Three women who met because they were all at one point married to a serial killer band together to try and stop a potential new killer when women start disappearing around where they live.
This book picks up with an unusual premise – what is it like to have been the closest person to a serial killer, and not have it believed that you knew nothing of their crimes?
The author does an excellent job of grounding us in the place and time of the setting – blazing hot California in the 1960s, where serial killing is approaching the proportions of an epidemic, and where women are constrained and hemmed in by patriarchal expectations despite the advances brought on by second-wave feminism. I also enjoyed the exploration of the differing relationships that Beverly, Elsie, and Margot had with their serial killer husbands and how they grappled with the knowledge that the person they’d married had been a monster and the impossibility of understanding why they did what they did.
However, the mystery does meander a little, and while the finale is suitably thrilling I felt that the wives lucked into it more than really solved the case. I also felt that because of the number of wives, each with their own cast of supporting characters, we don’t really get very deep into their everyday lives or get to understand their lives post-divorce/widowhood very well. I wondered if it would have been better if the author focused on just two wives. The ending chapter, which wraps everything up with a bow and gives all the wives a happy ending, did feel a little too pat and neat after the complex topics discussed by the rest of the book.
Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book from NetGalley. This is my honest and voluntary review.
