It may be hard to believe, since I read so much, but Nobody’s Fool is only my second book by Harlan Coben. Given that he’s written SO many books, it truly surprised me. Anyway… Nobody’s Fool was a very engaging mystery and I’m glad I read/listened to it!

Sami Kierce is the main character, a former NYPD detective who was forced out of the department due to problematic behavior in a couple of cases. So he’s scrambling to make a living for himself, his wife and baby son, by taking on various low-level private investigations, such as surveilling cheating husbands. He also teaches a sort of adult education detective class on the Lower East Side in Manhattan. That class is filled with a wide variety of “interesting” people. I loved that Sami referred to them mostly by nicknames, such as Gary The Golfer, Leisure Suit Lenny, and a few women he calls the Pink Panthers. (It actually helped me remember who was who, as opposed to just a list of names.) I really enjoyed Sami; he has a good sense of humor and it was a nice change of pace to read a main character who grew up in New Jersey of Pakistani heritage.

The book opens with some scenes from 20-odd years earlier, when he was backpacking in Europe with some of his college buddies (whom he refers to as the “lax bros”, i.e. lacrosse players), before starting med school. In Spain he meets and has a brief affair with a young woman named Anna. The publisher’s blurb gives this away, so it isn’t a spoiler: he wakes up next to Anna, who is dead and he’s holding a bloody knife! He runs, basically. And he never goes to med school; instead he becomes a police officer.

Fast forward those 20-odd years and a woman shows up at his class and he just knows it’s Anna, older of course. When she turns and runs instead of talking to him, he follows her. Most of the book involves figuring out how Anna could still be alive. I enjoyed how some of his more promising students helped him in this effort. Another thread is the release from prison of a man he helped convict, a man he believes killed his then-fiancee. Because of his checkered past, his lawyer has gotten that guy out of prison.

I mostly listened to the audiobook version, beautifully narrated by Vikas Adam. I sped through this book, not wanting to stop listening.

If you enjoy a fast-paced thriller with some good twists and great local atmosphere, check out Nobody’s Fool.

Thank you to Hachette Audio and NetGalley for the opportunity to listen to an advance copy of this audiobook and to Grand Central Publishing and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advance reader copy of this book. All opinions are my own.

If you are Nobody's Fool, pick up this pulse-pounding thriller where the jaw-dropping twists keep coming until the surprising conclusion.

Sami has had a string of bad luck beginning with a college vacation in Spain that went horribly wrong. Now, someone featured in his nightmares appears in his night class and just as abruptly vanishes. Meanwhile, a man he sent to jail sixteen years earlier for murdering his partner is released from jail due to Sami’s poor police work. Why are two mistakes from his past rising back to the surface now? Are they related? How will Sami protect his wife and their young son from these threats?

I loved Nobody's Fool. It had so many twists that were like a gut punch. The sizzling conclusion was a complete surprise but made the inexplicable actions of many of the characters so much clearer. I enjoy all of Mr. Coben’s thrillers but this book was one of his best. 5 stars and a favorite!

Thanks to NetGalley and Grand Central Publishing for providing me with an advanced review copy.

"Nobody's Fool" is a terrific read. In fact, too terrific: I meant it as a nighttime read, and it was so suspenseful that it got in the way of my work. I truly had trouble putting it down. After the fact, I thought that there were some elements that seemed implausible or not fully explained, but in propelled me along and drew me in, and I found the characters complex and persuasive. I've already been recommending it as a first-rate thriller.

🃏”Nobody’s Fool” - Harlan Coben 🃏

Genre: Thriller;Mystery
Setting: New York City, present day
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Detective Sami Kierce and his misfit criminology class set out to solve a cold case, when Sami spots a woman from his past that he presumed dead. As the mystery unravels, Sami and his friends find skeletons in closets all across the globe, uncovering much more than they excepted to.

I really enjoyed Coben’s writing. The characters were all well thought out and developed. I felt personally attached to both Victoria and Anna and I was desperate to find out what happened to them. The plot made sense and kept me guessing. There were lots of twists and turns that I did not see coming. I also enjoyed that the ending wrapped things up nicely and did not leave you guessing.

There was a lot about this novel that could have been flushed out - especially the quirky side characters. They could have their own spin off someday.

I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys a thriller that will leave you on the edge of your seat wanting more.

📢 Thank you to Grand Central Publishing for this early copy in exchange for my honest review.

🏷️ #grandcentralpublishing #nobodysfool #harlancoben #arcreview #bookreview #bookstagram #thriller #readmorebooks #tbr #deathbytbr #mystery #netflix

Nobody’s Fool by Harlan Coben is a police procedural led by a man, Sami Kierce, who was no longer a policeman. He had been asked to leave because of behavior outside police procedures. He deserved it; he often did not think before he acted. He did a variety of things to keep his family safe, including teaching a class on sleuthing, to which he had a cadre of regulars. One night someone slipped in he didn’t recognize, until he did. He had known her twenty years earlier when he had been just out of college and on a trek across Europe. He had woken up one day to find her dead body next to him and a knife in his hand. In a panic he ran to the police. When he finally convinced one to return to the apartment with him, nothing was there. He called his father who advised him to get a flight out to the United States immediately. It didn’t matter where. Now, here she was. The sharing that night had been about surveillance devices and he had one in his hand which he stuck in her pocket as she rushed away. Where that led him is almost beyond belief.

Her family was rich; very rich. He was turned away, aggressively, by security, so was interested when his lawyer called him with an interesting proposal from them. He went, and the Arthur, the lawyer, was waiting for him. That started an investigation that lead in and around many things in his past. It involved his dead partner who had also been his fiancee; his wife and son; a kidnapping and return to the family eleven years later; as well as all kinds of other twists and turns. What a good book. It is the first Coben book I have read and I am asking myself, “Why?” Sami was an interesting character with a backstory and a current story, and stories in between. The plot was complex and well-thought-out. The assistance Sami received from a variety of people was heart-warming. And the conclusion and the after-conclusion where both things no one had seen coming. What a good book!

I was invited to read Nobody’s Fool by Grand Central Publishing. All thoughts and opinions are mine. #Netgalley #GrandCentralPublishing #HarlanCoben #NobodysFool

I'll never get tired of a book by Harlan Coben. We were introduced to Sami Kierce in a previous novel, but I don't feel like you had to have read that book to get into this one. A past traumatic experience comes back to Sami when he believes he recognizes a girl from his past. While teaching his class, she is spotted in the back, sneaking out after making eye contact with Sami. Sami begins exploring and investigating if this person is who he believes she is, even instilling the help of a group of his students. You will be surprised at where this story takes you. While it seems like it might be predictable, Harlan Coben always takes us the long way around to closure, with a surprise here and there, threading life and humanity into his writing and characters!

First of all, I don't think you need to read Fool Me Once before reading this one. Kierce is such a minor character in that one you won't be missing anything. Nobody's Fool is a better book anyway. The mystery is complex yet somehow believable and the side characters are unforgettable. Since this is a series, I hope we get more involving the students in his little criminology class. I would love to know more of their back stories.

This is my third Harlan Coben novel and the second one where someone says, "Himmler likes tuna steaks." I can't tell if this is a cultural reference I'm not picking up on or some sort of Easter egg Coben wrote in. There were a couple of other objects or descriptions that were reused which gave me an odd sort of deja-vu while reading. Again, not sure if that was intentional or if Coben unintentionally reuses descriptions. It probably isn't noticeable unless you read his books in rapid succession, like I plan to continue doing.

Harlan Coben brings us a second novel starring Sami Kierce, a former Manhattan detective who lost his job because of inappropriate approaches to his investigations. I really enjoyed the plot, characters and writing in this novel. Coben never disappoints, but this time, he wowed me! Sami graduated from a prestigious private school where he was a scholarship student, then a prestigious college and is accepted to medical school. He is heading on a summer backpacking trip with very well-off friends from high school, having deferred his entry to medical school. While in Spain, he falls for Anna, a woman he meets in a bar, and they have a vacation fling that feels kind of serious to Sami. It ends badly and changes the entire trajectory of Sami's life.

Sami's first fiancé, another police officer, was murdered twenty years earlier. Thanks to his termination from the force, her convicted killer is being released based on Sami's conflict of interest in working on the investigation and assertions of wrongdoing. He is happily married, deeply in debt, has an infant son and works as a private investigator. He also teaches a pay as you go weekly class on crime solving, with each week's theme based on a Sherlock Holmes quote placed on the blackboard.

The class members are a hodgepodge of older women who try to solve cold cases online, an obviously wealthy guy who obviously plays golf, a woman Sami uses in some of his divorce investigations who is very poor and the unhoused, unhinged man she gives a sandwich each night. Three influencer type women round out the class, which has grown in recent weeks from a much smaller attendance rate. One night, twenty years after he last saw Anna, a woman stops in the doorway of his class and Sami is convinced it is Anna. This starts him on the road to finding out where she seems to live, who owns the well guarded mansion she apparently lives in, a cold case mystery surrounding the kidnapping of a daughter of the house, and just in general, Remi's getting involved when he shouldn't. Simultaneously, since his fiancé's alleged murderer was not pardoned, he might get retried. Sami wants to find new proof to nail him, but it's looking like they got the wrong guy.

In a great spirited move, Remi engages his most talented students in an advanced version of his course, kind of an adult group of Baker Street Irregulars. There is a definite need to follow the bouncing ball in the two very much fun and sometimes scary investigations. The ending was a great surprise but the clues were there. The characters were a lot of fun. The writing was Coben at his best which is the best!

Wasn’t able to read this one digitally but I did order a copy of the book so will be reviewing it after I’ve read it. I’m really excited for it as I’ve only heard great things about it.

I was new to the Sami Kierce series but love that coming in at book two didn't affect the story. Sami is a former detective who lives in New York and is currently teaching a class on sleuthing as well as working as a private investigator. However, being removed from the police force isn't the only story from Sami's past. He had gone to Spain when he was getting ready to go to college. He was backpacking with friends and met a young woman named Anna. They hit it off and he thought he was falling in love tell he woke up covered in blood and she was dead. Sami called his Dad and came straight home to be forever haunted by not knowing what had truly happened to Anna and if he was responsible for killing her as he was drinking and doing a ton of drugs when they were hanging out. Twenty two years later while he is teaching his group of sleuths she walks into the class and leaves. Sami chases after and the story begins of what really happened twenty two years ago. This was a great read and story. I am a huge fan of Harlan Coban and can't wait for the next Sami book in the series.

I was not expecting to fall in love with this book more than Fool Me Once, but I did! The story follows Sami Kierce, whose past never truly stays in the past. His journey begins during his backpacking trip to Europe, where he encounters the infamous Anna. A series of unexpected events leads Sami down his current path. Twenty plus years later, everything comes to a head in a whirlwind of events. This story kept me enthralled and compelled me to discover the ending. Trust me, the ending will not disappoint.

The first thing I would say about Nobody's Fool is that, although it says it is set ' a year after the devastating events that took place in Fool Me Once', this is not a continuation of the story from Fool Me Once so it can easily be read as a standalone.

The story does follow Detective Sami Kierce, now disgraced former police officer, who can currently be found teaching wannabe private detectives in a local community college. One night during class, Sami sees a woman at the door who quickly flees and Sami is convinced it is the same woman, Anna, who he met in Spain as a teenager. However, Sami woke up one morning next to Anna in Spain and she was quite clearly dead! So, who is this person he has just seen? And to complicate matters further, Sami receives unwelcome news about the killer of his former partner who is currently in prison.

Coben is an author who never disappoints me and I was delighted to read his latest novel. Sami Kierce is a brilliant, but flawed, character who you will find yourself rooting for throughout this novel as he attempts to deal with two significant changes in his life. Coben weaves both stories perfectly towards a dramatic and stunning conclusion.

Although the book concludes perfectly, Coben leaves a brilliant teaser for what is sure to be a third Kierce novel and I cannot wait!

Another hit from Mr. Coben. I must confess that I am a sucker for the Myron Bolitar series. This is the second book featuring Sami Kierce. While I enjoyed it, it doesn’t rank up there with my favorites. But until Mr. Coben goes the way of James Patterson, I will probably read everything that he writes. Thanks to NetGalley for a complimentary copy of the book in exchange for my honest review.

This book releases in March. This was soooo good! An ex cop turned PI teaches an investigations class to a group of characters and during one class a lady returns from his past. He is determined to figure out who she is and what happened in the time that has passed since they last saw each other. This would honestly make a GREAT tv show. I thought the characters were all great and even though there are a lot of people to keep up with it never felt too hard or complicated. Just a great story. And if you’ve read any of Steve Cavanaugh’s books about Eddie Flynn you will love this one!

Addictively entertaining! I usually listen to Harlan's books but got this from NetGalley so I had to read it. I Love the narrators for the Harlan books, but I was so excited to get this one that I started on it right away.

This book grabs your attention from the beginning and holds it until the very end. I loved Sami and his sarcasm and his humor, I loved his students being part of the investigation and their different personalities. This book has two different mysteries going on but the way they are presented makes it very easy to follow. Even as the twists kept coming, it was so easy to keep it all straight. This got me out of my reading slump, thank you NetGalley and Harlan Goben for my ARC, my only complaint is that Steven Webber didn't read it to me.

I was so excited to get a copy of Nobody’s Fool. I love Harlan Coben and I loved Fool Me Once(first Sami Kielce book). While you don’t have to read the first one to read this one I recommend it, it was so good.

Nobody’s Fool is full of mystery, family drama, lies, and deceit. It was a wonderful mystery(more mystery than thriller in my eyes) book. Right from the first pages it takes you on a crazy ride. I was hooked from the first page. As always Harlan delivered a 5 ⭐️ read. Ok, I am biased, as he is one of my favorite authors.


Thank you to NetGalley and Grand Central Publishing for the opportunity to read an advance copy in exchange for a honest review.

Harlan Coben does it again! After reading Fool Me Once, I knew I needed to read this book asap! Full of twists and turns and shocking revelations, this book will have you hooked from page one. Do yourself a favor and pick up this book as soon as you can!

First, I have to confess that until I became immersed in the story, after the first four or five chapters, I was a little lost about what was going on. I was glad to see the character of Sami Kierce once again, so I knew the story would be interesting once I got past the intro that set the stage for all of the action. In this novel, Sami seems to be chasing a ghost from his past in the form of a young woman he met in Spain and who he thinks is dead. After all, he was sleeping with her and woke up covered in blood with her body next to him. The plot defies belief but it is very well-crafted and drew me into the story, captivating my imagination and my curiosity to find out just who died and what was the real truth about Sami’s encounter in Spain. I really enjoyed the author’s signature humor that became a way to relieve the tension of the intrigue that just kept going, from one mystery to the next. I also enjoyed the portrayal of the characters although I did not find them particularly relatable. I thought that Sami’s wife was too passive and didn’t seem to want to know what happened to Sami as much as I wanted to. The pace was moderate but not too slow that I lost interest. There were some parts of the book that seemed to drag as more and more details were layered into the story. Because of the mountain of details, there were also numerous characters who seemed not to add much to the story but who were amusing or provided a backdrop for Sami to show his brilliant deductive powers. The sub-plots all tied together well in the end and the skillful plot made for a creative and uniquely written page-turner.
Disclaimer
I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley. I was not required to write a positive review, and all opinions expressed are my own.

Sami Kierce went to Europe after college with some college friends. While in the Costa Del Sol, he met a woman he began to fall in love with...except he murdered her (or so he thought). It completely derailed his life and sent him into the police academy instead of medical school. Now, he has been kicked out of the police for an horrific accident on his watch and he is trying to support his wife and child working as a PI. One day, he sees that woman he thought he murdered twenty years ago. It sets him on a path of destruction as he tries to figure out how she is now living in luxury, while claiming to have no memory of her kidnapping and subsequent re-emergence eleven years after she went missing. He is hired by the woman's family to investigate where Victoria was for those eleven years. What Sami uncovers will change the lives of three families. While I always enjoy Harlan Coben, this book was quite convoluted and did not seem to flow as well as others. That being said, Coben writes a very twisty and complex plot.

Sami Kierce is a mess and he may be the unluckiest guy in the whole world. He's not letting that slow him down, though. When his past comes back to haunt him, he dives headlong into an investigation to figure out what happened 22 years ago.

Harlan Coben once again proves why he's an auto-buy author for me! Fans of his Myron Bolitar series will be happy to know that the sarcastic wit that is employed so well in that series is alive and well in Sami Kierce. It's a mystery, sure, and horrible things have happened here, but Kierce is still cracking wise and not taking himself too seriously. Fans of MW Craven's Fearless series will appreciate this brand of writing and humor. Suspend your disbelief, grab your cozy blanket, and curl up for a lightning fast read you don't have to take too seriously to appreciate.

Thank you to NetGalley and Grand Central Publishing for allowing me to go on this adventure with Kierce prior to this book's publication in exchange for my honest review.