House on Fire by Bonnie Kistler
Published by Atria on March 12, 2019
Genres: Domestic Thriller, Family Life, Young Adult Fiction
Pages: 403
Format: ARC, eBook
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In the bestselling tradition of Jodi Picoult and Celeste Ng, a tightly wound and suspenseful novel about a blended family in crisis after a drunk driving accident leaves the daughter of one parent dead—and the son of the other parent charged with manslaughter.
Divorce lawyer Leigh Huyett knows all too well that most second marriages are doomed to fail. But five years in, she and Pete Conley have a perfectly blended family of her children and his. To celebrate their anniversary, they grab some precious moments of alone time and leave Pete’s son Kip, a high school senior, in charge of Leigh’s fourteen-year-old daughter Chrissy at their home.
Driving back on a rainy Friday night, their cell phones start ringing. After a raucous party celebrating his college acceptance to Duke and his upcoming birthday, Kip was arrested for drunk driving after his truck crashed into a tree. And he wasn’t alone—Chrissy was with him.
Twelve hours later, Chrissy is dead and Kip is charged with manslaughter.
Kip has always been a notorious troublemaker, but he’s also a star student with a dazzling future ahead of him. At first, Leigh does her best to rally behind Pete and help Kip through his ordeal. Until he changes his story, and claims that he wasn’t driving after all—Chrissy was, and he swears there is a witness.
Leigh is stunned that he would lie about such a thing, while Pete clutches onto the story as the last, best hope to save his son, throwing his energy and money into finding this elusive witness. As they hurtle toward Kip’s trial date, husband and wife are torn between loyalty to their children and to each other, while the mystery of what really happened that night intensifies.
This richly conceived and tightly plotted psychological exploration of family and tragedy will have you racing toward its shocking and thought-provoking conclusion.
In House on Fire, we follow a blended family – normal by today’s standards. There’s Leigh Huyett, who is a divorce lawyer who is five years into her second marriage with Pete. They seem to be beating the odds this time and their blended family is going very well.
Leigh and Pete are out for the night celebrating their anniversary. They have left Pete’s biological son, Kip in charge of Leigh’s daughter, Chrissy. Kip has been celebrating at a party and crashes his car on the way home with Chrissy inside. Chrissy later dies and Kip is charged with manslaughter.
I really appreciated how the author wrote Leigh’s character trying so very hard to keep her grief from separating her blended family. Little by little, it’s clear that Leigh just can’t help but drive her husband and her stepson away. Also, thanks to the fact that the author is an attorney, readers get to follow not only the family dynamics angle of the situation, but the whole legal angle and how that plays out. I did enjoy the drama and how well it captivated me. I was totally immersed in the story and all of the subplots and I enjoyed the twists and turns at the end.
Bonnie Kistler is a former Philadelphia trial lawyer. Born and raised in the horse country of Pennsylvania, she attended Bryn Mawr College, where she graduated magna cum laude, with Honors in English literature, and she received her law degree from the University of the Pennsylvania Law School, where she was a moot court champion and legal writing instructor.
She spent her law career in private practice with major law firms, first in Anchorage, Alaska, where she met and married her husband, and later in Philadelphia. Peer-rated as Distinguished for both legal ability and ethical standards, she successfully tried cases in federal and state courts across the country. She also taught writing skills to lawyers and lectured frequently to professional organizations and industry groups.
She and her husband now live in Florida and the mountains of western North Carolina. They have two daughters.
Be sure to connect with Ms. Kistler on social media ~~
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Thank you NetGalley, Atria Books and Bonnie Kistler for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an impartial review; all opinions are my own.
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