Three Great Books #39

Recommendations from my foot surgery recovery era!

The Devil at His Elbow, by Valerie Bauerlein

I knew only the bare minimum about Alex Murdaugh before picking up this book, which was written by the Wall Street Journal reporter who covered the legal proceedings against him. Murdaugh is a South Carolina lawyer who bilked his most vulnerable clients to feed his drug habit and was convicted of shooting to death his wife Maggie and son Paul — who had previously been accused of getting drunk and causing a boat crash that killed a 19-year-old woman. And that’s only a partial accounting of the destruction that members of the Murdaugh family have wrought in and around the tiny town of Hampton. Bauerlein has written a page-turner that digs deep into the family tree to show how rotten the Murdaugh dynasty was for generations. It’s a cautionary tale: when people aren’t held to account — whether it’s parents who never allow their children to suffer the natural consequences of their actions, or an entire town that kowtows to rich blustering bullies — things rarely end well.

Trust Her, by Flynn Berry

This starts with a bang. Within the first few pages, Tessa Daly is deliberately rear-ended while driving on the outskirts of Dublin and taken to an isolated house to be interrogated by a member of the IRA. Tessa and her sister Marian have a history with the IRA, explored in Berry’s previous book, “Northern Spy.” (You might want to read that first, but it’s not an absolute prerequisite for enjoying the sequel.) After the events of “Northern Spy,” the sisters have fled Northern Ireland and have settled in Dublin, with new names and new jobs, to raise their young children in safety. But the IRA has tracked them down, and gives them an assignment: make contact with their former handler in MI5 and turn him, or else. This is a high-quality thriller, with propulsive writing and an emotional core, thanks to the relationship between Tessa and Marian.

The Wedding People, by Alison Espach

This was the most surprisingly wonderful book of the summer for me. Phoebe Stone, whose husband has left her for their mutual colleague and friend, checks into a posh Rhode Island seaside inn with the intention of ordering a big room service meal and then killing herself with her cat’s painkillers. Her academic career has stalled, she’s suffered multiple emotional hits, and she’s had it with life. To compound her sense of isolation, it turns out she’s the only guest who isn’t at the inn to attend the weeklong wedding celebration of Lila, the young, wealthy, spoiled, bride-to-be, and her older, steadier fiancé Gary. Lila and Phoebe end up in an elevator together, Phoebe blurts out her suicidal intentions, and Lila tries to connect, desperate to keep Phoebe from ruining her picture-perfect wedding. What follows is a transformational week for both of them. The writing is lovely, the characters are complex, and it runs much deeper than I expected it to. Labor Day weekend may be over, but don’t put off this beach read until next summer.