Book Talk: Freida McFadden, ‘The Inmate’

Mystery fans will love this one. Frieda McFadden’s, The Inmate (2024, 332 pages in softcover) has more twists and turns than a Dutch cruller. And there are two timelines, eleven years apart. But the author makes it easy for us to follow. The characters are the same. In the earlier period, they’re teenagers; in the later years, they’re in their late twenties.

[Before going on, let me answer a question, asked by a reader. I don’t use the terms “paperback” and “softcover” interchangeably. I don’t know if there is an “official” difference. To me, a paperback is usually originally published in hardback and then made available in a slick-covered paperback that is typically 4” by 7”. A softcover is often the original publication, the cover is not shiny, and it typically measures 5” by 8”. A hardback has a plain hard cardboard cover with a glossy dust cover. The size is quite variable but usually larger than a softcover or a paperback. However, there no hard and fast rules. Every textbook, workbook, and study guide that I published in sociology or computer science was in softcover regardless of size because I wanted to keep the cost to students as low as possible.]

The main character in The Inmate is Brooke Sullivan, a single mother and nurse practitioner. She’s 28 and has a 10-year-old son, Josh. She’s just returned to her home town of Raker, which she left as a teenager. Brooke has inherited her parents’ house and has applied for jobs in and around Raker. The only one that was offered to her was at the prison, the one at which her former boyfriend Shane is serving a life sentence for multiple murders, including the attempted murder of Brooke. Naturally, this makes Brooke feel uneasy, especially because it was mainly her testimony that led the jury to find Shane to be guilty.