2009 mystery-adjacent; the Spellmans are a dysfunctional family of
private investigators, but narrator Izzy is trying to get away from
that. Of course it won't last.
Indeed, there isn't really much progress for Izzy: she starts in
a moderately bad mental place, gets worse, and ends up in a somewhat
better one, but I have no reason to believe she's learned anything and
it won't happen again with similar bad decisions.
In spite of the court-mandated therapy.
ISABEL: I don't want to lie to you, Dr. Rush.
DR. RUSH: I'm flattered.
ISABEL: I don't want to tell you the truth, either.
Insofar as there's an actual investigation, well, a favour for a
friend leads to the PI classic of a husband who's worried his wife's
having an affair, and while there's no sign of that there's clearly
something a bit odd going on. (Not to mention that there's another
private investigator involved.) But this is very much the background
to the story of Izzy's messed-up life, and the messed-up lives of the
people she meets. (Often it isn't even her fault.)
Meanwhile Izzy's brother has a sudden personality change, her parents
want her to come back into the PI business, her sister causes chaos
and confusion through a combination of well-meaning interference and
self-interest, various friends move away… it's more of the same, but
it's more of the same done very well, and I haven't read anything else
that does this good a job of making a very messed-up person
interesting to read about and even sympathetic.
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