Look Closer by David Ellis

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⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Review: LOOK CLOSER by David Ellis — A Marriage Made in Lies 😈

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (5/5)
📚 Buy Look Closer on Amazon (affiliate link)

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⚠️ Trigger Warnings

This book contains mentions of suicide, murder, addiction, infidelity, abuse, violence, and scamming. Proceed with caution if those are sensitive topics.

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🎭 Overview

Look Closer by David Ellis is a psychological and legal thriller set in Chicago — and wow, is it a ride. Published in 2022, it’s a mind-bending story about a husband and wife who look perfect on the outside… but their relationship is built on secrets, lies, and a body count.

Ellis, who’s also a Chicago attorney (and occasional James Patterson co-author), uses his legal background to craft a story that’s airtight, fast-paced, and full of twists. If you love unreliable narrators, double-crosses, and a couple who are way too calm about murder, you’re in for a treat.

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🚨 SPOILER WARNING 🚨

This is a full, detailed summary — including the ending! Stop here if you haven’t read it yet and don’t want the big reveals ruined.

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🕵️‍♀️ Plot Summary — "Trick or Treat… or Murder?" 🎃

The story opens on Halloween night (because of course it does). Simon Dobias, a mild-mannered Chicago law professor, is standing in the foyer of Lauren Betancourt’s mansion. Lauren is dead, hanging from the balcony in her Halloween costume. Simon calmly composes a fake suicide text and leaves.
So yeah… this isn’t your average suburban dinner party.

The timeline splits in two:

• The months leading up to the murder

• The aftermath, told through detective interviews and investigations

And Ellis keeps flipping the script so many times you’ll get plot whiplash (in the best way).

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💔 Simon and Vicky — The Perfect Couple (Not Really)

Simon is married to Vicky Lanier, who works at a domestic violence shelter. Their marriage is hanging by a thread. Simon starts seeing Lauren Betancourt, a former paralegal at his father’s law firm. In his diary, Simon confesses his guilt about cheating, but he’s obsessed with Lauren.

Meanwhile, Vicky is meeting with a “financial advisor” named Christian Newsome because she wants to access Simon’s $20 million trust fund once their 10-year anniversary hits. (Yikes. That’s not suspicious at all.) Turns out Christian is actually a scammer named Nick Caracci, who cons rich women with fake investments.

But Vicky isn’t the clueless wife you think she is… 👀

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💀 The Murder Web

Detective Jane Burke begins investigating Lauren’s “suicide.” She immediately suspects murder — and she’s right, though not in the way she thinks.

Lauren was having an affair, but not everything adds up. Meanwhile, we learn that Simon’s dad, Ted Dobias, was a cheater too — his affair drove Simon’s mother, Glory, to suicide. So yeah, Simon’s got major parent trauma.

Lauren tells Simon she’s pregnant and pressures him to leave Vicky. He agrees… but then everything goes sideways.

Vicky finds Simon’s diary and shows it to Christian (the scammer). They realize they’ve both been played — or at least they think they have — and decide Lauren has to go. Christian kills Lauren, believing it’s part of his and Vicky’s scheme.

Except… Vicky has been playing him all along.

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🔫 Double-Cross City

After Christian murders Lauren, Vicky shows up at his apartment, drugs him, and shoots him — faking his suicide. Boom.
Turns out Christian ruined Vicky’s sister Monica’s life years earlier by fueling her addiction and stealing her money. Monica later died by suicide, and Vicky has been plotting revenge ever since.

But there’s more. (Oh, there’s always more.)

Simon and Vicky were in on it together the whole time. They faked their marriage, manipulated Christian, and used Simon’s “diary” as a prop in an elaborate setup to pin everything on someone else. Every “affair,” every diary entry — all lies.

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🕵️‍♀️ Jane’s Last Stand

Detective Burke knows Simon is guilty of something — she just can’t prove it. The fingerprints don’t match, the evidence collapses, and her chief wants her off the case.

Simon and Vicky get away with it. Completely.

They meet one last time in a quiet park. They share a bittersweet goodbye kiss and go their separate ways — free, unpunished, and ready to start new lives.

It’s the kind of ending that makes you go: “Wait… THEY WON?” 😮

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💬 My Thoughts

This book was FUN. From page one, I was hooked — I mean, a Halloween murder scene where the victim is still in costume? I’m so in. 🎃

David Ellis gives you just enough clues to make you feel smart — right before yanking the rug out from under you. Every time I thought I’d cracked the code, bam, new twist. It’s like playing chess with a con artist.

What I loved most was how tight the plotting was. No loose ends, no random plot holes — everything comes full circle. You can feel Ellis’s legal brain at work, weaving all these lies and schemes into one big satisfying explosion.

And the whole “perfect marriage” trope? LOVE. When you peel back that glossy, suburban surface and find betrayal, greed, and murder underneath — I’m all in.

Final verdict: 5/5 stars 🌟
Clever. Twisty. Deliciously dark.

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📚 If You Liked Look Closer, Try These:

• 🔪 The Last Mrs. Parrish by Liv Constantine — another power-couple-gone-wrong story

• 🕵️‍♂️ The Girl Before by JP Delaney — sleek, sinister, psychological

• 💼 Anatomy of a Scandal by Sarah Vaughan — courtroom + marriage secrets = perfection

• 🎭 The Perfect Couple by Elin Hilderbrand — because there’s no such thing as perfect