Starred review from September 30, 2019
The murder of cardiac surgeon Greg Strasser in the home he shared with his fund-raiser wife, Kit Manning-Strasser, and his two stepdaughters propels this exceptional suspense novel from Shepard (The Elizas). Days earlier, a massive hack of the email system of Pittsburgh’s Aldrich University revealed explicit correspondence from the victim’s secret affair. Sharing the narration are a number of women whom Greg’s death touches, including Kit; Kit’s jealous, opportunistic coworker, Lynn Godfrey; Greg’s colleague, nurse, and new mother Laura Apatrea; and Kit’s distant sister, investigative reporter Willa Manning, who confronts her own history while helping to exonerate Kit. By giving each woman more than sufficient motivation to have killed Greg (Lynn and Laura also have reason to suspect their spouses) and making them sympathetic, the author ensures that the reader is pulled between revulsion and the urge to accept each one’s self-justifications for her behavior. In this viscerally satisfying thriller, Shepard forces readers to contemplate the inescapable aftereffects of impulsive poor choices. Agent: Andy McNicol, WME.
October 1, 2019
When a mysterious hacker exposes sensitive emails at Aldrich University, everyone's secrets are laid bare to public scrutiny. But no one saw surgeon Greg Strasser's murder coming. The data breach reveals Blue Hill, Pennsylvania, to be a veritable Peyton Place of disgrace, including extramarital affairs, testing scandals, and fraternity rape accusations. Hidden in Greg's trash folder are emails to a "Lolita Bovary" that cast him as certainly a philanderer and quite possibly a pedophile. After the Aldrich Giving Gala, Greg's wife, Kit, awakens from a drunken stupor to discover him stabbed in the kitchen. Could she have killed him out of rage? Or perhaps it was Kit's ambitious co-worker Lynn, eager to push Kit off the corporate ladder by framing her for murder? Then again, where was Lynn's husband that night? And who is Lolita? Kit's daughter, Sienna, is certainly sad about her stepfather's death, but her friend Raina's grief seems suspiciously excessive. Meanwhile, Kit's sister, Willa, is back in town. An investigative reporter with secrets in her own past, Willa is loath to stay a minute past the funeral reception, but how can she refuse to help Kit stay out of jail? With nods to Big Little Lies as well as her own Pretty Little Liars series, Shepard (The Elizas, 2018, etc.) brilliantly hides the identity of the true villain in the gaps between characters. An Agatha Christie for the 21st century, Shepard masterfully crafts a prestigious town rife with hidden temptation and sin. So Willa gets her chance to play Miss Marple, albeit a much younger, hipper version, and her sleuthing deftly exposes unexpected links between characters. From chapter to chapter, Shepard's plotting breathlessly careens between characters, with each cliffhanger swiftly answered by another, ratcheting up the stakes until the killer is finally unmasked. A fast-paced, twisty-turny mystery perfect for a cozy weekend read.
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November 15, 2019
When the email system at Aldrich University is hacked, secrets, betrayals, and cover-ups all emerge. Kit, the dean's daughter who works for the university, learns that her handsome doctor husband Greg has been cheating on her with "Lolita." Then Greg is murdered. Kit's sister Willa, an investigative reporter, returns to her hometown for the funeral, and to clear her sister, one of the many suspects. There is mousy nurse Laura, who secretly hates Greg; Lynn, an egotistical coworker who envies Kit, and Raina, a sexy coed up to no good. None of the suspects are likable: Kit is shallow and vain and constantly looking for the excitement of love and lust; Laura is wishy-washy with an unbelievable story line. Raina is a vapid seductress. The plot is all over the place, a crazy mashup of Mr. Robot, "CSI" TV shows, and Real Housewives. The #MeToo movement is also thrown into the mix.
VERDICT Shepard is very well known for her "Pretty Little Liars" series. Fans of the book and adapted television show will most likely enjoy her latest.--Marianne Fitzgerald, Severna Park H.S., MD
Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
Starred review from October 1, 2019
In this fifth adult novel (after The Elizas, 2018) from the New York Times best-selling author of the YA series Pretty Little Liars, the smug women of a college town learn who their colleagues and husbands really are after elite Aldrich University's emails are hacked. Everyone's bad judgment and misdeeds, including those of faculty, staff, students, and alums, are available for the world to see. The initial gasps turn sinister as both petty and deadly acts of revenge are played out. Shepard throws every clich� imaginable at the reader and then artfully massages them into a brilliant narrative told in the voices of the many women involved in the story who, having managed to make victims of one sort or another of themselves, all emerge victorious, each in her own fashion. Kit Manning's surgeon husband, outed as a total lech, is found murdered, and Kit's reputation is further battered by the reemergence of rumors that the surgeon allowed Kit's first husband die on the operating table. Kit's sister reluctantly returns to help, despite the painful and secret memories she holds of Aldrich. Everyone is hiding a closetful of secrets, which, when finally revealed, provide some excellent misdirection and a few OMG moments, until one final and shocking truth emerges. Fans of domestic suspense will devour this one.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)