Quick Synopsis

In this stunningly twisty thriller from #1 New York Times bestselling author Harlan Coben, a secret from former Detective Sami Kierce’s college days comes back to haunt him. His memory is clear, but all these years later, the facts don’t add up…which is something he cannot ignore.

Publisher’s Synopsis

Sami Kierce, a young college grad backpacking in Spain with friends, wakes up one morning, covered in blood. There’s a knife in his hand. Beside him, the body of his girlfriend. Anna. Dead. He doesn’t know what happened. His screams drown out his thoughts—and then he runs. 

Twenty-two years later, Kierce, now a private investigator, is a new father who’s working off his debts by doing low level surveillance jobs and teaching wannabe sleuths at a night school in New York City. One evening, he recognizes a familiar face at the back of the classroom. Anna. It’s unmistakably her. As soon as Kierce makes eye contact with her, she bolts. For Kierce there is no choice. He knows he must find this woman and solve the impossible mystery that has haunted his every waking moment since that terrible day. 

His investigation will bring him face-to-face with his past—and prove, after all this time, he’s nobody’s fool.

Book Review

Nobody’s Fool is the second novel featuring former detective Sami Kierce. (Kierce originally appeared in Harlan’s 2016 novel, Tell No One.) This story centers on Kierce’s own story beginning the summer after his college graduation. Before attending medical school, Kierce takes off to backpack through Europe with some friends. However, he decides to stay behind in Spain when he meets a young woman. In present day, as a disgraced former detective, Kierce teaches night classes and works as a PI for a law firm. During one of his classes, the woman Kierce thought he murdered in Spain 22 years prior appears, leading him on a chase to discover what really happened all those years ago.

As usual, Coben has written a fast-paced, intriguing story that will demand to be read in one sitting. I am always pleasantly surprised by his ability to create twists I do not see coming. As someone who typically guesses the twist or ending early on, this is one of the things that keeps me coming back to Coben’s books. In Nobody’s Fool, I was once again blindsided by the plot’s unveiling. This also means that Coben has again created a novel plot that you will not find elsewhere.

However, I did not love Nobody’s Fool and found a few things that could be improved. A few pages into the novel, Coben includes some disappointing Boomer fodder about political correctness. This unfortunately is not the first time in his recent releases that I have found some cringe, generational-based criticism that nearly turns me off the book. In addition, after starting off with a bang, I found that the pacing relented some, slowing in the middle. I would not have noticed the decrease in pace if some of the interesting, quirky side characters (Kierce’s students) were more developed. However, these sidekicks are opaque, one-dimensional characters used as props in moving the plot forward, rather than substantive characters.

Despite this book being the second in a new series, you can definitely read it as a standalone. I read Tell No One about 5 years ago and remember little of it. (I tried to watch the Netflix adaptation; however, so much was changed that it did little to refresh my memory.) The only thing you miss out on if you skip Tell No One is presumably Sami Kierce’s character development. Usually, I think Coben is excellent at creating full-fleshed out characters, particularly for a thriller writer. However, I felt like Coben skipped delving into Kierce’s past and building depth to his character. I assume that this is partly because that was done in the prior novel. Consequently, I never felt connected to the character or fully invested in the story’s outcome.

Overall, Nobody’s Fool is a solid, fast-paced thriller with twists you will not see coming. Despite some flaws, I still recommend this book if you are looking for an original, fast-paced, popcorn thriller.

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