Peter Swanson is an author that I love to read. He is masterful at the psychological thriller and his Every Vow You Break is proof positive of that. The above is a sequel to A Kind Worth Killing which I also recommend but it is not necessary to read it before.
Henry Kimball is a man with an interesting work history. He has been an English teacher, a police officer, a poet, and in this timeline a private detective. Now in his detective's office sits Joan Whalen, a woman who says she wants to hire Henry to prove that her husband is having an affair with someone he works with. Henry takes on the case and finds himself following Joan's husband and getting personally involved with the woman he purportedly is having an affair with. When Joan's husband and his lover both turn up dead, Henry suspects he might be involved in a dangerous situation and begins to do a different kind of investigating.
The story flashes back to a previous timeline where Joan is fifteen years old and at a seaside resort with her family. Events happen that end in a young man being found drowned. The reader also learns that a couple years later there is a school shooting where Joan attends. This also happens to be the school where Henry was a high school teacher at the time of the shooting. Joan says she trusts Henry because she remembers him as a teacher, but the question remains: should Henry trust Joan?
A woman enters the plot for whom Henry has unresolved feelings: Lily serves as Henry's confidant and sounding board. At one point Henry says to Lily, "some people fall in love because they are excellent observers, and they can see what's right in front them. And some people fall in love because they only imagine what is in front of them. They construct something that isn't there." Not only does this statement reflect darkly on Joan's relationships but eventually serves as a flashing arrow towards Lily.
Reading this book will make you rethink what you know about people based on outward observations. One just never knows what lies beneath the surface! This is a good one to curl up and get cozy with as we await the spring thaw.
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