Sunday 7 June 2015

The Other Child - Lucy Atkins



Sometimes a lie seems kinder than the truth ... but what happens when that lie destroys everything you love?.
When Tess is sent to photograph Greg, a high profile paediatric heart surgeon, she sees something troubled in his face, and feels instantly drawn to him. Their relationship quickly deepens, but then Tess, single mother to nine-year-old Joe, falls pregnant, and Greg is offered the job of a lifetime back in his hometown of Boston. Before she knows it, Tess is married, and relocating to the States. But life in an affluent American suburb proves anything but straightforward.
Unsettling things keep happening in the large rented house. Joe is distressed, the next-door neighbours are in crisis, and Tess is sure that someone is watching her. Greg's work is all-consuming and, as the baby's birth looms, he grows more and more unreachable. Something is very wrong, Tess knows it, and then she makes a jaw-dropping discovery...

Relocating while pregnant from the UK to the US, with her new husband and her small son from her first marriage, Tess finds the move to Boston stressful, especially as her husband is so work driven - but with his super high powered job as a paediatric surgeon he has no choice but to drop everything and do mercy missions to the hospital.

Tess is finding it difficult to settle in though as strange things begin to happen in her new home (which she never did truly warm to), the neighbours are stand offish and peculiar and she is unsure of the different social codes she's meant to adhere to in the affluent suburb - but the very worst is the female that she finds standing outside her house staring in, posting chilling notes. The safety of her family is threatened and Tess needs to find out why.

I was hooked from the beginning with The Other Child, I found it very easy to get in to and it is not long before things start to unravel for Tess which ensures that you keep turning the pages. It was a very gripping and well written plot, lots of secrets and lies that don't add up - which Nell, Tess' best friend back home in England begins to press her to investigate as it all becomes very clear all is not well.

I liked Tess' character and found myself rooting for her from the start, I also loved her son, Joe, and the relationship between he and his father. The ending did not play out quite how I was expecting, but it was still a satisfying and enjoyable read.

Review copy kindly provided by Quercus books via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.







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