The Best Friend - Susanna Beard

 

It's been a while since I've posted a review and I'm thrilled to be back with a review of The Best Friend by Susanna Beard which I thought was an enjoyable read!

Alice and her boyfriend Jason live together, they have a happy life and things are ticking along nicely for them until Jason's childhood friend, Carl, unexpectedly arrives on their doorstep one night. Trouble has always followed Carl and this time around he's found himself in a real bind and he says he desperately needs Jason's help. When Alice finds out about Carl's situation she begs Jason not to get involved and is horrified to find out that it's too late, they already are and the outcome could be horrifying.

This is a book with short, snappy chapters, the type that has you thinking "just one more chapter before I switch off the light" The story races along at a great pace and although I enjoyed it, there were times when I could have quite happily banged Alice and Jason's heads together. Their decisions were so poor and they just came across as being unbelievably weak at times. That said, I still enjoyed the book as it was well constructed and flowed well. This was my first outing with Susanna Beard and I'll be interested to read her other books as I've heard lots of good things about them.

With Kind thanks to Jill at Books 'n' All Promotions and Joffee Books for my review copy.

 

Blog Tour - A Womb With A View - Mark Tilbury

 

I couldn't wait to get my hands on a copy of MarkTilbury's new book, A Womb With A View and I was intrigued when I heard that he was veering away from his signature twisted genre and venturing into comic crime fiction.

Private investigator Bob Blundell has been called to Featherstone Manor by Claudia, the lady of the manor, as she suspects that her husband, Eugene, is having an affair. Despite her best efforts to give Bob a cover story for being at the manor, her teenage nephew, Reuben, has his suspicions about the new arrival and as a wannabe spy he begins his own covert mission,

With an eclectic cast of characters, this is a tale of a dysfunctional family riddled with secrets and lies that had me chuckling away to myself on numerous occasions. Reuben's antics and view of the world from a teenage perspective were what made this book for me. He's walking the line of adolescence, on the one hand totally unaware of the repercussions his actions are having and on the other having a typical teenage outlook on any adult reasoning.

I'm always nervous for an author when they take off into a new genre but I'm pleased to say that my fears were left unfounded as Mark Tilbury has pulled this new style off with aplomb. The writing is of the usual high quality calibre, the plot and cleverly intertwined subplots rattle along nicely and the humour is absolutely spot on - but I will always give a lobster a questioning look from now on!

A Womb With A View is another truimphant read from this author and one that I would very highly recommend!

You can  follow the rest of the tour with these great blogs:

With kind thanks as always to author Mark Tilbury for my review copy.