What we'll burn last

Heather Chavez

Book - 2024

When she was twelve, Leyna Clarke watched her older sister, Grace, walk away from their Sierra Nevada foothills home with her boyfriend, Adam Duran. Neither was ever seen again. Sixteen years later, a stranger who looks like Grace shows up at the restaurant where Leyna works--and vanishes soon after. When it comes out that Leyna was one of the last people to have talked with the young woman, Leyna's childhood crush Dominic, who is also Adam's brother, pleads with her to do the last thing she wants to do: come home. But Leyna isn't the only one who hasn't been able to leave that fateful night behind. Her mother, Meredith, still lives in the family's old home--even if she claims to believe the police's theory tha...t Grace and Adam were willing runaways. Down the street, Adam and Dominic's mother Olivia has also stayed, determined to be there when her son finally returns...and to prove that Meredith and Leyna have been hiding something all these years. But the past isn't the only threat to the two families, or the missing girl. As a wildfire sparks, tempers flare and intentions turn deadly. Because someone in the neighborhood knows what really happened that night--and just how good the forest is at keeping its secrets.

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FICTION/Chavez Heather
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1st Floor New Shelf FICTION/Chavez Heather (NEW SHELF) Due Dec 18, 2024
Subjects
Genres
Suspense fiction
Thrillers (Fiction)
Detective and mystery fiction
Novels
Published
New York : Mullholand Books, an imprint of Little, Brown and Company 2024.
Language
English
Main Author
Heather Chavez (author)
Edition
First edition
Physical Description
324 pages ; 25 cm
ISBN
9780316531658
Contents unavailable.
Review by Booklist Review

Another fast-paced and gripping thriller from Chavez (following Before She Finds Me, 2023), told in the voices of three women, each with her own secrets. "The Fire," the ever-gaining menace, also speaks. The wildfire begins when lightning strikes a pine tree just north of the Ridgepoint Ranch subdivision in the Sierra Nevada foothills. Ridgepoint is home to two families enduring an ongoing tragedy that began 16 years earlier when a teenage girl and boy disappeared. The two were dating, and speculation raged that they had run away together, but it was also rumored that they were dead since no trace of them was ever found. When a stranger who looks like the missing girl shows up at the restaurant where her younger sister, Leyna, works, and then vanishes soon after, Leyna and the missing boy's brother, Dominic, return to their unhappy homes and ask some difficult questions. As the flames move toward them, animosities also flare, and things turn deadly. What really happened is revealed amidst the choking smoke, and it is as complicated as it is compelling. Readers will have to really pay close attention with this one, and resist the urge to jump ahead to find out just what is going on. A perfect beach read.

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

Chavez (Before She Finds Me) blends simmering suspense and domestic drama in this slow-burning thriller. Sixteen years ago, when waitress Leyna Clarke was 12, her 16-year-old sister, Grace, disappeared from their home with her boyfriend, Adam Duran. The mothers of the missing pair blamed one another, and soon launched into a feud that took over their lives. Leyna ditched that toxic atmosphere for Reno, while continuing to hold out hope that she'd eventually find Grace alive. One sweltering July afternoon, a woman who looks like Grace walks into the café where Leyna works. When a stunned Leyna starts asking her questions, the woman flees; a few days later, Adam's brother, Dominic, calls Leyna to say a stranger has been poking around their old neighborhood, asking questions about Grace and Adam. Leyna returns home to investigate, reuniting with her mother, Meredith, and encountering Adam and Dominic's mother, Olivia, who still blames Leyna's family for the disappearance. As a dangerous forest fire crackles nearby, Leyna uncovers family secrets that shed new light on what happened to her sister. Chavez keeps the pace slack, building perhaps a touch too sluggishly to a resolution that nevertheless satisfies. Patient readers will be rewarded. Agent: Peter Steinberg, UTA. (July)

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