Originally published: 9 Jan 2018

Author: Greer Hendricks & Sarah Pekkanen

Set in: New York

Genre: Thriller

Page count: 346

Reading dates: 1-4 Apr 2018

Star Rating: 3/5

This is a difficult one to review – on one hand I read it quite quickly and it kept me very entertained. On the other, I’m not sure the twist (or rather trick) really worked and made me a bit cross with the authors.
The story begins with 2 narratives. One is Nellie, a young kindergarten teacher and part time waitress who is looking forward to marrying Richard. Richard seems to be the perfect man – rich, successful, kind and generous. Nellie’s personality is very nervous – there are hints to something tragic happening in her past, and she is getting nuisance phone calls.
The other narrative is Vanessa who is Richard’s ex wife – she is a mess after their split, drinking heavily and barely keeping it together. Richard had an affair and is about to marry her replacement and we gradually find out how badly he treated her during their marriage. Vanessa becomes determined that she has to warn Richard’s new fiancée how he will treat her badly in the end too…
Then about a third of the way through, there is a twist that for a few pages I couldn’t get my head around and then once I did, I felt tricked and distrustful of what I was reading. It’s quite clever I suppose but I’m not sure it was necessary. I won’t say anymore as I don’t want to give away the plot.
The cover includes the usual Gone Girl and Girl on a Train comparisons, which lots of books seen to have these days, but although entertaining, I wouldn’t say its as good or clever as either of these two.