Good Afternoon Lovelies

I hope you’re all having a lovely week. I haven’t had an awful lot going on, nothing worth mentioning specifically anyway. Winter Sarah is definitely kicking in and I have been eating like it’s going out of fashion. I really need to scale back because if I keep this up over the whole of winter I’m going to be in such a bad way. I have faith. I can do this. No more cakes with books.

Book 📖

Thank you to @BarnabyWalter and @0neMoreChapter for this advanced copy of The Woman on the Pier in return for an honest review. The Woman on the Pier is due to be published on 11th November 2021 and you can get a copy here.

Description 🔖

Caroline Byrne has suffered. Her daughter Jessica was killed in tragic circumstances. What Caroline can’t work out is why Jessica was murdered in Stratford, when she was supposed to be staying with a friend in Somerset.

Drowning in grief, Carline starts to go through Jessica’s phone and finds messages between her daughter and a boy called Michael. They were supposed to be meeting that fateful day, but he didn’t show up. Caroline surmises that it’s Michael’s fault that Jessica died. Michael is the reason that Jessica is dead and Caroline will make him pay.

General Thoughts 🤔

This was such a good book. I will come clean and admit that I had no idea what to expect. As I sometimes like to do, I didn’t read the blurb and didn’t read any reviews beforehand, I just dived straight in. It was the cover and this authors reputation that got me interested in the book. I’m so glad I went in blind because right up until events would happen, I had no idea they were coming. There were so many slap in the face moments for me in this book and I didn’t predict any of them.

There were many uncomfortable moments for me but only uncomfortable because it’s not my reality. It found it heartbreaking that this work of fiction is in so many ways, other people’s reality. I think I actually would have liked for the book to have delved into some of this a little bit deeper, but it wasn’t a must have and didn’t make me enjoy the book any less.

Characters 👫👬👭

So Caroline was completely and utterly unhinged but who could blame her? She lost her daughter in a way that nobody could ever imagine would happen to them so naturally she wanted someone that she could pin some “logical” blame on. I was hoping and hoping that she would see sense and realise that yes, Jessica shouldn’t have been stood up in Stratford, but just like she couldn’t have predicted what would happen, nobody else could have either. I felt Caroline’s pain and her grief and I understand how she became completely blinded by it.

I don’t do spoilers in my reviews, so I’m not going to talk specifically about any of the other characters other than to say I felt so very sad. Someone should have been able to help and rescue these poor people, but instead they were able to float under the radar and try to find their own ways to deal with their pain.

Writing Style ✍️

This is the first book that I’ve read from this author but it definitely won’t be the last. They were able to build the perfect amount of tension without it being overwhelming. The chapters were short and snappy meaning I literally did keep telling myself “one more chapter” just like the publisher.

I liked that this book was tense and kept me highly engaged but also covered some important and difficult topics. I thought that the author did a great job of not brushing these under the rug but also covering them with the correct level of sensitivity.

Conclusion & Scoring 🎖️

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and will definitely be recommending it to my friends. It’s the perfect book to curl up on the sofa with and it’s not overly long so you could binge it easily (which I love to do). This is being released at the perfect time of the year, so get it for yourself or for a Christmas gift and enjoy!

😍😍😍😍😩