Blake Nelson is a Mormon who sets up home on a remote farm in the wilds of Utah with his three wives. When he is found dead they are the main suspects, but which one is guilty?
Blake Nelson met his first wife Rachel at college. She is obedient and doting and glimpses an idealistic life she did not think possible. His second wife, Emily, is a guilt ridden Catholic who thinks she can atone for her past deeds while Tina, wife number three, sees a home away from the horrors of poverty and drug addiction.
Cate Quinn’s, Black Widows, tells the story of the lives and relationships between these wives living in a strict community where plural marriage (polygamy) is against the law. Their past lives are revealed gradually as each person’s story unravels. They live in close proximity with each other and have difficulty getting along. They each have specific roles within the marriage but virtually nothing in common so without Blake they quickly fall apart. But, when one of them confesses to the police the other two decide to play detective to prove her innocence.
The ‘investigation’ takes them from the deserts of Utah to the night life in Nevada where they discover much more than they intended and the novel has the reader hooked from the first page and gripped to the end.
Set against the backdrop of the Mormon Community, or the Church of Latter Day Saints as they prefer to be called, the reader learns a little about the life in a religious community, however, it is not portrayed in a very good light.
Author, Quinn, is a travel and lifestyle journalist who has written several historical novels but this is her first modern thriller and if this one is anything to go by it certainly won’t be her last.