This note contains spoilers for the book.

Seems to be another standalone, and I haven't even spotted a reference to Delano, Georgia (yet). Back when Woods was trying to be a real author, and before he'd found his particular goldmine, I think.

It's Woods' take on Patricia Highsmith's psychological thriller Strangers on a Train, though probably more people know of it through Alfred Hitchcock's film of the same name.

Two people meet while traveling (as randomly as one can meet today really, with nothing to connect them except airline seating charts, which neither of them ever gives a thought to) and realize their lives would be better of a particular person died. And eventually reach the idea of trading murders. With motive or apparent connection, the police are, they think, extremely unlikely to connect them.

Both as homage and to help get their conversation going, the movie being shown on the plane is Hitchcock's.

There is of course complexity, and things don't go smoothly. One of the conspirators is playing a deeper game, including significant elements of entrapment.

This is considerably better than the more recent Woods books, after he became a reliable best-seller. Fewer sheap shortcuts, more depth, more complexity.