Two Nights in Lisbon by Chris Pavone

Title: Two Nights in Lisbon
Author: Chris Pavone
Narrator: January LaVoy
Publication: Macmillan, audio, 2022
Genre: Suspense
Setting: Lisbon and New York

Description: When Ariel Pryce wakes up alone in her Lisbon hotel room, she knows almost immediately that something is wrong. Her husband is missing and she is sure he would not have gone anywhere without leaving a note, plus he left his phone behind. She asks at the hotel, then with growing alarm when he does not reappear, goes to the police, then the American Embassy – everywhere she gets the same questions, “Why was John in Lisbon? What business is he in? Why did you accompany him?” and she knows they are really asking how well she knows her new husband or wondering what he saw in her. Then Ariel gets a ransom demand: three million euros in 48 hours or her husband will be killed. In order to get the funds, Ariel is forced to ask the person she most fears in the world, while also evading the Lisbon police, the CIA, and the media, all of whom seem deeply suspicious of her and are more eager to extract her long-held secrets than to search for John.

My Impression: This was a fun, fast-paced thriller, different from the author’s previous espionage books and much more accessible. Ariel is a mostly sympathetic character, whose story is told in carefully crafted flashbacks, but what makes the book a breathless read is the way Pavone moves back and forth from Ariel’s anguish to the action of other characters. The CIA at the Lisbon Embassy, the Portuguese police, and a wily reporter all attack the kidnapping from different angles and learn a lot about Ariel and John, most of which makes them even more suspicious. Ariel does not trust anyone in this crisis:

If she simply disappears tonight in Portugal, that’s something that would definitely be investigated. What would be found? Evidence scattered all over town that Ariel’s husband had fallen into trouble, that she went looking for him and predictably fell into the same trouble, got herself killed. The policemen, the embassy, the hotel staff: all witnesses. Evidence might be unearthed, or perhaps manufactured; it’s possible that at this very moment drugs are being planted in their suite, bags of heroin, or maybe piles of cash, or dirty handguns, or all of these together, an overwhelming volume of incontrovertible evidence that this American couple came to Lisbon to engage in criminal activities, and what did they get? What they deserved.

I liked the author’s earlier books, particularly The Expats, but this is a much more commercial book and was a riveting audiobook. Ariel is desperate and willing to do whatever it takes to rescue her husband, while the reader (or listener) sympathizes with her plight, trying to imagine how to cope in a similar situation. The other characters’ race against time, not to find John, but to discover Ariel’s secrets is well done and entertaining. Even Ariel’s disgruntled mother contributes to the revelations Ariel tried to keep secret for many years. I did not, however, care for the author’s editorializing, mostly about Ariel’s previous privileged life, now repudiated (kind of ironic as Pavone and his wife, the CEO of Penguin Random House, are an example of NYC privilege).

Source: Library. This is my twelfth book for Carol’s Cloak and Dagger Reading Challenge.

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