Dark and swiftly moving, both a thriller and an examination of how deep a connection can be.
Lost in grief, a widow has only herself to trust as she searches for her missing dog as a last connection to her husband while she seeks the truth about his death.
Junie Lagarde’s husband, Olivier, was an in-demand safety consultant. Ever since his Cessna 172 went down during an assessment of the tunnel system around Mont Blanc, in the French Alps, Junie has had a hard time engaging with the world around her without a link to her lost love. She knows a connection is out there because Junie and Olivier’s beloved dog, Leo, survived the crash and stayed by Olivier’s side until his death. Determined to find Leo, Junie repeatedly returns to Chamonix to search for him, and the small town’s residents become familiar with the American who’s looking for her vulpine dog. After nine long months of waiting, Junie gets a call from Capitaine Philippe Brevard, who’s leading the investigation into the crash. He lets her know there’s been a sighting of Leo—and that the dog is not alone. Brevard shares a video of a strange man walking Leo, a man clad in Olivier’s distinctive coat. When Junie finally meets this man, she’s confused, disgusted, alarmed, and afraid, but she has no doubt that this man’s pose as Olivier is dangerous and that there’s more to her husband’s death than she knew. Was Olivier’s death a murderous act of eco-terrorism, or did it stem from more personal motives? Junie has Brevard’s support in seeking the truth and rescuing Leo from his captor. But the search for Leo and the details surrounding Olivier’s death lead her to question everyone around her, leaving her dependent on her own intuition to lead her to answers.
Dark and swiftly moving, both a thriller and an examination of how deep a connection can be.Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2023
ISBN: 9781448309931
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Severn House
Review Posted Online: May 9, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2023
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.
A struggling writer finds an unexpected muse when a mysterious man shows up at her cabin.
Petra Rose used to pump out a bestselling book every six months, but then the adaptation happened—that is, the disastrous film adaptation of her most famous book. The movie changed the book’s storyline so egregiously that fans couldn’t forgive her, and the ensuing harassment sent Petra into hiding and gave her a serious case of writer’s block. Petra’s one hope is her solo writing retreat at a remote cabin, where she can escape the distractions of real life and focus on her next book, a story about a woman having an affair with a cop. When officer Nathaniel Saint shows up at her cabin door, inspiration comes flooding back. Much like the character from Petra’s book, Saint is married, and he’s willing to be Petra’s muse, helping her get into her characters’ heads. Petra’s book is practically writing itself, but is the game she’s playing a little too dangerous? Does she know when to stop—and, more importantly, is Saint willing to stop? Hoover is no stranger to controversial movie adaptations and internet backlash, but she clarifies in a note to readers that she’s “just a writer writing about a writer” and that no further connections to her own life are contained in these pages—which is a good thing, because the book takes some horrifying twists and turns. Petra finds herself inexplicably attracted to Saint, even as she describes him as “such an asshole,” and her feelings for him veer between love and hate. The novel serves as a meta commentary on the dark romance genre—as Petra puts it, “Even though, as readers, we wouldn’t want to live out some of the fantasies we read about, it doesn’t mean we don’t enjoy reading those things.”
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2026
ISBN: 9781662539374
Page Count: -
Publisher: Montlake
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2025
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
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