An enormously gratifying crime novel featuring the Pool sisters—two estranged twin sisters with an unusual past take to the road on the hunt for their elusive mother.
HARD GIRLS
by J. Robert Lennon
Mulholland Books, Summer 2024
(via Sterling Lord Literistic)
Jean Pool has put her dark past behind her and is trying to live a peaceful life—caring for her daughter, enduring her bad marriage, and tending to her absentminded professor father—when a suspicious email lands in her inbox. It looks like spam, but she knows it’s a code—from her, Lila, the estranged twin sister Jean hasn’t seen in a decade. Against her better judgement, she responds, and learns that their mother, missing since they were teenagers and presumed dead, has resurfaced.
There’s nothing Jean wants less than to find the woman who abandoned them when they needed her most. But the mystery of their family’s past haunts her, and she agrees to a cross-country road trip to track Annabel Pool down and discover the secrets of their childhood. On the way, Jean and Lila must confront the horrific tragedy that turned them into runaways and eventually tore them apart.
Jean and Lila encounter gunrunners and conspiracy theorists, stalkers and spies, and uncover a decades-old secret that returns them to their youth—and to a shameful chapter in American history. Mystery, suspense, espionage, and family drama intersect in this smart thriller from the author of Castle and Broken River.
J. Robert Lennon is the author of ten novels, including Familiar, Broken River, and Subdivision, and the story collections Pieces for the Left Hand, See You in Paradise, and Let Me Think. He lives in Ithaca, New York.