The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave is a more than 20-page, riveting, heartfelt novel in which you respect those who love you, even when it’s hard.
It’s a perfect stand-alone novel, and I’ll keep an eye out for more Laura Dave writing. This book has interested me and kept me up to date on the relationship between Hannah and Bailey – an unlikely duo who would never have anticipated to live their current lives together in a million years – and Owen – who has so many questions about who he really is.
The novel is told in two timelines, one of which is the present in which Hannah Bailey tries to find out what happened, the second is flashbacks to the time Hannah and Owen fell in love. More a mystery than a driving thriller, the story becomes an examination of the relationship between Hannah and Bailey, a complex dynamic that Dave decodes with ease.
Later in the novel, several flashbacks show Owen and Hannah’s relationship. Hannah’s desperate calls to Owen go unanswered, FBI arrests his boss Marshals, and when FBI agents arrive unannounced at her home in Sausalito, Hannah realizes that her husband is not who he claims to be. Flashbacks of Hannah and Owen falling in love provide more context and clues to Owen’s disappearance and the decisions he made.
When Hannah’s increasingly desperate calls to Owen go unanswered, when the FBI arrests his boss, when a US marshal and FBI agents arrive unannounced at her home in Sausalito, she quickly realizes that he is not who he purports to be. Hannah as his beloved wife of a year, Hannah, one of the most popular wives in a year in which she was married to her husband Michael, while her increasingly desperate calls to Owen and Michael go unanswered when the Federal Bureau of Investigation arrests Owen and Michael’s boss, when a U.S. marshal and federal agents arrive in Hannah’s Sausalito home uninvited, Hannah quickly realizes that she is not the husband she said she was.
The family’s lives are shattered when Hannah receives a note telling her to protect herself and not reach Owen on the phone. When Hannah and her stepdaughter Bailey do not like her and investigate, they learn that he was on the run in her previous life, and he fears a new scandal could pervert his current identity because his father-in-law is a lawyer for a crime syndicate and Hannah Bailey lives in Austin under a different name. In the end Hannah negotiates a deal with Nicholas that she will be safe from the syndicate, which means Owen will not remain in her life forever.
When his new wife Hannah begins to cope with this unexpected predicament, a loving husband named Owen is arrested for fraud and FBI agents arrive at her home. It’s Hannah’s first question about her husband and what she thinks of him.
In this page shift, the two words that protected her are the last thing Hannah Hall’s husband Owen Michaels told her before he disappeared. While Hannah works to find out who her husband is and where he is from, she finds Owen Michaels.
Bailey is traumatized by her father’s disappearance and joins Hannah’s search. She realizes that the memories of her early childhood do not match the story her father told her. A big part of the book is that Hannah and Bailey come together as a family to solve the mystery of Owen Michael’s disappearance. Bailey is sixteen and hostile to Hannah, but needs solace from her.
Hannah is attracted to Owen’s daughter Bailey because she is lost and understands the pain and confusion. She doesn’t want to be like Bailey, but she believes she can find a way for herself and Bailey to live happily ever after. Then the US Marshals in Texas, Grady, show up at her door and offer to find ways to protect Hannah and Bailey by including them in the witness protection program.
When Hannah Hall marries single father Owen, she struggles to connect with his distant teenage daughter Bailey. Hannah is resourceful when her boyfriend Jules helps her delve deeper into Owen’s secret. Hannah learns in her search for her husband what it means to be a mother and how important the connection with her husband is to her.
The thriller follows the story of a woman who searches for her husband after his disappearance. Years ago. Hannah Hall married Owen and she set out to win the affection of his 16-year-old Stepdaughter Bailey so that they could be a happy family.
The day after Laura Davess’s husband Owen Michaels disappeared, Hannah Hall gets a message. Hannah is a woman who is in love with her husband Owen and tries to establish some kind of connection with her step-daughter Bailey. In her confusion and anguish, she knows the note says “protect her” and refers to Owen Michael’s 16-year-old daughter Bailey.
That’s why I think Hannah becomes the heroine of her own life in this novel. When Sheas picks up 6-year-old Bailey from school the day after Owen’s disappearance, Bailey comes home with a helpless look on her face, which I recognize. At 22, this is the first small but decisive moment that changes Hannah and Bailey’s relationship. In this way Hannah is able not only to forgive Owen, but to find her best way forward. I am drawn to such stories in all genres, from thrillers and memoirs to plays and extended family dramas.
The Last Thing He Told Me is not only exciting about evil people, it also makes me think about what you know and love about me in Hannah’s shoes. I understand why she is acting the way she feels, why her relationship with her father has changed and why I like who she is and where she comes from. I also understand Hannah in a new way what she wants and how she is in the midst of her own struggles.
