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Book: “The Widow’s Web” by Susan Moore
Publication Info: Bloodhound Books, January 2025
Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC from the publicist.
Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound
Book Description: When her tycoon husband suddenly dies, a woman discovers the sinister secrets of Silicon Valley, in this psychological thriller debut.
When tech mogul Brad Jones is found drowned off the Marin coast, his death is quickly ruled a suicide. But his wife, Dr. Anna Jones, a renowned cyberpsychologist, isn’t convinced. Driven by grief and suspicion, Anna begins to dig into Brad’s past, uncovering some dark details behind Silicon Valley’s elite.
Anna soon crosses paths with Scott and Kristy Lyle, influential figures with connections reaching the highest echelons of the tech industry. The deeper she goes, the more she realizes Brad’s death is tied to a long-buried secret—one that powerful people would kill to protect. Caught between the truth and some dangerous enemies, will Anna risk everything to expose the sinister forces at play?
The Widow’s Web is a gripping psychological thriller that explores ambition, betrayal, and the terrifying reality that our worst enemies may be those we trust the most.
Review: Thank you to SparkPoint Studio for sending me an ARC of this novel!
Well it just so happens that this week the books I’m reviewing are ALL about rich people behaving badly! Just like “A Girl Like Us” on Tuesday, we are now tackling a story that feels way too relevant, and in this case it’s even more so as it is about villainous tech bros in Silicon Valley doing shady things and destroying lives to maintain their power. I miss the days that my associations with that part of Northern California were more about my childhood memories of family trips and beautiful oceans and less about the aforementioned monsters in tech. Yep, “The Widow’s Web” by Susan Moore is a rich behaving badly thriller, but it has less melodrama and more actual nasty and disturbing plot points. Which surprised me in a good way.
As a thriller, “The Widow’s Web” is pretty straight forward on the surface. We have Anna, a psychologist who has been married to her tech mogul husband Brad for years and living a lavish life in Silicon Valley. But when Brad suddenly dies by drowning, she is suddenly plunged into a viper’s nest of lies and secrets involving her husband and fellow tech bro Scott Lyle, and realizes that Brad was hiding horrible secrets from her. We get the clues to the big reveals through modern day investigation from Anna herself, to flashbacks involving Brad and his business dealings, to journalistic digging from a reporter who has ties to Scott Lyle through his wife Kristy, and it all makes for a mystery that is fairly well put together, though well tread territory when it comes to the puzzle pieces and the way they fit together. I did wholly enjoy Anna as a character, as a grieving wife as well as a woman who is trying to protect her son from dark truths as she is finding them out.
But what struck me the most about this book is that, unlike other wealthy people behaving badly books I’ve read recently, Moore decides to take the bad behavior to incredibly dark and sociopathic places. I don’t want to spoil too much, but this book and its reveals don’t feel soapy or fun, and while I love soapy and fun, I appreciate the candor that Moore has put into place in her characters and the absolute depravity that she is calling out, as these tech bros are so rich and powerful that they don’t feel any fear of consequences. Was it a mind fuck to read this kind of story as tech bros are trying to dismantle society as we know it and turn in their techno-dystopic ideals? It sure was! Does it make this book feel all the more relevant and horrifying? YUP, IT SURE DOES. That is what stood out to me about this book. I didn’t expect it to continue fueling my existential dread about everything.
“The Widow’s Web” has familiar beats, but dares to push the envelope in its themes. Because of that, I found it to be compelling and effective.
Rating 7: A twisty conspiratorial thriller that has a sympathetic main character and the gall to go to the darkest places when calling out the sociopaths of the tech industry.
Reader’s Advisory:
“The Widow’s Web” isn’t on any Goodreads lists yet, but it would fit in on “Mysteries Set in Silicon Valley (Fiction)”.
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