Laura Lippman is amazing, and that certainly hasn’t
changed with her most recent novel, After
I’m Gone. In this stand-alone work, the law has caught
up to Felix Brewer, a bookie with less-than-legal operations. However, instead of serving time, Felix flees
with the help of his mistress. Behind
him he leaves a beautiful, loving wife, three young daughters, and said
mistress, much to her surprise. Ten
years later the mistress goes missing and is presumed dead. Her body is found some time later, but no
arrests are made.
Now in the present day, a retired homicide cop has reopened
the cold case and is determined to discover who killed Felix’s
mistress. Throughout the novel, the plot
hops back and forth across time, with some chapters following the present-day
investigation and others exploring the lives of the five women Felix left
behind from the time he disappeared and leading up to a stunning conclusion which
gathers with all the major players in the present to finally discover who the
murderer is.
This is a seriously tangled story of the five women Felix
left behind and how they were able to continue their lives after he left. Laura keeps you guessing the identity of the
killer the entire novel, revealing other shocking secrets and plots along the
way. Twists, turns, greed, and loyalty
abound in this page-turner, but behind all that is the story of a family trying
to cope after the loss of a loved one. I
highly recommend it, and luckily you can check it out on Edelweiss.
-Amanda