After her stunning debut novel, Turn of Mind, Alice LaPlante is back with A Circle of Wives--an engrossing psychological thriller where almost nothing is as it seems.
Dr. John Taylor, a well-known California plastic surgeon who eschews cosmetic surgery for the more important reconstruction of the disfigured, especially children, is found dead in a hotel room--in his own home town. Palo Alto detective Samantha Adams--whip-smart but at a disadvantage because she looks even younger than her 29 years--is assigned to the case. At first, it looks like a straightforward heart attack in an overweight, middle-aged man who worked too hard, but then the autopsy reveals he died from an injection of potassium chloride. For a detective accustomed to investigating bicycle thefts, this is a major step up.
At the funeral, we find out that there is no shortage of suspects. Dr. Taylor's three wives--concurrent, not sequential--were all neatly located in different cities, instructed as to when and where they might call him, under the careful orchestration of Wife #1, Deborah. She long ago discovered his dalliance with a nurse, confronted him and scared her off. "John was in despair," she explains. "You may indulge yourself if you like, I told him. But nothing that threatens our marriage.... He wanted the real thing. And I wanted to continue being Mrs. John Taylor... we worked out a deal. He could seek true love. He could even get married again, if he found someone who loved him back. But she was not to know about me. And he had to be home at 5:30 a.m. every morning." His first conquest was MJ, a hippie gardener. They were married for six good years; then John wandered again and he married Helen, a pediatric oncologist. Six months later, he was murdered.
Told in alternating voices by Sam and the three wives, the labyrinthine path to murder, the intricate stories of three women and their relationship to the same man, and Sam's discovery that her own love affair is bankrupt all play out in an exploration of the nature of love, marriage, trust and expectation. --Valerie Ryan
Shelf Talker: A psychological thriller about a prominent surgeon who keeps his three lives, and wives, separate--until he is murdered.