{
    "id": 310316,
    "slug": "marriage-pact",
    "nstc": null,
    "title": "Marriage pact",
    "subtitle": "Richmond Michelle",
    "collection_title": null,
    "collection_part_number": null,
    "annotation": null,
    "description": "<p><strong>How far is <em>too</em> far when it comes to protecting your marriage? Find out in this relentlessly paced novel of psychological suspense.</strong><br /><br /> <strong>&ldquo;Gripping, thought-provoking, and irresistible.&rdquo;&mdash;Dean Koontz</strong><br /><br /> Newlyweds Alice and Jake are a picture-perfect couple. Alice, once a singer in a well-known rock band, is now a successful lawyer. Jake is a partner in an up-and-coming psychology practice. Their life together holds endless possibilities. After receiving an enticing wedding gift from one of Alice&rsquo;s prominent clients, they decide to join an exclusive and mysterious group known only as The Pact.<br /><br /> The goal of The Pact seems simple: to keep marriages happy and intact. And most of its rules make sense. <em>Always answer the phone when your spouse calls. Exchange thoughtful gifts monthly. Plan a trip together once per quarter. . . . </em><br /><br /> <em>Never mention The Pact to anyone.</em><br /><br /> Alice and Jake are initially seduced by the glamorous parties, the sense of community, their widening social circle of like-minded couples.<br /><br /> And then one of them breaks the rules.<br /><br /> The young lovers are about to discover that for adherents to The Pact, membership, like marriage, is for life. And The Pact will go to any lengths to enforce that rule.<br /><br /> For Jake and Alice, the marriage of their dreams is about to become their worst nightmare.<br /><br /><strong>Advance praise for <em>The Marriage Pact<br /></em></strong><br />&ldquo;Riveting psychological suspense! This book will keep you up all night, while making you second-guess everything you know and everyone you&rsquo;ve ever loved.&rdquo;<strong>&mdash;Lisa Gardner, #1 <em>New York Times </em>bestselling author of<em> Right Behind You</em></strong><br /><br /> &ldquo;A truly chilling thriller . . . It ranks with <em>The Stepford Wives </em>and<em> Gone Girl</em> as a terrifying look at what it really means to say &lsquo;I do.&rsquo;<strong>&rdquo;&mdash;Joseph Finder, <em>New York Times </em>bestselling author of<em> Guilty Minds</em></strong><br /><br />&ldquo;<em>The Marriage Pact</em> is a tense, twisting, quirky novel of growing dread&mdash;and a love story with a richly imagined relationship between a wife and husband. Michelle Richmond looks with a gimlet eye at our therapy-obsessed culture and wonders if the experts who claim to have all the cures might themselves need therapy.&rdquo;<strong>&mdash;Dean Koontz, #1 <em>New York Times</em> bestselling author of <em>The Silent Corner</em></strong><br /><br />&ldquo;Michelle Richmond is, simply put, a great storyteller. And&nbsp;<em>The Marriage Pact</em>, without gimmicks or tricks, is a twisting, suspenseful, keep-you-up-all-night thriller. &nbsp;But it&rsquo;s more than that, too. It&rsquo;s a deep, insightful, nearly voyeuristic view into modern marriage&mdash;what brings us together, what keeps us together, what tears us apart.&nbsp;A smart, engrossing, scary read!&rdquo;<strong>&mdash;Lisa Unger,&nbsp;<em>New York Times</em>&nbsp;bestselling author of&nbsp;<em>The Red Hunter</em></strong><br /><br /> &ldquo;A brilliant premise for a novel of psychological suspense, taut plotting, and deft writing,&nbsp;<em>The Marriage Pact</em> shows in gripping detail just what could go wrong when we try too hard to protect the love we cherish most.&rdquo;<strong>&mdash;J. P. Delaney, <em>New York Times</em> bestselling author of <em>The Girl Before</em></strong><br /><br />&ldquo;Clever and original&mdash;as smart as it is scary.&rdquo;<strong>&mdash;Gin Phillips, author of <em>Fierce Kingdom</em></strong><br /><br /> &ldquo;This sometimes disturbing, always thought-provoking stunner of a novel will keep you reading far too late into the night.&rdquo;<strong>&mdash;Karen Dionne, author of <em>The Marsh King&rsquo;s Daughter</em></strong></p>",
    "imprint": null,
    "language_code": "eng",
    "original_language_code": null,
    "page_count": 432,
    "duration_seconds": null,
    "publication_date_first": "2017-07-25",
    "publication_date_latest": "2017-07-25",
    "cover_url": null,
    "editions": [
        {
            "isbn": "9781101966143",
            "product_form": "BC"
        }
    ],
    "ratings_count": 0,
    "read_count": 0,
    "review_count": 0,
    "favorite_count": 0,
    "reading_status_read_count": 0,
    "reading_status_reading_count": 0,
    "reading_status_want_to_read_count": 0,
    "rating_average": null,
    "ratings_distribution": {
        "1": 0,
        "2": 0,
        "3": 0,
        "4": 0,
        "5": 0
    },
    "created_at": "2025-09-19T13:15:43+00:00",
    "updated_at": "2025-11-03T00:24:41+00:00",
    "publisher": {
        "id": 4202,
        "slug": "doubleday-us",
        "name": "Doubleday US",
        "created_at": "2025-09-19T13:08:55+00:00",
        "updated_at": "2025-09-19T15:08:17+00:00"
    },
    "contributors": [
        {
            "id": 184889,
            "slug": "michelle-richmond-2",
            "key_names": "Richmond",
            "names_before_key": "Michelle",
            "prefix_to_key": null,
            "contributor_role": "A01",
            "readable_contributor_role": "Author"
        }
    ],
    "genres": [],
    "subjects": [
        {
            "scheme_identifier": "32",
            "scheme_version": null,
            "main_subject": false,
            "subject_code": "300",
            "created_at": "2025-09-19T13:15:43+00:00",
            "updated_at": "2025-09-19T13:15:43+00:00"
        }
    ],
    "campaigns": []
}