My Lovely Wife
They’re an ordinary couple living in an upscale Florida suburb. He’s a tennis pro, she’s a realtor. They’ve been married for fifteen years, and have two teenage children. Their family always has breakfast & dinner together, and they don’t allow toys or phones at the table.
Their marriage, especially their sex life, has been getting a little stale. But almost by accident they discover a wonderful aphrodisiac: murder. Without really intending to, they kill someone – and realize that it’s a tremendous turn-on. It makes everything seem so much more exciting!
So they embark on a highly secret program of further kills. They didn’t choose their first two victims, but now it’s important to scout potential victims, to choose the right one each time. They chose one a year ago, and are about to choose another.
Then a woman’s body is found at an abandoned motel. She’s apparently been held captive for months. She’s been tortured and her fingerprints have been filed off. Marks on the body are identical to those left by a notorious serial killer who was captured and imprisoned eighteen years ago. He was then released on a technicality, and has been missing ever since. Press and the public speculate that he’s returned and is killing again.
But our couple know that woman. They disposed of her body a year ago, in a remote nature preserve. Didn’t they?
My Lovely Wife was published in March 2019., and quickly reached the USA Today bestseller list. Reviewers have raved about its quirkiness and unusual premise.
What was Downing’s inspiration for the book? “I saw this documentary about a couple who kidnapped a woman and held her captive for years.” She began imagining the kind of marriage that could lead to that outcome, and this novel is the result.
Downing always considered writing as just a hobby. Over the past twenty years she’s written part or all of eleven other novels, but never tried to get them published. A Lovely Wife might have languished along with the others, if a member of her writing group hadn’t sent it to a friend who works as a literary agent in New York City. He said it wasn’t his kind of book, but suggested another agent who might be interested. That agent, Barbara Poelle, fell in love with the book and sold it to a publisher in 48 hours.
Downing, who’s been called “the new queen of the psycho thriller,” was born in the San Francisco area and now lives in New Orleans. Her second published novel, He Started It, is scheduled to appear in July 2020.
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