Mr Peanut made a significant impression in the American publishing industry, and was described by The New York Times as a ‘daring, arresting first novel by Adam Ross, an author of prodigious talent’. It is a story about marriage – predominantly the marriage of David and Alice Pepin who meet (ominously) in a film class at college titled ‘Hitchcock and Marriage’.

After 13 years of marriage David is harbouring two secrets. He wishes his wife was dead, and fantasises about calamities occurring. Occasionally he guiltily imagines murdering her. And his second secret is that he is writing a novel. Alice Pepin is an unhappy woman. She has become morbidly obese, depressed, and exhausted by her work teaching disturbed students. Early in the book she tells David, ‘I wish I were dead.’ The Pepins do not have children, and this is explored by revisiting the trajectory of their marriage. Individually and together, both dream of escape.

Adam Ross chooses circuitous ways to explore the Pepins’ marriage and Alice’s actual death. By page ten, we see David being interviewed by two detectives, Hastroll and Sheppard, in relation to her murder. And then the author takes off on another journey – one that explores the troubled marriages of both detectives. The author’s writing is so riveting and intriguing that these stories are fascinating backdrops and contrasts to the story of David and Alice.

This book can be read as a regular novel, or can be tackled like a jumbled Rubik’s cube. Even Pepin’s work role – the lead designer and president of a ‘small, extremely successful video game company’ forces the reader to think about game play and the solving of mysteries. This is a wonderful and clever book, and even though the events that occur are extreme, it’s an insightful meditation on all long-term romantic relationships.

Annie Condon is convenor of a Readings Australian Book Club.