Book review: The Note by Alafair Burke

Alafair Burke is one of my go-to authors. I’ve enjoyed her standalones, (both) series, and the books she co-authored with Mary Higgins Clark. Her latest novel, The Note, is yet another excellent read and I feel that Burke’s increasingly moving away from legal procedurals and crime fiction to thriller / suspense territory with her more recent work. Again she writes what she knows and our very likeable-though-quite-highly-strung lead character here (May) is a former assistant district attorney-turned law professor.

Growing up, May Hanover was a good girl, always. Well-behaved, top of her class, a compulsive rule-follower. Raised by a first-generation Chinese single mother with high expectations, May didn’t have room to slip up, let alone fail. Her friends didn’t call her the Little Sheriff for nothing.

But even good girls have secrets. And regrets. When it comes to her friendship with Lauren and Kelsey, she's had her fair share of both. Their bond—forged when May was just twelve years old—has withstood a tragic accident, individual scandals, heartbreak and loss. Now the three friends have reunited for the first time in years for a few days of sun and fun in the Hamptons. But a chance encounter with a pair of strangers leads to a drunken prank that goes horribly awry.

When she finds herself at the center of an urgent police investigation, May begins to wonder whether Lauren and Kelsey are keeping secrets from her, testing the limits of her loyalty to lifelong friends.

The incident that kicks off a series of unfortunate events here is something I think everyone can relate to… someone stealing your carpark when you’ve been sitting waiting for it. The three friends – reunited after years – have already had a few drinks when they head out for more, only to have a smug couple snavel the carpark they were about to pull into. I could certainly relate to that moment of irrational and uncontrollable anger that overtakes you and sometimes is hard to release. Here it’s in the form of a note left on a windscreen – and only of consequence because a man (one half of the aforementioned smug couple) goes missing.

May, Lauren and Kelsey are only just re-bonding when news of the man’s disappearance is made public and they’re immediately worried that the note might have played a part. And it drives a wedge between the three women because two of them didn’t know the third was leaving it. And when they discover they have a connection to the missing man through a past tragedy, everything seems too coincidental.

Burke dips in and out of the past here and we learn of the women meeting at summer camp (as teens) and friendships forged. May had isolated herself from the pair who continued to be close, but welcomed their support recently after footage of her went viral for all of the wrong reasons. As both Lauren and Kelsey have previously weathered ‘bad press’ or as Burke puts it, been ‘judged and vilified by strangers’, the trio bond again… hence the weekend away.

I initially felt I was missing some backstory as the incidents that plagued the women are only vaguely referenced. Later, however Burke offers detail and I realised that May’s history in particular goes some way to explaining ‘who’ she is and some of her actions here. Burke, through May, also talks about her post-pandemic struggle to return to normality and heightened sensitivity and I wondered if Burke experienced something similar to May.

There are LOTS of twists on offer here. The women’s friendship is again tested thanks to old secrets and recent lies. And of course it impacts on relationships with those around them. I very much enjoyed this and Burke tests readers by giving her lead and support characters some major flaws, behaving in ways they later find regrettable. There are also some deeper themes around friendships, relationships and of course society today – our propensity to judge (both positively and negatively) as well as a reflection on ‘cancel culture’ and its impact.

The Note by Alafair Burke will be published in Australia in early January 2025 by Allen & Unwin.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher for review purposes.