March 14, 2016
Early in this unsettling novel of psychological suspense from MacDonald (I See You), New York City book editor Eden Radley learns online of a mother and son murder-suicide in Cleveland, Ohio. Eden’s father, Hugh Radley, confirms that the dead are her estranged mother, Tara Darby, and the disabled four-year-old half-brother she never met, though he believes that the deaths, by carbon monoxide poisoning, are accidental. Eden’s gut tells her that her stepfather, writer Flynn Darby, for whom Tara impulsively left Hugh nine years earlier, is somehow responsible. When Eden is assigned to be the editor of Flynn’s upcoming memoir, she gets the opportunity to travel to Cleveland and investigate her suspicions of Flynn. With deep compassion, MacDonald sharply reveals how mental illnesses can test a loving family’s patience and ultimately tear them apart. Readers will come away questioning how we can trust others and ourselves, as Eden finds no one is truly safe from insanity. Agent: Meg Ruley, Jane Rotrosen Agency.
March 15, 2016
A book editor is forced to work with the author who ruined her life. Eden Radley's world was turned upside down nine years ago when her mother, Tara, ran off to marry handsome Harvard grad Flynn Darby, a short story writer 13 years her junior. Now Eden has a nice life in New York. She works for DeLaurier Publishing in Manhattan and lives in millennial-friendly Brooklyn, where she munches Thai spring rolls with her pals at the Black Cat as she wonders whether Vince Silver, the bartender at Brisbane's, might have a thing for her. Her world is upended a second time when her mother and her half brother Jeremy are found dead of carbon monoxide poisoning in their Cleveland home. Everyone sees their deaths as a murder-suicide. Four-year-old Jeremy suffered from a rare genetic disorder that had left him unable to walk, talk, or care for himself, an obvious burden for his aging parents. But something in Eden resists the notion that Tara would dose Jeremy and herself with barbiturates before leaving him to die alone in his bed while she retreated to hers. Her suspicions grow when Barry Preston and Tim McNee, investigators from Harriman Insurance, question her about a $5 million policy naming Flynn as beneficiary. But she must tread lightly because Flynn has just sold DeLaurier a book chronicling his and Tara's marriage and their struggles to care for their disabled son--and insisted as part of the deal that Eden be appointed his editor. MacDonald (I See You, 2014, etc.) presents a story of love gone wrong that avoids black and white, letting the reader appreciate its many shades of gray.
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Starred review from May 1, 2016
Eden Radley works at a New York publishing house. She is close to her father because her mother, Tara, abandoned them years ago to live with a younger man who was her "soul mate." When Eden learns that her mother committed suicide, after killing Eden's disabled half brother, she heads to Cleveland for the funeral. To make matters worse, her publisher asks Eden to edit the new novel penned by her mother's husband, the genius author Flynn Darby. As she works with Flynn, Eden soon learns how little she knew about Tara's life. VERDICT MacDonald (I See You) has written another terrific novel of psychological suspense, marked by well-developed, sympathetic characters and excellent, tightly paced plotting. Tami Hoag and Francine Mathews fans will devour.
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