Lying In Wait by Liz Nugent

Lying In Wait by Liz Nugent

Published: 14th July 2016

Publisher: Penguin Ireland

Pages: 304

Available in Paperback and on Kindle

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Rating: 5/5

Blurb

Andrew and Lydia Fitzsimons , a respectful judge and his reclusive wife, find themselves in a most unfortunate situation - they have had to murder a young woman and bury her in their exquisite garden.

While Lydia does all she can to protect their innocent son Laurence and their social standing, her husband begins to fall apart.

But Laurence is not as naïve as Lydia thinks and his obsession with the dead girls family may be the undoing of his own

Review

With the opening line ‘My husband did not mean to kill Annie Doyle, but the lying tramp deserved it.’ Liz Nugent’s new book was guaranteed to draw the reader in and she did just that with me, I have not been so addicted to a book in such a long time. The fallout from Annie’s murder was an intense read filled with unexpected twists and some of the most devilish characters I’ve ever read about.

The story begins in late 1980 when Annie Doyle has gone missing, her sister Karen is the only person who seems concerned as Annie does not have the most reliable nature. But Karen was close to Annie and knows something is not right and becomes frustrated when the police give up on her sister, vowing to find out the truth about her sisters disappearance.

Told from the perspectives of Lydia, Laurence and Karen we gradually begin to work out Annie’s connection to the Fitzsimons and the lengths that Lydia will go to protect herself and her husband from been convicted of her murder. As Laurence begins to work things out, Lydia feeds him even more lies and he unwittingly becomes an accomplice to murder. Things become even more complex when Laurence and Karen’s lives slowly begin to intertwine. Will Lydia get away with murder? Will Laurence ever tell the truth and will Karen ever find the answers she is looking for?

It’s the characters in this book which make is so completely brilliant, never in all my time reading have I met a character I hated as much as Lydia Fitzsimons, the woman is like the devil, every time I thought she couldn’t get any worse, she did with another fantastic twist in the plot. She has become so immersed in getting what she wants that she seems to have lost all grip on reality and any sense of morality she once had and becomes completely unhinged. She is one of the most manipulative and disturbed characters which I’ve ever come across, but one I enjoyed reading about immensely.

Poor Laurence, I wanted to like him I really did but I just felt he was too much under his mother’s spell to ever really be the man I was longing him to be. He was just too weak for me, he had glimpses of what a happy life could be like but just didn’t grab hold of them enough, preferring to keep pacifying his mother’s outbursts.

Karen was the only character I actually liked, her devotion to Annie and believing the best in her was very endearing. I also loved that she was able to turn her dreams into a reality and grab the career she wanted.

I thought Lying In Wait was a brilliant novel and one which I can’t stop thinking about, it’s a book I’ve recommend to many friends, if only for them to experience Lydia for themselves. It’s full of twists and turns and an ending which actually left me shaking! Utterly brilliant and definitely not to be missed, Lying In Wait is one of the top thrillers of 2016.

The Last Days of Summer by Vanessa Ronan

The Last Days of Summer by Vanessa Ronan

Published: 5th May 2016

Publisher: Penguin Ireland

Pages: 373

Available in Paperback and on Kindle

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Blurb

She can forgive. They can't forget.

After ten years in the Huntsville State Penitentiary, Jasper Curtis returns home to live with his sister and her two daughters. Lizzie does not know who she's letting into her home: the brother she grew up loving or the monster he became.

Teenage Katie distrusts this strange man in their home but eleven-year-old Joanne is just intrigued by her new uncle.

Jasper says he's all done with trouble, but in a forgotten prairie town that knows no forgiveness, it does not take long for trouble to arrive at their door.

Review

The Last Days of Summer tells the tale of Jasper Curtis as he returns home to the prairie outback of western Texas after spending ten years in the Huntsville State Penitentiary. His sister Lizzie has agreed he can come home to live with her and her two daughters Katie and Joanne, but she is unsure who will walk through the door the brother she once loved or the monster he became. The rest of the town are unsettled by his return and it’s not long before Jasper has found himself in the middle of trouble once more.

I found the writing in The Last Days of Summer to be very descriptive and Vanessa Ronan has done an excellent job of building the scene for us and giving us an understanding of each of the characters. I did feel this added to the suspense and feeling of unease throughout the book as we are drip fed littles snippets of Jasper’s life before prison but are not initially told what he did. While reading this book I felt the certain uneasiness that something really bad was going to happen and this is conveyed beautifully in the writing style. I did feel that all the action happened a little too late in the book. It’s not until three quarters of the way through that we find what Jasper did and the consequences of his return to town. By this time I was a little bored with the story and didn’t enjoy as much as if it had perhaps been a little shorter or a little less character driven.

I did find this quite a hard book to follow as it’s told from four different perspectives. Jasper, his sister Lizzie’s and each of her daughters Katie and Joanne have their own voice. The majority of the story is told in one main chapter “July” with no distinctive separation when the author changes voices, so you didn’t instantly know which character you’re focusing on and at times this was confusing.

I didn’t like the two older main characters. I found Jasper someone who just gave me the creeps, Lizzie might believe he’s changed but it’s obvious from his thoughts and actions that he hasn’t and it’s only a matter of time before he evil thoughts lead him to cause trouble again. I felt Lizzie was too weak. I could understand that living out on the prairie alone with her husband gone she wants some adult company and someone to help carry the burden. I felt she should have not allowed Jasper back and thought more about protecting her daughters from danger but also from town gossip and hurtful rumours instead of hoping her childhood brother and friend had returned. The only character I liked was little Joanne, she seemed so sweet, innocent and far too trusting to just accept her Uncle Jasper as her friend. The scene with the play fort in the living room was one of my favourite in the book.

The Last Days of Summer is a novel which perfectly captures the uneasiness of being around a simmering pot of evil and waiting for it to boil over. It’s a novel about family, forgiveness and about revenge.  It’s a book which falls in the middle for me, some parts I enjoyed but overall it didn’t wow me.  I enjoyed the writing style and would be interested to see what Vanessa Ronan writes next.  I’d like to rate three out of five.

I would like to thank the publishers for this review copy in exchange for my honest opinion.