HER DAUGHTER'S MOTHER
by Daniela Petrova
A mother-to-be stalks her mentally ill egg donor in this debut novel.
After three miscarriages and eight in vitro fertilization procedures, Lana Stone, a 38-year-old art curator, is very ready to get pregnant—right up until the moment when her partner, college professor Tyler Jones, leaves her after eight years of cohabitation. Lana suspects an affair but opts to go ahead with the next egg transfer on her own, and it's finally successful. When she spots her supposedly anonymous egg donor—whose picture she had seen but whom she only knew as CN8635—on the subway, Lana can't help but follow and befriend the younger woman. Katya Dimitrova is a lonely college student. She's been hooking up with Damian, who has a violent temper, and flirting with her mental health counselor, Josh Wozniak. The tone turns from cool to creepy as Katya insinuates herself into Lana's life and Lana realizes their friendship is very wrong. When Katya goes missing, Lana is determined to discover whether Tyler, among other suspects, was involved. Lana is an engaging and sympathetic protagonist. Katya is a troubled and rather dreary victim burdened with a lot of backstory. Tyler, the third of the three first-person point-of-view characters, is little-heard but offers some of the most sympathetic moments as he struggles to cope with the fallout from Lana's fertility obsession.
A credible but underwhelming ending mars this otherwise suspenseful, contemporary, and twisty thriller.