WHAT HAPPENED TO NINA?

A young Vermont woman goes missing and her boyfriend is the prime suspect.

“My name is Nina Fraser. There is a good chance that you know who I am.” The novel begins with a prologue in the voice of its 20-year-old title character, who relays the history of her relationship with her boyfriend, Simon Jordan, and a particular weekend they spent hiking and climbing at his parents’ new place near Stowe. It ends like this: “I went downstairs to tell Simon that we were over and that I never wanted to see him again.” From this point, other voices take over, including those of Nina’s parents, Leanne and Andy; Simon’s mother, Jamie; and Matthew Wright, the detective who’s investigating Nina’s disappearance. With the support of a few other characters, they are responsible for piecing together Nina’s story and bearing witness to the things they know—and the things they suspect—which will change all their lives. We learn that Nina never came home from that weekend trip with Simon, nor has she been in touch with her family. We learn that Simon, who was born with the proverbial silver spoon in his mouth, has a sense of entitlement and a shaky alibi. We learn that each of the parents would do anything to protect their children. And so the stage is set for revelation, revenge, and tragedy. McTiernan turns the traditional thriller on its head by exploring the why and the what over the who. There isn’t a lot of mystery here, but there is deep humanity; it’s a meditation on grief, and helplessness, and what it means to parent a child who might not live the life you thought they would—or might not be the person you want them to be—and how death removes from each of us the illusion of choice or control over past, present, or future. And that is truly haunting.

“The wages of dying is love,” Galway Kinnell once wrote. McTiernan asks if that’s enough.