Krysten’s Review

CONTAINS SPOILERS!

You can’t save everyone. Sometimes you just have to save yourself.

Erin and Mark are sickeningly happy. The kind of couple that has sex every single day and it’s always amazing, who have pet names and miss each other when they’re apart, who risk their lives for each other. The kind of couple you hate just because they are so happy.

But you can’t always see what’s lurking below the surface.

Just as they are starting their lives together as a married couple, they find Something in the Water during their honeymoon that changes everything. Thus begins a sequence of events that is as riveting as it is unbelievable. I admit I had to suspend my disbelief in order to get past the fact that some rich Russian thugs were hunting them down AND the police were investigating Erin in connection with terrorism, all while they are opening Swiss bank accounts and selling a bag of diamonds and going about their regular everyday business. Simultaneously. Within the space of a couple of weeks. But, I suppose, “That’s the way life works, isn’t it—nothing, and then everything at once.” Although farfetched, having that many problems all at once makes it more difficult to figure out who the “bad guy” really is.

I found myself cringing at Erin’s naiveté and mentally smacking her upside the head for being so dumb/impulsive/thoughtless/secretive/risky. She knew everything she was doing was incredibly stupid, yet she kept chugging along. Turning on the phone was the worst possible thing she could have done…everyone who’s watched Law & Order or NCIS knows that. Trusting and confiding in Eddie was a huge gamble. And how did she not realize immediately that Patrick wasn’t from the prison? Hell, taking the bag in the first place was far from a brilliant idea. But even I didn’t see Mark’s betrayal coming until right before Erin realizes it herself.

There’s only so far planning can take you, then you just have to wait and see what happens.

In the end, everything fit together perfectly: Erin had a perfectly believable explanation, and she didn’t have to come clean about the bag or the plane crash or anything they’d done. Everything except Mark. Did he really love her? (He had to have loved her—it’s not like she was rich from the beginning, to justify marrying her and then betraying her.) If he did love her, how could he have betrayed her like that? What was his ultimate plan—to kill her, or just disappear with the money, without a trace? When did he come up with this plan—in the middle of their honeymoon? And why did he turn on her out of the blue? It’s not like he could have been planning that for the entirety of their relationship, and he couldn’t have known anything like that would ever happen. Or did he just decide to seize the opportunity when it presented itself? And if so, why did he even marry Erin at all? Oh, and, one other thing: What the heck was on that flash drive?!

I did find parts of this novel tedious: Erin’s long inner monologues (with the same questions over and over), the educational info dumps (the significance of the size of champagne bubbles?), lengthy dialogue with no interruption (no one talks that long without doing something!), the fully transcribed phone conversations (we don’t need to hear them from hello to goodbye). That said, it was still an excellent book, one I may have to read again later to pick up on the subtle hints I’m sure I missed before…. and I will definitely pick up Steadman’s next book!

Special thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing for an advance copy of this book!