All the Dangerous Things

August 1, 2022

Unable to sleep but for the occasional quick nap after her toddler was taken from his crib a year previously, Isabelle Drake is willing to do anything to discover what happened to him--including being interviewed by a true-crime podcaster. But the way he probes into Isabelle's past is making her nervous. Following her skyrocketing debut, A Flicker in the Dark.

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November 1, 2022
A bereaved mother's year of sleepless nights is turned even more dire by percolating revelations about her past and present. Isabelle Drake, a lifestyle reporter for The Grit who turned freelancer so that she could marry Grit publisher Ben Drake without raising too many eyebrows, hasn't slept through the night since her 18-month-old son, Mason, was snatched from his crib as his parents snoozed a few yards away. She's been so tireless in pursing leads, even breaking the nose of a supermarket cashier she suddenly learned had a record, that Det. Arthur Dozier of the Savannah Police Department has tuned her out and warned her off the case. Exhausted from touring true-crime conventions across the region, publicizing the tale of her lost boy and the breakup of her marriage that followed, Isabelle agrees to tell her story at length to podcaster Waylon Spencer so that he can spread it more widely while she searches for sleep. But his questions are so unsettling that she begins to wonder if she was the one responsible for Mason's disappearance--and what her role might have been in a family calamity more than 20 years earlier that was likely papered over because her father was a South Carolina congressman from a long line of congressmen. The windup is anything but tidy, for the multiple mysteries end up requiring multiple culprits. No matter: Willingham is so relentless in linking Isabelle's sleeplessness to her deepening sense of waking nightmare that fans can expect some seriously sleepless nights themselves. "People love violence--from a distance," reflects the protagonist. This one's for readers who can love it up close.

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November 14, 2022
Journalist Isabelle Drake, the narrator of this lyrical thriller from bestseller Willingham (A Flicker in the Dark), is struggling with overwhelming grief and guilt a year after her toddler son, Mason, disappeared one night from their Savannah, Ga., home. She’s tried just about anything to find Mason, even addressing conventions of true crime addicts, but these emotionally draining efforts don’t seem to be making any more headway than the stalled police investigation—which is why the usually guarded Isabelle agrees to cooperate with podcaster Waylon Spencer in hopes of persuading any listeners with possible leads to come forward. Answering Waylon’s painfully probing questions, including ones delving into the childhood tragedy that ended her father’s congressional career, could either provide the fresh perspective the podcaster promises—or prove one of her worst decisions ever. Though some of the climactic twists don’t quite convince, Isabelle’s vivid memories of a past she’s coming to question nicely intersect with her increasingly dangerous drive for answers. This involving, thought-provoking page-turner raises disturbing questions about the nature of the stories people tell themselves to make sense of the world. Willingham remains a writer to watch. Agent: Dan Conaway, Writers House.

Starred review from December 1, 2022
Isabelle Drake desperately hopes to mobilize the true-crime community's armchair detectives to find her son, Mason, who was abducted from his bedroom a year earlier. Ignoring the protests of her estranged husband, Ben, and the case's lead detective, Isabelle speaks at CrimeCon, confiding her horror at finding Mason's crib empty the morning he disappeared. Online detectives label Isabelle as either pitiable or plain evil: How could someone have taken Mason from the house without the dog barking? Also, doesn't Mason's disappearance cast suspicion on the early deaths of Ben's first wife and Isabelle's younger sister? The doubters don't know that Isabelle, formerly a deep sleepwalker, has suffered untreatable insomnia since Mason vanished or that she's obsessively tending an evidence board on her dining-room wall. Podcast host Waylon Spencer, also a crime victim, offers to investigate Mason's disappearance, and Isabelle exposes herself even further. But Waylon has hidden motives, and when she catches him lying, Isabelle realizes that she's been in denial about Mason's disappearance all along. True crime's trending appeal and Willingham's mastery of the domestic mystery (A Flicker in the Dark, 2022) promise popularity for this one: fans of Lisa Gardner's Frankie Elkin series will be drawn to the risky amateur-detective elements, and those who crave resolution will appreciate that Willingham tucks the story's ends in tight.

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