Laura Dave (Eight Hundred Grapes; Hello Sunshine) sustains the suspense as a woman grapples with her husband's sudden disappearance--plus the terror of not knowing whom to trust--as she commits to finding him and truths about the life she thought they shared in The Last Thing He Told Me.
Married just a year, Hannah and Owen are happy in their floating home in scenic Sausalito, Calif. A widowed father when they met, Owen is devoted to 16-year-old Bailey, while Hannah patiently works to gain the girl's acceptance. The night Owen doesn't come home, Hannah and Bailey are forced to become a team. Both have received cryptic notes from him within an hour of hearing an NPR report: the FBI and SEC have raided his software company, his boss is in custody and other staff are under suspicion of fraud. The next morning a U.S. Marshall appears and bluntly tells her: "Owen's not who you think he is."
Gentle with Bailey, Hannah also knows the girl likely holds memories leading to truths about Owen. Clues take them to Austin, Tex., a trip heavy with anxiety and suspicion of what, and who, they might find. This tension, paired with a bittersweet camaraderie between Hannah and Bailey, propels the plot, supported with passages from their past that eventually mesh with what they discover. Dave weaves a complex yet well-supported explanation of Owen's past, and offers a poignant, thrilling conclusion. But an epilogue provides an even more surprising--and satisfying--ending. --Cheryl McKeon, Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza, Albany, N.Y.