The Son’s Secret     

                              by Daryl Wood Gerber

Maggie Lawson life is pretty stressful. Her job as the dean of a small college in New Orleans involves lots of demanding parents and a couch who is facing sexual harassment charges. Her son’s girlfriend was killed in a hit-and-run accident, and he married his dead girlfriend’s best friend. She has money problems because her house flooded, and she has to pay for her mother’s rather expensive care facility. Her husband divorced her and married his girlfriend. And now her son Aiden seems to be ghosting her. Maggie feels that his conduct isn’t normal for him and starts being afraid that something has happened to him.

At first, everyone tells her that she is overreacting. She feels guilty about being a helicopter mom, but her feeling that he is in trouble grows as she finds out more about his life and feels that his texts to her are not written by him. His wife Celine finally admits that he left her, and she doesn’t know where he is. When her investigative reporter husband is shot, and Aiden doesn’t even get in touch with him it only increases her fear.

I must admit that I found some aspects of this book annoying. It takes quite a while for Maggie to convince herself that there is a problem and a long time to get everyone else on board. Even though it seems obvious that something bad is happening to Aiden, I imagine that it would be hard to convince the police since there isn’t much evidence. But I expected more interest when his father was shot, and no one knows where Aiden is.

When everyone finally gets on board, the book ends up having red herrings, twists and turns, and many people of interest. I became invested in trying to find out what could have possibly happened to Aiden.

Gerber writes a lot of mysteries, cozy mysteries, and Romances. She has several series including the Fairy Garden mystery series which I enjoy reading. Sometimes it’s nice to include a little magic in your reading. Last April she added a fourth book to her fairy series, “A Twinkle of Trouble.” In October 2024 she is starting a new literary dining series with “Murder on the Page.”

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