With a vengeance A novel

Sager's newest book, With a Vengeance, is also one of his very best. The setup is simple: in the mid-1950s, Anna Matheson invites a handful of people to take a cross-country journey, overnight from Philadelphia to Chicago, aboard a luxury train. Who is Anna? What is her relationship to these seemingly unconnected people? All will be revealed in the author's good time: Sager demonstrates his gift for dispensing information a piece at a time by keeping the reader in a constant state of suspense. And, anyway, Anna's plan--one enacting her own idea of justice--goes tragically wrong when one of the passengers is apparently murdered, and the killer begins picking off passengers, one by one. Back at the top of his game, Sager delivers a thriller so tautly written, so tightly constructed, that readers will emerge from the book breathless and in a mild state of shock. With this book, Sager has committed an act of brilliance.

Murder aboard a luxury train gets a fresh spin in this ultratwisty historical thriller from Sager (Middle of the Night). Anna Matheson was 16 when one of her railroad tycoon father's trains, which was transporting WWII troops, exploded and killed 37 people, including her brother, Tommy. A dozen years later, in 1954, Anna is the sole surviving member of her family and has managed to lure, under false pretenses, the six individuals she blames for the tragedy on an overnight train ride from Philadelphia to Chicago. She hopes that by confronting the dirty half-dozen with smoking guns she's discovered during her investigation, she can elicit confessions before turning them over to the FBI at their destination. A few hours into the trip, just after Anna reveals herself and her agenda, one of her suspects keels over. Blindsided, Anna realizes she has effectively trapped herself with desperate people who want her dead--at least one of whom is ready to do the job. From there, Sager swiftly ratchets up the suspense through a Survivor-worthy series of alliances and betrayals as the body count mounts. A few of the final twists feel excessive, but for readers seeking a page-turner with a kick-ass female protagonist, this punches the ticket. Agent: Michelle Brower, Trellis Literary. (June)