One Step Too Far

One Step Too Far Tina Seskis 4.5 / 5	Published January 27, 2015 (First published April 7, 2013 in the UK) First Sentence "The heat is like another person to push past as I make my way along the platform."
Publisher's Description: The #1 international bestseller reminiscent of After I'm Gone, Sister, Before I Go to Sleep, and The Silent Wife--an intricately plotted, thoroughly addictive thriller that introduces a major new voice in suspense fiction--a mesmerizing and powerful novel that will keep you guessing to the very end. No one has ever guessed Emily's secret. Will you? A happy marriage. A beautiful family. A lovely home. So what makes Emily Coleman get up one morning and walk right out of her life--to start again as someone new? Now, Emily has become Cat, working at a hip advertising agency in London and living on the edge with her inseparable new friend, Angel. Cat's buried any trace of her old self so well, no one knows how to find her. But she can't bury the past--or her own memories. And soon, she'll have to face the truth of what she's done--a shocking revelation that may push her one step too far. . . .
Dear Reader, Could. Not. Put this book down! The description does a crap job of describing the story, but I guess it's difficult to talk about it too much without revealing the important pieces. (I'll give it my best shot here, though.) This book seems like it will be popular with those who embraced Gone Girl or Before I Go to Sleep; it is one of those books with a twist ending you know is coming. This book is set up from the get-go to be clearly all about one mysterious turning point, but while normally I have some sort of inkling, this time I was shocked! Add to that a fun (if you can look past a woman abandoning her life & family) story of a young woman who is entering the big city for the first time, intertwined with stories from the past, both hers and those of her loved ones. This book moves so quickly that I would forget where I was for whole stretches of hours: I read it in 2 days. When there were other, more pressing (library) books I should have been reading! But, it caught me up and I just needed to know what happened. I can't say I liked the main character all that much, at any point, but I do think I sympathized with her. Even if I had no idea what had happened in her "former" life, I felt as if I understood her feelings of being overwhelmed and her inadequacy when it came to being a wife, or a Londoner, or a new employee. I'd like to think I wouldn't do all of the things Cat did in order to shed her old skin, but I suppose that even her most extreme actions are ultimately "explained" when the story comes out. I love the way the author unwrapped the story one layer at a time, going back all the way in time to the birth of Emily and her twin, and including other interesting tidbits about how strained the family was, and how Emily met her husband. Those layers - while frustratingly prolonging the reveal! - gave so much more depth to how the characters were motivated and how their lives ultimately would up as they did. One thing I would have liked to have seen was an explanation of Emily's fear of heights - it comes up both in the skydiving scene and in a scene where she gets too close to a cliff edge. The author implies that this fear may be due somehow to Caroline, but does not ever expand on that, and those unexplained mysteries always bother me a bit. However, all in all, one of those books that I just couldn't put down - so, no matter what I thought of the writing or how the story ultimately panned out, I have to rate it highly. Besides, I did like how the book ended. I'd love for others to read it & let me know what they think! Yours, Arianna P.S. This book was sent to me by William Morrow (an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers) in exchange for an honest review.

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The Drowning House

The Drowning House Elizabeth Black 2013 3/5	First Sentences "If there was a sign, I missed it.  But I knew I was in Texas when I swerved to avoid a shape by the side of the road."
Publisher's Description: A gripping suspense story about a woman who returns to Galveston, Texas after a personal tragedy and is irresistibly drawn into the insular world she’s struggled to leave. Photographer Clare Porterfield's once-happy marriage is coming apart, unraveling under the strain of a family tragedy. When she receives an invitation to direct an exhibition in her hometown of Galveston, Texas, she jumps at the chance to escape her grief and reconnect with the island she hasn't seen for ten years. There Clare will have the time and space to search for answers about her troubled past and her family's complicated relationship with the wealthy and influential Carraday family. Soon she finds herself drawn into a century-old mystery involving Stella Carraday. Local legend has it that Stella drowned in her family's house during the Great Hurricane of 1900, hanged by her long hair from the drawing room chandelier. Could Stella have been saved? What is the true nature of Clare's family's involvement? The questions grow like the wildflower vines that climb up the walls and fences of the island. And the closer Clare gets to the answers, the darker and more disturbing the truth becomes. Steeped in the rich local history of Galveston, The Drowning House portrays two families, inextricably linked by tragedy and time.
Dear Reader, Wow. This book was nothing like I expected. I thought it was going to be a story about the history of a girl who had drowned during a hurricane, he hair entwined in a chandelier. That is what the book’s description led me to believe! However, it was NOTHING of the sort. It was a story about a woman who had lost her young child, and of her journey through finding understanding regarding the rest of her life, particularly her rather messy childhood. I have to admit, I didn’t particularly like the reader of this book (I was audiobooking it via Overdrive, from my local library). That probably didn’t help endear me to the protagonist. However, I also kept being constantly surprised by this novel, and not in a good way. I kept expecting things to happen that didn’t, and I felt a complete lack of empathy throughout the story, even after finding out the Truth. While I might have felt bad for the protagonist, I certainly didn’t feel much sympathy. It sucked what happened to her, but she was not terribly likable and certainly the story itself was paced in such a way that I kept waiting for things to happen, but when they did, it was kind of a let-down. While ultimately I liked the idea of the story, I didn’t particularly love the execution of it. The narrator basically let things happen TO her, which is understandable in the long run, but doesn’t make you like her much as she relates her tale. Additionally, I couldn’t relate to her reactions to things, nor to her discoveries themselves - they never seemed quite completed, and while they should have perhaps been obvious, the clues felt too muddied, to me. (A bit like this review! - I’m not quite sure what I’m even trying to say.) I did love the setting of this book: the intriguing island of Galveston, TX. I wanted to visit there, to become one of the looked-down-upon tourists who the narrator and other B.O.I. (Born On the Island) barely tolerate. But the author made the island sound so enticing, despite its decline from its heyday. I want to experience the place, particularly its vivid history which seems to linger long after it’s happened. Overall, my impression of the book was that it felt somewhat unfinished, which is weird because there were several times when I kept thinking that the story hadn’t even yet started. I wanted to know more about Clare’s photography exhibit, for one thing. And about where she went and what she did after her visit: what happened to her marriage, where did she live? I felt the author was vague and therefore distant regarding these details, ones which I found the most important. Perhaps that just means I was looking at the story the wrong way entirely. Yours, Arianna P.S. By the way?  GREAT first sentence of the novel, though!!!  I loved it.