Someone Must Die, by Sharon Potts. Thomas & Mercer. 380 pages. Trade paperback $15.95. Kindle Ebook $3.99.
A bone-chilling thriller with a strong sense of how history shapes people’s lives, this book also probes deeply into the workings of family dynamics. The main character, Aubrey Lynd is a PhD candidate in social psychology. We meet her at home in Rhode Island where she is dealing with the harsh ending of a six-year relationship. Her boyfriend, she has just discovered, has been a serial cheater. 
Her confidence shaken not only by his behavior but also by her blindness to it, Aubrey soon receives more bad news. Her six-year-old nephew Ethan has been abducted. This is not the kind of return home to Miami that Aubrey needs, but she must comfort her mother, Diana, who had taken her grandson to the carnival where the abduction took place. Diana had only recently been reunited with her son Kevin’s family, and this apparent show of irresponsibility only turns him against her and back into the embrace of his wife’s parents.
Diana is heartbroken. After the combined police and FBI investigation begins that we learn the motive for the abduction. Someone leaves a note for Diana saying that Ethan will be returned if she will kill Jonathan Woodward. Jonathan, who is being considered for a Supreme Court vacancy, is Diana’s significant other.
Sharon Potts
Diana is given a deadline by which she must provide proof of Jonathan’s death. If she contacts the authorities or misses the deadline, Ethan will die. In other words, she is put in a trap: someone must die – Ethan or Jonathan. The fact that a child had died under Diane’s care (she had been a practicing physician) only complicates her emotional situation. At first, she keeps the note a secret, but it doesn’t stay secret.
Aubrey plays an important role in the investigation, using her own training to influence the actions and perceptions of FBI Special Agent Smolleck and Detective Gonzalez of the Miami-Dade police. . . .
To read the full review, as it appears in the June 29, 2016 Fort Myers Florida Weekly and the June 30 Naples, Bonita Springs, and Punta Gorda / Port Charlotte editions, click here: Florida Weekly – Someone Must Die
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