Lies That Bind

by Amanda Lamb

Maddie Arnette has built her whole life around the narrative that her father murdered her mother. When a woman in the grocery store claims that Maddie’s father did not kill her mother, the revelation forces the journalist toward a reckoning. Is it possible that her father has sat in prison for almost forty years for a crime he did not commit? And if he didn’t do it, who did?  Maddie barely has time to absorb this earth-shattering news when she is called to report on what appears to be a suicide. Tilly Dawson is found shot to death on her driveway, a gun by her side. But right away something about the situation doesn’t feel right to Maddie. Before long, the tough television reporter finds herself delving once more into a dark world of violence, secrets, and intrigue. This time around Maddie must put her own life on the line to guarantee that the truth will prevail.

276 pages, Paperback

First published May 25, 2021

About the author

In addition to being an author, Amanda Lamb is an accomplished public speaker, podcaster and veteran television crime reporter. She worked for an award-winning NBC affiliate in the southeast for nearly three decades. She also hosted, co-wrote, and co-produced three true crime podcasts including "Follow the Truth," "What Remains," and "The Killing Month August 1978." "Follow the Truth" won the regional Edward R. Murrow award for excellence in journalism. Currently, she hosts and produces "AGELESS: Opening Doors with Amanda Lamb" which is about women transforming themselves personally and professionally after fifty. This is the focus of her keynote speech about not allowing age to define your value and your potential. She shares her wisdom and inspiration with audiences across the country.

Amanda's newest thriller, Whispers on the Mountain, is due out in September 2025. It features a dogged newspaper reporter who arrives at a mountain resort only to learn there is a missing hiker. She can't ignore the tug of the compelling mystery swirling around her in the beautiful but dangerous North Carolina mountains. Amanda hopes this will be the first installment in a new murder mystery series.

Amanda has published twelve books in dramatically different genres from murder mysteries, to true crime books, to touching and humorous memoirs, to children's books. From murder cases to motherhood, Amanda examines life through the lens of a curious journalist who is constantly observing and documenting everything in her path with deep interest, insight, and compassion.

She has written a murder mystery series about a tenacious television journalist seeking truth and justice all while juggling her own intriguing backstory. These novels from Torchflame Books include "Dead Last," "Lies that Bind," and "No Wake Zone."

As a journalist, Amanda can only report about ten percent of what she knows, but her novels peel back the veil of the news industry and give readers an intimate peek into the world of journalism through the eyes of a crime beat reporter. While the people and stories in her books are fictional, they are all loosely based on real-life scenarios Amanda has encountered in her more than three decades in the trenches.

Amanda has also penned three true crime books which include "Love Lies," the saga of a young mother who disappeared after her husband said she went jogging and never returned home. In a desperate search for the truth her friends and family circle the wagons demanding answers-answers that ultimately expose a grim tragedy in the small, idyllic southern town. "Evil Next Door" features the story of a brutal rape and murder case Amanda covered as a news reporter. The victim, a young woman who was just beginning to live into her potential, was stalked and killed by a suspected serial killer who left copious amounts of DNA in his path, but little else for investigators to go on. They play a dangerous of game of cat and mouse with the police trying to lure the killer into their trap. "Deadly Dose" is a true crime story about a young up-and-coming scientist who was poisoned by someone in his inner circle. A dogged, old-school investigator refuses to give up in his relentless pursuit of the truth, a truth far more gruesome than anyone could have imagined.

Amanda's memoirs include "The Living Room" which chronicles her 80-day journey caring for her mother who was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor. In the midst of tragedy, Amanda learns how to live from her dying mother. The darkness is tinged with light as her mother's departure becomes a celebration of a life and an inspiration to those around her.

Amanda's parenting memoirs include "I Love You to God and Back" which chronicles her young daughter's prayers giving the reader a glimpse into the way adults see the world through a child's eyes. There is also a companion child's book of the same title. "Girls Gone Child" chronicles Amanda's daughters' sometimes outrag

Reviews

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn't realize this was book 2 in a series and even though it's a great stand-alone, I wished I had read the first one before this one. Maddie is a television reporter, a single mother to two, and has a father in prison for killing her mother. So life is a little complicated! When a woman is discovered dead in her own driveway of an apparent suicide, Maddie is called to the scene but questions everything. Who shoots themselves in the head in a driveway? Many other suspects appear: the abusive husband, the chef she had an affair with, his ex-wife, her daughter, and each has some motive. So in-between her other assignments which include a drug-sniffing dog and a ghost cat, Maddie investigates the killing and is also shocked when a woman approaches her in a grocery store claiming that it was her son, not Maddie's father who killed her mother. So lots of twists and turns and you'll have to read book #3 to find out more!
Thanks to NetGalley for this ARC!

[John Miller · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amanda Lamb is a local reporter in my viewing area, which makes it doubly cool to read books by her. She has written quite a bit of nonfiction, but this and the previous, “Dead Last” are, I think, her first novels. While I enjoyed the first in the Maddie Arnette series, I found this one to be truly intense and mind-bending in its complexity.
The main question is, did Tilly commit suicide, or was she murdered by one of the people who loved her and had connections to her through different avenues: husband, daughter, or the former restaurant chef with whom she’d had an affair. Maddie never really accepts the former conclusion, so she leans hard on her cop friend Kojak (cool name, right? I think it’s a reference to a 70s-era tv show) to re-launch the investigation. Evidence implicating each of the possible suspects is presented, and the reader has fun trying to work out “who-dun-it”.
Interspersed with the story of murder and mayhem, we follow Maddie as she investigates whether her father did indeed kill her mother, an extended storyline from book 1, as a stranger makes what might be classed as a deathbed confession that her son actually committed the crime. I assume that storyline will be explored in full in future iterations of this series.
While I would say that one need not have read the first to appreciate this one, doing so would allow for a fuller understanding of the characters and events that Maddie often reflects on as the book unfolds. As with that first, Lamb gives interesting insight into the behind-the-scenes of news reporting, including how they often respond to viewer interactions bad and good. We also, again, see Maddie as she goes “in the field” to do some silly and serious pieces. I found that fascinating, but what I most enjoyed about this one was the action-packed ending. I could barely stop while at work, at a time when I had to grudgingly put the book down. I think in this book Maddie really finds her voice, and the story of her twisty-turny life gains full traction. Well done.