“A FAMILY BUILT ON LIES…
A dark and twisty psychological thriller, in which a young girl is abducted and her family is confronted with a horror from deep in their past.
A young girl has been taken. Abducted, never to be seen again.
Joe and Hannah, her traumatized parents, are consumed by grief. But all is not as it seems behind the curtains of their suburban home.
Loretta, the Family Liaison Officer, is sure Hannah is hiding something – a dark and twisted secret from deep in her past.
This terrible memory could be the key to the murder of another girl fifteen years ago. And as links between the two victims emerge, Joe and Hannah learn that in a family built on lies, the truth can destroy everything…”
I am delighted to welcome you to the blog today as it’s my stop on Chris Curran’s Her Deadly Secret blog tour. I was absolutely delighted when asked to feature on the tour for her latest release as Chris was one of the incredible authors who took part in my #damppebblestakeover last Summer. (I can’t quite believe that was a year ago!) Back then, Chris wrote a fantastic piece on ‘Amnesia Noir’ which I urge you to read (click here). Particularly if you are looking for a few book recommendations!
I couldn’t help myself and I HAD to read and review Her Deadly Secret. We are first introduced to Joe, father of missing school girl, Lily and husband of Hannah. The news doesn’t appear to be good and the sorrow you feel for this one character is immense. But this is only the very tip of the iceberg in what proves to be a multi threaded and intricate tale of secrets and lies.
The story is divided into three POVs. You have Joe, father of missing daughter Lily. Loretta, who is the Family Liaison Officer (FLO) for Joe and his wife, Hannah. And finally, Rosie, whose sister Alice was murdered when she and Rosie were just children. I loved Curran’s multi point narration but couldn’t for the life of me work out how Rosie fitted into the plot. It’s only as you progress through the book do you discover exactly how detailed and intricate a tale the author is telling. I confess, I did get a little muddled by the number of characters but once I’d written them all down, I was well away and had no further problems. More to do with me and my ageing memory than anything else I think!
In a story about terrible things happening to normal people, I couldn’t understand why there was so much emphasis on the FLO, Loretta and her own fractured home life. It WAS interesting and I enjoyed reading about her but it did feel a little like ‘filler’ in some scenes. I understand that she was there as part of an ongoing investigation but she did feel a little superfluous at times (as the characters tend to make the big case breaking discoveries more than those that are employed to do it). She’s a great character but at times I wanted her to step away from the limelight so I could focus more on Joe, Hannah, Rosie and her parents.
Would I recommend this book? I certainly would. It’s a tense tale about family secrets and not really knowing those we claim to love. Great twists, one of which I didn’t see coming and it blew my socks off! I would pick up another book written by Chris Curran in a heartbeat.
Four out of five stars.
I chose to read and review an eARC of Her Deadly Secret. The above review is my own unbiased opinion.
Her Deadly Secret by Chris Curran was published in the UK by Killer Reads, Harper Collins on 21st July 2017 in eBook format (with the paperback to follow in August 2017) | amazon.co.uk | amazon.com | Waterstones | Book Depository | Foyles | Goodreads |
Chris Curran lives in St Leonards on Sea, East Sussex. Her first two psychological thrillers, Mindsight and Her Turn To Cry, were both Amazon bestsellers.
She also writes short stories one of which was recently shortlisted for the 2017 CWA Margery Allingham award.
Her latest novel, Her Deadly Secret, is published as an ebook on July 21st 2017 and a paperback in August.
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