'With a Vengeance' by Riley Sager is a tense mystery on a train: Review

USA Today

2 days ago

'With a Vengeance' by Riley Sager is a tense mystery on a train: Review
Justice is best served cold — after a luxury overnight train ride, of course.
That's the premise of "With A Vengeance" (Dutton, ★★★ out of four), the newest novel from bestselling author Riley Sager. It's is a locked-room mystery that takes us back to 1954 as a trap is being set.
Anna Matheson's plan was simple, and she has put all her energy — and money — into every last detail. Get the people responsible for her family's downfall during the war onto a train where there's no escape, confront them and find out why they did what they did and then deliver them right to authorities waiting at the train's destination.
But her meticulous plans are, well, derailed shortly after the train departs Philadelphia. Anna has managed, through anonymous invitations (and mild threats), to lure the six people who were behind destroying her family onto the luxe, and suspiciously empty, Phoenix train for a nonstop overnight ride bound for Chicago.
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She's prepared for this moment, prepared to face them all with what she's uncovered about their crimes, but she's unprepared for what comes after. Anna might want justice, but someone on the train apparently wants them dead and is killing Anna's captives, one by one.
Now, she is in a literal race against the clock to not only figure out who's behind the murders, but also help protect the people she despises so they can be alive to face the justice they deserve.
Sager's novel, which takes readers through each of the 13 hours from the train's departure to its arrival, brings easy comparisons to Agatha Christie's "Murder on the Orient Express" and "And Then There Were None." But there's also familiarity from Sager's previous novels: the panicky main character making messy moves, hints of romance past and present, uncovered family secrets and many twists.
The journey through "Vengeance" almost loses its way along the tracks setting up some of those twists. Like real train trips, initial excitement can wane as the adventure gets underway and you settle in for the ride. Will it remain fun, or will the repetition rock you to sleep?
There's plenty, though, to capture a reader's interest along the way. The tension between the characters, the tightness of the quarters on the train are visceral and sharp. You might not understand why Anna makes some of her choices, but you can understand her grief for the loss of her family and her desperation for closure and justice. That along with the story's short timeframe factor add to the urge to find out what happens next as the mystery deepens and the action escalates.
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And Anna is surrounded by characters with more interesting backstories than her own: Her Aunt Retta, glimpsed through flashbacks, who had little patience for weakness, or her late beloved brother, Tommy, the kind and charming youth who joined the military and the war effort both seem worthy of novels of their own.
"Vengeance" is not merely the final destination — the answers to whodunit or how — but the whole journey: observing the passing scenery, the setting, the passengers and seeing where the ride takes you.