There's something about Manhattan apartment buildings that demands to be the setting for psychological thrillers. Among such novels, there's Rosemary's Baby, SWF Seeks Same, Must Read Well, and now Lisa Unger's The New Couple in 5B, an exemplar of this seductive subgenre.
The novel is narrated by Rosie Lowan, a writer working on a follow-up to her successful true-crime debut. Her next book will be about the Windermere, a Park Avenue apartment building with a macabre past. Rosie got to know the Windermere through one of its residents: Ivan, her floundering-actor husband Chad's ailing uncle. After Ivan dies, Rosie learns that he has willed the couple his unit, which surprises her, as she recalls Ivan saying that the property would be going to his estranged daughter. Also curious: when Rosie is exploring the Windermere's basement, she has an encounter that tests her resolve not to believe in ghosts.
Despite the novel's occult preoccupations, Unger (Confessions on the 7:45; Last Girl Ghosted) makes the story work for readers who like their mysteries to follow the rules of logic. A parallel narrative set in 1963 will have readers one step ahead of Rosie at times, but anticipating when and how she'll see the light is irresistible enticement to turn pages. At one point, Rosie and her editor "fork fight" over a shared tiramisu, and reading The New Couple in 5B is like tucking into a rich dessert: it's dark and intense but goes down so easy that one is disinclined to stop. --Nell Beram, author and freelance writer