Second chances

In Carla Buckley's intriguing 2019 novel The Liar's Child, there is so much lying going on that it is never quite clear to whom the title refers. And this proves to be a good thing when truth eventually wins out.

Sara Lennox gets a new life as part of the witness protection program, though she has no intention of staying around to testify. Her father taught her never to cooperate with the authorities. In the meantime she lives in an apartment near North Carolina's Outer Banks and works in a dreary job cleaning places rented by tourists.

Her neighbors are a troubled family. The beautiful wife accidentally left Boon, their preschool son, in a hot car for hours. The child survived, but now a child welfare worker checks up on them frequently. Whit, the husband, seems out of his depth, especially after his wife disappears. Cassie, their daughter just entering her teens, has become rebellious and dependent. She frequently escapes her homelife by dangerously leaping from one balcony to another and exiting through Sara's apartment.

Then comes a hurricane. With their mother missing and their father busy elsewhere, the kids look to Sara as their reluctant rescuer. She can think only of ditching the kids so that she can disappear into another new life.

But then, of course, things happen, and she finds a new life she never expected.

Buckley keeps things moving and the suspense building. Her novel is never quite a thriller and never quite a mystery, although there are elements of each. Mostly it is a novel of second chances and unexpected saviors.