A familiar stranger

Lillian Smith, the principal narrator of this gripping psychological thriller from bestseller Torre (The Good Lie), has a lot to worry about: her husband, Mike, is cheating on her; her high school junior son, Jacob, is becoming extremely alienated and uncommunicative; and she's fired from her job as an obituary writer for the Los Angeles Times. Doubting that Mike will end his affair, Lillian decides to embark on an affair of her own after meeting David Laurent, the owner of a screen-printing T-shirt company who lives in Nevada but regularly visits L.A.--and to adopt the identity of a recently deceased woman with an exciting life. The trouble begins when a video of Lillian--specifically identifying her as "Jacob's mama"--appears on TikTok showing her scantily clad and kissing David. The tension grows as flashbacks over a period of two months, amid many twists and turns, build up to the death of an unknown person. Along the way, the author skillfully reveals the characters' many lies and secrets. Torre knows how to keep the reader guessing. Agent: Maura Kye-Casella, Don Congdon Assoc. (Sept.)

A Los Angeles Times obituary writer who likes to tweet riddles asking which of three imaginary characters will die becomes the center of a triple-twisted riddle of her own. Two months before the death of a woman the author doesn't initially identify, Lillian Smith accidentally learns that her husband, financial manager Mike Smith, has spent the weekend at a posh Santa Barbara hotel with someone who wasn't her. So she's less inclined than usual to resist the advances of T-shirt printer David Laurent when he flirts with her. From that point on, as Lillian confesses alternately to her best friend, Sam Knight, and Lenny Thompson, a retired LAPD detective who tends the grounds at the cemetery where his 7-year-old daughter is buried, things go rapidly downhill. Fired from her job at the Times, Lillian starts a serious affair with David, who's gotten her work at the marina where his boat is docked. Someone posts PG--rated but still damning video evidence of her affair online, where it's watched by everyone she knows, including the high school classmates of her son, Jacob, who proceed to make his life miserable. And that's all before the death of one of the principals. Torre is hoarding so many surprises that readers are bound to see one or two of them coming, but since everyone involved has secrets to hide from the other characters whose secrets they're sure they know, the unwary, and maybe even the wary, should buckle up and prepare for a wild ride whose perfectly timed shocks won't end till the last page. A whiplash suspenser that's a model of its kind. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.