What do you think?
Rate this book
Past Perfect
Having been fired from her CIA dream job without an explanation thirteen years earlier, cable television writer Katie Schottland is enlisted for help by a former colleague who offers insight into the mystery of Katie's dismissal. By the author of Any Place I Hang My Hat. 150,000 first printing.
352 pages, Hardcover
First published February 1, 2007
75 people are currently reading
443 people want to read
About the author
Susan Isaacs
48 books504 followersI was born in a thatched cottage in the Cotswolds. Oh, you want the truth. Fine. I was born in Brooklyn and educated at Queens College. After leaving school, I saw one of those ads: BE A COMPUTER PROGRAMMER! Take our aptitude test. Since I had nothing else in mind, I took the test-and flunked. The guy at the employment agency looked at my resume and mumbled, “You wrote for your college paper? Uh, we have an opening at Seventeen magazine.” That’s how I became a writer.
I liked my job, but I found doing advice to the lovelorn and articles like “How to Write a Letter to a Boy” somewhat short of fulfilling. So, first as a volunteer, then for actual money, I wrote political speeches in my spare time. I did less of that when I met a wonderful guy, Elkan Abramowitz, then a federal prosecutor in the SDNY.
We were married and a little more than a year later, we had Andrew (now a corporate lawyer). Three years later, Elizabeth (now a philosopher and writer) was born. I’d left Seventeen to be home with my kids but continued to to do speeches and the occasional magazine piece. During what free time I had, I read more mysteries than was healthy. Possibly I became deranged, but I thought, I can do this.
And that’s how Compromising Positions, a whodunit with a housewife-detectives set on Long Island came about. Talk about good luck: it was chosen the Main Selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club, auctioned for paperback, sold to the movies, translated into thirty languages, and became a bestseller. I was a little overwhelmed by the success. However, it’s hard to rise to a state of perpetual cool and go to slick downtown parties when you’re living in the suburbs with a husband, two kids, two dogs, and a mini-van, I simply wrote another book… and then another and another.
About half my works are mysteries, two fall into the category of espionage, and the rest are…well, regular novels. In the horn-tooting department, nearly all my novels have been New York Times bestsellers.
My kids grew up. My husband became a defense lawyer specializing in white collar matters: I call him my house counsel since I’m always consulting him on criminal procedure, the justice system, and law enforcement jargon. Anyway, after forty-five years of writing all sorts of novels—standalones—I decided to write a mystery series. I conceived Corie Geller with a rich enough background to avoid what I’d always been leery of—that doing a series would mean writing the same book over and over, changing only the settings.
I also produced one work of nonfiction, Brave Dames and Wimpettes: What Women are Really Doing on Page and Screen. I wrote a slew of articles, essays, and op-ed pieces as well. Newsday sent me to write about the 2000 presidential campaign, which was one of the greatest thrills of my life-going to both conventions, riding beside John McCain on the Straight Talk Express, interviewing George W. Bush. I also reviewed books for the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, and Newsday. (My website has far more information about my projects than most people would want to know, but have a look.)
In the mid-1980s, I wrote the screenplay for Paramount’s Compromising Positions which starred Susan Sarandon and Raul Julia. I also wrote and co-produced Touchstone’s Hello Again which starred Shelley Long, Gabriel Byrne, and Judith Ivey. (My fourth novel, Shining Through, set during World War II became the 20th Century Fox movie starring Michael Douglas, Melanie Griffith and Liam Neeson. I would have written the script, except I wasn’t asked.)
Here’s the professional stuff. I’m a recipient of the Writers for Writers Award, the Marymount Manhattan Writing Center Award, and the John Steinbeck Award. I just retired (after over a decade) as chairman of the board of the literary organization, Poets & Writers. I also served as president of Mystery Writers of America. I belong to the National Book Critics Circle, the Creative Coalition, PEN, the Ameri
I liked my job, but I found doing advice to the lovelorn and articles like “How to Write a Letter to a Boy” somewhat short of fulfilling. So, first as a volunteer, then for actual money, I wrote political speeches in my spare time. I did less of that when I met a wonderful guy, Elkan Abramowitz, then a federal prosecutor in the SDNY.
We were married and a little more than a year later, we had Andrew (now a corporate lawyer). Three years later, Elizabeth (now a philosopher and writer) was born. I’d left Seventeen to be home with my kids but continued to to do speeches and the occasional magazine piece. During what free time I had, I read more mysteries than was healthy. Possibly I became deranged, but I thought, I can do this.
And that’s how Compromising Positions, a whodunit with a housewife-detectives set on Long Island came about. Talk about good luck: it was chosen the Main Selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club, auctioned for paperback, sold to the movies, translated into thirty languages, and became a bestseller. I was a little overwhelmed by the success. However, it’s hard to rise to a state of perpetual cool and go to slick downtown parties when you’re living in the suburbs with a husband, two kids, two dogs, and a mini-van, I simply wrote another book… and then another and another.
About half my works are mysteries, two fall into the category of espionage, and the rest are…well, regular novels. In the horn-tooting department, nearly all my novels have been New York Times bestsellers.
My kids grew up. My husband became a defense lawyer specializing in white collar matters: I call him my house counsel since I’m always consulting him on criminal procedure, the justice system, and law enforcement jargon. Anyway, after forty-five years of writing all sorts of novels—standalones—I decided to write a mystery series. I conceived Corie Geller with a rich enough background to avoid what I’d always been leery of—that doing a series would mean writing the same book over and over, changing only the settings.
I also produced one work of nonfiction, Brave Dames and Wimpettes: What Women are Really Doing on Page and Screen. I wrote a slew of articles, essays, and op-ed pieces as well. Newsday sent me to write about the 2000 presidential campaign, which was one of the greatest thrills of my life-going to both conventions, riding beside John McCain on the Straight Talk Express, interviewing George W. Bush. I also reviewed books for the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, and Newsday. (My website has far more information about my projects than most people would want to know, but have a look.)
In the mid-1980s, I wrote the screenplay for Paramount’s Compromising Positions which starred Susan Sarandon and Raul Julia. I also wrote and co-produced Touchstone’s Hello Again which starred Shelley Long, Gabriel Byrne, and Judith Ivey. (My fourth novel, Shining Through, set during World War II became the 20th Century Fox movie starring Michael Douglas, Melanie Griffith and Liam Neeson. I would have written the script, except I wasn’t asked.)
Here’s the professional stuff. I’m a recipient of the Writers for Writers Award, the Marymount Manhattan Writing Center Award, and the John Steinbeck Award. I just retired (after over a decade) as chairman of the board of the literary organization, Poets & Writers. I also served as president of Mystery Writers of America. I belong to the National Book Critics Circle, the Creative Coalition, PEN, the Ameri
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 240 reviews
June 27, 2009
What a mess. This was a train wreck of a book, all the more disappointing because I adored Susan Isaacs' other books.
Katie Schottland, former CIA report writer, is now a somewhat famous writer of a weekly television spy drama, "Spy Guys." But despite her supposedly happy marriage and fulfilling life, she can't get over what happened a decade and a half before, when she was tossed from the CIA's "inner circle" without explanation.
When an old colleague gets in touch with her on a matter of "national importance," Katie isn't interested -- until her friend promises to reveal why Katie was booted. With the possibility of finally putting her 15-year-long obsession to rest, Katie jumps at the chance, only to be disappointed when her friend disappears without a trace.
What follows is a coast-to-coast romp involving numerous ex-Agency personnel (who seem willing to help Katie for no good reason), sexual tension that is never resolved, inexplicable leaps of logic, and page after page of Katie's musings, mind-wanderings, and illogical suppositions as the reader is led from the fall of the Berlin wall in '89 to present-day Tallahassee.
I was left bewildered and bothered, as well as raising my eyebrows more than once at Katie's improbable streams of logic, paragraphs of "what ifs," and seeming willingness to sacrifice her perfectly good marriage for nothing more than a midlife wandering.
I expected more from Susan Isaacs.
Katie Schottland, former CIA report writer, is now a somewhat famous writer of a weekly television spy drama, "Spy Guys." But despite her supposedly happy marriage and fulfilling life, she can't get over what happened a decade and a half before, when she was tossed from the CIA's "inner circle" without explanation.
When an old colleague gets in touch with her on a matter of "national importance," Katie isn't interested -- until her friend promises to reveal why Katie was booted. With the possibility of finally putting her 15-year-long obsession to rest, Katie jumps at the chance, only to be disappointed when her friend disappears without a trace.
What follows is a coast-to-coast romp involving numerous ex-Agency personnel (who seem willing to help Katie for no good reason), sexual tension that is never resolved, inexplicable leaps of logic, and page after page of Katie's musings, mind-wanderings, and illogical suppositions as the reader is led from the fall of the Berlin wall in '89 to present-day Tallahassee.
I was left bewildered and bothered, as well as raising my eyebrows more than once at Katie's improbable streams of logic, paragraphs of "what ifs," and seeming willingness to sacrifice her perfectly good marriage for nothing more than a midlife wandering.
I expected more from Susan Isaacs.
April 18, 2010
Issacs is an engaging writer, however the plot is thin and the mystery is convoluted and worse, non-sensical. There are gapping holes in the logic and in the conclusion. The main character Katie continually makes what are supposed to be logical conclusion with little or no evidence, and the reader is expected to accept that her guess work was all correct at the end, when there was no proof provided that her assumptions were accurate. A very disappointing book.
November 14, 2020
This story of an ex-CIA analyst/report writer turned spy-show-writer is just fun--not groundbreaking, not a gripping spy thriller, just fun. What makes it four stars, for me, is Isaacs' writing, which is clever and fits the story perfectly. Katie, the main character, was fired from the CIA some twenty years before with no reason given, and it's bothered her ever since. Bothered her enough, in fact, that when a former acquaintance turns up asking for help in exchange for telling Katie why she was fired, Katie jumps at it. Except then the woman disappears, and the story turns on Katie's inability to let it go despite everyone in her life telling her to. It was an enjoyable read, though not on a par with some of her other books, and Katie's voice is very strong and readable. A fun way to spend an afternoon.
January 30, 2020
Not her greatest effort, because the plot is weak, but I did enjoy the main character Katie and her family members. Plus I find the author's style of writing so amusing that I didn't mind being carried along on this somewhat meandering story.
For example, this is one character description: "He had the even-featured, craggy face of a forgotten movie star, but with an older man's sun-dried skin and loss of lips. His eyes must have started out blue or gray, but now they were faded to that no-color shade that could only be described as pale. Nothing was new about him: after nine thousand launderings, his jeans had shrunk in length but not in size; they were just short of baggy, which admittedly was better than having to eyeball an older guy's package. His blue shirt, with its button-down, frayed collar, appeared to have been worn on a once-a-week basis since he was eighteen."
For example, this is one character description: "He had the even-featured, craggy face of a forgotten movie star, but with an older man's sun-dried skin and loss of lips. His eyes must have started out blue or gray, but now they were faded to that no-color shade that could only be described as pale. Nothing was new about him: after nine thousand launderings, his jeans had shrunk in length but not in size; they were just short of baggy, which admittedly was better than having to eyeball an older guy's package. His blue shirt, with its button-down, frayed collar, appeared to have been worn on a once-a-week basis since he was eighteen."
November 15, 2023
This I almost had to place on my DNF list - Very slow reading - an ex-CIA analyst/report writer turned spy- became a TV show writer after being released for unknown reason - much of the story wasn't interesting - the last few chapters did pick up with some mystery -
February 2, 2009
I'm a Susan Isaacs fan but haven't read anything of hers lately and was pretty delighted to see this at Costco. As in all of her books, her female protagonist is a strong, smart, but self-depricating hero. Katie can't really get over the fact that she was fired from the CIA for seemingly no reason over a decade earlier (a bit of an obsessive worrier myself, I could totally relate). When a former colleague calls out of the blue and says she can tell Katie why she was fired, Katie is immediately intrigued. When the caller promptly vanishes, Katie tries to follow her trail and is sucked into more than she bargained for. I'm not usually a mystery reader but Isaacs' books always pull me in. I liked this book, it is smartly written as Isaacs' usual form and as with all Isaacs' books I'm trying to get through it quickly so I can find out what happened then disappointed when I'm done with the book because now I have to find something else to read!
October 21, 2014
Past Perfect is my first Susan Isaacs book; and unless I am guaranteed by a friend whose opinion I trust, I will not read another. At first I thought I would enjoy the main character Katie Schottland because she is still haunted by being walked off her job at the CIA with no reason given for her dismissal. After all, she her job performance was exemplary. She thought she was being summoned for a promotion not a dismissal. Although she now has a successful tv shot, Spy Guys, a happy marriage and a beautiful son, when she receives a call from a former irritating colleague who promises to tell her why she was fired, she is hooked.
Anyone who has read a good mystery will sit on the edge of the chair, jump at any unusual sound, and maybe even cook dinner for two hungry kids while turning the pages because the book cannot be put down. Past perfect never creates that tension.
Anyone who has read a good mystery will sit on the edge of the chair, jump at any unusual sound, and maybe even cook dinner for two hungry kids while turning the pages because the book cannot be put down. Past perfect never creates that tension.
March 18, 2015
I generously gave it two stars because it started out being fun and I feel like I should give it credit for that. This book will resonate with people who are or who know people who are so high strung, obsessive, and self absorbed that all rational thinking eludes them. This was really a crappy mystery novel written in a lower level of diction, like maybe it was intended for a tween who had to grow up a little bit too soon. I'm sure other people enjoyed this book, but I found the character and plot development lacking, although the protagonist's persona could be fun at times.
January 9, 2008
I just finished this today and enjoyed it. It's a very past paced book about a former CIA employee who got fired for unknown reasons many years ago. Now living as a writer, a wife & a mom, she's been contacted by someone in her past who needs help and is willing to tell her why she was fired from the CIA.
July 6, 2007
Definitely not one of Isaac's better novels.
September 18, 2017
I was terribly disappointed in Past Perfect. I am an admirer of Susan Isaacs. I have enjoyed most of her books. This one, not so much. Here is the major spoiler: nothing happens. The heroine is Katie, a former CIA gal who is now writing her own spy cable show. She was mysteriously fired from the CIA 15 years ago. She is called by an annoying friend, Lisa, who, if Katie will help her get in touch with a news agency will spill why Katie got canned. She will call Katie back the next day. She never calls back. That's it. Lisa never calls back. The rest of the book is about Katie talking to people, imagining worse case scenarios, talking to more people, ignoring her lovely, ever patient husband, traveling to places to talk to more people who never give her a straight answer. Eventually there are some deaths...but they happen like Greek drama, offstage. I was expecting a page turner...not so much...If I hadn't been listening in the car, I doubt if I would've finished the book. The narrator blithers all over the place about things that could possibly happen, rather than any actual plot. Not worth your time. Very rarely do I ever say that.
August 28, 2020
The plot line is definitely thin, and the protagonist not completely likable.
Katie Schottland was a CIA report writer 15 years ago and was fired without cause — she was escorted out the door. Now she has a husband, and her son is off to camp for the summer. She supposedly has a happy marriage, but that seems based more on her husband’s understanding, and for her part more about lacy black nightgowns than trust and communication. She is the lone writer for a crime-fiction TV series, but spends more time chasing down people out of her past and imagining danger and other scenarios (trying to chase down the person who promises to tell her why the CIA fired her 15 years ago) than engaging in the present. Her questionable decisions along the way, with only 3 people she can trust, keep the story moving.
3 stars is a generous rating for this book.
Katie Schottland was a CIA report writer 15 years ago and was fired without cause — she was escorted out the door. Now she has a husband, and her son is off to camp for the summer. She supposedly has a happy marriage, but that seems based more on her husband’s understanding, and for her part more about lacy black nightgowns than trust and communication. She is the lone writer for a crime-fiction TV series, but spends more time chasing down people out of her past and imagining danger and other scenarios (trying to chase down the person who promises to tell her why the CIA fired her 15 years ago) than engaging in the present. Her questionable decisions along the way, with only 3 people she can trust, keep the story moving.
3 stars is a generous rating for this book.
May 8, 2023
Katie is the writer of a television show Spy Guys, based off of a spy novel that she had written. Her husband Adam works at the Bronx Zoo. And their 10 year old son Nicky is at camp for the summer. She used to work for the CIA writing up reports about agent’s assignments. She was fired 15 years ago but never knew why. Now Katie gets a call from a former coworker from the CIA. Lisa says that she has important information about one of those assignments and if Katie helps her, she will tell her why she was fired. However Lisa never calls her back. Now Katie is worried and the story takes her on a hunt to figure out where Lisa is. Along the way she uncovers the truth about a blackmail scandal that involved her superior in the CIA. Which is who got her fired. The book was a bit wordy and a touch too long but overall fine.
June 27, 2025
I am a big fan of Susan Isaacs' novels, especially "Shining Through," so I was disappointed how inert and sluggish "Past Perfect" was. I can only think Isaacs was satirizing spy novels in her story of Katie's search why she was fired from the CIA nearly twenty years ago. But the story never caught fire, and I was annoyed how casual Katie was about lying to her husband in this quest for some excitement in incipient middle age.
The resolution of the mystery just emerged vaporously, so it was hard to care when we learned the truth. What made the novel have some value was Isaacs' wit and some of the characterizations of the minor characters.
But if you want to read Isaacs, avoid this one initially and read "Shining Through" or "Compromising Positions." Both will keep you engaged which sadly "Past Perfect" doesn't.
The resolution of the mystery just emerged vaporously, so it was hard to care when we learned the truth. What made the novel have some value was Isaacs' wit and some of the characterizations of the minor characters.
But if you want to read Isaacs, avoid this one initially and read "Shining Through" or "Compromising Positions." Both will keep you engaged which sadly "Past Perfect" doesn't.
March 31, 2019
Tired, fairly uninspired writing. It did take me a while to get into it and when I hit the middle Past Perfect seemed to hold some promise. Once I hit the 3/4 mark I finished the rest in one sitting as it felt like it was trying to become more interesting, but then the ending seemed crude, uninspired, and rather boring. Girl who spends her childhood years competing with her sister for parental attention gets hired by the CIA. Two years later she is unexpectedly fired, then spends the next 15 years wondering what happened. My advice . . . honey, after that amount of time, and managing to become successful in your next venture, just let it go! This one really wasn't worth the effort.
April 25, 2022
I am enjoying reading Susan Isaacs, but had a harder time with this one. The main character’s anxiety and imagining tragedies, plus her obsession with her CIA firing and her former boss, when she has everything most of us would want; a husband who is much better than she deserves, a son, a good job, I mean her whining about her past, plus her hiding her actions from her husband just plain irritated me. I should keep more distance, but I get involved in my reading. Anyway, will read more if I find them in the larger print, as my vision is failing. One thing that I especially like about Isaacs, though, is her description of her character’s work.
June 18, 2023
I've read and enjoyed several of Susan Isaacs' novels, and I have to say that this was one of the weaker ones. The writing is snappy, as usual, but the protagonist, a woman who was suddenly fired at the CIA 15 years before, and suddenly jumps into a quest to find out why, I felt there were some pieces of logic missing. There also seemed to be a whole lot of filler between the beginning and the point where there was some significant action, which made me put down the book several times...but I kept picking it up again and I did finish it. But there are other books by Isaacs that are much more compelling...
November 16, 2018
A lot of twists as former CIA and current writer receives a call from a past CIA acquaintance who promises to find why Katie Schottland was suddenly fired from the agency with no explanation years before. She needs to know the reason before she can finally find peace. The acquaintance never shows up. This leads Katie through a dangerous journey to find the truth. Who can she really trust and who is lying? Ms. Isaacs saves the answers to all the questions until the very end. Well written and a good story line. Would like to read more of her books.
November 12, 2019
Spoiler Alert: This review reveals important plot elements.
Pleasant and amusing story, but the ending seemed a bit contrived. The character Maria, did not work for me at all. Why was her house so messy? What was her beef with the main narrator? It seems as though the author needed a tense chase scene, so she made Maria a nut case to make it happen. In view of the tight plotting that led us to this climax it seem like Isaacs got lazy and in a hurry to create a tense finish. The ending did not live up to the first seven eights of the book.
Pleasant and amusing story, but the ending seemed a bit contrived. The character Maria, did not work for me at all. Why was her house so messy? What was her beef with the main narrator? It seems as though the author needed a tense chase scene, so she made Maria a nut case to make it happen. In view of the tight plotting that led us to this climax it seem like Isaacs got lazy and in a hurry to create a tense finish. The ending did not live up to the first seven eights of the book.
December 23, 2020
I love Susan Isaacs books. Her characters are imperfect sassy and totally believable even if their situations might be a bit far fetched. Katie has a lovely husband and loving dysfunctional family. She wrote a successful book Spy Kids which was picked up by a tv network so she has a successful career. But she once worked for the CIA and was sacked. She was never told why and this has continued to bug her. When an old colleague contacts her wanting her help but offering to tell her why all the old wounds open up and the fun begins!
May 21, 2023
I was a big fan of Isaacs before she lost her touch for good chick lit. I happened upon this one at the library sale...
What a mess. A former non spy CIA worker was fired and fifteen years later she is still obsessed with knowing why. She's happily married and a successful writer, but after she drops her not overweight son off at "fat" camp(????) she starts running around investigating the disappearance of an acquaintance who can possibly knows the firing details.
The situations were silly and so unrealistic! The spy details were tedious, and the ending preposterous.
What a mess. A former non spy CIA worker was fired and fifteen years later she is still obsessed with knowing why. She's happily married and a successful writer, but after she drops her not overweight son off at "fat" camp(????) she starts running around investigating the disappearance of an acquaintance who can possibly knows the firing details.
The situations were silly and so unrealistic! The spy details were tedious, and the ending preposterous.
October 26, 2018
3.5 stars, really, but rounded down. It's not her best. The secondary characters who are part of her non-adventure life were unusually weak, for her and the beginning dragged until we got to the adventure. Once there, the story cracked along and it is definitely worth reading for a fan. Most interesting was how the heroine, who was a writer, talked about the practice of writing. Surely some of that was drawn from life.
June 2, 2021
I read this book way too soon after reading Susan Isaacs’ Takes One to Know One and they were virtually identical. It’s almost like she took the template and changed some names and locations and voila – two books that are interchangeable. Maybe if I had waited a year or two between them I would have enjoyed Past Perfect more. I didn’t hate it, and I did finish it, but was it a wonderful read for me …. Not really. I think I'm going to take a break from Susan Isaacs for a bit.
December 21, 2023
Katie had been fired by the CIA fifteen years ago. No explanation. Even though she now has a career writing for a low-level TV spy show and a wonderful husband and a 10 year old son, she is still bothered by the firing. Out of the blue, one of her old colleagues calls her asking for help and offering to tell her why Katie was fired and then disappears.
Katie tries to figure out what has happened.
This is light almost suspenseful reading.
Katie tries to figure out what has happened.
This is light almost suspenseful reading.
August 3, 2017
I liked this book. I see many others did not but I didn't care that it wasn't the most intriguing book I've ever read. It kept me interested enough that I wanted to be reading it whenever I could. My caveat is that Katie did way too much speculating on what happened. Some paragraphs were just too full of speculation on her part. I only wished I could have actually witnessed the downfall of Ben.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 25, 2020
Sometimes one needs a mindless read. I have in the past turned to Sue Grafton or Janet Evanovich. I think Ms. Isaacs provides an experience that is a step above those. She retains some of the wise ass humor, but she is a little more plot driven and thoughtful. This was my first Isaacs book, and the next time I have a long planeflight I might try her again.
February 2, 2022
My first Susan Isaacs book. It is one for her older books on the New York Times Bestseller list. I have been into mysteries lately and had heard that her writings have an element of humor to them. I thought these novel so thought I would try one. It enjoyed it but doesn't rank as on of my favorites . I will try another one of her books. .
July 5, 2017
Reread but still enjoyable. All along, I thought the husband did it but I'm sure I thought that the first time around as well...still was entertaining and the ending, while a bit far-fetched, was engaging and suspenseful even the second time around.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 19, 2017
Premise was why I picked up the book but there was too much chatter. You are suppose to follow our heroine's inner dialogue but it was so back and forth I had a hard time getting into the book. I did finish but the ending was anti-climatic.
August 8, 2018
I was so disappointed in this book. I've always found Susan Isaac's books to be such fun, delightful reads. I could barely get through this one and now that I've finished I wonder why I wasted my time.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 240 reviews