You’re invited to a wedding on a beautiful island off the coast of Italy. It’s going to be an event you’ll never forget: storms, shocking discoveries, and murder. Check out my spoiler review and discussion for Her Dark Lies by J.T. Ellison.
Her Dark Lies by J.T. Ellison. To be published on March 9 2021 by Mira Books. Thanks to the publisher for providing an advance review copy.
This post contains affiliate links.
First, I’ll run through a quick (or not that quick!) plot summary of Her Dark Lies. Then I’ll reveal the ending and then we can discuss!
Characters in Her Dark Lies
Claire is marrying into the Compton family and there are a lot of them!
Claire Hunter is an up-and-coming artist in Nashville.
Jack (William Jackson) Compton is the groom. He’s ten years older than Claire and lost his first wife in a tragic sailing accident.
Jack’s parents: Brice (William Brice) and Ana Compton. Along with their sons, Brice and Ana run the family’s tech company.
Jack’s brothers: Tyler and Elliot
Jack’s Grandfather Will. His wife May drowned in a grotto when the tide came in and trapped her. Will was a cinematographer but is now suffering from dementia.
They’re dead, but Jack’s great-grandparents (William and Eliza) bought the villa. Eliza died in a hunting accident.
Claire’s sister Harper is a photographer and Instagram influencer.
Plot Summary for Her Dark Lies
After their lavish pre-wedding reception in Nashville, Jack and Claire and head home with their bodyguards to get some rest before heading to their destination wedding in Italy. As they enter the house, two masked men jump out and attack them. There’s a struggle and Claire grabs a gun and shoots one of them. Jack tells her to say that the bodyguard did it.
Claire and Jack are having small, intimate wedding is on Isle Isola, a small island near Capri owned by Jack’s family. Jack is older than Claire and his late wife was swept off a sailboat during the last day of their honeymoon in California.
A storm is brewing which makes it challenging to get all the guests to the island. The local police arrive and say a body has been discovered.
Claire meets Jack’s grandfather Will. He’s belligerent and confused, saying “he killed her” and “he’s dangerous.”
Claire finds a mysterious note in Jack’s bedside table and discovers that someone has written “whore” on her wedding dress.
Claire signs a prenup which includes a requirement to change her name and a prohibition against taking about the family. She takes a blood test as a requirement for the marriage license. There’s a computer attack on the Compton computer servers. There’s a ransom message: 24 hours to tell the what you’ve done.
The Nashville police call and say that they found hidden cameras in Jack and Claire’s house.
After the call Claire tells Jack and Karmen, the head of Compton family security, that a woman named Ami came to see her a few weeks back about buying a painting for a client. Claire was surprised that Ami knew the title of the painting she was working on. She hasn’t told anyone the title but Jack. She wonders if the cameras explain how the woman knew that. Karmen says she’ll look into Ami.
There’s a POV from Morgan, Jack’s former wife, who didn’t want children and admits to spying on Claire. She’s alive!?
Morgan reveals that the Compton family’s philanthropic foundation and tech business is a front for secret government contracts.
Jack gets an anonymous text with a video of Claire shooting the intruder.
Karmen learns that the masked intruder Claire shot was Shane, a troubled boy Claire dated in high school. Claire’s parents had a messy divorce and Claire started acting out. Shane was eventually sent to prison.
Claire’s sister Harper is a photojournalist and will be photographing the wedding. Unbeknownst to Claire, Hunter wants to do an expose on the family. She’s been researching them and the island and the THREE wives who died there, Morgan and May by drowning and Eliza in a hunting accident. Harper has figured out that Morgan died on Isle Isola, not in a sailboat accident in California.
Claire confesses to Jack that the man she killed was Shane. He tells her the body found in the island was the mother of Fatima, the housekeeper.
Morgan is also spying on them on the island. She has a background in software engineering and is presumably the one who put cameras in Claire and Jack’s house.
Claire’s mom gets drunk at the pre-wedding brunch. Because the power has been spotty due to a storm, Claire is helping her mother back to her room. They discover a body. It’s Henna, the wedding planner, who presumably fell down the stairs in the dark.
Harper is photographing and interviewing Brice and Ana. She asks them why they were covering up Morgan’s murder and pretending it was an accident in California. They grab her phone and realize there is an open line to her editor … Ami. They tell Harper that Ami is an impostor who probably fed her false information.
Fatima suggests that Claire wear her mother’s wedding dress in place of her ruined one. She makes Claire a pot of tea which Claire is paranoid and throws out. Karmen sends Claire some photos and asks her if the woman in them is the one who inquired about the painting and called herself Ami.
The firm lawyer calls, claiming that magazine that Harper is writing for is ready to print a story accusing the family of covering up Morgan’s murder by Jack. Jack argues with his parents and brother who think he should call off the wedding.
Karmen gets confirmation of Ami’s identity. Before she can inform the family she is stabbed to death.
Claire gets a text from Harper asking Claire to meet her. Claire heads outside with bodyguard Malcolm and sees a woman in a white dress. Malcolm suddenly tries to attack Claire. There’s a struggle Malcolm falls into some sort of gardening stake in the ground and dies.
Spoilers for the Ending of Her Dark Lies
Jack tells Claire he thinks Elliott killed Morgan because she was spying on the family. He says they all had a family meeting on the island. Morgan was angry, ran out into the storm, and fell off the cliff. Jack swears he did not kill her.
Jack tells Claire that his family spies with their software and use the information in a variety of ways, including blackmail. That they thought Claire’s art would be useful for planting surveillance devices.
Claire confesses that she was a drug runner for Shane in high school. The two of them want to go forward with the wedding despite everything. Jack leaves Claire puts on the dress Fatima offered to lend her.
No surprise: it’s Morgan’s wedding dress. (Total callback to Rebecca!)
Gideon calls and says that Morgan is alive. She’s Ami. Which means that Morgan and Jack are married.
Morgan pops out and shoots Gideon, Ana and Jack. She tells Claire that she didn’t die when she fell off the cliff. She found Shane and paired up with him. Now she blows up the boat, possibly with wedding guests on it.
Claire escapes into the tunnel and Morgan chases her. Claire gets to the villa and finds Katie but Morgan shoots Katie. Morgan tries to gell Claire who tried to kill her. Enraged, Claire kills Morgan. Well, no need for Jack to file for divorce!
Jack is in the hospital in Naples. Ana is dead.
Who Tried to Kill Morgan?
Flashback to Morgan’s accident – Elliot chased her, Jack pushed her and she fell off the cliff, and Ana tells them to not to call help but to just leave her to die.
Claire suspects that Jack had something to do with Morgan’s death. But she doesn’t care!
Questions, I Have Questions
I did love the atmosphere in this one – the island, the storm, all the guests, the creepy vibe. But I did have some questions. If you have answers, please tell me in comments!
Okay so the people who died in the book are:
Shane: shot by Claire in self-defense; Henna, presumably pushed to her death by Morgan; Karmen, presumably stabbed by Morgan; Malcolm, accidentally killed by Claire; Katie, shot by Morgan; Ana, shot by Morgan; Morgan, neck broken by Claire.
Did Fatima poison the tea or did Trish just get drunk at brunch? If Fatima drugged Trish’s tea, was that to cause a distraction so that Morgan could kill Henna?
Did we every find out what Henna knew or saw to cause Morgan to kill her?
What happened to Fatima’s mother?
Isn’t it a bit of a coincidence that three Compton wives have died (or in Morgan’s case, almost died) on that island?
Is anyone else getting Rebecca vibes with this one? The handsome widower, the sailboat, the conniving housekeeper who gets the new wife to wear the old wife’s dress?
Join our Discussion of Her Dark Lies!
What are your thoughts? Our discussions are lively and friendly and all opinions are welcome. Be sure to leave a comment and (IMPORTANT) if you want to be notified of my (and other readers’ responses to your comments, subscribe to comment replies. Just click on the arrow by the little envelope symbol above the comment box and enter your email to subscribe to the comments for just this post. You can unsubscribe anytime!
How did Claire murder her father? Did I miss the explanation?
Hi Margo! She didn’t exactly murder him but is responsible for his death. When Claire was fifteen, she and Shane had been doing drugs at a party. They left the party and Shane robbed a convenience store. Both of them got arrested, but they let Claire go after Shane told them he’d kidnapped her. Claire’s father came to pick her up and, on the drive home, told her she was going to rehab. She freaked out and grabbed the wheel. The car crashed and he died.
I read this a while ago so all the details are kinda of fuzzy, I just remember I didn’t like this book too much it would have been (in my opinion) better if Morgan stayed dead and that one of the Compton family members was the killer on loose. I feel like the whole family was sketchy i don’t know why Clair stayed. I forgot why one of the brothers wife was so skinny? I think she was described that way.
Hi Kathy. I read it a while ago too. I feel like the overall vibe was that a woman does NOT want to marry into this family – all the wives seem to end up in a bad way. And I agree that Morgan as the killer wasn’t my favorite…
I know I’m late to the party but I just finished this book and found your post! There were a few inconsistencies I need to vent abt-
I also have some questions-
The ending act just seemed rushed overall, Anna might offer Harper a job at the travel magazine, but her chief of staff? Unrealistic. Harper can’t forgive Claire’s roll in their fathers death for decades, but then all of a sudden wants to be 100% involved in her life and new family? The “reveal” about Fatima liking Morgan had no foundation Are we really supposed to believe Claire could fill Ana’s shoes so seamlessly and keep the family’s powerful, secret business going? Was there actually nothing more sinister going on abt the other wives dying over the years? Seems like a real loose thread to leave hanging. If the Island is so cursed for women having it destroyed Rebecca-style would have made much more sense and been more satisfying.
I’ll subscribe to the comments in case anyone wants to revisit the story and these questions with me 🙂
Hello Laura! There is no “late to the party” as I am always here with a glass of wine ready for anyone to show up and talk. However, I did read this a while ago. The one thing you bring up that I remember DID drive me crazy was why did no one think it was strange that all the wives kept dying? As soon as I figured that out, I’d have returned the ring and been out of there.
I did love the atmosphere of this one. I’m a picky reader and I want it ALL: great characters, great setting, twisty plot, and all the loose ends tied up. to me, this one did fall short a little on the loose ends.
I just finished this book too and am currently trying to Google what happened there at the end. Also baffled about her random change of heart on having kids/being pregnant and how the other Compton wives untimely deaths were left unexplored. Also she kinda thinks Jackson killed Morgan and she just… doesn’t care? Or that her best friend got murdered? And Fatima was really a double-agent for Morgan this whole time and nobody caught a hint of it? The thing about the potentially poisoned tea bothered me too, and that we don’t get a tidy ending. Feel like careless writing left a lot of loose ends on this one. And who was the body they found on arrival?! I still have no idea.
Hi Lindsey! I think all the wives ending up dead is one of the most interesting parts!
And hey, you’re right. The body at the beginning was supposed to be Morgan’s so … who was it? WHY are so many women dying on this island and why is no one getting to the bottom of it?