SLIVER OF TRUTH (Shaye Areheart Books 2007)
Author, Lisa Unger
The prologue to SLIVER OF TRUTH starts out looking like a book that should be called "Scenes from a Marriage." A ho-hum marriage, at that. Told in third person from the wife's point of view, we hear her gripe about her husband (internally). She's a journalist. He does something else (something that doesn't matter). But all that changes by the prologue's end.
Chapter 1 puts the reader in the protagonist's head. And it's written in first person (Ridley Jones' point of view--more on her later). The story starts with a scene like something out of a nightmare. Ridley's running . . . it's dark . . . she's in Potter's Field in the Bronx. She's chasing someone . . . there's a pain in her side, fire in her lungs . . . she has a gun. She's going after this shadowy person. Someone else tells her, "Ridley, don't do it. You'll never be able to live with it." The chapter ends . . . well, read it and see for yourself.
Chapter 2 is where the story really starts. You have to love an opening line like, "I bet you thought you'd heard the end of me." ("But I've barely heard the first of you," I thought, and kept going.) Starting this book is like walking into a movie roughly halfway through it. Reading those first few chapters was like having someone catching me up to what's gone before, while I was watching what's taking place. A bit discombobulating at first. (I kept thinking there was too much telling, not enough showing.) But once I settled in, what followed was . . . amazing.
Ridley Jones, at some point before the story begins, has learned that the people she's always known as her parents are actually foster parents. She was placed with them by an organization called Project Rescue. This organization was founded by her beloved late Uncle Max, who was--get this--actually, her real father. These few sentences may help save some confusion for you upfront--but not all, because there's Jake, another Project Rescue child, with whom she has an on-and-off relationship. And some other guy named Christian Luna who's killed, for reasons I could never figure out. (None of these things I'm telling you are spoilers. This is all in Chapter 2, believe it or not.) Somehow all this truth comes out after a photo of Ridley is taken rescuing a small boy from getting run over by a van. A photo that makes her famous. (Still in Chapter 2.) I can't remember all the details, all of it came at me so fast and furious, I found myself turning back after reading several pages and saying, "Now, who's Jake? And what's this got to do with Project Rescue? And what does Christian Luna have to do with all this?"
But like I said, after I kind of got an understanding of what was going on, the book really gripped me and never let me go--sometime after the FBI questions Ridley about a series of photos of her in which a shadowy figure keeps appearing. They think the shadowy guy is her Uncle Max, but her Uncle Max is supposed to be dead. But then Ridley gets these weird phone calls with just static and breathing, then the caller hanging up. Plus there's a spooky scene in her uncle's apartment (really creepy!). Lisa Unger's eye for detail and her ability to build suspense with it, really got under my skin. And next thing you know, people are dying. And Ridley ends up in trouble over her head.
I read somewhere that thrillers and suspense stories should have a roller coaster storyline. But this narrative wasn't a roller coaster. It was more like a freight train. Barreling downhill, full throttle. With no brakes.
And not only is it a great thriller, but it's a great meditation on our recollections of people from our past. How they really are, who we want them to be, and the differences between the two. Every time I started reading this book, I had to tear my eyes away to set it down. (It was torment waiting to pick it up again.) It made me want to stay up reading all night.
To say that Ridley goes through hard times is pretty much the understatement of the year. The plot takes her through quite a few twists. I'll admit--I was expecting some of them, but that's only because I watch Damages (a show that's probably spoiled all thrillers for me for life).
Thing is, the book is more than a thriller. It's about a woman who's looking for answers about herself and this Uncle Max she loved and thought she knew, but didn't. It's about memory, identity, choices and all sorts of heavy stuff like that.
Unger manages the delicate balancing act of telling a story with suspense and thrills, while exploring a woman's shattered psyche as she learns the truth and is put through her paces.
And it's a truly great read. You just have to get through that beginning, where it's like walking into the middle of a movie. (I suppose it might have helped to read BEAUTIFUL LIES first.)
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