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Those who have an immovable rock lodged in the psyche will find that “Past Perfect” strikes a resonant chord. Susan Isaacs takes that mental lump, multiplies it by 10 and gives it to a central character just a little more obsessive – and resourceful – than most. The engaging result is a light, fast read that explores the difficulty of some emotional truths and how hard it can be to let some things go.

Katie Schottland’s particular stumbling block had not been close to the surface for a while. She is happily married; her only child, Nicky, is getting ready to head off to summer camp, and Katie is obsessing over whether she’s a shallow mother for sending him to a weight-loss camp. But a call from Lisa Golding upends a well-ordered life, bringing a past hurt into the present.

Isaacs, speaking by phone from her home on Long Island, said Katie’s dilemma is a common one. “There’s generally some hurt in the past,” she said. “There is something that is unresolved, whether it’s an old boyfriend or girlfriend, whether it’s a lost job, or a parent that you just can’t deal with it. You go on with your life and when you do bring it up, the common advice is ‘Come on, get over it, you’re 30 or you’re 40 or you’re 90 and … it’s about time.’ But I think people don’t. I think a lot of them yearn for some sort of resolution or do-over. I don’t think its necessarily women or men, I think with women, it’s just probably closer to the surface.”

Lisa is an acquaintance from Katie’s short tenure with the CIA. They had not been close; Lisa was given to exaggerations that crossed over into outright lies. But in this conversation, Lisa waves an irresistible flag: She needs Katie’s help, and in return she will tell Katie why she was fired from the service.

Even after 15 years, Katie’s termination smarts. She had been writing reports for the Office of Eastern Europe Analysis when the Berlin Wall came down. She was a firsthand witness to the intelligence denial in the highest levels of her department, when her boss kept predicting the re-emergence of an East German government that was in full rout.

She thought she was up for a promotion the day she was called into the personnel office and, without explanation, told to empty her desk. Subsequent success in family and career have dulled, but not erased, her shock and hurt. When offered a chance to finally come to closure, Katie finds herself willing to invest a lot – everything she loves, actually – to discover the truth.

In Katie, Isaacs has created a character that is both obsessive and familiar. “She’s prone to obsessing, she’s prone to anxiety,” Isaacs said. “She’s prone to a lot of things, but again she’s not pathological. She’s just slightly crazy in the way that probably half of everyone’s friends are a little crazy. My idea was, in creating her, she certainly has a privileged background and exciting job, but she’s pretty much a normal woman.”

Katie’s determined search for the truth brings her back into the game and puts her at odds with her family. She falls prey to life’s absurdities, many self-inflicted, and only occasionally handles the situations with panache. Most often, she simply reacts.

Her thought process is familiar and, at times, funny. “Past Perfect” isn’t a comic novel, but it’s written with a lot of wit. Isaacs said she doesn’t set out to write humor; the result of that effort is just leaden. But she sees humor in the world and in human decisions, and brings those insights onto the page.

Isaacs said part of the inspiration for “Past Perfect” came from looking at the situation in Iraq and thinking, “Boy, did we get this wrong.” She has read much about the CIA over the years and said, “The powers that be really did get it wrong over the invasion of Cuba and certainly the fall of East Germany. If you go back and read, the people were reeling when Germany imploded so quickly. But if you read a little further, you find that a lot of people, and a lot of analysis, said, ‘This is a corrupt government, the people hate it. It’s not going to last.’ The Russians were pulling out. For all those reasons it was going to go, but the word was changed at the top.”

Isaacs believes that the compelling story of communism and the Cold War blinded some to the emerging reality. “People develop a theory and a story … and anything that doesn’t fit that story gets ignored or tossed out or trampled. That’s OK for me to do, because I’m a novelist. I pick what fits my story. (But) if you are a person in power, that’s a very bad thing to do. Your story may be a great one, but it may not necessarily reflect reality. It’s very dangerous to throw all those facts away, or hide them or not listen or say, ‘Well, these aren’t important,”‘ she said.

Character is Isaacs’ starting point, and she said putting Katie together with the CIA in this situation appealed to her. She followed the initial idea with research that, she said, included “reading a lot of memoirs by former spooks and reading about the agency.” It also involved speaking to current and former operatives, who are “pretty open to talking to authors now, I guess, figuring that their publicity couldn’t get any worse. What I wanted to get was just their way of expressing themselves, the language they use.”

Issacs will speak at the Central Branch of the Denver Public Library at 6:30 p.m. March 5. Though she will be discussing her current work, she also expects to speak on the differences between the private and public writer.

The private writer, she said, is “the person who writes the book. The public writer is the ambulatory ad for the books.” The public role is not one all writers relish, but the writer as marketer is, she said, an increasingly important role. “With books competing with other media, there’s more and more pressure to be out there.”

Robin Vidimos reviews books for The Denver Post and Buzz in the ‘Burbs.

Other books by Susan Isaacs: