Sliver of Truth (Ridley Jones series #2)
Lisa Unger, 2007
Crown Publishing
368 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780307338495
Summary
Ridley Jones is being careful about where she steps and trying to get on with her life when a seemingly mundane act—picking up a few envelopes of prints at a photo lab—puts her at the nexus of a global network of crime. A shadowy figure of a man appears in almost every picture she’s taken in the last year, lurking just far enough away to make identification impossible. Now the FBI is at her door, some serious bad guys are following her every move, and the family she once loved and relied on is more distant than ever.
The only thing Ridley knows for sure is that she has to get to the truth about herself and her past if she’s ever going to find her way home. Charged with relentless intensity and kinetic action, playing out with unnerving suspense on the streets of New York and London, and seen through the terrified but determined eyes of a young woman whose body and heart are pushed to the point of shattering, Sliver of Truth is another triumph from the New York Times bestselling author of Beautiful Lies. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—April 26, 1970
• Where—New Haven, Connecticut, USA
• Reared—The Netherlands, UK, and New Jersey, USA
• Education—New School for Social Research
• Currently—lives in Florida
Lisa Unger is an award winning New York Times, USA Today and international bestselling author. Her novels have been published in over 26 countries around the world.
She was born in New Haven, Connecticut (1970) but grew up in the Netherlands, England and New Jersey. A graduate of the New School for Social Research, Lisa spent many years living and working in New York City. She then left a career in publicity to pursue her dream of becoming a full-time author. She now lives in Florida with her husband and daughter.
Her writing has been hailed as "masterful" (St. Petersburg Times), "sensational" (Publishers Weekly) and "sophisticated" (New York Daily News) with "gripping narrative and evocative, muscular prose" (Associated Press).
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Her own words:
I have always most naturally expressed myself through writing and I have always dwelled in the land of my imagination more comfortably than in reality. There’s a jolt I get from a good story that I’m not sure can be duplicated in the real world. Perhaps this condition came about because of all the traveling my family did when I was younger. I was born in Connecticut but we moved often. By the time my family settled for once and all in New Jersey, I had already lived in Holland and in England (not to mention Brooklyn and other brief New Jersey stays) for most of my childhood. I don’t recall ever minding moving about; even then I had a sense that it was cool and unusual. But I think it was one of many things that kept me feeling separate from the things and people around me, this sense of myself as transient and on the outside, looking in. I don’t recall ever exactly fitting in anywhere. Writers are first and foremost observers … and one can’t truly observe unless she stands apart.
For a long time, I didn’t really believe that it was possible to make a living as a writer … mainly because that’s what people always told me. So, I made it a hobby. All through high school, I won awards and eventually, a partial scholarship because of my writing. In college, I was advised by teachers to pursue my talent, to get an agent, to really go for it. But there was a little voice that told me (quietly but insistently) that it wasn’t possible. I didn’t see it as a viable career option as I graduated from the New School for Social Research (I transferred there from NYU for smaller, more dynamic classes). I needed a “real job.” A real job delivers a regular pay check, right? So I entered a profession that brought me as close to my dream as possible … and paid, if not well, then at least every two weeks. I went into publishing.
When I left for Florida, I think I was at a critical level of burnout. I think that as a New Yorker, especially after a number of years, one starts to lose sight of how truly special, how textured and unique it is. The day-to-day can be brutal: the odors, the noise, the homeless, the trains, the expense. Once I had some distance though, New York City started to leak into my work and I found myself rediscovering many of the things I had always treasured about it. It came very naturally as the setting for Beautiful Lies. It is the place I know best. I know it as one can only know a place she has loved desperately and hated passionately and then come to miss terribly once she has left it behind.
But it is true that we can’t go home again. I live in Florida now with my wonderful husband, and I’m a full-time writer. There’s a lot of beauty and texture and darkness to be mined in this strange place, as well. I’m sure I’d miss it as much in different ways if I returned to New York. I guess that’s my thing … no matter where I am I wonder if I belong somewhere else. I’m always outside, observing. It’s only when I’m writing that I know I’m truly home. (Author bio from the author's website.)
Book Reviews
Bestseller Unger's sensational second thriller (after Beautiful Lies) puts her in the same league as such genre masters as Peter Straub and Peter Abrahams. From the cryptic opening section, which ends with a New York Times reporter finding her husband bleeding to death, Unger grabs the reader by the throat and doesn't let go. Meanwhile, the FBI informs Ridley Jones, a magazine writer, that her late uncle, Max Smiley (who's really her biological father), is still alive and being sought by assorted international players on all sides of the law. Rapidly finding that little in her life is what it seems, Jones is horrified to be confronted with evidence indicating that Smiley is a misogynistic monster of the first order, who may have played a role in the murder of the reporter's husband. Unger's gifts for dialogue and pacing set this far above the standard novel of suspense and will leave many anxiously awaiting her third book.
Publishers Weekly
Freelance journalist Ridley Jones stops by the photo lab to pick up her pictures and is taken in for questioning by FBI agents on her way home. It seems that a mysterious figure is hovering in the background in several of her photos, and Special Agent Dylan Grace believes that the figure is Ridley's Uncle Max, whom she thought was dead. In Unger's follow-up to Beautiful Lies, Ridley must face the fact that her beloved uncle may not only be alive but that he wasn't the man she believed him to be. The FBI wants her to lead its agents to him, but she doesn't completely trust anyone now, including her boyfriend, Jake, who informs her that Max was part of a vicious crime ring. Determined to discover the truth in the web of lies surrounding her, Ridley decides to do some investigating on her own and encounters danger and deception at every turn. A fast-paced story that readers will find difficult to put down; recommended.
Library Journal
More identity crisis for New York City journalist Ridley Jones in this murky follow-up to Unger's debut (Beautiful Lies, 2006). Just when she thought she'd figured out who her real father is, single working girl Ridley is confronted with fresh evidence that her dead Uncle Max Smiley, revealed a year ago (and in Unger's previous book) to be her biological father, might in fact still be alive, and responsible for a series of ghastly assaults on women. Max, an abused child himself, was a self-made real-estate developer and the shadowy head of the Project Rescue organization, which ostensibly saved at-risk children from abusive parents, but in some cases actually abducted children and placed them in foster homes. Ridley's adoptive parents, Ben and Grace Jones, were also involved in Project Rescue, and adopted Ridley as a child. At this point in her life, Ridley is still picking up the pieces of her identity, having been involved in the last year with Jake, a former Project Rescue baby who is still obsessed with Max's whereabouts. Meanwhile, Ridley is being trailed by FBI Special Agent Dylan Grace, who ties her to the recent disappearance of a New York Times journalist, Myra Lyall. In a development that turns these characters into paranoid, damaged people, it's revealed that Agent Grace's mother happened to have been a spy and one of Max's victims. And with everyone looking for Max, possibly at the center of a sex slave trade, the trail leads naturally to Ridley, the beloved daughter he will surely reveal himself to at the novel's 11th hour. Ridley is a character still in search of herself, and this effort offers appealing moments of first-person honesty, but could lose readers unfamiliar with Unger's first.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. Of all the baffling plot twists in Sliver of Truth, which one caught you most by surprise? Why?
2. The book’s pivotal scene—where Ridley confronts Max at Potter’s Field—bookends the novel, appearing at the beginning and near the conclusion. Why do you think the author chose to structure this scene like this? What did you think of having it split in this way?
3. In chapter 2, Ridley describes her childhood habit of hiding from adults, saying, “I just got better and better at finding places to hide. Eventually I had to reveal myself or never be found” (page 21). In the context of the novel, does this statement have another meaning? If so, what?
4. What was your opinion of Dylan Grace? At first, did you think he was being honest with Ridley about his motives for finding Max?
5. “Some of us are lost and some of us are found. I think that’s really the difference Max had observed” (page 273). Who are the “lost” characters in Sliver of Truth, and who are “found”? What are the differences between these characters?
6. Talk about the relationship between Dylan and Ridley. Did you expect that he and Ridley would get together? Why do you think they were so attracted to each other?
7. “I was filled with dread and fury, and yes, the slightest glimmer of hope,” Ridley says after she finds out Max is still alive (page 283). Why hope? Does this foreshadow her ultimate encounter with Max? At any point in the novel did you believe Max was alive?
8. Ghosts and hauntings are recurrent themes in Sliver of Truth. Discuss some instances where they are prominent, and their significance. Does the author employ other symbols like these?
9. “I have a tremendous ability to compartmentalize my emotions. Some call it denial, but I think it’s a skill to be able to put unpleasant things out of your head for a little while in order to accomplish something else,” (page 98). Consider this statement of Ridley’s. What does it reveal about her personality? Do you agree with what she says?
10. Nature versus nurture is a theme Ridley frequently debates with herself: Is her true self a result of her adoptive parents’ upbringing, or is she Max’s daughter (and therefore shares his traits)? What do you think? Are we really products of our DNA, or do the people around us shape who we become?
11. Discuss Jake. Did you imagine that he was not who he claimed to be? Were you surprised to discover what his real identity actually was? Do you think Ridley suspected that Jake was lying to her?
12. If you read Beautiful Lies, did you realize that Jake lied to Ridley on the Brooklyn Bridge?
13. Why was Ridley unable to see the real Max, despite the attempts by many to inform her of his wrongdoings? For that matter, why does it seem that all the men in Ridley’s life (Dylan, Jake, her ex-boyfriend Zack, even her adoptive father, Ben) hid their true selves from her?
14. “I’m sure you were hoping for a neater package–the villain is caught and brought to justice. I live happily ever after” (page 351). What did you think of the book’s ending? When Ridley’s real intentions against Max were revealed, were you surprised?
15. What do you think the title means?
(Questions issued by publisher.)
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