- Mona Verma
- Friday, December 17, 2021
Wanda M Morris’s stunning debut Mystery/Thriller 'All Her Little Secrets' published on November 2, 2021, is riveting. I cannot stop talking about this book and recommending it to my friends. As an addict of psychological suspense, I am always looking forward to the next adrenaline pumping read. This one kept me up at night, navigating its unpredictable twists and turns and I just had to finish the book in one sitting to know how the story ends. I agree with the author when she says that apart from the thriller elements, at the heart of it, this book is about "love, loss, family and resilience"
"Tense, taut, and relentlessly suspenseful, Wanda M. Morris's riproaring debut All Her Little Secrets delivers full-throttle twists reminiscent of The Firm with the winning characters and nuanced social justice commentary of an Attica Locke...Wanda Morris is the sharpest new voice in thrillers today. I'm hooked." -- Amy Gentry, bestselling author of Bad Habits and Good as Gone
Ellice Littlejohn is an African-American attorney with an ivy league degree and secrets from her past. She is in an amorous relationship with her White boss Michael who is “gorgeous with chiseled features, deep blue eyes, and the tall trim stature of a Kennedy from Cape Cod.” He is also married and Ellice cannot help being his lover despite her mother figure Vera’s advice to “never get your honey where you make your money”
It is interesting how Ellice and Michael are from different backgrounds and races and yet they are like two peas in a pod. He matched her in “every way- height, intellect and humor.”
Ellice finds Michael dead from a gunshot wound with “a star-shaped hole” on his right temple when she goes to meet him in his office on a bleak January morning. Shocked, she flees the scene without informing anybody and is later promoted to his position even before she gives a clear acceptance to the job offer.
This is the first step in a series of unsettling events which put her in danger. Ellice knows she is being set up and framed and she has to untangle the web of deceit. Houghton, the law firm she works for is predominantly White and it is facing protests in the streets from people who are shouting, “Houghton Hates Blacks.” Ellice hopes that as a woman of color in a position of power, she can open doors for more diverse people to join the staff at Houghton.
Ellice had a traumatic childhood and she has always wanted to compartmentalize her life but now all the angst of her past comes to the forefront and collides with the present. She has to race against time to try to save her brother and deal with corporate conspiracy without compromising on her ethics. It is a shock to her to find out that her brother has been ensnared in this trap as well. I hope I am not giving away any spoilers when I say that what Ellice is fighting against gave me chills as it is one of the biggest reemerging threats we face in our times.
The novel is brilliantly written with alternating chapters dealing with her past in Chillicothe, Georgia and her present in modern day Atlanta which is “a southern Mecca for business and industry.” Some chapters end with bombshell revelations which are also heartbreaking.
The prose is easy to read, vivid and lucid with metaphors which stayed with me such as the description of sound in Michael’s murder scene, “the hum of the fluorescent lights, the only sound in the room, was like a thousand bumblebees.” It was a perfect choice of words when Ellice describes her life as a “cruel irony of blessings.”
I loved the scenes with her girlfriends. What Ellice lacks in family is compensated by her ride or die friends, Lana and Grace. She can depend on her girlfriends who will always take care of her and bring her what she needs; they will even get her body bags and shovels if she asks.
Some readers on Goodreads have critiqued that Ellice is so smart with a high IQ and yet she makes awful decisions. I think the criticism is unfair. Ellice is beautiful, strong and empowered and yet she is human and hence she errs but she always manages to rebound and stay one step ahead of her enemies.
Wanda M Morris paints a realistic picture of behind the scenes at a law firm as she is a corporate attorney in real life who has worked in the legal departments of several Fortune 500 companies. It is interesting how one of the higher floors is assigned to all the top-notch executives and how coveted those positions are.
The author is also a successful Black woman who in the course of her corporate career was sometimes the only Black woman at the table. She brings this insight through Ellice and shines a light on how difficult it is for the main character “to learn to manage predominantly white spaces — from boarding school to the boarding room. It’s another unfortunate layer of anxiety of managing life as a successful Black woman.”
Wanda M Morris also says that she wrote Ellice based on her “own lived experiences working in toxic offices where management underestimated the value that women and people of color can bring to the workplace.”
Do read more about the book and put a copy on hold by clicking on the image of the book below. We also have copies of this book in our Fresh Picks collection.
If you are a fan of psychological thrillers, this will be a very fulfilling read, thought provoking and tragic too but a wild ride nonetheless.
Do scroll below to watch a video interview of Wanda M Morris with author Hank Phillippi Ryan followed by a list of the best Mystery/Thriller books by Black authors published in 2021.