This is the road trip to beat all road trips…

Lisa Lutz, the New York Times bestselling author of the Spellman Files, has written, in The Passenger, a thriller about murder, secrets and increasing desperation as Tanya flees the scene of her dead husband’s accident.

But is she Tanya, and is his death an accident? Such are the questions that slowly, and irrevocably are answered as the novel proceeds and the miles unfold. Tanya, or is it Debra, and what about Sonia, drives from danger,  but is it to safety? Nah, nothing so easy. She reaches a temporary sanctuary each time, and huddles beneath its roof, and the umbrella of another new identity but that’s as far as it goes.

The miles seem to put no distance between her and the past, but instead, through numerous encounters carefully managed by Lutz, she edges towards home, and a startling denouement, for her, and for us.

The Passenger shows the loneliness of the ‘long distance driver’, someone who has left a life, and all ties behind, who does not even own her own name. It reveals the depths of fear, pain and desperation of someone wanting, or needing, to disappear.

Written with verve, plot twists, and cleanly etched characters, but does it work?

On the whole, yes though I found I was hoping about halfway through that things would start coming together more quickly than they actually were. But this could have been me. I’m getting picky in my old age.

The layer upon layer of revelation, and consequences built the tension as I left the slight sag behind and soon I was hanging on for grim death as we roared, with a g force I admired, round hair pin bends of revelation towards the finishing line.

Should you read it? Yep, and prove me wrong about the sag and anyway, I really enjoyed it.  It was thought provoking.

The Passenger    Liza Lutz   Titan Books. Paperback and ebook