Cross Her Heart3.5 Stars

Published September 4th 2018 by William Morrow

I read mixed reviews of this book and wasn’t sure what to think. Once I started reading, I was up and down. From the first chapter, I was hooked, but there were huge sections that were a bit slow. Starting from the first page, we learn that someone is very angry. The letter this person is reading has sent him into a rage. He starts to make a plan… I do not want to go into the plot, because that would ruin the story for you, but it is the story of a mother (Lisa) and her daughter (Ava) and what happens to their lives when secrets come out.

This story is told using multiple points of view – Lisa, Ava, and Marilyn (Lisa’s best friend). This story focuses on Lisa and Ava, but includes chapters from Marilyn’s POV, which adds other detail to the story, it also shows us what others think about Lisa. This book is twisty and has a lot going on. For the most part, the reader is kept in the dark about what happened in Lisa’s past and who is behind the current troubles until the last quarter of the book. As I mentioned earlier, it was a slow build, then a rushed ending. It had a huge twist that surprised me, but not quite enough to make up for the slowness. I was a little disappointed in the ending, mainly because it felt too abrupt, but this was still a good psychological thriller. It was intense, suspicious, and twisted. There were unreliable narrators, a twisty plot, flawed characters, and a huge twist, in fact, more than one.

I listened to this book and the narrator had the same voice for all the female characters. I had to keep checking back at the table of contents often to verify who was speaking, that might have added to the slowness of the story for me. I think I might have enjoyed it more if I had read this one. If you are a fan of domestic suspense/thriller, you will probably enjoy this book. One warning for the reader, there are some descriptions of abuse in this story, so it that is a trigger for you, be ready.

About the Book (From Goodreads): Lisa lives for her daughter Ava, her job, and her best friend Marilyn, but when a handsome client shows an interest in her, Lisa starts daydreaming about sharing her life with him too. Maybe she’s ready now. Maybe she can trust again. Maybe it’s time to let her terrifying secret past go. Then her daughter rescues a boy from drowning and their pictures are all over the news for everyone to see. Lisa’s world explodes, and she finds everything she has built threatened. Not knowing whom she can trust, it’s up to her to face her past to save what she holds dear.

Sarah PinboroughAbout the Author: Sarah Pinborough is the number one Sunday Times Bestselling and New York Times Bestselling author of the psychological thriller Behind Her Eyes (Jan, 2017). During her career she has published more than 20 novels and several novellas, and has written for the BBC. Her recent novels include the dystopian love story, The Death House, and a teenage thriller, 13 Minutes which has been bought by Netflix with Josh Schwartz adapting.

Behind Her Eyes has sold to nearly twenty territories so far and was sold at auction to the US in a significant deal to Flatiron, Macmillan. There are discussions on going with several movies studios about the film adaptation. You can follow Sarah on Twitter at @sarahpinborough.

Website: https://sarahpinborough.com/