I guessed some of it. Not enough. Kimberly McCreight is very good at what she does.
Synopsis
New York Times bestselling author Kimberly McCreight delivers a tour de force of character-driven suspense: the story of two women whose secrets and desires entrap them in a deadly love triangle.
You had to rely on the power of love. That he loved you enough not to do the thing that would break your heart.
It was paper-thin ice on which to stake your survival.
Gretchen Falk, a Park Avenue sophisticate born into great wealth and blessed with a storybook marriage, knows she lives a charmed life, and she’s not about to risk losing any part of it. That’s why she tried to convince Richard, her devoted husband and father to their three children, not to join his old college friends on an expedition almost eight thousand miles away, to the imposing peak of Mount Kilimanjaro. Little did she know the beautiful artist climbing alongside him might prove the far greater danger.
Frankie Callahan’s dream of artistic success is within reach, with her career-making exhibition at a celebrated New York gallery only weeks away. If all goes well, the show will leave her financially independent, free of the tainted money that ties her to a past—and a man—she’s desperate to escape. To mark the end of this chapter, she is going to climb Kilimanjaro. But when she learns she’s the sole female accompanying a group of male friends, Frankie realizes that nothing about the trip will be as she expected. She certainly hasn’t counted on meeting anyone like the very charismatic, very rich, very married Richard Falk. By the time the group descends—with one fewer than when they began—they have lost more than they ever could have imagined.
Now, just two weeks after returning to New York, Frankie is dead, her East Village loft a blood-soaked crime scene. When Richard is charged in Frankie’s death, it falls to Gretchen to piece together how the life she so carefully constructed could have imploded so completely. There are only two things Gretchen knows for she’s the only woman Richard has ever loved, and he would never hurt anyone.
Someone Else’s Husband is the sweeping and suspenseful story of two women on a collision course with love—and with each other—in which no one is right and everyone is very, very wrong.
Audiobook review
4.5 stars
Even though I had guessed parts of the truth, I can say objectively that this is an excellent crime and mystery novel. The missing half star is due to a personal pet peeve that I won’t explain, as it would spoil part of the story.
The premise is straightforward: told mainly from two points of view, Frankie, an artist who died, and Gretchen, the wife of the accused, the whole book is built around Gretchen trying to prove her husband’s innocence while Frankie retraces the past events that led to her death. We switch between both, led from one revelation to the next, slowly uncovering the truth behind everyone’s carefully constructed lives.
The character I loved most was Gretchen. She’s a bit of a snob, far from perfect, and very good at putting her head in the sand and ignoring problems she’d rather not see, including some deeply problematic behaviors from her own family. But the more I listened, the greater my compassion for her grew.
Frankie is another matter entirely. I didn’t like her. Everyone makes mistakes, especially when young, but I have never had patience for home wreckers, men or women. She made bad choices, repeatedly and over a long period of time, which made her feel flighty and erratic. I couldn’t admire her, and I couldn’t empathize with her despite Kimberly McCreight’s considerable efforts to make us understand her life. It’s rare that I genuinely cannot walk in a character’s shoes. Frankie was that rare case.
And then there’s Richard. I loved him, and then I came to despise him. That shift says everything about Kimberly McCreight’s talent: she played me like a violin, steering me from one feeling to another, making me love or hate characters as the truth was slowly, carefully revealed.
The stalker’s point of view, which I won’t say more about, is brilliantly handled. Knowing the whole truth by the end, looking back at those passages, it was masterfully done.
I wholeheartedly recommend this one.
Thanks for reading!
Sophie
Those are interesting perspectives for the story, and I like when characters surprise me.
Now this sounds good. I like the perspectives chosen to tell the story.
I love the sound of this, and I have to say I’m curious about Frankie, even if you didn’t like her. You have tempted me!