The Blurb:
“One innocent child A secret that could destroy his life Imprisoned for a heinous crime when she was a just a teenager, Allison Glenn is now free. Desperate for a second chance, Allison discovers that the world has moved on without her…Shunned by those who once loved her, Allison is determined to make contact with her sister. But Brynn is trapped in her own world of regret and torment. Their legacy of secrets is focused on one little boy. And if the truth is revealed, the consequences will be unimaginable for the adoptive mother who loves him, the girl who tried to protect him and the two sisters who hold the key to all that is hidden…”
(blurb source: Waterstones.com)
What I thought:
I galloped throught this book, unwilling and unable to put it down. I read the authors debut novel, The Weight of Silence, last year and enjoyed it enough to want to get my mitts on any subsequent books published by the same author. I enjoyed this one more – much more.
The story is told from the perspective of four different women. Allison Glenn has just been released from jail for a shocking crime committed when she was a teenager, despite her being the school golden girl; great at sports, grade A student and pretty to boot. Brynn is Allison’s sister (younger by just one year) and the two sisters haven’t spoken since Allison was sent to prison, despite Allison’s relentless attempts. Between them, Allison and Brynn narrate the story of what happened to bring them to where they are today. Two other women also contribute their side of the story – Claire owns a bookshop in the same town that the sisters are from and has a husband and adopted child and Charm is training to be a nurse and caring for her dying step-father and between the four of them they dip in and out of the past to help us piece together what happened. The way that the stories are linked become apparant as the book progresses but I don’t want to give too much away as books like this are much more powerful if you don’t know what’s coming – and, trust me, there is a twist at the end of the book that I did not see coming and made me shout “No!” out loud.
Great narrative drive, plenty of cliff-hanging moments and a shocking central plot line made this book a winner for me. Highly recommended. I’d love to know what you think to the storyline too, if you do read it (please pop back on and let me know).
(Source: I received my copy of this book from Amazon Vine)
These Things Hidden sounds great! I have the author’s previous novel – I am planning to read it soon and then buy These Things Hidden.
Thanks for the review!
Hope you like them, Misha
Sounds interesting! I enjoyed reading The Weight of Silence, but wasn’t happy by a trick of the writer to make the reader misunderstand something in the beginning that later turned out to be differently. I felt cheated. If this book is not like that but better even than the other book in other ways, I’ll be keen to read it too!
I prefered the second one, Judith.
this dosen’t look like my type book boof but nice review all the best stu
It’s definitely not your kind of book, Stu, but thanks for stopping by
This book is on my reading stack for this week! I suspected it might be even better than the first one (which I loved!). Now I can’t wait to dive in….
I think you’ll like it, Laurel-Rain
I am definitely in the minority, I loved Weight of Silence and only enjoyed this one. An issue for me is that I didn’t find the voices different enough but the storyline was very intriguing. And also that OMG moment was great for the reader but I felt it should have affected the characters, hmmm. Great to see different views. I look forward to more from HeatherG.
I do get what you’re saying about it affecting the characters, but I was so engrossed in the book it didn’t bother me.
I read The Weight of Silence and thought it was very good. I have read some reviews of this book and they are all very positive, like yours. It sounds like a riveting page-turner that’s tough to put down once you syart reading it. My kind of book!
Hope you enjoy, Amy
Sounds so intriguing. I love twists at the end! I haven’t read the first book, but I think I’m more drawn to this one.
It’s a good book, Sakura, sort of Jodi Picoult-ish. Hope you enjoy if you pick up
The Weight of Silence has been sitting very patiently on my shelf for weeks now and after reading your review, I want to read it AND These Things Hidden. Going to hop onto amazon now and order it!
Hope you enjoy!
I’m never sure if I can deal with too many cliffhangers, but I am still looking forward to reading The Weight of Silence. Do you think I should read this instead?
I haven’t heard of the book or the author before, but These Things Hidden sounds like a great book. Good review
Looking forward to reading this one. Glad to read another positive review.
I really liked The Weight of Silence, and I have this one on my TBR list. I was hoping to read some good reviews of it-you and I generally have the same tastes, so now I am super excited to get it.
I just read Gudenkauf’s first after reading this book, and I agree – THESE THINGS HIDDEN is so much better, though the first one is great too! I absolutely loved this book, great review.
Oooh this popped through my letterbox last week so looking forward to it even more now!