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Nova Lee Maier

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Mother Dear: A Thriller Kindle Edition

by Nova Lee Maier (Author), Jozef van der Voort (Translator) Format: Kindle Edition

4.1 5,885 ratings

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There’s only one thing worse than doing the unthinkable: what you’re willing to do to hide it.

Helen lives a decent, uncomplicated life. Satisfied in her career, she’s raising three happy teenagers, and her family has the most envied house on the street. Admittedly, she’s growing just a little disenchanted with her marriage to her workaholic husband, Werner. But that’s nothing she can’t fix. Then one day Helen comes home to something completely unexpected that threatens to shatter her carefully cultivated world.

For disaffected, young petty criminals Ralf and Brian, it was a scheme to make some cash: a quick home invasion. The targets they’ve chosen are Helen and Werner. With Ralf as lookout, Brian disappears into Helen and Werner’s house. But he never comes out.

And Helen’s nightmare is just beginning. She can’t possibly imagine how much worse it can get or just how far she’ll need to go to protect her family.

Print length

443 pages
Language

English
Sticky notes

On Kindle Scribe
Publisher

Amazon Crossing
Publication date

July 1, 2019
File size

4929 KB
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Popular Highlights in this book

What are popular highlights?

Death didn’t discriminate. Not by age, not by gender or race. Whether you were beautiful or ugly, fat or thin, it made no difference. Death took what it wanted, at random.
Highlighted by 236 Kindle readers
People don’t really change, her mother had said to her once. Some character traits just grow stronger over the years, while others fade away.
Highlighted by 196 Kindle readers
“There’s no such thing as truth, Helen, only perception. And that’s different for everybody.
Highlighted by 150 Kindle readers

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Nova Lee Maier is a pseudonym of Dutch bestselling author Esther Verhoef, whose psychological thrillers and novels have sold more than 2.5 million copies in the Netherlands. Esther is the recipient of numerous awards, including the NS Publieksprijs (NS Audience Award/Prix Public); the Hebban Crimezone Award; the Diamanten Kogel (Diamond Bullet); and for Mother Dear, the prestigious Gouden Strop (Golden Noose) Award for best crime thriller of the year. She is also the author of Close-Up and Rendezvous, both available in English. For more information, visit www.novaleemaier.com and www.estherverhoef.com.

Jozef van der Voort is a professional translator adapting Dutch, German, and French into English. A Dutch-British dual national, he grew up in southeast England and studied literature and languages in Durham and Sheffield. He has lived and worked in Austria, France, Luxembourg, Germany, and Belgium. As a literary translator, he took part in the Emerging Translators Programme run by New Books in German and was also named runner-up in the 2014 Harvill Secker Young Translators’ Prize. Mother Dear is his first translated novel.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B07HM1VYD7
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Amazon Crossing (July 1, 2019)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ July 1, 2019
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 4929 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
Print length ‏ : ‎ 443 pages
Page numbers source ISBN ‏ : ‎ 1542042798

Best Sellers Rank: #230,068 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #848 in Domestic Thrillers (Kindle Store)
- #1,572 in Domestic Thrillers (Books)
- #1,655 in Psychological Fiction (Kindle Store)

Customer Reviews:
4.1 5,885 ratings

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Nova Lee Maier

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Nova Lee Maier is a pseudonym of Dutch bestselling author Esther Verhoef, whose psychological thrillers and novels have sold more than 2.5 million copies in the Netherlands. Esther is the recipient of numerous awards, including the NS Publieksprijs (NS Audience Award/Prix Public); the Hebban Crimezone Award; the Diamanten Kogel (Diamond Bullet); and for Mother Dear, the prestigious Gouden Strop (Golden Noose) Award for best crime thriller of the year. She is also the author of Close-Up and Rendezvous, both available in English. For more information, visit www.novaleemaier.com and www.estherverhoef.com.

Customer reviews

4.1 out of 5

5,885 global ratings

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Mary H.

Great psychological thriller!

Reviewed in the United States on September 12, 2023

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This book was an excellent psychological thriller. Some shocking parts (hello the aftermath of the breakin), some parts I didn't understand their significance until the book had concluded, and some parts that were definitely a "wow they had it coming" moment.

Initial observations: Helen seems like a go-with-the-flow mom who has a lot on her plate. Her kids seem like upper middle-class kids, definitely spoiled and used to getting their way, but generally well-adjusted. Werner seems like a class A d1ck from the beginning...though also a hard worker who wants whats best for his family.

I love the plot. Just when the excitement from the break-in and its aftermath had concluded, this almost morphed into another story. Bringing both storylines together in the end was genius and totally satisfying.

I do wish we could have heard more of Helen's thoughts through the letters to her mom throughout (and especially at the end as the book was wrapping up). I feel like we saw a lot of her actions, but didn't hear a lot of her thoughts. Although maybe the point was that her actions *are* who she really is as a human. Something to think about at least.

I will definitely read more by this author, and really enjoyed this!

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Josh Mauthe

Lots of fun, even if it won't really stick with you or do anything new

Reviewed in the United States on July 31, 2022

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Nova Lee Maier is a bestselling author of Dutch thrillers, and having read Mother Dear, it’s not hard to understand why; if her other books are like this one, they move like rockets, twist nicely, waste little time, and offer bite-sized chapters that keep you going “oh, just one more.” It all turns out to be empty calories that don’t really stick with you at all by the end, but that doesn’t make the read any less enjoyable while you’re in it.

Helen has a pretty successful upper-middle class life: a wealthy husband who runs a series of restaurants, three kids who seem to be doing well, a nice house, a medical career. It’s all nice – maybe a bit unfulfilling, but nice. So when she walks in to find a young man with a gun pulled on her husband trying to rob the place, she reacts in defense of her family and her good life, shooting the boy multiple times…and then consciously letting him die as she checks on her husband and the house.

From there, Mother Dear gets complicated, taking a page out of Vince Gilligan’s style on Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul by wringing the tension out of the process here – indeed, when the fundamental question is “how do you hide a body that could ruin your life,” Maier digs into the question way more than I expected, delivering some fantastic setpieces that pull every bit of uncertainty out of the situation. And when you add into the mix the robber’s accomplice, who knows that his friend disappeared into that house but doesn’t know what to do about it, you have all the ingredients for a tidy little potboiler.

Mother Dear delivers on that front nicely; with every chapter being a minute or two long, the book moves relentlessly fast, and Maier has a way of throwing out unexpected wrinkles just often enough to hook you in. And if those wrinkles maybe give away the game a little too early, well, that’s okay – Maier has some other ones you’re not expecting. The downside of that pace, as you might imagine, is that there’s not much there there – the characters are basically functional tropes and archetypes, the story is interesting but nothing groundbreaking, the denouement basically what you would expect (admittedly, not quite what I thought, but pretty close). It’s all empty calories, and in a week or so, I doubt I’ll remember much about it – but that didn’t make it less fun to read.

4 people found this helpful

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Amazon Customer

Mother Dear

Reviewed in the United States on August 7, 2023

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This book didn't start out too strong for me, but as I got further in it picked up and took me for an unexpected ride.

I felt tense, amazement, and just utter shock. Overall was a very good book. I will definitely read more from this author

Reviewed in the United States on November 12, 2023

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What a creepy story. I get the chills just thinking about. It was not at all what I expected and the ending blew my mind. It was really good story over all.

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Britt

Not the ending I expected

Reviewed in the United States on July 28, 2023

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Great read. Little slow in the middle. But it picked up momentum as I pushed through. Really enjoyed reading this

Reviewed in the United States on October 1, 2023

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I could not stop reading once I started. The twist and turns had me on the edge of my seat with anticipation. The ending was well worth it.

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Dawn Human

How far will a mother go to protect her family?

Reviewed in the United States on May 7, 2022

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Things go sideways when Brian gets high & decides to rob the home of hard working restaurateur Werner & his recovery nurse wife, Helen. Brian slips into their posh home but never returns to the getaway car where his friend, Ralf waits. While we, the reader, learn quickly what has happened to Brian, Ralf doesn't. The chapters go back & forth between the points of view of Helen as she deals with the aftermath of the burglary & Ralf as he seeks to solve the mystery of his missing friend. Yes, there are spots where the pacing is a little slow, but perhaps that is due to my reading a translated version. As imperfect as Helen is, as awful as Ralf was at the beginning, I still longed to know what happened to them.

Also, if you read this as an American bear in mind that the gun laws we have here & how those impact our culture could have some bearing in how the novel os seen. The characters were making decisions based in a different country & in light of those laws & that culture.

6 people found this helpful

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Silvia Prime Customer

Over the top

Reviewed in the United States on September 12, 2023

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I had high expectations but this book but it fell short.
It was doing a good job around page 300 but then the ending didn’t work. I was expecting more thrill.

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Maddy

And the ending -!

Reviewed in India on May 15, 2023

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Fast-paced and intriguing thriller that took a suddenly unexpected turn a short while from the end and then began to get even more unpredictable. Okay, that end does leave a lot of questions unanswered, but still. An enjoyable read.

Alexander Loth @xlth

Von Verbrechern und Vorfällen: Ein kurioser 'Thriller'

Reviewed in Germany on May 29, 2023

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Mother Dear: A Thriller von Nova Lee Maier war in vielerlei Hinsicht eine Reise, die mich eher durch die schillernden Tiefen der Absurdität führte als durch die dunklen Korridore des Nervenkitzels.

Die Grundprämisse des Buches ist denkbar einfach: Brian, ein junger Mann in finanzieller Not, entscheidet sich für einen Raubüberfall auf ein wohlhabendes Ehepaar, um seine Schulden bei einem Drogendealer zu begleichen. Die Dinge nehmen eine verheerende Wendung, als die Frau im Ehepaar Brian aus Versehen tötet, was sie und ihren Mann in eine verzweifelte Lage versetzt, die sie mit der Entsorgung der Leiche lösen müssen. Das Verbrechen setzt eine Reihe von Ereignissen in Gang, die sich in einem gemächlichen Tempo entfalten, dabei aber eine Menge absurder Situationen produzieren, die eher zum Lachen als zum Schaudern anregen.

Zwischen dem leidenschaftlichen Detektivspiel von Brians Freund Ralf, seinem unerwarteten Einstieg in eine Liebesaffäre mit Brians Freundin und der entstehenden Freundschaft mit Sara, der Tochter des Ehepaars, macht die Handlung einige Schlenker, die für Überraschungen sorgen, und offenbart, dass nicht alles so ist, wie es scheint.

Leider leidet das Buch unter dem Übersetzungsproblem, das ein unvermeidlicher Stolperstein in der Lektüre war. Englische Ausdrücke und Sprachgebrauch wirken gelegentlich unangemessen und verwirrend, was auf eine unerfahrene Hand hinter der Übersetzung hindeutet.

Ein besonderer Dorn im Auge ist das als "großes Verbrechen" bezeichnete abschließende Ereignis, das die Erzählung in die Lächerlichkeit treibt und die Geduld des Lesers auf eine harte Probe stellt. Es gibt einen Unterschied zwischen geheimnisvoll und absurd, und leider hat Maier's "Thriller" einen Sprung auf die falsche Seite dieser Grenze gemacht.

Trotz seiner Mängel und Absurditäten bietet "Mother Dear" eine unterhaltsame Lektüre, die einen faszinierenden Einblick in die Mechanik der Vertuschung und die menschliche Natur bietet. Der Schreibstil ist fesselnd und die Charaktere sind gut gezeichnet, auch wenn ihre Entscheidungen manchmal schwer zu glauben sind.

Insgesamt vergebe ich dem Buch 4 von 5 Sternen, wobei ich jedoch einen Stern für die schlechte Übersetzung und das eher lächerliche Ende abziehe. Trotz seiner Schwächen ist Mother Dear ein Buch, das durch seine originelle Handlung und seinen flüssigen Schreibstil punktet.

One person found this helpful

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Anjali V Raj

Riveting thriller

Reviewed in India on December 30, 2022

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I got this book as a part of Amazon World Book day 2022 give away gift. Really interesting thriller, I enjoyed every bit of it, thanks Amazon. It has a very clean plot, intriguing narration and good characters. The chapters are short and has a simple language hence you don't realise how quickly you flip pages

Boingboing

How to get rid of a dead body and not get caught.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 5, 2019

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I didn't find this month's Amazon Prime First Reads book choices very exciting and picked 'Mother Dear : A thriller' as a bit of a 'least worst' option. I knew it was written by a Dutch author and I was probably hoping for something in the style of Herman Koch, a writer I really like. The theme also hinted at something similar to Koch's 'The Dinner' since the blurb promised a tale of how far parents would go to cover up the crime and protect their families. Sad to say, 'Mother Dear' is not in the same league at all.

The premise is simple. A young man, Brian, goes to rob a well-to-do couple in order to pay off his debts to his drug dealer. Things don't go as planned and the wife 'sort of accidentally' kills the robber, leaving her and her husband to work out what to do with the dead body. The young man's friend and accomplice, Ralf, was nearby during the robbery and hears three gunshots.

The plot plods along rather slowly as the killers have to find ways to dispose of the body. That part seemed pretty ludicrous to me. Ralf tries to uncover what happened and how, getting involved with Brian's girlfriend and getting to know the daughter of the family, Sara. If there's a hero - and that's a big if, then Ralf's the best you're going to find in the book. Step by step he starts to uncover some surprising coincidences until he eventually works out that things are not at all what they seem.

There's an underdeveloped use of letters to a dead mother which could have been removed completely without diluting the book. There weren't enough of them and they weren't sufficiently revealing to be required. We do get them thrown back at us later in the book as a sort of justification for a character's reactions, but that same person would have been wanting to do what they did even without the letters. If I were an editor, I'd have said dump that device and move on.

The final 'crime waiting to happen' is absolutely ridiculous. Any Brit who knows the words 'Beachy Head' will instantly know what's planned. Silly stuff. And the eventual outcome is even more silly than that.

3 stars seem to be a bit on the generous side. I did consider just giving it a 2-star rating. I also would suggest that calling it 'Mother Dear: A thriller' is indicative of a problem. If you have to tell people it's a thriller, it probably isn't. I wouldn't classify this book in that genre.

It's a good, quick read with a plot that more or less comes together but some parts are just too silly for words. There are also some distracting translation issues that I found rather irritating. We're introduced to the translator at the end of the book and told it's his first book. Not bad for a first effort but there were things that just didn't ring true. Strange English usage, very odd phrases when the author is trying to indicate 'Posh' English, and repeated use of the phrase 'get ahold' just didn't work for me. Also, Dutch characters would never talk about how many calories there are in cakes. Tiny things, and not contributing to the rating, but maybe they could be addressed for later editions.

20 people found this helpful

sandy

Nice twist

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 11, 2022

Verified Purchase

Long drawn out book. Character building was good final twist was unexpected but did drag on for me. Although everything added up in the end.

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