Kennedy's second novel shares elements with her debut, Tornado Weather (2017)--small-town Indiana setting, flawed characters, a mystery revolving around a missing girl--but with a tighter plot. Down on her luck, Jenny has unpaid bills, a house on the verge of foreclosure, and a daughter, Billie Starr, who keeps a book of sorries because that's all she ever seems to hear from her mother. Out of desperation, Jenny takes a job from two mysterious men to seduce the Candidate. The plan works but Jenny never sees the mysterious men again, or her money. The Candidate, however, thoroughly enchanted by Jenny's beauty, offers her a job at his campaign office. When Billie Starr goes missing, and the incompetent town cops (who are all related to Billie Starr's deadbeat dad) offer no help, Jenny starts investigating for herself. While the second half of the book, after Billie Starr's disappearance, often feels like an entirely different book from the first half, Kennedy once again proves her expertise in writing about small towns and the characters that inhabit them.

A down-on-her-luck single mom takes a job that ends up changing her life--and endangering her family--in this funny yet bitingly realistic look at small-town life. In the town of Benson, Indiana, Jenny Newberg is having a hard time. She can't pay her bills, her ex (and the father of her daughter) won't leave her alone, her mother criticizes every choice she makes, and she's always disappointing her daughter, Billie Starr, a second grader. So when mysterious men in black suits approach and ask her to do one simple job--seduce a man running for governor so they can take down his campaign--she agrees. The job isn't as easy as she'd expected, though. The men never pay her, and the man running for governor asks her to work as his receptionist. With no better job prospects on the horizon and a debt collector knocking on her door, Jenny agrees. Soon, she finds herself fielding mysterious phone calls, getting threatening faxes, and wondering what, exactly, she's been caught up in. At the same time, Jenny has to deal with the eccentric characters in her life--her newly engaged mother, the neighbor who's known for wielding a crossbow in public, the annoyingly perfect moms at school, and everyone else who seems out to get her. But it's when the mysterious callers threaten what Jenny loves most that her life really starts to spiral out of control. Kennedy excels at writing quirky characters and entertaining dialogue, but what sets the story apart is the shimmering thread of dread that runs through all of Jenny's thoughts and interactions. Although Kennedy imbues Jenny's life with the sparkle of humor, the quiet desperation of her sometimes-bleak existence grounds the story in reality. A grim literary mystery and a hopeful family story, this genre-blending novel manages to be both charming and heartbreaking. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Fired for defending herself from a sexual assault by her boss, Jenny Newberg is desperate to find a way to support herself and her bright young daughter, Billie Starr. Finding work is nearly impossible when other business owners blacklist her in their small Indiana town. When strangers approach her with a proposition to seduce a candidate running for governor, she accepts the job. The promised payment never appears, but the candidate, charmed by her beauty, tracks her down and convinces her to work for him at his campaign headquarters. As they get ready for the election season, Jenny spends less time with her daughter and relies on family and friends to help watch Billie Starr. On the night of the campaign launch party, Billie Starr goes missing, and Jenny must overcome her fear of inadequacy to find the confidence within herself to save her daughter. VERDICT Kennedy's second novel (after Edgar-nominated Tornado Weather) adeptly delves into the intricacies of interpersonal relationships within small-town life, much like Elizabeth Strout's Olive Kitteridge.--Joy Gunn

Edgar finalist Kennedy follows her debut, Tornado Weather, with an enthralling suspense thriller. Unmarried 28-year-old Jenny Newberg, who lives in Benson, Ind., a small town where "you might meet yourself on the street, coming and going," is always apologizing for everything. Meanwhile, her precocious eight-year-old daughter, Billie Starr, and a school friend record her "sorries" in a book. They plan to publish it, not for the money but "for the good of the world." Despite all Jenny's apologies, "nothing ever gets better." Until it seems it might, when two men in black suits offer Jenny the chance to get out of debt--if she wears a wire while seducing the Candidate, a married man who's running for high political office. Jenny's rendezvous with the Candidate at a hotel is supposed to change her and Billie's lives. It does. But not exactly the way Jenny hoped. The Candidate endears himself to Jenny, fixing her furnace and being attentive to Billie. Yet something seems off kilter. When Billie goes missing after a Christmas field trip to Chicago, Jenny goes into high gear to find her, and, in the process, herself. The tension rises as the real intent behind the seduction scheme unfolds. Exquisite prose matches deep characterization. Kennedy deserves to win an Edgar with this captivating sophomore effort. Agent: Yishai Seidman, Dunow, Carlson & Lerner. (Oct.)