she’ll publish it in the Financial Times. Leaving Judah and the kids at home in New York, Lo is surprised by a last-minute upgrade to first class, which kicks off her trip in style. The hotel is appropriately awe-inspiring in both scenic location and effortless luxury, and Lo starts to put the memories of last trip’s trauma behind her, thinking that maybe she can just enjoy the experience this time. But then, at dinner, she's surprised to see at least three guests who were also on that original cruise, and when she finds a mysterious note in her room saying "Please come to suite 11 as soon as possible," she gets another shock. To quote William Faulkner, she realizes that “the past is never dead,” and soon Lo is careening across Europe on her way to England, only to find herself embroiled in another murder. The back half of the novel offers her the opportunity to continue her amateur sleuthing, and while she avoids much of the physical danger that plagued her on the cruise a decade ago, she is in very real legal trouble. This is the prolific Ware’s first sequel, and it's fun to spend time with Lo again, as she's both savvy and kindhearted. Unfortunately, the mystery is not as atmospheric and gripping as usual for Ware, though even a lesser Ruth Ware thriller is still worth reading.

An enjoyable visit with an old character, but not one of Ware’s strongest.

Pub Date: July 8, 2025

ISBN: 9781668025628

Page Count: 400

Publisher: Scout Press/Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: April 4, 2025

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2025

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NEVER FLINCH

Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.

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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

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