The Last Thing He Told Me (Hannah Hall Book One) by Laura Dave

 

The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave.

Published 13th April 2021 from Viper.

From the cover of the book:

IT WAS THE LAST THING HE TOLD ME: PROTECT HER

Before Owen Michaels disappears, he manages to smuggle a note to his new wife, Hannah: protect her. Hannah knows exactly who Owen needs her to protect - his teenage daughter, Bailey, who lost her mother tragically as a child. And who wants absolutely nothing to do with her new stepmother.

As her desperate calls to Owen go unanswered, his boss is arrested for fraud and the police start questioning her, Hannah realises that her husband isn't who he said he was. And that Bailey might hold the key to discovering Owen's true identity, and why he disappeared. Together they set out to discover the truth. But as they start putting together the pieces of Owen's past, they soon realise that their lives will never be the same again...

Now a major Apple TV+ series starring Jennifer Garner and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, discover the book that everyone is talking about...

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On the day Owen Michaels disappears, he sends his new wife Hannah a mysterious message asking her to protect his sixteen-year-old daughter, Bailey. Then the news breaks that Owen's boss has been arrested, on suspicion of massive corporate fraud, and the police are looking for Owen.

Hannah has no idea where her husband has gone, her calls to him go unanswered, and she is at a loss about how to respond to the searching questions the police are asking her. But the one thing she is sure of is that she must do her best to carry out his request - even if Bailey wants nothing to do with her step-mother.

As Hannah's life comes crashing down, she decides to look into what Owen has been up to herself. She is shocked to discover that all he has told her about his past appears to be a lie. Who is this man she has married, and what is he really running from?

This gripping story unfolds through the perspective of Hannah, alternating between her desperate search for the truth in the present, and flashbacks to significant moments in her relationship with the man she knows as Owen Michaels. Hannah is determined to make sense of this mess, relying on what she feels she knows about the man she loves, rather than the ever growing number of lies that reveal themselves once she begins to question Owen's version of his past. She gradually realises that Bailey holds the key to finding out why Owen and his daughter are living under assumed identities, and the two of them embark on a cross-country journey that leads them into danger - caught between an F.B.I. investigation into fraud, the attentions of a US Marshall with unknown motives, long-held grudges on the part of some very bad people, and shocking information about who Owen and Bailey really are.

I loved how the gritty, and surprisingly emotional, threads of this story come together, twisting and turning as Hannah and Bailey follow a murky trail of clues drawn from Bailey's earliest memories and the nuggets of truth Hannah mines from her interactions with Owen. The relationship between Hannah and Bailey develops beautifully over the course of the story, as they both come to terms with the life-changing things they discover - the transformation from spiky hostility on Bailey's side to acceptance that she can rely on Hannah, and the strength Hannah finds from her own traumatic childhood, are especially heart-warming.

Dave's writing flows so well, and I enjoy how she explores some very knotty themes in her books, especially when it comes to family. Here she delves into abandonment, dysfunctional relationship dynamics, and the power of love to both blind you to the faults of your loved ones and cause you to take make of break decisions to ensure their safety. This all adds so much depth to the excellently wielded thriller elements.

I picked this one up ahead of reading the brand new sequel Dave has penned, The First Time I Saw Him - and I am so glad I did, because it establishes the unbreakable bond between Hannah, Owen and Bailey. And that killer last line! Right in the feels! I cannot wait to find out what happens next...

The Last Thing He Told Me is available to buy now in paperback, ebook and audio formats.

About the author:

Laura Dave was born in New York City and grew up in Scarsdale, New York. She graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a BA in English, and went on to gain an MFA from the University of Virginia's creative writing program. She was a Henry Hoyns Fellow and a recipient of the Tennessee Williams Scholarship.

She is the national and international bestselling author of Eight Hundred Grapes, London is the City in America, The Divorce Party, The First Husband, Hello, Sunshine, The Last Thing He Told Me, The Night We Lost Him, and The First Time I Saw Him. Her fiction and essays have appeared in The New York Times, Oprah Magazine, Glamour, Redbook, The Huffington Post and The New York Observer. In 2008, Cosmopolitan named her a 'Fun and Fearless Phenom of the Year'.

She is married to Oscar-winning screenwriter Josh Singer, with whom she resides in Los Angeles, California.