Book Review: Under Currents by Nora Roberts

Under Currents
Author: Nora Roberts
Publication: St. Martin's Press (July 9, 2019)

Description: For both Zane and Darby, their small town roots hold a terrible secret. Now, decades later, they've come together to build a new life. But will the past set them free or pull them under?

Zane Bigelow grew up in a beautiful, perfectly kept house in North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains. Strangers and even Zane’s own aunt across the lake see his parents as a successful surgeon and his stylish wife, making appearances at their children’s ballet recitals and baseball games. Only Zane and his sister know the truth, until one brutal night finally reveals cracks in the facade, and Zane escapes for college without a thought of looking back...

Years later, Zane returns to his hometown determined to reconnect with the place and people that mean so much to him, despite the painful memories. As he resumes life in the colorful town, he meets a gifted landscape artist named Darby, who is on the run from ghosts of her own.

Together they will have to teach each other what it means to face the past, and stand up for the ones they love.

My Thoughts: This is one Nora Roberts book that I was hesitant to read. I don't like stories about child abuse. I should have known that Nora Roberts could take a difficult subject and write a compelling story of love and survival.

Zane Bigelow and his sister Britta lived what looked like a perfect life. Their father was a successful surgeon; their mother on all the right committees. They lived in a beautiful house in a posh part of town. But their house hid many secrets. Their father had been beating his wife and son for years. Zane began keeping a diary of this abuse when he was a young teenager and his father's abuse broke his nose and caused a concussion that his father explained away as a bike accident or a ski accident depending on who he was telling the story too.

Zane wants very badly to get out but knows that his father has all the power, a pristine outer appearance, and powerful friends. He also has a complicit wife who likes the abuse she receives at her husband's hands and doesn't care about her children at all.

When Zane comes home from a school dance to see his father hitting his mother, he intervenes. His father pushes him down the stairs and breaks his arm and sprains his ankle. But worse of all he blames Zane for hitting him, hitting his wife, and hitting his little sister. He demands that Zane be arrested and sent to a juvenile detention center where he spends a horrible night until he is rescued by the actions of his little sister, his aunt, and a police detective who believes that it was his father who was to blame.

With his father and mother arrested, tried, and imprisoned, Zane and Britta have a chance at a new, better life with their aunt and loving grandparents.

Then the story jumps to the present day where Zane is a lawyer who is returning home and his father is finally getting ready to be paroled after eighteen years in prison. His mother had waited loyally for him after her own release from prison.

Then a new person comes to town. Darby McCray has her own history with violence. She managed to escape from her abusive husband who was convicted and imprisoned. She and her mother ran a successful landscaping business until her mother died in a hit-and-run accident. Darby sold up and needed to choose a new place to restart her life. She chooses the same town where Zane and his family live to begin her new business.

But both Zane and Darby are still of strong interest to their abusers and danger follows both of them home. I liked that both Darby and Zane were survivors who hadn't lost the ability to fall in love and trust. I also liked that neither of them was looking for a new relationship when they met.

As is common in Nora Roberts' books, there are a bunch of supporting characters who form a web of friendships and who are there for our hero and heroine. I loved Darby's personality. She's optimistic and seems to have a real gift for making friends. I liked Zane's resilience. I liked that the information about child abuse and domestic abuse were woven into the story but didn't dominate.

Fans of Nora Roberts won't want to miss this story with its memorable characters and suspense.

Favorite Quote:

He tipped down his sunglasses. "You're going to fit a tree in that car?"

"No, I'm buying a truck on the way there."

And just kept studying her over the tops. "You're buying a truck on your way to pick up a tree."

"I ordered it over the phone this morning."

"You ordered -- I have to stop repeating what you say just because what you say is weird."

"It's not weird. They had what I want, they're starting the paperwork. I go in, boom, boom, drive off and get the tree, and so on. Anyway, are you still my lawyer?"

"I...could be."

I bought this one. You can buy your copy here.