Nobody's Fool a Harlan Coben Thriller

 

 

 

Nobody’s Fool (2025)

By Harlan Coben

Grand Central Publishing, 340 pages.

★★★★

 

A reminder: Book (and movie) titles can legally be reused. I suspect this is because most titles use ordinary words that don’t lend themselves to copyrights. Richard Russo’s Nobody’s Fool (1993) is one of his best-known books and there are at least two films of that name. It’s also the title of a new thriller from Harlan Coben. I wish he had chosen a different title. His protagonist Sami Kierce is a fool when we first meet him and 22 years later he still makes mistakes. Nonetheless, it's a very good novel, even if there’s a fairly major logic flaw.

 

Sami is of Pakistani descent who, in the present, is 40-something, is recently married to the lovely and supportive Molly, and they have a one-year-old son Henry. Some 20 years earlier Sami was a recent college graduate who partied way too much. In a trip to Spain he meets Anna at a disco and stayed with her for nearly a week. He awoke one morning covered in blood, a knife in his hand, and Anna lifeless beside him. He doesn’t think he killed her, but doesn’t know what to do. In a panic he called his father, who tells him to talk to no one and board the next plane to the United States: “You’re a brown kid in a foreign country.” He violated his father’s command in one respect. Before he scampered he tells the police that a woman had been murdered.

 

Five years later he was a police detective engaged to Nicole, who is murdered. The gunman, one Tad Grayson, was sentenced to life, but Sami had unresolved anger issues that led to mistakes and dismissal. Now he’s an unlicensed gumshoe-for-hire by sleazy divorce lawyers for tasks like taking photographs of unfaithful spouses. He also had a side gig of teaching criminal justice courses to night school adults. On evening Sami is startled to see Anna walk into the classroom, meet his eye, and race out of the room, though not before one of his students dropped a tracking device into her coat.  

 

Was it really Anna? Sami follows a fading signal to a Connecticut estate and gets beaten up by security for his trouble. Sami begins to act like a real detective and enlists his students in real-life lessons in research and surveillance. Sami’s life takes a series of dramatic turns. First, he comes to suspect that Anna is a bigger catch than he imagined: Victoria Belmond, an heiress who has been missing for 22 years. This is confirmed by her parents, wealthy philanthropists Archie and Talia, and eldest son Thomas. In fact, they’d like to pay Sami a $100,000 retainer if he will sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) and investigate what happened to Victoria in Spain; there are 11 years for which she has no memory. They offer another half million plus expenses for three months of investigative work. He’s not crazy about signing the NDA, but he and Molly are swimming in debt.

 

His lawyer friend Arthur advises him to sign and lays another shock on him. Because of past irregularities several criminals he investigated have been released; one is Tad Grayson for whom Sami has a hatred bordering on sanguinary. There’s no doubt in his mind, or that of his former partner, that Grayson murdered Nicole. The only solace is that Grayson’s were vacated–meaning he could be retried–not dismissed. Moreover, someone is stalking Molly.

 

First things first. It’s off to Spain with his family. Matters get super twisty. Was Anna/Victoria kidnapped? Used as a sex slave? A scammer? Who was the guy who appeared in the bedroom when Sami screamed 22 years earlier? Back in New York, who is “Scraggly Dude,” the lowlife making Molly’s life uncomfortable? Who was the last person to see Victoria before she disappeared at midnight on Y2K? Why do two more murders take place and why was Sami shot? Was Anna really Victoria? Are the Belmonds as they seem? Was Grayson a wronged man?

 

Coben is a wonderful thriller writer. His plots are dense and well-constructed. He also makes judicious use of humor. Get back to me when you figure out the massive logic hole.

 

Rob Weir

 

Note: I loved this quote from Sherlock Holmes via his creator, Arthur Conan Doyle: It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories instead of theories to fit facts. It’s used by Sami and is also a good way to read Coben’s novel.

 

Swede Caroline: Brilliant or ...?

 

 

Swede Caroline (2024)

Directed by Finn Bruce and Brook Driver

Belstone Pictures, 97 minutes, R (pixelated nudity, minor violence)

★★★★

 

Swede Caroline (note spelling) is the strangest film I’ve seen since Hundreds of Beavers and matches its production values as a homemade film made on a shoestring budget. It was made in Britain and made just $68,000 worldwide, so I doubt you’ve ever heard of it. If you can stream it or find on DVD, though, it’s worth trying. You will have one of two opinions about it; you’ll either find it so wacky you’ll hoot despite yourself, or you’ll think it’s amateurish and dumb.

 

We will get into this, but first consider that few people on the planet as obsessed by gardening and rural nostalgia as the English. If you’ve ever watched Masterpiece Theatre it’s practically a given that there were mentions of gardening. How many times have we seen some upper-class twit with a name like Lady Handspring Buffington Chicken-Plucker trimming her prize-winning roses, or a country fair with Farmer Bursten Pantstear showing off his sheep? (E’yup lads, look at yonder ryet nice yows by the sitch.)

 

Swede Caroline is a mockumentary on gardening. Caroline (Jo Hartley) grows big marrows (a courgette or zucchini) that can weigh hundreds of pounds. Alas, not everything is on the up and up at the agricultural fair in Shepton Mallet (Somerset). Somehow Caroline’s marrows never win because the veggie judge (Mark Silcox) disqualifies her for things no one else sees-like a hairline crack- and awards the cup to someone from the better classes. Caroline is not such a person; she’s divorced, a bit on the rough side, lives in a council flat, and has a bear-like goofball boyfriend Willy (Celyn Jones) who is more brawn than brain.

 

Rigged judging is scandalous enough, but a line is crossed when someone sneaks into Caroline’s back garden, smashes into her small greenhouse, and steals her plants and seeds. It’s the crime of the century in Shepton Mallet. Willy tries to calm Caroline, but another neighbor, Paul (Richard Lumsen) launches a full-scale investigation. He fancies himself an expert because he’s watched a lot of TV programs about detectives and has their techniques down. (Not!) Caroline knows that Paul is basically an ageing slobbish geek who has no life, wiles away time playing video games, and watches computer porn. Speaking of which, Caroline approaches Louise (Aisling Bea) who allegedly does know something about detection, though every time we see her she’s wearing a slinky robe, as is her husband Lawrence (Ray Ferron).

 

As the investigations proceed, one silly thing after another occurs. I shan’t reveal them other than to say: bad cellphone video, jealousy, an MP (Member of Parliament), a close encounter with a garden fork, demolition, plant napping, social class satire, mallows posing as mammaries, and a group of swingers. Through it all, Kirsty (Rebekah Murrell) gives us a meta backseat point of view. She is allegedly making a documentary about the investigation. (Get it? A documentary within a mockumentary.) I won’t pretend that the script will knock Shakespeare from his literary pedestal. Directors Bruce and Driver made the film for just $64k, cut every corner that could be cut, and turned them into roundabouts. I’ll leave it you to determine if what’s on the screen really is amateurish or whether it’s tongue-in-cheek deliberate. I suspect it was an absolute hoot to make what is akin to an extended Monty Python sketch. Perhaps the cast made a few quid on the video release and buggered off to the pub to laugh and hoist a few pints.

 

About the title. There is a passing mention to a Swede, but that part of the plot is too convoluted to connect the dots clearly. My theory is that it’s another of the film’s many in-jokes. It could be an oblique nod to the film’s (tame) sex subplot. Sweden is generally credited with being the first nation to legalize what was then called “pornography.”* Then again, it might just be a bad pun. Swedes are rutabagas in Britain, though rutabagas are not marrows.

 

Like Hundreds of Beavers, the best way to digest Swede Caroline is just to go with it. Let its absurdity wash over you like V8 Juice.

 

Rob Weir

 

* Many film histories consider Sweden’s I am Curious Yellow (1967) to be a forerunner in mainstreaming movie with overt sexual content. It was followed by Blue in 1968. The Swedish flag is yellow and blue, though the films are black and white.

 

If in Richmond, Catch this Exhibit

 

 

Frida as Toddler

 

Frida Kahlo: Beyond the Myth

Virginia Museum of Fine Art (Richmond)

Through September 28, 2025

 

Should you find yourself anywhere near Richmond between now and the end of September, by all means make a stop at the city’s Virginia Museum of Fine Art (VMFA) to see Frida Kahlo: Beyond the Myth.

 

A splash of cubism

 

 

Kahlo (1907-54) is, of course, one of the world’s most famed artists–so much so that perhaps you are, such as I was, suspicious that there’s anything new to reveal about her. Wrong! First of all, though Kahlo died at 47, she was prolific in numerous genres, including surrealism, cubism, symbolism, magical realism, and modernism. Second, she had an adventurous love life that remains shocking to some. Her great love was Mexican muralist Diego Rivera to whom she was married twice (1929-39 and 1940-54), but they had an open marriage. Kahlo was openly bisexual and among her lovers was Josephine Baker, Leon Trotsky, photographer Nikolas Muray, Japanese sculptor Isamu Noguchi (who might also been a Rivera conquest), singer Chavela Vargas, and possibly actress Dolores del Rio and painter Georgia O’Keeffe. Though she was a petite mite (about 5’3” tall and not more than 100 pounds), she didn’t apologize for her admiration for communism or her love affairs. 

 

Hit by bus 1926

 

 

These things have long been known about Kahlo, but what’s new in VMFA exhibit are images of her seldom seen outside of Mexico, including hurried drawings, self-portraits, and photos and paintings of her made by others. Kahlo was just 15 when she met 41-year-old Rivera. When they married the first time, Frida was already in the poor health that haunted her for most of her life. At 18, she was hit by a bus. In all, she endured 32 operations, including the amputation of her gangrenous left leg in 1953. (In all likelihood gangrene is what killed her in 1954.)

 

Suicide of Dorothy Hale 1939

 

 

 

Kahlo, Sun and Life 1947

 

 

Granted that two world wars and her love of surrealism and modernism predisposed her to favor gloomy subjects, but so too did her Mexican identity with its fixation on death, skeletons, and the supernatural. The VMFA exhibit is dotted with such material.

 

That said, most visitors are most likely to react most strongly to subjects that are about her. Kahlo was one of those people with plastic (as in malleable) features. Kahlo was something of a fashion plate, a bright quetzal-like presence who wore beautiful clothes based upon traditional Mexican dress. Yet, she retained her unibrow and, depending upon how she posed could look either alluring, coquettish, or masculine. The latter tendency was enhanced later in life when she seldom bothered to pluck her moustache-like upper lip. Her attractiveness also varied according to who was painting or photographing her. Or, how she felt. Naturally, she painted the body cast in which she was encased after one of her many surgeries. 

 

Age 19, first self-portrait

 

 

Photo by Imogen Cunningham, 1931

 

 

Seated nude self-portrait 1930

 

By Nikolas Muray 1939

Frida with Figurine 1939 by Muray

 

By Dora Marr 1939

 

 

 

 

 

Self-portrait with loose hair 19477

 

Today Frida Kahlo would have reaped NIL (Name, Image, Likeness) royalties. And you could bet she’d dictate the terms!

 

Rob Weir