Marriage and more at stake in domestic thriller

“The Golden Couple” by Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen (St. Martin’s Press)

Call them the not-so-golden couple. Divorces are usually complicated and messy and this couple’s is no exception. Husband and wife Matthew and Marissa Bishop appear picture perfect at the office of therapist Avery Chambers.

Profiled as Washington’s Maverick Therapist, Avery practices without a professional license, which was revoked almost half a year ago. Her method, using 10 short-term counseling sessions dealing with emotions starts with The Confession.

“The Golden Couple,” a domestic thriller by best-selling novelists Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen, starts almost immediately with Marissa’s confession about having had an affair with someone, so she says, at her gym. “I slept with someone. Just once.” It enrages Matthew. After the confession, Avery continues through “Disruption, Escalation, Revelation, Devastation, Confrontation, Exposure, The Test, Reconciliation and Promises.”

The couples Avery treats are alternately intimate and passionate. Throw into the Bishops’ mix their young son, 8-year-old Bennett, and you have a great thriller.

Each chapter goes back and forth between therapist Avery and client Marissa, and gives you much to chew on. The tension picks up in the second half, and you may find yourself stopping your daily chores to read more and more as you race toward the finish line.

A 350,000-copy market distribution came out last week. It is likely to be another blockbuster, much like the authors’ 2018 thriller, “The Wife Between Us.”