The Expats by Chris Pavone

The Expats

Chris Pavone

Short chapters of recurring flashbacks in different timezones, and a former CIA spy turned bored expat housewife/mum - this novel reads like an Angelina Jolie screenplay. Full of twists and turns it certainly kept me guessing throughout, as it was fuelled with a high level of paranoia.

Extract
Kate resumes walking lost in thought. She stops again at the large windows of an art gallery. Contemporary photography. She watches the reflections of the passersby in the windows, mostly women who are dressed like her, and the men who form matched sets. Also a gaggle of German tourists in their sandals and socks, a trio of American youth in their backpacks and tattoos.
There’s one man walking on her side of the sidewalk too slowly wearing an ill-fitting suit and the wrong shoes, rubber-soled lace-ups that are too casual, too ugly. She watches him pass, continue up the street, out of view.
Parallels
  • AKA Jane by Maureen Tan
  • Identity by Robert Ludlom
  • Mr & Mrs Smith - the film