Upstanding Young Man

In a quiet Chicago suburb, a star wrestler goes missing weeks before his high school graduation, shattering his mother’s carefully curated image of domestic bliss.

A pulse-pounding thriller with complicated family dynamics, perfect for fans of domestic suspense writers like Mary Kubica and Jennifer Hillier.

Meg Hart has taken great pains to create her perfect All-American family. It looks effortless, but that’s because she’s been smart about it.

However, on a brisk spring morning weeks before his graduation, her son McClane goes missing. And as the investigation deepens, the police zero in on her as their perfect suspect. Tragedy has struck this family before, and all signs suggest that she is the source. Add in her elusive husband’s strange behavior and inconsistencies in her story, it becomes clear that she has plenty to hide.

Before he disappears, it turns out McClane has secrets of his own: a pregnant girlfriend, a shocking truth about his wrestling career, and a chilling discovery—the person he trusts most has betrayed him in the worst way.  

Alternating between Meg’s perspective in the initial days of the investigation and McClane’s in the hours leading up to his disappearance, Upstanding Young Man is packed with relentless tension and short, fast-paced chapters that will keep readers up all night.

Sharon Doering has worked on Wall Street, in a lab, and as a science professor. She has also been a good waitress, a mediocre bartender, and a terrible maid. She lives in Chicagoland with her family and a big, silly dog. Upstanding Young Man is her third novel.