THIRD DEGREE
Greg Iles
Scribner
Thriller
ISBN: 9780743292504

I have described THIRD DEGREE, the new novel by under-appreciated wundermeister Greg Iles, to friends as a “thriller,” but that is probably inaccurate. It certainly has thriller elements, but large parts of it are given over to domestic drama, southern gothic and romance. What the book ultimately should be classified under is “must-read,” which is what you will do if you begin perusing the first couple of pages of this addictive, quietly hyperdriven work.

THIRD DEGREE takes place over several hours of a day that begins with unexpected news and goes downhill from there. Laurel Shields is the mother of two, the wife of Warren and the (former) lover of Danny. As the novel opens, she is the recipient of the most inopportune result that a home pregnancy test is capable of giving. To make matters worse, Warren, who is a prominent pediatrician in their Athens Point, Mississippi community, seems to be going off the rails. His medical partnership is on the receiving end of an IRS audit, and he has spent the previous night searching through every book in their home library. Laurel doesn’t know what he is looking for, even as she has no idea whether Warren or Danny is the father of her unborn child.
 
What Laurel attempts to do is to go through this day like any other, even as she wonders what she is going to do, with whom and when. She won’t have the luxury of making a leisurely decision, however. Before the sun sets, her life will begin unraveling for reasons that she only gradually will be able to comprehend. It turns out that Laurel is not the only one in the Shields household with secrets; a number of disparate elements come together explosively in the book. By day’s end, Laura, her children and her husband will find themselves in mortal danger as actions of the remote and recent past come home to roost in a way that can only end badly (at best).

There is enough drama and excitement here to fill three books, due in no small part to Iles’s meticulous plotting, within which the reader will find explosive and occasionally heart-rending revelations planted with exquisite care. A cautionary tale of quiet brilliance, THIRD DEGREE will keep you reading and thinking long into the night.

   --- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub

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