Novels No. 95

 

Tess Gerritsen. The Summer Guests. USA: Thomas & Mercer, 2025.

Maggie Bird and her ex-CIA companions invite comparison to the Thursday Murder Club series; I’d met them before in The Spy Coast (Novels No. 30)—that one impressed me, being mainly about Maggie. This one also features Jo Thibodeau, police chief of Purity, Maine, where the quartet retired under the radar. The four retired spooks – Maggie, Declan, Ingrid, and Ben – prefer relaxing at their personal book club after working their various hobbies, but can’t resist lending an experienced hand when things go badly for others. Suddenly fifteen-year-old Chloe Conover, whose family arrived early for the summer season at their palatial Maiden Pond “cottage,” vanishes. Abduction seems likely, with suspicion being cast on local residents. Chloe’s parents are not regular visitors to Maiden Pond; Ethan, a novelist, normally sees little of his birth family. His mother Elizabeth and brother Colin’s family are the usual summer inhabitants. Susan is uneasy with the Conovers—so emotionally distant, unlike Ethan.

The search includes dragging the Pond where Chloe had been swimming; no Chloe, but they did retrieve the skeleton of an unknown young woman. Our quartet briskly pitches in to help find Chloe and identify the mystery woman who died many years earlier. My sympathies to Jo, when their skills and resources tend to outshine her. Reuben Tarkin is one suspect in Chloe’s disappearance—he has a history of harassing the Conovers. Apart from the antipathy between permanent residents and summer people, and the family drama, a new twist goes sideways – well done! – although MKUltra, in my experience, is no longer quite the shocker it once was in spy fiction.

The author never fails to provide an immersive experience. Gerritsen is adept at keeping you guessing; comfort food for crime fans.

Clues

▪ “This is supposed to be a book group,” said Ingrid. “Even if we really come for the martinis.” (10)

▪ “The man’s insane, all right? And I assume you know what his father did. Those people he killed on Main Street.” (42)

▪ Could Colin really be that blind to all the ways he’d tormented his younger brother? (81)

▪ “Tell us how the blood got into your truck, Mr. Yount,” said Alfond. (119)

▪ “But she’s still too young to deal with the truth about who her father is. What he is.” (179)

▪ “How could you write about her, Ethan? Is everything in our lives just material for your novel?” (205)

▪ “Her records were deliberately wiped,” said Maggie. “That’s why Ingrid couldn’t find out what happened to Vivian Stillwater.” (245)

▪ “You told me she got hit by a car in New Hampshire. Died in a long-term facility,” said Jo. (258)

Harlan Coben. The Innocent. 2005. USA: Dutton, 2023.

(In-house grab) Our protagonist Matt Hunter is the college-age guy who accidentally killed another student in a drunken brawl and went to prison for four years on a manslaughter conviction. Some years later he is blissfully happy with wife Olivia, a computer systems sales director. They plan to move back to his New Jersey hometown where people will remember he’s an ex-con, although he tries to repress his sensitivity. Joyfully learning of her pregnancy, Olivia insists they invest in “camera phones” for instant communications. But Matt receives a weird video that could blow his whole world apart, on top of the anxiety that someone is stalking him. Not allowed to practice his law degree, he works as a paralegal at brother Bernie’s law firm.

So how does Kimmy in Nevada fit in? Kimmy—a weary mid-thirties stripper cum hooker. One day a young woman takes her by surprise, claiming to be the baby her best friend Candace gave up at birth. Candace, also a stripper, was murdered some years ago and the daughter, though never having known her, seeks revenge; no one was arrested but Kimmy knows all the rumours of the time. Loren Muse is an investigator for the Newark prosecutor’s office; working on the suspicious death of a Catholic nun leads her to Matt’s widowed sister-in-law Marsha. Lively dialogue spices up the suspense in numerous threads as more and more characters spin out convoluted connections.

Throw them all together and it’s a story only Harlan Coben could tell, forcing you to participate by anticipating. Does it hang together everywhere? Breathless is an adjective I’d seldom use, but it’s applicable to this tightly wound novel.

Some threads

▪ “He’s retired now. Max Darrow, I mean. He says they know who killed her, but they don’t know where he is.” (14)

▪ Whoever did this—and yeah, she was sure it was Clyde and Emma—could hurt her or kill her, but she wouldn’t back down. (16)

▪ “Sister Mary Rose never asked for glory. She had no ego. She just wanted to do what was right.” (37)

▪ Loren was thirty-four years old, a serial dater who, to quote her cigarette-toting mother, who was currently on the couch, “never closed the sale.” The cop thing worked like that. (58)

▪ The FBI. They were the ones who had shut her down. (147)

Matt

▪ “I know that I’ll never get past what happened,” Sonya McGrath said. “It’s simply not possible. But I thought ... I hoped maybe you could.” (101)

▪ “Hey.” It was a man whispering. “Guess what I’m doing to your wife right now?” (117)

▪ “I know it was you in the blond wig. I know it wasn’t a big joke. I even know about Charles Talley.” (129)

▪ Maybe his old chum Detective Lance Banner was right. Prison changes you. You go in one guy, even if you’re innocent, but you come out ... . (135)

▪ He didn’t know what was going on with Olivia, but one thing he knew for certain: it marked the end. The fairy tale was over. (164)