Do I know you? A novel of suspense

Eleven years ago, Jane Ellison's sister, Kit, disappeared during a drug-fuelled beach party. The evidence pointed to Kit being murdered, but the cops closed the case without finding her killer. Jane's sure that Bella Valencia, the adopted daughter of billionaire Chet Pease, was Kit's killer and that the cops backed off after Pease made a generous donation to the local police. After Kit's death, Jane's life disintegrated, leading to her being confined in a psych ward. Finally recovered, she learns she's a "super recognizer"--someone who never forgets a face--and puts this talent to use by getting a job with Homeland Security, identifying possible terrorists as they disembark from flights to the U.S. But things start to go wrong when Jane recognizes Bella, who disappeared after Kit's disappearance, getting off a plane. Excited about having a chance to find out what happened to Kit, Jane makes a mistake that threatens to derail her life again. Tense and suspenseful, Strohmeyer's novel features a quirky, occasionally foolish heroine and a complex, sometimes credulity-straining plot, all leading to a shocking yet satisfying ending.

Boston Homeland Security agent Jane Ellison, the protagonist of this entertaining suspense novel from Strohmeyer (The Secrets Lives of Fortunate Wives), is ready to risk everything to finally discover what happened to her older sister, Kit, last seen one night 11 years earlier looking wasted after partying with other teens on the beach near their family home on Cape Cod. Jane's gift as a "super recognizer" (someone able to ID strangers from the tiniest facial details) has convinced her the person she glimpsed that night with Kit was Bella Valencia, beloved adopted daughter of the Kennedyesque Pease clan. Bella, who now runs the Peases' nonprofit in her native Colombia, has just gotten engaged to sexy scion Will Pease, townie Kit's secret romance the summer she vanished. An ostensibly vacationing Jane, aided by her boyfriend, attempts to sleuth in her former stomping grounds without attracting the attention of the prickly Peases. Though the plot becomes a mess of red herrings, triple crosses, gaslighting, and worse, spunky, self-deprecating Jane and the skewering of the superficially woke but fundamentally clueless Peases save the day. Strohmeyer knows how to keep the pages turning. Agent: Zoe Sandler, ICM Partners. (Nov.)