The Senator's Wife

February 27, 2023
Brainy, beautiful Washington, D.C., philanthropist Sloane Chase Montgomery, the protagonist of this deviously plotted if character-challenged psychological thriller from the pseudonymous Constantine (The Stranger in the Mirror), looks to be leading a charmed life following a tragedy. Just two years after the murder of her first husband, Robert Chase, she has embraced a second chance at happily ever after with Robert’s best friend and Senate colleague, Whit Montgomery. But the honeymoon may soon be over. The first signs of trouble are the brazen moves on her husband that Sloane witnesses by D.C. power broker Madelyn Sawyer, advances Whit explains he has to rebuff gently so as not to jeopardize Madelyn’s husband’s campaign contributions. Then, following Sloane’s scheduled hip replacement surgery and subsequent lupus flare-up, the home health aide Whit hires to supervise her care, stunning Athena Karras, appears to have a hidden agenda. Physically deteriorating and increasingly isolated from concerned family and friends, the sympathetic Sloane fights to figure out what’s happening to her. This perfect storm of perfidy swirls to a shocking climax, though readers should be prepared for some cartoonish villains. Constantine reliably delivers what her fans expect. Agent: Jenny Bent, Bent Agency.

March 1, 2023
This well-crafted thriller, which follows The Stranger in the Mirror (2021), takes us into the world of the rich, powerful, and superbly attired world of politics. Sloane Montgomery is married to Senator Whit Montgomery. Her first husband was also a senator, who was killed by Whit's deranged first wife. Sloane trusts Whit implicitly, despite the remoteness of her daughter and the resentment of her former mother-in-law. She heads a well-funded organization that channels millions into projects for victims of domestic abuse. Recovering from some much-needed surgery, Sloane begins to find her faith in her husband faltering and chafes under the care of the woman hired to provide her post-surgical support. One of them, she believes, is out to destroy her sanity. Or perhaps they both are. Sloane's confusion and panic grow as the suspense heightens, until the shattering denouement. Liv Constantine is the pen name of sisters Lynne Constantine and Valerie Constantine. Their books have sold over one million copies worldwide, and The Last Mrs. Parrish (2017), their best-selling debut, is in development with Netflix.

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March 15, 2023
A domestic thriller set among the Washington, D.C., in crowd starts with a bang. Sen. Robert Chase and his wife, Sloane, have their beach weekend ruined by their friends Sen. Whit Montgomery and his screaming wife, Peg, who is convinced Whit is cheating on her. Two weeks later, Peg shoots Robert and herself as Whit stands helplessly by. The widowed partners eventually fall into each other's arms, raising eyebrows when they marry. With that whirlwind of belief-challenging events out of the way in the first few pages, the real story gets going. Sloane, who has lupus, is finally scheduling her hip replacement. A shady but stunningly attractive home health care worker named Athena is hired to live in for the first few weeks; she immediately begins snooping and controlling Sloane's medication. Meanwhile, Whit may still be tomcatting around and looks to be involved in some shady schemes of his own, including gaining control of Sloane's very well-endowed foundation. Some thriller fans are not super picky about writing--wooden dialogue and stereotyped characters can be forgiven if the twists are twisty enough. The sisters who write under the pen name Liv Constantine will have to count on that this time around, since not only is some of the dialogue and several of the characters laugh-out-loud ridiculous--the raunchy gold-digger sex kitten really takes the cake--but the most serious attempts at realism in the book involve granular detail on lupus and its treatment as well as fun facts about the White House and elite designer brand names. As for the main twist, it relies rather heavily on the omniscient third-person narrator misleading the reader and concealing information to a degree that could almost be seen as cheating. On the other hand, they did fool this reader, and the reveal scene was gaspworthy. Not for the picky.

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