From the first sentence, I loved Gailey’s writing style. It was mysterious, earthy and so damn Gothic. The sentences felt decadent and elongated, creating that mesmerising atmosphere. There is a clear sense of beauty and power here, but also intimate moments and flashbacks of a traumatic upbringing. Gailey keeps the tension razor-sharp with that creeping sense of something watching at all times. I found myself jumping at shadows while reading, caught up in that foreboding sense of something deeply deeply wrong in this story.

This is a book built on deception. The slower pace masks an array of horrors, with seemingly boring or throwaway details forming a vital part of the overall pictures. Pay attention to everything because nothing is as it seems. Guiding us through this tangled maze is Vera, who I could not help but root for. Her repetitions betray a mind twisted by trauma and years of repression. The secrets surrounding her are suffocating. The characterisation here of every major player is amazing, with none of them being likeable. Instead, these are flawed and often despicable people with self-serving motives and veiled in deadly lies. The dynamics between characters are fascinating and provide stark, bleak and deeply perturbing moments. Their interactions feel fragile and able to descend into chaos at any moment. Gailey’s control of atmosphere is deployed wonderfully in these interactions, with the tension building into a choking fog.

The way this story is woven together is masterful. On one hand, it is a haunting exploration of trauma, illness and fractured families. It delves into the unintended consequences of actions and the perpetuated cycle of violence and abuse. On the other hand, it is a disturbing Gothic mystery, full of gore, blood and death. The revelations are earth-shattering, particularly in the third act. The way this book is plotted is astonishing with surprises around every corner. Every time you think you have this book nailed down, trust me when I say you do not. This is an incredibly tricksy and bewitching book. Gailey ensures you follow down every last rabbit hole before the awful truth is finally laid bare.

I sat until the early hours of the morning pouring over this unsettling, spine-chilling and gorgeously serpentine book. This is the Gothic genre at its best, with the setting taking on a life of its own, haunting exploration of societal issues and the drop in your stomach at its menacing nature. Crowder House truly becomes its own character here, with every detail feeling menacing and fully fleshed out. The setting often parallels the crumbling interior state of our characters and that is realised to full effect here. Gailey also weaves in these quieter moments of reflection and introspection, allowing flashbacks to interrupt the central narrative and instead offer us glimpses into exactly what happened all those years ago. We are soon thrust back into the claustrophobic trepidation of the present day narrative, full of Gothic flourishes. I loved how Gailey took every last trope of the genre and spins them on their heads to squeeze fresh life out of them.

Just Like Home leaves you with a lump in your throat and a chill on your skin. It perfectly balances classic horror with an exploration of family, trauma and the uprooted returning home.

Just Like Home is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers, like your local bookstore, as of July 19th 2022.

Will you be picking up Just Like Home? Tell us in the comments below!

Synopsis | Goodreads

Just Like Home is a darkly gothic thriller from nationally bestselling author Sarah Gailey, perfect for fans of Netflix’s The Haunting of Hill House as well as HBO’s true crime masterpiece I’ll Be Gone in the Dark.

“Come home.” Vera’s mother called and Vera obeyed. In spite of their long estrangement, in spite of the memories ― she’s come back to the home of a serial killer. Back to face the love she had for her father and the bodies he buried there, beneath the house he’d built for his family.

Coming home is hard enough for Vera, and to make things worse, she and her mother aren’t alone. A parasitic artist has moved into the guest house out back and is slowly stripping Vera’s childhood for spare parts. He insists that he isn’t the one leaving notes around the house in her father’s handwriting… but who else could it possibly be?

There are secrets yet undiscovered in the foundations of the notorious Crowder House. Vera must face them and find out for herself just how deep the rot goes.

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Defining Domestic Thriller

Simply put, domestic thrillers turn the safety of domestic settings into a claustrophobic, thrilling, shock-twist experience. Expect house wives gone rogue, alcoholic commuters, lying husbands, disturbed baby sitters, and dysfunctional families.

Starting Out

The first place domestic thriller newbies should look is Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. It is a phenomenal book and a great entry point to the world of crime fiction. The film adaptation (starring Rosamund Pike) is also well-known for a reason. It is amongst the most faithful film adaptations out there.

Next, The Girl On The Train by Paula Hawkins follows an alcoholic commuter who is convinced she witnessed a crime along the train tracks. Much like Gone Girl, Hawkins’ utilises a dual narrative to unravel this domestic thriller.

Themes

Domestic thrillers come into their own in their treatment of female characters. The vast majority of writers in this category are women, but unlike so-called “chicklit”, these female writers and their protagonists are not here to present pink-filled tales of middle aged women’s holiday adventures. Domestic thrillers deal with dark (and, at times, very graphic) themes: infidelity, deception, money troubles, infertility, and untold family secrets.

The more domestic thrillers you encounter, the more obvious the themes will become – yet authors in this genre are very keen on spinning dark twists that keeps the sub-genre fresh. Gillian Flynn’s other novels, Dark Places and Sharp Objects, are both genius pieces of work in their own right. These two do come with a heavy content warning, though: without spoiling anything plot-wise, they contain graphic descriptions of self-harm and abuse. Flynn’s talent for bringing her stories alive may not be appropriate for particularly young or sensitive readers.

Further Reading

Let’s talk further reading, and how to find yourself the next great domestic-thriller read. First, a couple of personal suggestions:

• The Wife Between Us by Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen: The story of a rich man’s ex-wife and the woman she is replaced with – told from the perspectives of both women.
• Half Broken Things by Morag Joss: I had the pleasure of being taught Creative Writing at university by Morag and although this title isn’t technically classified as a domestic thriller, it shares many of the themes discussed in this post.

Next, take a peek the domestic thrillers on my TBR list:

• The Couple Next Door by Shari Lapena: A dinner party, suspense, and the friendly neighbours of a young couple. What could possibly go wrong?
• Our House by Louise Candlish: A new family moves into the house they just bought… but it’s your house, and you didn’t sell it.

Spotting A Domestic Thriller In The Wild

Here’s how to search out a domestic thriller in the wild. As a whole, titles in the sub-genre tend to be blessed with beautiful covers so the next time you visit a bookstore, you’ll inevitably end up with armfuls and armfuls of books. It’s worth being very specific with your choices.

Domestic thrillers often have a female-led title and emphasis on the home, as well as personal relationships: marriages, affairs, babysitters, grandparents – mention of these in the blurb, sat among the crime/thriller genre, is the biggest indication you’ve stumbled upon a domestic thriller book.

Do you have any other recommendations? Tell us in the comments below!

The post Discovering The World of Domestic Thrillers appeared first on The Nerd Daily.

The following recently released debut thrillers range from traditional detective stories to dark, gritty, serial killer chases to domestic suspense novels to gothic-style tales with magical elements, and almost everything in between. Some have been written as the start to a new series and some are standalones, but all of them are highly rated and highly recommended.

DEATH IN THE FAMILY by Tessa Wegert
Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository

An impressive combination of a traditional Agatha Christie-style locked-room mystery, with a young, gifted detective who is suffering from PTSD who is still learning who to trust in her new job and environment. Tessa Weggert introduces us to Senior Investigator Shana Merchant as she works to solve a mysterious disappearance on a small private island. We learn a lot about Merchant through her work on this case, but there is plenty more of her backstory to be unfolded. Weggert has written such a dynamic character that we can’t wait to see her in her next adventure!

THE GOOD DETECTIVE by John McMahon
Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository

P.T. Marsh really IS a good detective, but his life has been tragic in the last year.  Struggling with his private life has left him not always making the best decisions, and sometimes those decisions have far-reaching consequences. Thinking he is helping a stripper get out of an abusive relationship, Marsh starts a chain of events that lead back to his job, his father-in-law, and multiple murders in the area. Likeable detectives aren’t always easy to find, but Marsh comes across as genuine, but not perfect, real, but not too-good-to-be-true, and someone who truly wants to make a difference.  

BLOOD ORANGE by Harriet Tyce
Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository

A domestic thriller that will often leave the reader feeling like a voyeur, but also unable to look away. Alison is a young, successful lawyer with an attentive husband, a precocious daughter, and seems to have it all. But she is also having an affair with one of her colleagues, and drinking too much, and she’s starting to feel things unravel. When she takes on a new client – who willingly admits to stabbing her own husband – Alison thinks this might be the opportunity to straighten out the various threads of her life that have gotten out of control. Power, jealousy, betrayal, love, and hate are all added to the mix and this disturbing tale will keep you on the edge of your seat.

HOLD YOUR TONGUE by Deborah Masson
Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository

Fans of M.J. Arlidge’s books about DCI Helen Grace should definitely be paying attention to Deborah Masson.  Similar in tone, Hold Your Tongue gives us an entirely new detective squad to get acquainted with. This dark and gritty serial killer hunt, with all its twists and turns, may not be for everybody, but for those of us that live for these twisted tales, it is a MUST! Masson also has a sequel currently scheduled to come out later this year!

MAN OF THE YEAR by Caroline Louise Walker
Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository

Walker gives us a novel of domestic suspense set in a world where there just might not be a “good guy” to cheer for. Dr. Robert Hart has been named Citizen of the Year in his elite seaside town. His beautiful (second) wife and his son are there to celebrate with him. His son’s college roommate is also there, and the troubled young man changes the balance of power in the home. As the balance of power shifts, so does everything else in Dr. Hart’s life. Readers will hold their breath as they watch (mostly unlikable) people try to undo the damage they themselves have done.

NO BAD DEED by Heather Chavez
Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository

Heather Chavez hits the ground running with this fast-paced, menacing story. We meet veterinarian and mother of two, Cassie Larkin on her way home from work where she witnesses a crime. She calls 911, but against the advice of the operator, she gets out of the car. From that point forward she throws her happy, suburban life into absolute paranoia and chaos! Unfortunately, the paranoia is contagious, and Chavez will definitely have you looking over your shoulder. The book, however, is fantastic, with unique characters and nerve-wracking tension!

YOU LET ME IN by Camilla Bruce
Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository

A bit more gothic-horror than true thriller, this book quickly becomes very hard to categorise. Fans of Patrick Ness’s A Monster Calls, or Seanan McGuire’s Wayward Children Series will find some similarities here. The entire book is written as a manuscript for Cassandra Tipp’s niece and nephew with instructions they are to follow upon her death or disappearance in order to obtain their inheritance. Occasionally written in second person, the reader feels very much a part of the story, as if they are being spoken to directly.

WOMAN ON THE EDGE by Samantha M. Bailey
Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository

Told from two alternating points-of-view, Woman on the Edge is the story of Morgan Kincaid who, while waiting for the subway on her regular trip home from work has a woman thrust her baby into Morgan’s arms, and then jump in front of the oncoming train! (That’s not a spoiler – it is on the back cover and happens in the first 3 pages.) But faster than the blink of an eye, Morgan’s life, which was already going through some very trying times, is turned upside down by this seemingly random act. 

 Do you have any other recommendations? Tell us in the comments below!

The post Eight Outstanding Debut Thrillers You Might Have Missed appeared first on The Nerd Daily.

“Outside the door I stood for a second, hardly able to breathe. This was it. Once I went in, there was no going back.”

Following her 2018 novel, The Girl I Used to Be, the newest release from popular thriller author, Mary Torjussen, is a captivating story full of edge-of-your-seat suspense. Torjussen’s The Closer You Get is the tale of Ruby Dean, a woman in her late 30s that one day decides to leave her husband. Ruby ends her marriage and seemingly comfortable life due to the fact that Ruby and her boss, Harry, are in love and have arranged to both leave their spouses to run away together. What seems to be a thoughtfully planned out exit from her marriage quickly goes awry when Harry never shows up to meet Ruby. Full of confusion and heartbreak, Ruby is faced with the struggles of picking up the pieces of her disrupted life all while dealing with a sudden and mysterious chain of events.

The Closer You Get is a slow burn of a novel that culminates in a page-turning conclusion. Pushing the narrative along are the first person point-of-view chapters that switch between the perspectives of Ruby and Harry’s wife, Emma. The alternating chapters allow for an interesting look into the reasoning behind the actions of both women, ultimately making them relatable and sympathetic characters. Furthermore, looking through such a narrowed perspective makes readers question the truthfulness of various characters as duplicities are slowly revealed. Yet it is the overall portrayal of the story’s characters that makes the thriller feel plausible and extremely grounded in reality.

The inciting incident in the novel, Ruby leaving her marriage in order to be with the man she is having an affair with, centers the novel to explore the complexities of relationships. From toxicity and abuse to the falling out of love, Torjussen explores multiple marital situations that permeate the everyday. While extramarital affairs are generally looked down upon by society, Torjussen takes a humanistic approach with Ruby’s depiction. By looking at the situation through Ruby’s eyes, there comes an understanding of the expectations of marriage: how it can fall apart, how one can lose their sense of self, and how certain pressures are placed specifically on women.

While the novel offers an interesting look at relationships, the narrative’s slowness tends to impact its overall flow. The mystery as to why Ruby’s plan to run away with Harry went wrong carries the majority of the story. Then the action picks up toward the latter half of the narrative when suspicious events begin to happen to Ruby. She begins to question her own sanity and ability to trust and connect with others, resulting in nail-biting suspense. Though while reading, it becomes clear that Torjussen’s work is not solely dealing in terms of twists and mystery, but rather also in exploring the realities and uncertainties of an abrupt new beginning for a woman that is unfamiliar with the person she has become after years of marriage.

Overall, this is a captivating story that will keep patient readers hooked. Rollercoasters of emotion are in store, ranging from dread and disgust to hopefulness. Readers will be left questioning their appeal for certain outcomes and their interest in specific characters. The novel is a great introduction to the works of Torjussen and an excellent new mystery for those that are already fans of her work.

The Closer You Get is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers as of April 21st 2020.

Will you be picking up The Closer You Get? Tell us in the comments below!

Synopsis | Goodreads

They promised to tell their spouses they were leaving and then meet to begin their new life together. But he never shows up.

A new twisting novel of psychological suspense from the acclaimed author of Gone Without a Trace.

Coworkers Ruby and Harry are in love–but they’re married to other people. They decide to tell their spouses that their marriages are over and to start their new lives together. Ruby, who has wanted to leave her controlling husband for a while, tells him she’s leaving him and waits at the hotel where she and Harry are to meet. But Harry never shows up.

Suddenly, Ruby’s life has fallen apart, and she’s lost everything. Harry won’t answer her calls, and she’s fired from her job. She finds a cheap apartment in a run-down part of town, all the while wondering what happened to Harry.

Just as Ruby thinks she’s hit rock bottom, strange and menacing things start to happen–someone is sneaking into her apartment, and someone is following her home late at night–and she is going to have to fight for her survival.

The post Review: The Closer You Get by Mary Torjussen appeared first on The Nerd Daily.

Readers are first greeted with a chilling scene of a man, out on the lake who is fishing in the early morning hours. When he gets out on the water, he sees another boat, but as he nears, the other boat is only inhabited by a barking dog…and spots of blood. I could see it, I could feel it, and I was immediately drawn in!

We pick up the story 17 months later with a family in the midst of trying to heal after the father has simply disappeared. Teenagers Connor and Maggie and their mother Nina are in the process of moving into a new house with Nina’s new boyfriend Simon, who is a teacher at Maggie’s school. The various dynamics between these characters are handled masterfully by Palmer as we get to know the good-natured, ‘go with the flow’ attitude of Connor, Maggie’s dubious distrust of Simon balanced with her genuine love for her mother, and Nina’s often frustrating inability to see what the reader sees.

What the reader sees, that Nina so often discounts, is every single red flag ever described in any pamphlet about toxic relationships that has ever been produced! I know for a fact that I am not the only one who literally yelled at her book, just hoping we could get through to Nina. (“Come on! You’re a social worker!”) It could get incredibly frustrating, but the fact that a reader would feel such extreme emotion is clearly a testament to just how engaging the story and the characters were overall.

Chapters from Nina’s point-of-view are interspersed with chapters from her daughter Maggie’s point-of-view. Like the other side of a coin, every sigh and eye roll I had given to Nina was offset by a “yes!” or a “that-a-girl” for spirited, loyal Maggie. Not to mention Maggie’s close friend Ben, who may be the greatest supporting character (in every sense of the word) you’ve encountered in a book in a long, long time.

I did find myself concerned from time to time that the story was heading in a completely predictable direction, (which I am thrilled to say I was 100% wrong about). I like when a story, particularly a domestic thriller, takes me down a few wrong turns, as that is much more realistic to how we figure things out and solve problems in real life.

Additionally, there are a couple of chapters early in the novel where it feels a little slow just as you are hoping the pace and the action will ramp up. Once it does start to pick up speed, however, it is a wild ride, and more than worth the wait!

A thoroughly engaging read full of breath-holding moments and pulse pounding tension, DJ Palmer’s The New Husband is an incredible tale of secrets and obsession.

The New Husband is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers as of April 14th 2020.

Will you be picking up The New Husband? Tell us in the comments below!

Synopsis | Goodreads

Just because you love someone doesn’t mean you know them.

Nina Garrity learned that the hard way after discovering that her missing husband, Glen, had been leading a double life with another woman.  But Glen’s gone – presumably drowned while fishing on his boat – so she can’t confront him abut the affair or any of his other misdeeds.  A year and a half after the accident, Nina considers herself a widow, even though the police never found a body.  Following a chance encounter with Simon Fitch, a teacher from her daughter Maggie’s middle school, Nina finds love again and has hopes of putting her shattered life back together.

Simon, a widower still grieving the suicide of his first wife, has found his dream girl in Nina.  His charm and affections help break through to a heart hardened by betrayal.  Nina’s teenage son, Connor, embraces Simon as the father he wishes his dad could have been, but Maggie sees a far darker side of this new man in their lives.  Even Nina’s good friends wonder if Simon is supremely devoted – or dangerously possessive.

But Nina is committed, not only to her soon-to-be new husband but also to resuming her former career as a social worker.  Before she can move forward, however, Nina must first clear her conscience that she’s not making another terrible choice in a man.  In doing so, she will uncover the shocking truth: the greatest danger to her, and her children, are the lies people tell themselves.

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*Disclaimer: this article and the novel both refer and discuss suicide openly*

Woman on the Edge is Samantha M. Bailey’s debut novel and it is an extraordinary fast paced psychological thriller about two women and how their lives become entwined with one another. Morgan Kincaid is trying to go unnoticed and just move through the motions of life following the suicide of her husband until she is suddenly thrust back into the spotlight. Nicole Markham, a well-known CEO of the company Breathe, forces her newborn daughter into Morgan’s arms before falling to her death at the hands of a subway. Morgan is left holding little Quinn with a million questions running through her head.

The reader will be taken on a wild journey as Morgan tries to uncover why Nicole not only fell to her death, but why baby Quinn was left to Morgan to care for when Morgan has no clue who Nicole or how they know each other. Written from the perspectives of both Morgan and Nicole, the reader follows Morgan in the present and Nicole from the time she gives birth up until she falls to her death. Bailey has done an excellent job at keeping both stories separate yet blending them together in a way that has the reader trying to guess where the connection is between these two women.

Morgan is a social worker at a local shelter and wants nothing more than to have a child, but after the suicide of her husband, she is finding that the steps to becoming a single mother is not as easy as it seems. After Nicole falls to her death, Morgan is left with Quinn and finds out that Nicole has left Quinn to Morgan as her sole guardian, even though Nicole leaves behind a husband and a brother. Morgan takes it upon herself to uncover Nicole’s past with the help of Nicole’s brother Ben, to find out what really happened to Nicole.

Bailey has constructed an absolutely brilliant story about a woman losing her grip with reality after the birth of her daughter. In the beginning, Nicole is shown to be a successful business woman who is just about ready to give birth to her first child. While she is thrilled about the new adventure she is about embark on, it is clear that there are parts of Nicole’s past that are coming back to haunt her and even have her fearing for her life and the life of Quinn. One of the themes that Bailey explores in Woman on the Edge is post-partum depression, an incredibly common diagnosis for women to get after the birth of a child; Bailey uses Nicole to shine light on this topic that still needs to be discussed more frequently. On top of post-partum depression, Bailey also uses mental health and especially suicide to show how people in extreme isolation with feelings of hopelessness and helplessness feel that their only way out is by suicide. Nicole becomes extremely isolated, both self-induced and from those she thought she loved pushing her away. Bailey is able to show the reader how detrimental isolation can be and how even when we try to reach out for help, maybe we aren’t reaching out to the right people. Bailey also ties in the expectations of perfectionism that can take over a mother’s life. Nicole becomes obsessed with wanting to be the perfect mother to Quinn and feels like nothing she does is good enough. Any reader who is a mother or is going to be a mother will likely feel empathetic to Nicole and her situation.

Bailey’s debut novel is stunningly written and very well thought out, even the title of the novel is something that can be taken both literally and figuratively and I think that is just absolutely brilliant. Woman on the Edge is also an excellent reminder that when we are struggling with our mental health that it is okay to reach out for help, to find someone that you trust to lean on. Even though Nicole felt like she had nobody to turn to, you can always find someone to turn to when you are sick. Mental health is something that is being talked about more openly all of the time and seeing novels like this reminds the reader that mental health is a normal part of life and that it is okay to seek help when you need it. After reading Woman on the Edge, I cannot wait to see what Samantha M. Bailey brings to her readers next, she is bound to come up with some more excellent and intense work.

Woman on the Edge is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers.

Synopsis | Goodreads

A moment on the subway platform changes two women’s lives forever—a debut thriller that will take your breath away.

A total stranger on the subway platform whispers, “Take my baby.”

She places her child in your arms. She says your name.

Then she jumps…

In a split second, Morgan Kincaid’s life changes forever. She’s on her way home from work when a mother begs her to take her baby, then places the infant in her arms. Before Morgan can stop her, the distraught mother jumps in front of an oncoming train.

Morgan has never seen this woman before, and she can’t understand what would cause a person to give away her child and take her own life. She also can’t understand how this woman knew her name.

The police take Morgan in for questioning. She soon learns that the woman who jumped was Nicole Markham, prominent CEO of the athletic brand Breathe. She also learns that no witness can corroborate her version of events, which means she’s just become a murder suspect.

To prove her innocence, Morgan frantically retraces the last days of Nicole’s life. Was Nicole a new mother struggling with paranoia or was she in danger? When strange things start happening to Morgan, she suddenly realizes she might be in danger, too.

Woman on the Edge is a pulse-pounding, propulsive thriller about the lengths to which a woman will go to protect her baby—even if that means sacrificing her own life.

The post Review: Woman on the Edge by Samantha M. Bailey appeared first on The Nerd Daily.

Shay Miller leads a very ‘meh’ life.  She works temporary jobs, she lives with a roommate that she wishes was more than just a friend, and is just generally unfulfilled. Nothing ever seems to quite fall in line for her, and she is frustrated with how things seem to be turning out for her.

One day while waiting for the subway, Shay witnesses a suicide and this pushes her a little over the edge. Unfortunately, instead of seeking professional help to deal with the trauma and all the feelings it brings up, Shay instead allows herself to dig into the woman’s life to a degree that leads toward obsession. What Shay finds tangles her up into a web of deceit and manipulation that she could never have seen coming.

You will almost certainly find yourself yelling (maybe even out loud) at your book, and at Shay in particular, as you want with all your might to see her make different (better) decisions…but, of course, what would be the fun in that? Poor decision-making leads to the consistently creepy feelings of paranoia that practically drip off the page!

If you are a fan of An Anonymous Girl, you will certainly recognise the themes of doubt, trust, and deceit that are again on display in You Are Not Alone. If you are a fan of The Wife Between Us, you won’t likely find that same type of gasping, jaw-dropping twist in You Are Not Alone, but rather you will find lots of “Wow – I had no idea THAT’S where we were going” moments throughout! While some elements of the story were occasionally predictable, for every twist that you could anticipate, there were three others that you never saw coming.

This story has a little bit larger cast of main characters than Hendricks and Pekkanen’s previous books, but they are all handled incredibly well. Each has an interesting backstory that is weaved into the main storyline, similar to the first seasons of Netflix’s Orange is the New Black, how we would be introduced to a new character and then be shown a flashback of how she ended up in prison. Each of the women in the book are unique characters, and were used perfectly in constructing this exciting tale.

Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen are on a roll with their best-selling thrillers. They have tapped into the vein of what so many readers are looking for, and You Are Not Alone is certainly no exception. I can’t even begin to imagine what they will come up with next, but I will be more than ready for it!

You Are Not Alone is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers as of March 3rd 2020.

Will you be picking up You Are Not Alone? Tell us in the comments below!

Synopsis | Goodreads

You probably know someone like Shay Miller.
She wants to find love, but it eludes her.
She wants to be fulfilled, but her job is a dead end.
She wants to belong, but her life is so isolated.

You probably don’t know anyone like the Moore sisters.
They have an unbreakable circle of friends.
They live the most glamorous life.
They always get what they desire.

Shay thinks she wants their life.
But what they really want is hers.

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While in The Night Olivia Fell it is the character of the mother who is left to piece the story together, in Behind Every Lie McDonald has turned this upside down and the daughter (Eva) is the character who has to pick up the pieces after a tragedy and find out what happened to her mother (Kat)…and why.

Eva wakes up into a confusing scene in the Emergency Room. She quickly learns that her mother has been murdered, and that she, herself, was found nearby – after being struck by lightning! At the moment that’s all Eva knows. She doesn’t remember going to her mother’s house or anything else. It doesn’t take long, however, for Eva to realise the police are highly suspicious of her inability to remember anything that happened.

Realising she will have to take matters into her own hands, Eva starts to unravel her mother’s complicated story and in the process starts to unpack her own complicated feelings about life, and happiness, and past traumas. We don’t always get to see characters grow in a way that feels organic within the story, but McDonald accomplishes it in such a natural way in Behind Every Lie.

Throughout Eva’s journey to find the answers she needs, we are given the opportunity to really examine truths, half-truths, and lies, particularly when they come from (or are given to) those we love. Sometimes we lie thinking we are protecting someone, but are we? Are we protecting them, or are we only trying to protect ourselves from having to face a difficult choice or consequence? Do we think about how one day learning the truth will ultimately affect that person? And what if one day we aren’t around to explain or untangle our lies? What will happen then? What about when we lie to ourselves? Is that better, or worse, than being lied to by someone else? These questions have sat with me and rolled over and over in my mind ever since I turned the last page, and I adore a book that just doesn’t want to let me go.

Being such a huge fan of The Night Olivia Fell, I pre-ordered this book so that I would have it on release day. From the moment it arrived on my doorstep, I could barely put it down. I read it cover to cover in two days, because it immediately made me feel like I needed to unravel the story just as much as Eva did! Christina McDonald definitely remains one of my most frequently recommended authors!

Behind Every Lie is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers.

Will you be picking up Behind Every Lie? Tell us in the comments below!

Synopsis | Goodreads

From the author of The Night Olivia Fell – an “emotionally charged mystery” (Mary Kubica, New York Times bestselling author) – comes a thrilling new suspense novel about the insidious nature of family secrets …and their deadly potential.

If you can’t remember it, how do you prove you didn’t do it?

Eva Hansen wakes in the hospital after being struck by lightning and discovers her mother, Kat, has been murdered.  Eva was found unconscious down the street.  She can’t remember what happened by the police are highly suspicious of her.

Determined to clear her name, Eva heads from Seattle to London – Kat’s former home – for answers.  Bu as she unravels her mother’s carefully held secrets, Eva soon realizes that someone doesn’t want her to know the truth.  And with violent memories beginning to emerge, Eva doesn’t know who to trust.  Least of all herself.

Told in alternating perspectives from Eva’s search for answers and Kat’s mysterious past, Christina McDonald has crafted another “complex, emotionally intense” (Publisher’s Weekly) domestic thriller.  Behind Every Lie explores the complicated nature of mother-daughter relationships, family trauma, and the danger behind long held secrets.

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We are introduced to Investigator Shana Merchant, who is suffering from PTSD after her interactions with a serial killer when she was a detective with the NYPD. About a year has passed since then, and she now lives and works in upstate New York where she expects to see nothing more serious than a burglary.

But on a small, privately owned island in Shana’s jurisdiction, a wealthy young man named Jasper Sinclair has disappeared from his bed overnight, leaving a large pool of blood.  While this has been called in as a murder, the family can’t even come to an agreement on that, much less on anything else. Shana and her investigative partner Tim Wellington, a local who knows a little bit about everybody around town, head to the island to inspect the scene, but unfortunately, a storm is moving in as well.

The ultimate ‘locked-room” mystery, as this private island houses only the Sinclair estate, and the eight people in front of them are the only ones who have been on island since the previous night. That is not a lot of suspects, but Shana and Tim have to wade through a swamp of lies – and family secrets – before they can even begin to untangle the mystery of what has happened to Jasper Sinclair. Some of the family members believe he is dead, some believe he is wounded and out in the storm waiting for rescue, and still others think he has just pulled a prank for attention.

At least the lines of communication are still open to the outside world, and Shana is able to reach out for help. But soon, the reader starts to wonder if that “help” is actually helping at all. Dealing with a family who vary from grief-stricken to brutish, the outside pressures of her family and supervisor, the unrelenting storm outside, and the PTSD issues that she hoped were in her past, Shana has a full plate and Wegert does an excellent job of weaving this tale through all different twists and turns.

Without going into any spoilers, I’ll say that there is one trope that I absolutely despise, and at one point during the book I was afraid we were headed in exactly that direction.  But we weren’t and if you hate this trope too, you’ll know it when you see it and remember these words and you will then breathe the same sigh of relief that I did.

I am absolutely thrilled that Wegert considers this a first in a new series, and I love that by the end of the book we still don’t know 100% of Shana Merchant’s backstory. Taking the time to slowly develop this character is a fantastic choice. I can’t wait for the opportunity to watch Shana Merchant work again!

Is there a way to physically force an author to write faster? Asking for a friend…

Death In The Family is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers as of February 18th.

Synopsis | Goodreads

A storm struck island.  A blood-soaked bed.  A missing man.  Senior Investigator Shana Merchant believes it all adds up to a killer in their midst – and that murder is a family affair.

Thirteen months ago, former NYPD detective Shana Merchant barely survived being abducted by a serial killer.  Now hoping to leave grisly murder cases behind, she’s taken a job in her fiance’s sleepy hometown in the Thousand Islands region of upstate New York.

But as a nor’easter bears down on her new territory, Shana and fellow investigator Tim Wellington receive a call about a man missing on a private island.  Shana and Tim travel to the isolated island owned by the wealthy Sinclair family to question the witnesses.  They arrive to find blood on the scene and a house full of Sinclair family and friends on edge.

While Tim guesses they’re dealing with a runaway case, Shana is convinced they have a murder on their hands.  As the gale intensifies outside, she starts conducting interviews and discovers the Sinclairs and their guests are crawling with dark and dangerous secrets.

Trapped on the island by the raging storm with only Tim, whose reliability is thrown into question, the increasingly restless suspects, and her own trauma-filled flashbacks for company, Shana will have to trust the one person her abduction destroyed her faith in – herself.  But time is ticking down, because if Shana’s right, a killer is in their midst and as the pressure mounts, so do the odds that they will strike again.

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Even under the best of circumstances, moving houses can exact quite a toll—physically, psychologically, and emotionally. Compound that with a recent stay at a psychiatric facility and the lingering wounds of spousal betrayal, and the stakes are raised considerably. In the opening pages of Felicity Everett’s new suspense novel, the reader is introduced to fragile protagonist Karen, reeling with boundless, imperceptible scars and bruises, beholden to a treacherous insecurity that gives rise to envisioning conspiracy all around her, which kicks up doubt and distrust of everyone’s motivation. Her contrite husband Nick has created a perfect environment in which Karen may heal and convalesce far from the strains and pressures of their urban lives, purchasing a seemingly idyllic country cottage, going so far as to build a new studio for his wife to resume her ceramics work, a craft for which she had been on the cusp of great success before her life derailed.

This new location, of course, is unable to quiet or extinguish in any definitive way the demons of painful memory.  An initial visit from her best friend Jude and husband Dave only exacerbates the anxieties and uncertainties that Karen suffers over this new start.

Karen, uneasy and uncomfortable, is prey to queasy perceived threats from the surroundings—distant, still figures lurk on hills, staring; dark, darting shapes steal about the property and nearby lanes; feral delinquents enact aggressive vehicular manoeuvres on the roads and interrupt community events with a vaguely menacing presence. Whereas all other members of the small town shrug at the behaviour, it is Karen who regards each incident as another example of a cankerous rot in Paradise. Who is tampering with the family car? Did a distracted Karen really leave the kiln on so that her most recent casts are left in ruins? How could a bird have become trapped in the studio to eventually expire and spread pestilent odours?

Never truly settling, Karen’s encounters with the locals are fraught with awkwardness and misgivings, while in contrast her husband’s casual ease and ingratiation is a source of great abiding agitation. She eventually grows closest to hearty Scot Cath, a landscape gardener grieving the recent death of her wife. There are disagreements with the rest: insufferably assured Douglas and pert wife Imogen (a source of jealousy as Karen suspects a growing affection between her and husband Nick) and their two cordially hostile offspring Honour and Grace; resident B&B owners Ray and Min who restore vintage motorbikes in their spare time; gruff Gordon and mousy Jean in whose relationship the spectre of abuse is conjectured; and cosmopolitan Luca and Melissa, gallery owners, who offer Karen an opportunity to create new work for exhibition, Luca’s true motivations in helping her unclear.

If anything, Everett pushes Karen’s hysteria to such a degree that she risks losing a reader’s sympathy—at a certain point in the story, it is all too reasonable to shift opinion in favour of the reactions of supporting players, even though focus and voice is relentlessly exclusive to Karen. In service to this, many potentially interesting plot points are abruptly dropped or left wanting development. And yet this may only be an understanding that Karen has been simply exaggerating what is in actuality benign, an unreliable guide through the thicket—there is no feasible way for them to progress. This is hardly the cabal of satanists in Rosemary’s Baby manipulating the title character into belief of her own madness, Karen, in many ways, seems the architect of her own downfall.

The origin of her relationship with Nick founded itself in an adulterous gesture, so deep in her bones Karen has always imagined that something would eventually go wrong with the marriage that followed, borne on the ashes of a previous one. Feelings of class inadequacy plague her. Nick’s first wife, who was poised, elegant, and a member of high society, only exposes her own fraudulence. Despite many years of marriage, the nagging agony that she and Nick have stubbornly performed happy coupledom simply out of fear of embarrassment or inconvenience settles on her. And Nick’s affability may indeed hide a nasty core of control. The sex, as portrayed, is pitched somewhere between abject desperation and sadomasochism, flecked with troubling shards of anger and active punishment. Subversive elements of her previous work hint at a predilection (preference?) for the dark side, a rejection of the traditional; her heart soars out to a group of ravers in the forest that her fellow adults find faintly distasteful (“there was an energy in their hedonism that I found beguiling…a sybaritic two-fingered salute to everything about the English countryside that was staid and safe and depressing”).

Perhaps all of the bumps experienced in this foreign territory, unhinged as they may seem, are a means to guide Karen towards a necessary revelation and a true path that remove her far afield of anyone else’s intentions for her. The ultimate voice to which she must submit—and trust—is her own. In the end, it is time for Karen to declare and embrace her own wild. The most essential move, or shift, ultimately, must be internal.

The Move is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers.

Will you be picking up The Move? Tell us in the comments below!

Synopsis | Goodreads

From the author of The People at Number 9, a new story of nightmare neighbours…

‘Felicity has the reader gripped when she explores unhealthy relationships based on insecurity and delusion. She writes with a raw realism.’ Adele Parks, Platinum

Can you paint over the cracks in a marriage?

Karen has packed up her life and is making The Move. She’s on her way to the idyllic country cottage which her husband has painstakingly renovated for her. They’re escaping the London bustle and the daily grind. And they’re escaping their past.

A fresh start in a beautiful, peaceful village. It will be different here, right?

But something is awry. The landscape, breathtaking by day, is eerie by night. The longed-for peace and solitude is stifling.  And the house, so artfully put together by her husband, has a strange vibe. Now that Karen is cut off from her old friends and family, she can’t help wondering if her husband has plans of his own, and that history might be repeating itself.

From the author of the bestselling The People at Number 9 comes a dark and redemptive tale of a rural dream gone wrong…

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