FIVE BAD DEEDS

“Sooner or later everyone sits down to a banquet of consequences,” begins the letter that changes Ellen Walsh’s life. This might as well be the tagline for the novel.

While Ellen might not be the perfect mom, she checks most of the boxes, most of the time. She’s got the successful husband, the designer bling, and the idyllic small-town life, complete with a house undergoing expensive renovations (financed by the in-laws) to become her dream home. If she might snap at her kids or overindulge in wine from time to time—well, who wouldn’t, with a hostile teenage daughter and a set of 4-year-old twins? But Ellen’s secrets run deeper than the occasional, regrettable Facebook selfie-under-the-influence. She may be responsible for destroying her friend’s marriage. She may have had a hand in her model sister’s career-ending accident. And she definitely chose to keep the high school student she's tutoring a secret from her husband. So when Ellen receives an anonymous letter from someone intent on tormenting her for her perceived “crimes,” she knows she has a lot to lose. Trying to uncover the culprit and avoid exposure, Ellen instead finds herself humiliated and discredited at every turn. While Frear’s exploration of the darker side of motherhood and the trappings of affluent domestic “achievement” for white women seems to follow the recent trend in thrillers, the characters and the mystery itself are elevated by expert pacing; snappy, believable dialogue; and colorful metaphors (“Kristy always had a mouth like a rusty machete”). As a commentary on what some people will sacrifice for social status and the long-reaching consequences of childhood trauma, the novel is a psychological triumph.

Well-plotted and deliciously edgy.