While Sarah Pekkanen is known for her suspense novels, including her previous novel, the bestselling “The Golden Couple,” but in her newest novel, “Gone Tonight,” Pekkanen takes us on a dark voyage as we follow the mother/daughter relationship that will leave readers unsettled. This story is told from a dual perspective as we learn about the past of both women from their own first person perspectives. Catherine Sterling lives with her mother Ruth, but she has recently gotten a job as a nurse at a prestigious hospital in Baltimore and plans to move there. When her mother seems to be exhibiting signs of Alzheimers, Catherine decides she must change her plans to stay and care for her mother.

We know something is askew in the lives of these two women. Ruth is obviously paranoid, and they have moved often throughout Catherine’s life. We realize through the clues that Pekkanen tantalizingly tosses out that there is more to this story than meets the eye. When Catherine begins to suspect that her mother is hiding something from her, she decides to investigate her mother’s past. She realizes that although her mother told her that she came from a Catholic family, and had to leave when she became pregnant, a few clues indicate that Ruth is definitely not Catholic. She doesn’t recognize an excerpt from The Lord’s Prayer not does she recognize Ave Maria. What else might Ruth be hiding?

At the same time, Ruth realizes that Catherine is hiding something from her, which causes her overly protective mother instinct to go into full mama bear mode. She will protect her daughter at any cost. We see how their divergent paths will inevitably collide as they each are determined to learn the truth about plan their own path toward the future.

What is revealed at the end, by Pekkanen’s clever use of a unreliable narrator, or perhaps more specifically an incomplete narration, is that both women are not what we thought they were. Those twists are not only chilling but completely surprising, as is the ending. Pekkanen substitutes her usual husband/wife suspense with the mother/daughter relationship extremely effectively. This is a novel that will cause you to ponder how much our genetics influence our morals and values. Nature versus nurture. What Pekkanen leaves us with is an unsettling view of how the people we think we know and work with can be so very different inside.

Please note: This review is based on the final, hardcover book provided by St. Martin’s Press, the publisher, for review purposes.