They're Gone

September 7, 2020
This solid crime novel from Barres (The Unrepentant, writing as E.A. Aymar) starts slowly as it introduces two women from different backgrounds: middle-aged housewife Deb Linh Thomas, who lives in suburban northern Virginia with her 19-year-old daughter and her genial husband, Grant Thomas; and Baltimore bartender Cessy Castillo, the battered wife of Hector Ramirez, a crooked ex-cop. Both learn that their husbands have been murdered in the same way—one bullet to the heart and one to the head. A man who identifies himself as an FBI agent informs Deb that the agency had been investigating Grant. Meanwhile, Cessy finds a flash drive that links Hector to a string of homicides. The pace picks up once Deb and Cessy meet and join forces, and they realize they aren’t just up against one killer, but rather an insidious web of corruption that includes the highest levels of law enforcement. The fully fleshed out leads compensate for some clichéd characters and stock action scenes. This women-fight-back thriller will please those looking to vicariously smack down a few hulking villains. Agent: Michelle Richter, Fuse Literary.

Starred review from September 1, 2020
The murders of two men who couldn't be less like each other entangle their widows in a web of prostitution, blackmail, murder, and eventually each other. Grant Thomas was a successful professional in the Beltway suburb of Vienna, Virginia; Hector Ramirez was a hit man who plied his secret trade around Baltimore. After they're gunned down in separate incidents on the same night, freelance writer Deb Linh Thomas goes into dazed mourning while bartender Cessy Castillo celebrates that the husband who'd beaten her for years is finally gone. Their paths begin an exquisitely slow convergence when Cessy is visited by two lowlifes who inform her that Hector had owed their boss $15,000, a debt that's now passed to her, and FBI agent Levi Price tells Deb that Grant had dallied with a series of prostitutes, one of whom had milked him and his estate dry. As Cessy scrambles to find some way to deal with the collectors who won't take no for an answer, Deb seeks her own answers by meeting with Maria Vasquez, the D.C. hooker who'd replaced her in her husband's sex life and bank account. When Cessy's resources prove inadequate to fend off the intensifying threats, her brother, Chris, rides to the rescue from Phoenix, his background as a contract killer guaranteeing fireworks even before the two women collide with each other. Barres stands out from the pack with his unusually sensitive handling of racial and sexual identities--Cessy's mother was Panamanian, Deb was born in Vietnam, and Deb's daughter, Kim, has a girlfriend--and his ruthless efficiency in sweeping supporting characters from the board the minute they've lost their ability to support anyone. Smartly plotted, violent, and utterly absorbing.

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