Michael Hart is taking his wife and kids on a much needed break in New York City. After the trip from Boston, he leaves his wife Natalie to get their kids settled in to the hotel room while he goes out to pick up some pizza for them all. And when he gets back, the room is empty.
He double checks the room number, but there is nothing in the room. His wife is gone, his daughter Addie is gone, and his son Bryce is gone. Only his suitcase is left in the closet, but Michael does find Bryce’s stuffed bear in the hallway. So not only were they taken (what other explanation could there be?), but Bryce is going through that without his favorite comfort animal.
Michael checks in with the hotel to make sure they didn’t change rooms, but they know nothing at the front desk. All of his texts and calls to his wife are unanswered. He asks for the manager, who tries to help but has no extra information. He suggests that Michael call the the police, which he does, but the detective who shows up can’t help him. The security footage shows Natalie and the kids leaving on their own, to a car that she had scheduled ahead of time. There were no menacing men with guns nearby. They all look safe and as if they are acting of their own volition, and since there is no custody order that Natalie is violating, she’s free to take the kids with her if she leaves him. There is no crime, so there is nothing the police can do.
Michael heads back home to try to figure out what’s happened, hoping for a call or text, and finally has to face the fact that Natalie has left him without a word, taking his kids somewhere that he doesn’t know about.
Natalie, meanwhile, has planned out an escape route to the home of an old friend. She hasn’t been in touch with her friend in many years, so she’s hoping that Michael won’t think to look for her there. And with what he’s done, she doesn’t care if he’s worried about the kids. She just wants to keep them safe. She wants to keep them safe from him and the secrets that he’s been keeping.
Because Natalie knows about his affair. And when that affair ends suddenly, Natalie believes that Michael killed her. But that’s only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the secrets that Michael has been keeping from her, so Natalie has no choice but to disappear.
But all this stress has been interfering with Natalie’s ability to sleep. One sleepless night after another is taking its toll. She’d been to her doctor and followed all the suggestions. Pills, teas, hot baths, reading, putting down screens, giving up caffeine—none of it helped her at all. Now she’s on the run and her exhaustion is making it increasingly hard to keep herself and the kids safe. She starts hearing things. And maybe she’s seeing things? But she knows the threat is real—the threat to her family, and the threat to her life.
Will she be able to outrun Michael and his deadly secrets, or will he come after her and make good on those threats?
My Wife Is Missing is the latest thriller from D.J. Palmer. This domestic chiller tells of the rift that can happen in a marriage when there are secrets. Add in the extreme stress of an illness like insomnia, and things get worse. And when you to the point where your insomnia makes you hallucinate, how can you know what’s true and what’s imagined? My Wife Is Missing takes a hard look at what it takes to keep a family together and what can rip it apart.
I have to admit that I struggled with this one. I found Michael hard to believe in. Even before he admitted to readers that he had secrets, I thought that he seemed disconnected with the rest of the family and lacked compassion toward his wife and what she was going through. I thought the premise of the book was good, the plotting was strong. I liked how it bounced around in time, offering up pieces of the puzzle from the past and the present. So for me, My Wife Is Missing is a good thriller, not a great one, but your mileage may vary.
Egalleys for My Wife Is Missing were provided by St. Martin’s Press through NetGalley, with many thanks.
