Vintage Crime/Black Lizard / Black Out

0307338487 excerpt

Unger: BLACK OUT

When my mother named me Ophelia, she thought she was being literary. She didn't realize she was being tragic. But then, I'm not sure she understood the concept of tragedy, the same way that people who are born into money don't realize they're rich, don't even know there's another way to live. She thought the name was beautiful, thought it sounded like a flower, knew it was from a famous story (play or novel, she wouldn't have been able to tell you). I guess I should consider myself lucky, since her other choices were Lolita and Gypsy Rose. At least Ophelia had some dignity.

I'm thinking this as I push a cart through the produce aisle of my local supermarket, past rows of gleaming green apples and crisp blooms of lettuce, of fat, shiny oranges and taut, waxy red peppers. The overly familiar man in meats waves at me and gives me what I'm sure he thinks is a winning smile but which only serves to make my skin crawl. "Hi, honey," he'll say. Or "Hi, sweetie." And I'll wonder what it is about me that invites him to be so solicitous. I am certainly not an open or welcoming person; I can't afford to be too friendly. Of course, I can't afford to be too unfriendly, either. I look at my reflection in the metal siding of the meat case to confirm that I am aloof and unapproachable, but not strangely so. My reflection is warped and distorted by the various dings and scars in the metal.

"Hi there, darlin'," he says with an elaborate sweep of his hand and a slight bow.

I give him a cool smile, more just an upturning of the corner of my mouth. He steps aside with a flourish to let me pass.

I have become the type of woman who would have intimidated my mother. Most days I pull my freshly washed, still-wet blond hair back severely into a ponytail at the base of my neck. The simplicity of this appeals to me. I wear plain, easy clothes-a pair of cropped chinos and an oversize white cotton blouse beneath a navy barn jacket. Nothing

Lisa Unger is an award-winning New York Times and international bestselling author. Her novels have sold over 1 million copies in the U.S. and have been translated into 26 different languages.

From the Hardcover edition.

"Riveting psychological suspense of the first order."
-Harlan Coben

"A hurricane of a thriller.... Impossible to extract yourself until the last page."
-Entertainment Weekly

"A white hot page-turner."
-Naples Sun-Times

"Psychotic scary, all the way."
-New York Daily News

"Twisty, riveting, and enormously exciting."
-Joseph Finder, author of Power Play

"Unger's latest keeps the adrenaline pumping with a roller-coaster plot and harrowing psychological suspense.... Well worth the ride."
-People

"Full of twists and turns. A great read for anyone craving some suspense."
-Cosmopolitan

"Masterful.... Black Out spirals through one shock after another."
-St. Petersburg Times

"I read Black Out in one hungry gulp, and spent the rest of the night trying to calm my jangled nerves. This is a stunning, mind-bending shocker with moments of sheer terror."
-Tess Gerritsen, author of The Bone Garden

"[A] largely gripping narrative and evocative, muscular prose....Unger...create[s] the perfect razor's edge of tension."
-Associated Press

"Black Out is rewarding in a darkly voyeuristic way: the gruesomely realistic tale of a troubled teen's descent into a codependent hell on earth."
-AP Review

"Black Out ... is bound to be a sure hit. In it, [Unger] has written literature that is ... a thriller with more twists than a cage full of snakes. Right about the time that you think you know what's going on, the story takes another angle. Hold on tight...it's a scary ride!"
-Bookreporter.com

"Twisty, riveting, and enormously exciting. Lisa Unger is a powerful and elegant writer, and Black Out is her best novel yet."
-Joseph Finder, New York Times bestselling author of Power Play and Killer Instinct
"Unger, author of the best-selling and critically acclaimed Ridley Jones series...[creates the] compelling character of Annie: dark, troubled, and teetering on the brink."
-Booklist

"Let Lisa Unger work her magic and I promise the ending will be a