The Book of Secrets

Description

Chloe has been with her husband Nate since she was 8 years old when the two bonded over the Narnia series, an adventure that began Chloe’s love for fiction. Now, Chloe and Nate are married and own a specialized antique bookstore. Chloe is horrified and confused when Nate leaves one day without explanation, saying only that he had something that needed to be taken care of and that he had no idea when he might return.

As she searches for clues to his whereabouts, Chloe comes across a notebook hidden inside an antique copy of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, written in the code she and Nate used as children. Using novels from their childhood to slowly decode his messages, she embarks on a mission to find out why he would disappear without a word.

Nate’s family, with his mother and two beautiful sisters, were all largely sequestered from the rest of the world by their puritanical father who monitored their every move. But Chloe knows that the family has hidden dark secrets. What really happened when the girls finally escaped their father’s home many years later? Could Nate’s disappearance be somehow related to the role his father may have played in the death of a family member?

The Book of Secrets takes a fascinating look at a troubled marriage and the darkness the Sinclair family tries to hide. Filled with an underlying adoration for the written word, love for the very feel/scent of a book in the hand, and references from novels as diverse as Crime and Punishment and Where the Wild Things Are, The Book of Secrets is a novel for anyone who has ever stayed up late to finish just one more chapter.

By Elizabeth Joy Arnold