Every Waking Hour

Starred review from October 26, 2020
Schaffhausen’s excellent fourth novel featuring Ellery Hathaway, who as a teen was the sole survivor of a serial murderer/kidnapper, and Reed Markham, the FBI agent who rescued her (after 2020’s All the Best Lies), finds Ellery and Reed, now in a romantic relationship, enjoying a street fair with his seven-year-old daughter in the Boston Common. When 12-year-old Chloe Lockhart vanishes from the fair, Ellery, still on tryout as a Boston PD detective, latches onto the case, seeing parallels with her own history; her captain is thrilled that renowned profiler Reed can assist. A theory soon emerges that Chloe was escaping the strict surveillance of her wealthy parents, Martin and Teresa Lockhart. This is not Teresa’s first tragedy—20 years earlier her son from her first marriage was murdered when he was 12 years old, along with her housekeeper. Tight plotting and sophisticated surprises fuel the rich storytelling. Schaffhausen layers much emotion into each tension-filled twist as she deepens Ellery and Reed’s characters. Readers will eagerly await their further adventures. Agent: Jill Marsal, Marsal Lyon Literary.

November 15, 2020
A child's disappearance triggers dark memories for a Boston cop. Ellery Hathaway's idyllic day with her lover, Reed Markham, and his young daughter, Tula, at Boston Common turns horribly wrong when 12-year-old Chloe Lockhart, another Common visitor, goes missing. Ellery, a Boston police detective, and Reed, an FBI Special Agent, take on the investigation. It's a red flag when Chloe's father, Martin, calls his attorney, Stephen Wintour, into a meeting at the police station. Chloe's well-paid nanny, Margery, who was supposed to be watching the girl, is the first to fall under scrutiny. Then Chloe's mother, Teresa, drops a bombshell: Several years ago, while she was married to her first husband, her son was kidnapped and killed. Ellery and her partner, Dorie, begin their probe with Margery's husband, Frank, who has a criminal record, then move to Chloe's parents. Meanwhile, Reed uses his considerable resources to get to work profiling. An anonymous tipster claims that Martin's having an affair with his employee Amanda McFarland. The story follows a traditional template as the sleuths question Chloe's friends, scour her room for clues, delve into her online activity, and follow every obscure lead that promises to lead them to yet another. Schaffhausen's prose is similarly measured and deliberate. Shadowing the investigation is Ellery's painful past, which is doled out in tidbits. A solid but formulaic procedural that should satisfy the heroine's fans but may frustrate newcomers.

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December 17, 2020
In their fourth series pairing (after All the Best Lies, 2020), Boston detective Ellery Hathaway and FBI agent Reed Markham are navigating the intricacies of a long-distance relationship, complicated by Ellery's lingering PTSD. (They first met when Reed was a rookie cop, freeing teenage Ellery from a serial killer's closet prison.) Reed and his daughter have barely settled in for a weekend visit before Ellery and Reed are pulled into a missing-child case: 12-year-old Chloe Lockhart has vanished from a busy Boston street. For a sheltered child, Chloe somehow faced multiple threats, especially from a lecherous friend of her father's. Teresa and Martin Lockhart's stifling, overprotective rules make a runaway scenario seem viable, but the revelation that Teresa's son, Trevor, was murdered before Chloe's birth suggests further complications. Schaffhausen's ability to generate suspense and her nuanced depiction of tangled relationships hold strong appeal, but veteran crime-fiction readers may find that the mystery is wrapped up a bit too theatrically.

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