Behind the Lie Audio CD – MP3 Audio, 3 March 2022

Emilya Naymark likes to juggle, and what she juggles best are timelines. She starts her Laney Bird mysteries at the point where a glorious mess falls into the lap of our former NYPD detective (now turned suburbanite), then sets up a parallel track which unfolds just how things got so messed up in the first place. At the point where her two timelines come together, though, there’s still plenty of action.In the suburb of Sylvan, New York, everybody’s got secrets, even the nicest, most harmless people, and some of those secrets are deadly. In Hide in Place, it was her own teen-age son. In Behind the Lie, it’s her best friend and neighbor, Holly. You might think this is terribly convenient, but Naymark has a point—that we really don’t know those closest to us, that people are like the cosmos, mainly consisting of Dark Matter.I don’t want to tell you too much, but I don’t want to leave you with the idea that this is a little domestic drama, either. There are a pair of baddies who are bad to the bone, with a scheme as cruel and manipulative as they are. Laney has her hands full and her life on the line. This one will keep you involved from beginning to end. Pick it up.

At the core of this thriller lie characters so flawed, so real, that you want to wrap your arms around them, take them home, and give them milk and cookies. Everyone is vulnerable. Everyone hides secrets. Naymark weaves a complex plot in which ordinary people twist their lives into knots, hurting one another and themselves. Readers will hold their breaths, while the author masterfully uncovers one lie after another. What is "behind the lie" is a gripping tale of hubris and greed, inhumanity, redemption, and, weirdly, love.

This is a suspenseful and layered novel about lives in suburbia that possess dark secrets. I really like the main character, Laney Bird, an ex cop who investigates the disappearance of her best friend in the neighborhood after a disturbing summer party. The novel takes you deep into the life of that friend, who may have seemed to have a perfect life on the surface. Wife, mother, friend. But there is a lot to her background, a long-ago tragedy that is guiding her behavior. Newcomers to the neighborhood, a strange couple, set everything in motion, and the plot goes in many unexpected directions. The level of the prose makes this a memorable novel. I highly recommend it.

Whether you read the prequel to this book or not won't impede the absolutely page turning energy of this fabulous thriller. Naymark brings back complex former cop Laney and her equally complex son Alfie for a plot that is mesmerizing, thrilling and beautifully written. Sometimes thrillers sacrifice the sentence level writing for a good story but Naymark delivers the whole package. Haunting imagery, a compelling tale full of tension, and nuanced characters. I can't wait to see what she writes next.

This was a wild ride—a fast-paced book that I could not put down! There is so much to praise here. The two main protagonists, Laney and Holly, are women we all know: loyal caretakers who will do anything to protect their families. A suburban neighborhood’s block party—the event of the year—thrusts Laney, an ex-cop private investigator, into a weeks’ long search for her best friend, Holly, and the events leading to this disastrous night.Naymark’s prose is beautiful, vivid, flawless; it never gets in its own way. As with her debut thriller, she keeps you guessing until the very end. <i>Behind the Lie</i> is a book I strongly recommend to all readers.