Dark Circles

A foray into the wacky world of wellness led by my favorite character of the year, Olivia (Liv) Reed. Thirty-something Liv, an actor starring in a long-running TV series, is a bit down on her luck. The paparazzi caught her making out with a man who is not her boyfriend, and photos of her ensuing meltdown on the streets of Manhattan were published everywhere. Liv’s also a bit too hands-on with the booze and pills, and her relationship with her one friend, also her publicist/handler, is on the ropes. Begrudgingly, she agrees to check in to the House of Light—don’t call it rehab!—in upstate New York, which bills itself as a spiritual center. But before you can say namaste, the body of a young woman turns up in the adjoining lake—she had ties to House of Light—and when Liv learns she’s just the latest in a series of what are being called suicides, she’s off and running. Smartly, Liv uses her celebrityhood to start a podcast that becomes wildly successful and allows her to present the investigation in nearly real time. Comparisons to Nine Perfect Strangers, the Liane Moriarty book/Hulu series starring Nicole Kidman, are inevitable—and should be helpful in promoting this book—but Dark Circles is even better. After all, it’s got the sarcastic, sophisticated, completely credible, and even sometimes vulnerable voice of Liv Reed.