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The main problem is the narrator, who sucks up all the oxygen in the story. "I was good at making up stories," she tells us. Later, we learn she has visions. We hear about her extraordinary storytelling gift over and over, until finally she becomes the semi-famous author she longs to be. Patty, the nearly mute, loyal sidekick, has to die for plot reasons and is killed off in a terrorist attack in Somalia that has no organic relationship to the story. The depressed mom is virtually invisible. And although Maynard says in an afterword that the dad was based on the real detective who investigated the killings, the fictional character is largely an amalgam of genre conventions. Maynard is a slick, commercial writer. An earlier novel, "To Die For," was turned into a hit movie. Another novel, "Labor Day," is being made into a film due out this fall. Perhaps "After Her" was always meant to be just a trial run for the Hollywood version. ___ Online:
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