Just The Nicest Couple Couple by Mary Kubica

Just the Nicest Couple by Mary Kubica

Published by Park Row ISBN 9780778333111

Hardcover, $28.99, 320 pages

As Mary Kubica's twist domestic suspense novel Just the Nicest Couple opens, a woman is running through the woods as some unkown person is chasing her. Who is she and who is she running from?

Christian, a financial analyst, comes home from work to find his wife Lily exhausted in a chair. Lily is a high school math teacher and she is pregnant, in her first trimester. They are thrilled to be having a baby, but after a few miscarriages, they are also cautious.

Although he is concerned that Lily is more tired than usual, Christian dotes on his wife and offers to bring her dinner in bed so she can rest. Lily seems overly worried that the doors are locked, she thinks she sees something or someone outside their home.

Nina is a teacher at Lily's school and her husband Jake is a reknowned neurosurgeon. Nina and Jake have a fight one morning, and when Jake storms off and doesn't return home from work, Nina thinks he is staying at a hotel to punish her. 

But when Jake's hospital calls to find out why he has missed appointments with patients, Nina goes to the police to report him missing.  Word about Jake gets around, and Lily tells Christian that she saw Jake in the wooded area where she was taking a walk and shares what happened when they spoke.

Christian and Lily decide that no one can know what happened between Lily and Jake that day. And so begins a series of bad decisions they make that could have far reaching repercussions. Nina doesn't think that the police are doing enough to find Jake, so she begins searching for answers herself.

Nina and Jake and Christian and Lily are couple friends- they have been out to dinner together, at each other's homes, at school functions together. But how well do they really know each other?

There are a lot of secrets in Just the Nicest Couple, and just when you think you know what has happened, Mary Kubica throws in some twists that most readers (including myself- one of those twists really comes out of left field) did not see coming.  She expertly builds the tension in some key scenes that are just made for a good TV movie.

If you are fan of twisty suspense novels that keep you turning the pages to see what happens next, Just the Nicest Couple is one not to miss.

Thanks to Harlequin Books for putting me on their Winter 2023 Mystery/Thriller Blog Tour.