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Summary
Summary
Mary McGarry Morris has been hailed by the New York Times as "one of the most skillful writers at work in America today." In The Last Secret , she tells the riveting story of Nora Hammond, a woman blessed with the perfect life: a charming husband, two bright teenage children, a successful career in the family's newspaper business, and an esteemed role in the charity work of her New England town. But Nora's comfortable existence threatens to unravel when she learns of her husband's longtime affair--and when the specter of a sordid incident from her youth returns with terrifying force.
Confronted by shame and betrayal, Nora suddenly feels dangerously alone. With no one to turn to, she becomes easy prey to a ghost from her past--the cunning, relentless Eddie Hawkins.
A tautly told tale of psychological tension and chilling moral complexity, The Last Secret accelerates to a shattering conclusion as it explores the irreparable consequences of one family's crimes of the heart. The Last Secret burnishes Morris's reputation as one of our most prodigiously gifted writers.
Reviews (2)
New York Review of Books Review
A PLOT synopsis of "The Last Secret" tells you everything you need to know about both its genre and its intended readership. Mary McGarry Morris's heroine, Nora Hammond, seems to have it all, living a life of privilege with her husband and teenage children in a picturesque New England town. But when her husband confesses to a long affair with his childhood sweetheart, Nora's life begins to come apart. And as a web of secrets and lies is revealed, a dark shadow from Nora's past returns "with terrifying force," as the publisher's ad copy has it, bringing the story to "a shattering conclusion." In these days of smart, knowing literary fiction, with its ironic debunking of manners and morals, there's something refreshing about reviewing a book that inspires phrases like "desperate longing," "cruel rejection," "deadly truth" and "lonely passion" to describe its characters and their lives. When most "serious" novelists write about "regular" people, they surround them with packing-foam irony peanuts so there's no confusion about the writer's personal take on the world that's being recreated with such precision. But this isn't the case with Morris. When Nora and her best friend slice into their asparagus spears and pour that second glass of wine ("Nothing wrong with a little numbing"), you don't envision their creator smirking over a retro cocktail while she types. "The Last Secret" appeals to the longing readers feel to inhabit, at least for a change, a zone free of such condescension - to be engaged by the lonely passion of Nora's husband and his lover, the cruel rejection that drives Nora to desperate acts of anger and revenge, the devastating realization that the children have guessed their parents' crimes of the heart. What a change it is to sink into a book where big, elemental feelings are coming at you all the time, and you don't have to ponder the author's debt to French modernism or postcolonial theory. "The Last Secret" is skillfully paced, its characters engrossingly snared in complicated relationships. Morris has established her commercial bona fides as an Oprah Book Club author, and her status as a finalist for the National Book and PEN/Faulkner awards means she also has credentials with the critical establishment. But what makes this new novel more Oprah's bag than Faulkner's is the premise behind Morris's plot - the myth, enshrined in pop culture tales of "the psycho from the past" or "the hidden love child" variety, that you can never really know the people you love. Unfortunately, Morris's skill as a writer sabotages this theme: her central character simply has too much insight and capacity for self-examination to make it believable. Despite the intense, urgent feelings that pulse through its pages, this novel of emotional realism is based on an emotional fantasy - as becomes obvious when Morris is forced to conclude it with an unconvincing denouement. An over-complicated attempted abduction from a suburban garage, a conveniently stored garden shovel used as a weapon, improbable resolutions to the characters' difficulties and a bizarre and out-of-place wedding all leave the book's key question unanswered: how could someone like Nora have gotten herself into this situation in the first place? The heroine of Mary McGarry Morris's latest novel is a New England wife and mother who seems to have it all. Sophie Gee, an associate professor of English at Princeton, is the author of the novel "The Scandal of the Season."
Library Journal Review
In this family drama with a psychological twist, secrets from Nora Hammond's past threaten to destroy her perfect life. Morris (www.marymcgarrymorris.com), author of the Oprah Book Club selection Songs in Ordinary Time (1995), delivers a largely well-crafted story, though the escalating number of problems the characters face is at times unbelievable, and listeners may find Nora's obtuseness frustrating. Actor/narrator Renee Raudman (A Weekend To Change Your Life) reads capably, employing a surprising range of voices. For fans of Morris's other works as well those liking the novels of Jacquelyn Mitchard and Jodi Picoult.-Donna Bachowski, Orange Cty. Lib. Syst., Orlando, FL (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.