Format: Hardcover, 416 pages
Release Date: August 12, 2025
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Source: Publisher
Genre: Thrillers / Suspense
A New York Times bestselling author returns with the latest installment in the addictive Frankie Elkin series, in which Frankie is called to Tucson, Arizona, to find a missing Afghan refugee, whose friend suspects she is in grave danger—before it is too late. “Timely and completely gripping.” (Louise Penny, New York Times bestselling author)
Recent Afghan refugee and young mother Sabera Ahmadi was last seen exiting her place of work three weeks ago. The local police have yet to open a case, while her older, domineering husband seems unconcerned. At the insistence of Sabera's closest friend, missing persons expert Frankie Elkin agrees to take up the search just in time for a video of Sabera to surface—showing her walking away from the scene of a brutal double murder.
Frankie quickly notes there's much more to the Ahmadi family than meets the eye. The father Isaad is a brilliant mathematician, Sabera a gifted linguist, and their little girl Zahra has an uncanny ability to remember anything she sees. Which given everything that has happened during the girl's short life, may be a terrible curse.
When Isaad also disappears under mysterious circumstances and an attempt is made on Zahra's life, Frankie realizes she must crack the code of this family's horrific past. Someone is coming for the Ahmadis. And violence is clearly an option.
When everything is on the line, how far would you go to protect the ones you love? Frankie is about to find out.
Recent Afghan refugee and young mother Sabera Ahmadi was last seen exiting her place of work three weeks ago. The local police have yet to open a case, while her older, domineering husband seems unconcerned. At the insistence of Sabera's closest friend, missing persons expert Frankie Elkin agrees to take up the search just in time for a video of Sabera to surface—showing her walking away from the scene of a brutal double murder.
Frankie quickly notes there's much more to the Ahmadi family than meets the eye. The father Isaad is a brilliant mathematician, Sabera a gifted linguist, and their little girl Zahra has an uncanny ability to remember anything she sees. Which given everything that has happened during the girl's short life, may be a terrible curse.
When Isaad also disappears under mysterious circumstances and an attempt is made on Zahra's life, Frankie realizes she must crack the code of this family's horrific past. Someone is coming for the Ahmadis. And violence is clearly an option.
When everything is on the line, how far would you go to protect the ones you love? Frankie is about to find out.
Kiss Her Goodbye, by Lisa Gardner, is the 4th installment in the author's Frankie Elkin Series. Set against the scorching backdrop of Tucson, Arizona, the book follows Frankie Elkin, a recovering alcoholic and missing persons expert, as she takes on the case of Sabera Ahmadi, a young Afghan refugee who has vanished under mysterious circumstances. What unfolds is a riveting narrative filled with twists, trauma, and a deep exploration of the refugee experience, making it both a thrilling mystery and a poignant social commentary.
The story begins with Frankie Elkin, a nomadic investigator who specializes in finding the "invisible" people society overlooks, arriving in Tucson to search for Sabera Ahmadi. Sabera, a recent Afghan refugee, wife, and mother, was last seen leaving her workplace three weeks ago. The local police have not opened a case, and Sabera’s older, domineering husband, Isaad, appears strangely unconcerned. However, Sabera’s closest friend insists she would never abandon her three-year-old daughter, Zahra.
Driven by this conviction and her own empathy for the marginalized, Frankie takes on the case. The plot thickens when a video surfaces showing Sabera walking away from the scene of a brutal double murder, raising questions about her involvement. As Frankie digs deeper, she uncovers layers of complexity within the Ahmadi family: Isaad is a brilliant mathematician, Sabera a gifted linguist, and their daughter Zahra possesses an uncanny photographic memory. This gift may be a curse, given the family’s traumatic past.
When Isaad also disappears and an attempt is made on Zahra’s life, Frankie realizes the stakes are higher than she imagined. The narrative spirals into a web of secrets, espionage, and violence, forcing Frankie to confront not only the Ahmadi family’s dark history but also her own demons. The novel delves into the horrors of refugee camps, the psychological toll of war, and the challenges of adapting to a new life, including issues like PTSD and postpartum struggles.
These elements are woven seamlessly into the thriller framework, adding emotional weight without feeling didactic. The secondary cast of characters includes Detective Marc, a man who is brought into the search for Sabera after Isaad is found dead. Then there's Daryl Daniels, who helps Frankie around and tries to prevent her from getting over her head. Sabera's story is featured over the course of this story as flashbacks and storytelling to her daughter, Zahra who is only 4 years old, and was born in a refugee camp.
Zahra, in particular, stands out as a heartbreaking yet resilient figure whose photographic memory becomes a pivotal plot device. There are, of course, other secondary characters who are essential to the story, as well as others whose participation in the story reveals that not everything is as it appears. It's a story that is filled with layers and mysteries.
*On a side note: This story dives into the chaos that was the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, and the impact it had on those left behind. The US left behind many people who had worked with the US for years. These should have been the first people taken out of the country because the Taliban ended up hunting these people down. They deserved the respect and admiration for what they did against the same threats that US troops faced in the country.
Sabera's story is interesting in that she ends up getting involved in things that her own mother likely guided her on this path before dying of cancer. The one person in this entire book you should have an emotional connection to is Zahra. This little girl has gone through so much in 4 years of existence, and it appears that she might be a prodigy like her mother, who can hear a language once and understand and speak it.
*As always, the author does an excellent job of researching the issues in this book, and that is why she's at the top of my must-read list of authors.
No comments:
Post a Comment