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A Better Ending
A Brother's Twenty-Year Quest to Uncover the Truth About His Sister's Death
Table of Contents
About The Book
For fans of We Keep the Dead Close and The Night of the Gun, a propulsive and moving memoir about a brother’s decades-long investigation into the circumstances surrounding his sister’s tragic death—and his own journey to forgiveness and closure.
On a summer evening in 1974, Jim Thomson arrived home from a baseball game to the news that his younger sister, Eileen, had taken her own life. To Jim, his parents, and brother, the loss was unexpected and devastating. Only twenty-seven, Eileen had been living in California with her high school sweetheart, Vic, a cop. She had a circle of close friends and a job she loved. But details soon emerged that Eileen had been depressed, her storybook marriage plagued by infidelity and guilt. On the day of her death, Vic later explained, he stormed out of the room in the midst of a bitter argument. Moments later, a gunshot went off. The revelations were deeply troubling, but Jim and his family believed him. The police ended the investigation and the Thomsons moved on as best they could.
In 2001, his parents and brother all dead, Jim often found himself thinking about Eileen. What had the final months of her life been like? Why had she not told him about her troubled marriage? What other demons had she been battling? Frustrated by how little he knew, Jim hired a private investigator to help track down Eileen’s old friends and the police reports from that fateful afternoon, beginning a two-decade journey through a tangled web of secrecy, deception, and shifting stories that would force him to consider the unthinkable: Had Eileen really committed suicide?
Told with the precision and pace of a whodunit and the searing emotion of a family saga, A Better Ending is an unforgettable tale about the love between siblings, the murkiness of truth and memory, and the path to acceptance.
On a summer evening in 1974, Jim Thomson arrived home from a baseball game to the news that his younger sister, Eileen, had taken her own life. To Jim, his parents, and brother, the loss was unexpected and devastating. Only twenty-seven, Eileen had been living in California with her high school sweetheart, Vic, a cop. She had a circle of close friends and a job she loved. But details soon emerged that Eileen had been depressed, her storybook marriage plagued by infidelity and guilt. On the day of her death, Vic later explained, he stormed out of the room in the midst of a bitter argument. Moments later, a gunshot went off. The revelations were deeply troubling, but Jim and his family believed him. The police ended the investigation and the Thomsons moved on as best they could.
In 2001, his parents and brother all dead, Jim often found himself thinking about Eileen. What had the final months of her life been like? Why had she not told him about her troubled marriage? What other demons had she been battling? Frustrated by how little he knew, Jim hired a private investigator to help track down Eileen’s old friends and the police reports from that fateful afternoon, beginning a two-decade journey through a tangled web of secrecy, deception, and shifting stories that would force him to consider the unthinkable: Had Eileen really committed suicide?
Told with the precision and pace of a whodunit and the searing emotion of a family saga, A Better Ending is an unforgettable tale about the love between siblings, the murkiness of truth and memory, and the path to acceptance.
About The Author
Christopher LaFarge
James Thomson grew up in Pittsburgh and attended Harvard College on a scholarship, after which he served as the navigator of a Navy ship off the coast of Vietnam, then earned a PhD in American studies. After a brief stint in academia, he had a successful career as a salesman and business consultant. His novel, Lies You Wanted to Hear, received wide acclaim. Jim and his wife live outside of Boston. They have five far-flung children and eleven grandchildren.
Product Details
- Publisher: Avid Reader Press/Simon & Schuster (April 16, 2025)
- Length: 304 pages
- ISBN13: 9781668062869
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Raves and Reviews
“A haunting and heartfelt meditation on personal loss, James Thomson’s memoir is meticulously recounted with powerful suspense and hard-earned wisdom.” —Robert Kolker, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Hidden Valley Road
“Gutting. A Better Ending is a heartbreaking work that examines how grief and tragedy ripple across decades. I cannot imagine the courage James Whitfield Thomson had to summon in order to face the brutality and ultimately the truth of his sister’s sudden death. His book does the seemingly impossible: for the briefest of moments, he brings her back to life.” —Rachel Louise Snyder, author of Women We Buried, Women We Burned and NBCC Finalist No Visible Bruises
“A brave and meticulous investigation of not only a death, but a life, A Better Ending reveals the destruction wrought by silence and asks whether we can ever truly know the people we love. Written with great feeling and structured like a mystery, this book is a beautiful monument to a lost sister and a lost time.” —Sarah Perry, author of After the Eclipse and Sweet Nothings
“Toggling artfully between past and present, Thomson’s account of his belated search for the truth of his younger sister’s death is both adrenaline-boosting whodunit and tender family memoir. But what impressed me most about A Better Ending was its author’s honesty as he followed the twists and turns wherever they led and learned along the way, not only about his sister’s death but also about himself.” —George Howe Colt, bestselling author of Brothers and The Big House
“James Thomson’s chronicle of his dogged search for answers that may or may not be findable lays bare a family’s evasions, intimacies, and impenetrable mysteries. A heartbreaking and mesmerizing book.” —Joan Wickersham, author of the National Book Award finalist The Suicide Index
“Murder or suicide? James Thomson seeks the truth of his sister's death in A Better Ending. His journey will take us across the country and across the decades, into the heart of darkness and out the other side. It's powerful and personal, a riveting true-crime page turner, destined to become a classic of the genre.” —William Martin, New York Times bestselling author of Back Bay and December '41
“James Thomson’s masterful and meticulous storytelling—part mystery, part elegy—is a gift for us all. This brave and unflinchingly honest book grabs you from the first page and does not let you go until the very last word.” —Meg Kissinger, author of While You Were Out
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- Book Cover Image (jpg): A Better Ending Hardcover 9781668062869
- Author Photo (jpg): James Whitfield Thomson Christopher LaFarge(0.1 MB)
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