A taut, beautifully written psychological thriller about desire, deceit, and the fragile limits of understanding.
Marvin crafts a chilling portrait of love corroded by guilt and the dangerous intimacy that turns affection into fixation. Physician Erica Seames and journalist Charles Portland appear to have the perfect marriage; intellectual equals bound by affection and respect, until jealousy, silence, and misplaced trust begin to corrode their bond. When it begins to crumble, each withdraws inward, defending pride as though it were love. Escaping to Toronto, Erica pours her turmoil into an anonymous blog, a diary of longing and regret. Her posts, part confession, part self-performance, exposed the cracks neither dared name aloud.. When Charles finds them, the discovery detonates what remains of their trust. The woman he reads about is not the wife he knew, and the truth she reveals pulls them both toward an inevitable tragedy.
Erica and Charles are intellectual equals but emotional opposites. She is intuitive, restless, and drawn to introspection; he is analytical, proud, and slow to reveal his inner feelings. Dr. Milo is the novel’s most quietly menacing presence, a man whose intelligence conceals emotional emptiness. He speaks in the measured cadences of a healer, however, behind that restraint lies the vanity of a man who mistakes manipulation for understanding. Marvin uses Milo to question the boundaries between care and control, revealing how even empathy, when misused, can wound more deeply than hate.
Marvin constructs the novel as a mosaic of voices—letters, therapy transcripts, diary fragments, and recollections—as he draws readers into a labyrinth of shifting perspectives and unreliable narrators. The effect is mesmerizing and disquieting at once: every revelation births suspicion, every confession hides a shadow of deceit. His prose is precise and lyrical and the pacing tight. Shifting between detachment and vulnerability, the book captures the uneasy harmony of intellect and feeling that defines its doomed lovers. Behind the psychological drama lies a piercing study of communication—how silence breeds distance, and how exposure can ruin what it means to be known. Marvin leaves readers to wonder if genuine understanding is ever attainable, or if love depends on the comforting myths that keep us from breaking apart. A gripping and cerebral read, the novel probes the darkest corners of devotion and the perilous edge between confession and control.
Lovers of Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates and Notes on a Scandal by Zoë Heller will find much to savor.
FriesenPress
Pub date September 15, 2025
ISBN 978-1038340627
Price $42.99 (USD) Hardcover, $32.99 Paperback, $9.99 Kindle edition
