The Vanishing Year by Kate Moretti

Published by Atria Books on September 27, 2016

The seemingly perfect boyfriend who turns out to be a dangerous and demented husband has been a popular thriller theme in recent years. Popular to the point of being overused, as writers strive to find a new twist to place on a story that is getting old. Kate Moretti does that, but the twist isn’t convincing. The novel as a whole, however, has modest entertainment value.

Pretty but poor Zoe Swanson was wooed by handsome and wealthy Henry Whittaker while she was working in a florist’s shop. The man who was charming and kind during courtship becomes cold and vaguely threatening as soon they exchange wedding vows. After that, he vacillates between being attentive and distant. Henry isolates himself with people of his own social standing. He doesn’t share his thoughts with Zoe, and he complains that Zoe too often shares her thoughts about Carolyn, the mother who abandoned her. His summer home has a mysterious locked room. All of that is a little too familiar.

Zoe is trying to keep her past a secret -- she used to be Hilary Lawlor, a woman most people believe is dead -- and has managed to do so for five years, ever since Hilary vanished into the night. Hilary/Zoe is, of course, a good person who does some moderately bad things -- but not bad enough to lose the reader’s sympathy. She witnessed a crime and decided to disappear rather than playing the role of a pawn in a game between the government and the criminals it was prosecuting. The contrived backstory lacks the detail that would be required to make it convincing. It’s the usual sad story of modern fictional heroines. The effort to manipulate the reader’s emotions is a little too obvious to provoke genuine sympathy.

With its premise established, the novel moves forward with Zoe’s new life. It seems that someone is trying to kill Zoe, and therein lies the plot. Or at least, that should be the plot, but the story is actually more of a family drama involving Zoe/Hilary and her mother and her husband and a reporter who has a crush on her. The book builds little tension until the last 30 or 40 pages. The story seems to be in search of a theme as it meanders its way to a conclusion. Billed as a psychological thriller, The Vanishing Year packs few thrills into its pages. I won’t spoil any surprises, but I can say that the family drama is more soap opera than drama.

Kate Moretti’s prose style is fine. Other than Hilary/Zoe, her characters have little depth, and Hilary/Zoe’s depth comes from a backstory that’s just too familiar. Henry, in particular, is a hollow cypher. Moretti provides no explanation for his devious, psychopathic nature.

It is nevertheless worth hanging in for the resolution of the various plotlines. Again, the resolution is not entirely convincing -- Zoe has a chance at the end to resolve her problem but she chooses instead to place herself in continuing danger -- although the ending is more entertaining than its setup. Still, the story is too contrived and the characters too shallow to merit giving The Vanishing Year an enthusiastic recommendation. Fans of chick lit might like it more than I did.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS