Synopsis:
Seven days. Three families. One killer.
It was supposed to be a perfect vacation — a group of families enjoying a week together at a luxurious French villa in the sunny south of France. Four women who have been best friends for as long as they can remember making the most of an overdue week together.
But Kate has a secret. Right after arriving with her husband, Sean, and their two children, teenage Lucy and eight-year-old Daniel, she discovers that Sean may be having an affair. So the week together might provide the perfect opportunity to amass proof that Sean is involved with one of two of her best friends spending the week there.
Soon it becomes clear that one of her friends is working against her and willing to sacrifice years of friendship to destroy Kate’s family. But which woman is it?
As the week drags on in the stifling Mediterranean heat, Kate struggles to discover the truth. Too late she realizes that the stakes are far higher than she imagined . . . because someone in the villa may be prepared to kill to keep their secret hidden.
Review:
The Vacation is a domestic thriller from T.M. Logan, the bestselling author of Lies and 29 Seconds. Logan is a former journalist who lives in Nottinghamshire, England, where he now writes full-time in a cabin situated in the garden of the home he shares with his wife and two children. He was inspired to begin writing thrillers by his love of reading books by great authors like Michael Connelly, Harlan Coben, and Scott Smith, whose Simple Plan was a “turning point book” for him.
The Vacation unfolds in a beautiful setting. Four college friends — Kate, Jennifer, Rowan, and Izzy — are overdue for a get-together. When they score a stay at an exquisite private estate in the south of France none of them could afford independently, they decide to bring their families along for a one-week vacation of a lifetime. They have just arrived when Kate discovers damning text messages on Sean’s phone that suggest he is involved in an extramarital affair, which may explain why he has been secretive of late. Worse, the sender suggests that they make decisions while they are together at the villa. Kate concludes that Sean, a network security manager with a medium-sized IT company who feels that he has not achieved the success he should have by this point in his life, is cheating on her with one of her three best friends. But which one? And how should she approach the situation? Should she confront Sean immediately? She rejects that option, instead waiting and observing Sean’s interactions with her friends, hoping that she will be able to determine which one of them has betrayed her. After all, she has been a crime analyst with the Metropolitan Police for thirteen years, collecting and collating data, and analyzing patterns, so her investigative skills are above average.
The four friends have a lengthy history, and Kate alludes to issues they have overcome throughout the years. Rowan and her husband, Russ, have one daughter, aged five, who regularly throws tantrums that they prove unable to effectively manage. Jennifer is an overprotective mother to two sneaky and sarcastic teenage boys, Jake and Ethan, who seem to constantly be getting into trouble. They attend school with Lucy who is demonstrably upset about something, but will not share the details with her mother. Izzy, Sean’s childhood friend, is the only one of the four women who is still single and childless. However, as the story progresses, Logan reveals the reason she has never married and has been spending her time far away from home.
As the story unfolds at a steady pace, Logan reveals salient details about the group’s long and somewhat troubled past. Kate harbors guilt about two traumatic events and, for that reason, among others, is reluctant to confront either of the women she suspects. Instead, she spends a great deal of time observing Sean’s activities and attempting to catch him engaging in inappropriate behavior with the other woman in his life, her lack of self-esteem fueling her belief that she is inferior to and cannot compete with her friends for Sean’s affection. But she does want to save their marriage and not only for the sake of Lucy and Daniel. Until they arrived at the villa, she believed they were a happy couple. Meanwhile, Sean is also experiencing guilt in the present. He is indeed keeping a secret from Kate, but are her suspicions accurate?
The truth is simple. Lies are complicated.
The estate is fraught with danger. It is surrounded by sloping vineyards and a wall, but there is also a gorge at the end of a path that leads to a rock face with pools below. A clearing at the edge of a cliff looks out over the rocky promontory and the water far below.
Logan takes full advantage of the lush setting where he places his characters as scenes play out throughout the estate. But none is as terrifying as the cliff from which the water can be seen rushing below. His characters’ secrets and concealed agendas motivate them to engage in behaviors that could be either innocent or deadly, and Logan keeps readers guessing which. He deftly injects clues and revelations into the story, compelling the action forward and accelerating the suspense leading up to a major development that will keep readers frantically turning the pages to see what else will be revealed and who will survive.
Once all of the characters’ secrets are revealed, Logan’s protagonists, Kate and Sean, face a moral conundrum that will spur readers to question what they would do if faced with a similar choice. How far should parents go to protect their child’s future?
Although the The Vacation‘s storyline is primarily plot, rather than character-driven, Logan has nonetheless crafted an eclectic and intriguing group of players, most of whom are thoroughly unlikable, starting with Kate and her insecurities. She is devoted to her family and career, and wants to preserve both. Rowan is a driven businesswoman on the brink of launching her public relations firm to greater success, and Russ is committed to enjoying it with her. Jennifer, the athletic beauty that Sean dated before Kate, has devoted her life to raising her two boys with Alistair, her therapist husband. Readers do not get to know Izzy as well as the others, but the teenagers in the story are each fascinating in their own right, if also repugnant. Little Daniel is innocent and endearing, and will have readers cheering for him.
The Vacation is an entertaining look at long-time friendships, the destructive power of secrets, and the lengths to which parents will go to secure their child’s future.
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