A swift, compelling thriller with unexpected swoops and swerves.
On the run from her abusive boyfriend, Lucy King holes up in Woodstock, New York. Her new neighbors, John and Vera, welcome her with open arms. But are they too good to be true?
In her first non–YA novel, Konen proves herself a master of weaving webs that slowly contract, strangling characters in the threads. Within minutes of meeting Vera, Lucy is warned off the couple by Maggie, who lives on the other side of Lucy’s cottage. She cautions Lucy that Vera Abernathy and John Nolan are charming but only care about themselves. But after Lucy’s hidden all of her valuables under the floorboards beneath her bed and closely documented everything in the cabin, determined not to let her violent boyfriend, Davis, gaslight her ever again, she drops by her neighbors' for dinner anyway. Soon, Vera, John, and Lucy are inseparable, their friendship fueled by alcohol and half-revealed secrets: Lucy confesses to Davis’ abuse but holds back the details of his surveillance; Vera alludes to unfriendly relations in town but won’t say why. And as the weeks progress, Lucy finds herself emotionally dependent on Vera and strongly desiring to kiss John. Yet questions persist: Why did their previous neighbor, Rachel, move out? Why are the townspeople leaving threatening notes in their mailbox and graffiti on their gallery downtown? Who is sneaking into Lucy’s cottage, leaving faucets running and mementoes rearranged? As tensions rise, Vera and John tell Lucy about their plan to escape the hostilities by faking a death, and Lucy seizes the opportunity to help. But when someone turns up actually murdered, Lucy has to solve the mystery before she is arrested and blamed herself.
A swift, compelling thriller with unexpected swoops and swerves.Pub Date: June 30, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-08547-9
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: March 28, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Trust no one in this over-the-top tale of deception and revenge.
Dead bodies turn up in the first sentence of the prologue in McFadden’s latest domestic thriller.
The mystery of who died is at the pulsating heart of this propulsive tale. As Chapter 1 begins, Naomi arrives home to find the locks changed on the front door of the gorgeous home she shares with her husband, Jeremy, and their 5-year-old son, Teddy. Jeremy steps out the front door and convinces Naomi to move out while he has their home renovated, a plan Naomi knows nothing about. It’s all a ruse, though, as the next day Jeremy tells her he wants a divorce. Naomi is shellshocked and soon discovers that Jeremy is having an affair with Veronica, a beautiful younger woman. What seems at first like a stereotypical story about a man who leaves his wife turns into something else when Naomi decides she’ll do anything to get Veronica away from Jeremy and Teddy, and Veronica decides to fight for what she thinks she deserves. Fans of stalker novels will cringe with delight as creepy things start to happen. Teddy’s stuffed elephant, a gift from Veronica, is found impaled on a kitchen knife; Naomi suspects Jeremy is gaslighting her and that Veronica tried to poison her. A weird confrontation among Jeremy, Veronica, and Naomi at Teddy’s birthday party, to which Naomi shows up uninvited, is priceless. There are three main characters, and any or all of them may be unreliable narrators. Packing the plot with dark, gasp-inducing twists, McFadden outdoes herself in a story about how highly emotional people engage in risky behavior to get what they want—but in this novel, for better or worse, not everyone will survive.
Trust no one in this over-the-top tale of deception and revenge.Pub Date: May 26, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249631
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2026
BOOK TO SCREEN
Recommended reading for every paranoid suburbanite who’s considering a move to the city, or to the Arctic wilds.
Character assassination reigns supreme, if not uncontested, in a Long Island suburb.
April Masterson loves her husband, corporate attorney Elliott; their 7-year-old, Bobby; and her YouTube channel, “April’s Sweet Secrets.” What she doesn’t love is whoever’s texting her warnings about how Bobby isn’t really in their backyard while she’s busy filming her videos or withering critiques of her baking show or veiled accusations about her past and threats about her present. Her best friend, former prosecutor Julie Bressler, may be bossy and opinionated, but surely she’d never turn on April this way. Who else might know enough to send April goodies like a picture of her kissing Mark Tanner, Bobby’s soccer coach? Though April struggles to get Elliot to take her ordeal seriously, even when she shows up at his office for a lunch date, he’s protected by his receptionist, Brianna Anderson, whose attachment to her boss goes far beyond loyalty. Then Julie turns on her; Maria Cooper, her friendly new next-door neighbor, turns on her; and in the most mind-boggling scene, Doris Kirkland, April’s mother, whose dementia has brought her to a nursing home, turns on her. McFadden releases an escalating series of toxins so deftly into the suburban atmosphere that it’s practically an anticlimax when someone gets killed and April instantly becomes the prime suspect. But that’s only a setup for the tale’s boldest move: switching its narrator from April to a fair-weather friend who frames the whole nightmare in dramatically different terms. As a special gift to her savviest fans, the author throws in an even more jolting epilogue that’s as hard to forget as it is to believe.
Recommended reading for every paranoid suburbanite who’s considering a move to the city, or to the Arctic wilds.Pub Date: March 3, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249600
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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