Spoilers for this book and its predecessor, The ̶P̶e̶r̶f̶e̶c̶t̶ Marriage.
I’m all in Jeneva Rose at this juncture, so when her sequel to her debut novel in 2020, The ̶P̶e̶r̶f̶e̶c̶t̶ Marriage came out this year, aptly titled, The ̶P̶e̶r̶f̶e̶c̶t̶ Divorce, I gobbled it up. These two books certainly owe a debt to the influence of Gillian Flynn’s 2012 book Gone Girl, as Sarah Morgan is essentially Amy Dunne and the book interplays between unreliable narrators (except for the sheriff).
Where the The ̶P̶e̶r̶f̶e̶c̶t̶ Marriage left off is Sarah having gotten away with killing Kelly Summer, the woman her husband, Adam, cheated on, framing him for the deed (while publicly defending him as his criminal defense attorney), and seeing him executed for it nearly a decade later. As I mentioned in my review of the first book, I didn’t like being misled about Sarah being a brutal killer since I was rooting for her against Adam. At least going into the sequel, readers know exactly who Sarah is, which actually presented a challenge to Rose to fool us about what was going on. I’m not entirely sure she succeeded, but as with all of Rose’s books I’ve read to date, I enjoyed the ride, nonetheless.
So, we know Sarah married Bob, whose brother, Greg, was ostensibly killed by Jenna Way (who changed her name to Kelly Summer). When police and prosecutors were unable to pin her for the murder, it was thought when she was killed perhaps Bob had something to do with it. Easy motive. Kelly’s new husband was Scott, a police officer, who may have helped her escape charges in the killing of Greg. Kelly also was sleeping with the then Sheriff of the town where all this takes place, Sheriff Stevens. Scott was constantly going after Adam, who he thought killed Kelly. I believe we knew a third set of DNA was found on Kelly’s body; it’s revealed to be Stevens’ DNA in the sequel. When Scott learns of this, he kills the former disgraced sheriff at the local hospital. Back to Sarah and Bob: We also knew they had a child together weirdly named Summer (Sarah later says it’s an ode to Kelly and her unborn child she brutally murdered, but I take it as psychopathic), and are — you guessed it — on the path to divorce. Bob cheated on Sarah with a woman named Stacy. I’m surprised Rose used the cheating angle again since that’s what Adam did, or maybe it’s intentional.
That’s all table setting for me to begin wrapping my brain around the web Rose weaved. Interestingly, I had a few plot problems with the first book Rose buttons up in the sequel. Mainly, I was perturbed Sarah, as a criminal defense attorney, was working so closely with the sheriff on seeing an active crime scene. But this is explained by the corruptness of the sheriff. Fortunately, in the sequel, Sheriff Hudson and his wife, also a deputy, Deputy Olson, are good cops (in the sense of being on the right side of the law), who are earnest about solving the cases. They’re just duped by Sarah, like everyone is duped by Sarah.
Bob thinks he has leverage on Sarah, though. The murder weapon from the Kelly slaying: a bloody knife. Before Sarah can “Adam him,” Bob wants to expose her. But what an idiot! How could he possibly think Sarah, his wife of 10 years he readily acknowledges is unbelievably cunning, with a nearly impeccable sense of forethought, would hand over the murder weapon to him?! All along the way, Sarah is leaving breadcrumbs to make Bob look bad, so she can divorce him and have Summer all to herself. Stacy, the woman he slept with, disappears, with incriminating text messages left behind. A second woman, Carissa, also disappears. She is a hairdresser and her last client before her disappearance was Bob. Sarah also files a protection order against Bob alleging anger and abuse. Everything is coming up Bob! Moreover, the other point of leverage for Bob — putting a tracker on Sarah’s car — she is well aware of and uses her company vehicles to fool him.
Speaking of the company, Sarah works for the Morgan Foundation, a nonprofit she established to give second chances to persons with felony records. Through the Foundation, which Bob is a board member of, Sarah meets Alejandro, the 50th such person they’ve helped give a second chance to. All this foundation truly is is another way for Sarah to “look good” with the public. It’s a ruse. Anyhow, I figured Sarah was going to use Alejandro to off Bob. Then I was fooled because it was actually Bob using Alejandro to off Sarah. But Sarah, being the omniscient woman she is, figured as much. So, when Alejandro went to shoot her, she was ready with a gun of her own. She drags out of Alejandro that Bob actually did intend to kill Jenna, or Kelly, all those years ago, but that was before Greg’s murder! What was Bob’s motive then?! Because apparently Bob was into “something shady,” and he needed to kill Jenna before she could expose him. Instead, Alejandro encountered Greg and killed him instead, unbeknownst to Bob. Sarah pays Alejandro $250,000 not to kill her and they stage a fake death as proof of Alejandro killing her to send to Bob. Bob, being the idiot he is (much like Adam), falls for it.
And instead of killing Stacy like she killed Kelly, Sarah this time is the one who orchestrated her kidnapping. She also made it appear like Carissa was also kidnapped and probably murdered. Carissa wanted to escape an abusive boyfriend, so Sarah agreed to help by concocting a plan to fake Carissa’s death by leaving enough of her blood behind to make it seem like nobody could survive that. Then, when Bob cheated, it became convenient to put her death on him. But what was the plan if Bob hadn’t cheated? Just fake the death anyhow? But Stacy, of course, doesn’t know any of this. When Sarah pretends to “kill” Carissa at the abandoned farmhouse where she’s keeping Stacy, it frightens her and puts her over the edge. When Bob comes to the farmhouse (using the tracker he had on Sarah’s car), Stacy shoots him dead, thinking he’s the killer and kidnapper. (Sarah left a gun behind for Stacy to “discover”).
Sarah gets away with it again: She frames Bob for the abduction of Stacy, the seeming murder of Carissa, and even for Kelly’s death (Sarah left the knife used to kill her in Bob’s apartment), and makes herself seem the victim in all of it twice, first because the county killed Adam through a wrongful conviction and execution, and second, because she was taken advantage of by Bob, a predator and killer. And of course, she has Summer all to herself now. To top it off, a federal jury in Virginia awarded her $32 million for Adam’s wrongful death. Which, I should note, Sarah’s mother-in-law, Adam’s mom, died before seeing him vindicated. I wonder if Sarah had something to do with that?! A year after the main events of the book, 60 Minutes does a glowing profile of Sarah’s “generosity and compassion.” She’s fooled everyone. To be fair, Hudson and Olson are somewhat skeptical of how tidy everything is, as they should be, given Sarah’s two husbands who cheated on her ended up dead and suspected (even if one was cleared) of murder, but it doesn’t go further than that.
Rose teases in her Acknowledgments that her Sarah Morgan fun isn’t over yet. I don’t see how you could run this formula a third time. We know Sarah knows all and always one-ups the man! The only two parts of the book that surprised me were Alejandro actually working with Bob and Bob trying to kill Jenna before Greg’s death. Otherwise, I presumed Sarah was behind everything to set-up Bob and she was. Still, like I said, I enjoyed the ride as always with Rose. It’s just fun silliness, what can I say!
Milam's Musings 