Still Waters by Matt Goldman

Published by Forge Books on May 21, 2024

Gabe and Liv Ahlstrom are siblings but they have not connected with each other in decades. They grew up in Minnesota, where their family made a living operating the Ahlstrom resort on Leech Lake. The resort holds bad memories, particularly concerning their mother’s death. Now they live on separate coasts.

The funeral of their brother Mack brings Gabe and Liv back to Minnesota. Mack lived in Chicago and also maintained no connection to his siblings. Despite the absence of connection, Mack emails his brother and sister from beyond the grave. He accomplished this by setting his email program to send them emails in the future, resetting the delivery dates each day until his death prevented him from accomplishing that daily task. The emails disclose his suspicion that someone is trying to kill him. The delivery of threatening notes and a dead beaver at the resort make Liv and Gabe wonder whether they might be the next victims.

Still Waters is a novel of family secrets. As Gabe and Liv try to identify Mack’s killer — assuming he was killed and didn’t die from a natural but unusual cause, as his doctor certified — they learn that their parents’ relationship might not have been as idyllic as it appeared to the younger children.

It isn’t a secret that Judith Otsby, the owner of a neighboring resort, would like to acquire the Ahlstrom resort. Another family member’s death seems to open the door to that possibility, but Liv and Gabe would have to surrender their right to take ownership for that to happen. Could Judith be the murderer? Winona, a niece of Liv and Gabe, hopes to acquire the land so she can build a small ecofriendly power plant on the premises. Would murder further her ambitions? Add a murder mystery to a Succession plot and you’ve got Still Waters.

Unfortunately, Still Waters doesn’t feature the sharp writing and wicked twists of Succession. The family drama is rooted in a pedestrian story of parental infidelity. The characters are bland. That probably shouldn’t be surprising, as the book is populated with characters in Minnesota whose goal is to “blend in and carry on as if you’re embarrassed to be alive” (by far the best line in the novel). Various love stories (Gabe and his girlfriend) and love gone bad stories (Liv and her husband) do little to spice up the plot.

The only interesting character is Judith, and she’s only interesting because she’s nasty and snarky. She treats her husband like a servant but it’s difficult to feel sympathy for him, given that he only puts up with her to benefit from her family’s wealth. It’s easy to feel sympathy for a mentally challenged character, but a weak effort to cast suspicion on him is a waste of time. No conventional writer is going to turn a sweet likeable guy with a mental disability into a killer, and Still Waters is clearly the work of a conventional writer.

On a side note, Gabe and Liv need to pull off a scheme to deceive someone they suspect of being the murderer, but the scheme requires them to track down a unique liquor bottle that hasn’t been manufactured in decades. They apparently do this in less than a day. Writers gloss over improbabilities all the time for the sake of telling a story, but this one seriously impairs the story’s credibility.

The plot drags between major events. Efforts to build suspense milk scenes for longer than is necessary, causing suspense to dissipate. Chapters finish with cliffhangers before the action resumes in the very next chapter in an apparent attempt to make the book seem like a page turner. The technique fails to rescue a dull story. The reveal is ho-hum, capped by a rambling confession that serves only to tie up loose ends. While the story might hold some interest for mystery fans who enjoy family dramas, I would put Still Waters near the bottom of a reading list for most mystery fans.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS