The Fair Weather Friend

• Author: Jessie Garcia
• Genre: Mystery
• Publication Date: January 20, 2026
• Publisher: St. Martin’s Press

Thank you to NetGalley, St. Martin’s Press, and Macmillan Audio for providing me with an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

The next gripping domestic suspense novel from Jessie Garcia.

It’s always sunny in Detroit for Faith Richards. The popular TV meteorologist, endearingly referred to as “The Fair Weather Friend” by her viewers, has the world by the tail. But one night, Faith leaves work on a dinner break and never returns. Her body is found the next morning.

The town is reeling, suspects emerge, and long-buried secrets are uncovered. While her allies rally, her list of adversaries also grows. Little does anyone know that only the deepest secrets will expose the truth.

In this riveting thriller from the author of THE BUSINESS TRIP, Jessie Garcia’s signature multi-POV, rapid-fire style will propel you into the heart of a mystery no one could have forecasted.

I loved Garcia’s debut novel, so it was an easy decision to request this book. Although I started by reading the ebook, halfway through I got approved for the audiobook, and was able to continue binging this book exactly when I couldn’t stop reading and had to find out what happened next.

To start with, there are a lot of perspectives in this book. Once I realized that more than two characters would be narrating, I wound up taking notes on the narrators to keep them straight since my memory isn’t what it once was. I thought the narrator, Gail Shalan, did a wonderful job with so many different characters and managing to have them all sound unique. 

I was initially intimidated by the number of narrators (6+), but as my reading went on, I appreciated what the author was doing by presenting so many perspectives to allow readers to see multiple angles of the characters themselves and at the center of the circle is Faith, the murdered TV meteorologist. We learn about Faith through the lens of some of the people who see her most—her coworkers and friends, but can’t leave out Faith’s hometown celebrity status as the author explores the idea of friendship, parasocial relationships, and how well we really know the people around us. 

Initially, we see Faith through the eyes of one of her biggest fans, Carol. Carol also happens to have a niece who is interning at the same station that Faith works at, and this only works to increase the intensity of the parasocial relationship that can arise out of sharing parts of yourself with the public, like people on the news each night but especially among social media influencers. Fans often feel like they ‘know’ the person behind the account or fame, but really only know what has been shared publicly. Unsurprisingly, Faith has a stalker, and I found his chapters to be creepy and icky, but also fascinating to see how this type of dynamic develops and is maintained.

It isn’t until the third perspective that readers are introduced to a different version of Faith. Instead of the flawless public image, narrators share their experiences befriending or working with Faith, and it is like night and day. As I continued reading, I realized that Faith had gone from a TV celebrity to a highly flawed person behind the scenes, and found that I didn’t care for Faith much, although I did want to get to the bottom of the mystery. Readers learn about the negative character traits that Faith has demonstrated over a period of years, dating back to college, and I was fascinated by learning more about Faith and why she did the things she did. 

Garcia does a fantastic job of planting red herrings along the way, effectively setting up enough characters who dislike, are in competition with, or have developed an unhealthy attachment to Faith. There were twists and turns throughout the story, some of which I saw coming, and some that surprised me, but I was completely caught up as I read. The final twist was a total shocker, and wasn’t anything I had even considered. 

I was a little disappointed by how rushed the ending felt, and that it didn’t leave me with a firm conclusion, but rather a more open-ended final scene. Those aren’t my favorite, and some of the characters struck me as a bit too much, whether they are immature or just strange, but Garcia fully committed, and gave every one of the narrators and side characters their own story and motivations, so everything felt like it was always moving towards an answer. 

Overall, this was a really enjoyable read, and I’m glad that I got the opportunity to read it in both digital and audiobook formats. Both were equally well done, and I found myself struggling to put this down despite my growing dislike for Faith. Prior experience of working in the mental health system makes me lean towards Borderline Personality Disorder due to Faith’s behaviors, but she clearly had some other things going on mentally as well. Things do get a little over-the-top at the end, although I wasn’t surprised by the over-the-top elements and they seemed to be logical points for the plot line to reach somehow. Garcia proves that her success with The Business Trip wasn’t a fluke, and tightly plotted and complex, realistic characters seem to be Garcia’s forte. She’s an easy one to add to my auto-read list, and I’m going to continue looking forward to future books.

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