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His and Hers by Alice Feeney HQ Stories NetGalley blog tour books book review books blog blogging diary of difference diaryofdifference

★★★★

With His and Hers by Alice Feeney, prepare to jump on a ride where one murder will open up the gates of the past, and expose a lot of people in a very brutal way.

I am extremely happy and proud I can be part of the blog tour for this book!

Synopsis:

When a woman is murdered in Blackdown village, Anna Andrews needs to go there to cover the story. However, her hometown brings back a lot of unwanted memories.

Her ex-husband, DCI Jack Harper is investigating the murder and is very suspicious of Anna’s involvement. That is, until he becomes a suspect himself.

My Thoughts:

I have to admit, at the beginning I though this will be a domestic thriller, and I am not too keen on them. I enjoy them, but I prefer psychological thrillers more. It turned out that His and Hers is not only a psychological thriller, but also a very well written one. I have only read one book from Alice Feeney before, I Know Who You Are, and I also enjoyed it, so I was expecting to enjoy this one as well.

The chapters are split into three points of view.

The first one is Her – Anna’s point of view. The second one is Him – Jack’s story. The third one is the point of view of the killer, who has their own thoughts and explanations. And the beautiful thing about the third point of view is that we don’t know who it might be until the very end of the book. That point of view is so well written, that I kept guessing who it might be, and kept changing my mind. At the end, the answer was so surprising and satisfying in the end. And once I knew who the killer is, I went back and read those pages again, and they had a completely another meaning for me. Kudos to Alice for making this possible, as I know not everyone can manage to do this!

“And I pay attention to the little things, because they are often the biggest clues to who a person really is. People rarely see themselves the way others do; we all carry broken mirrors.”

Dementia

The book also briefly focuses on Dementia, and we get to experience the moment Anna realises her mother is ill. For me, this had a special meaning, having experience working with people suffering from dementia, and the writing of the symptoms was very accurate. The reaction of Anna was quite accurate as well, in terms of how hard it was to notice, but also how much harder is to actually accept this fact.

“Mum doesn’t always remember that I’m thirty-six and live in London. She frequently forgets that I have a job, and that I used to have a husband and a child of my own. She didn’t even seem to know that it was my birthday. There was no card this year, or last, but it’s not her fault. Time is something my mother has forgotten how to tell. It moves differently for her now, often backwards instead of forwards. Dementia stole time from my mother, and stole my mother from me.”

If you get to read His and Hers, prepare for many twists, many mysteries, a lot of drama and betrayals. The ending was the most satisfying part for me, but I enjoyed this book all the way through and struggled to put it down. I recommend it to everyone that is in love with mystery thrillers, especially the ones that focus on the psychological aspect.

“Youth fools us into thinking there are infinite paths to choose from in life; maturity tricks us into thinking there is only one.”

Thank you to the HQ Team, for sending me an ARC copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

I Know Who You Are by Alice Feeney is a book that stays with you after you read it. Dark, twisted and unpredictable until the very last chapter.

In the very beginning, we are met with the unknown. Aimee Sinclair is an actress and when she comes home, she realises her husband is missing. The police suspect she is hiding something. They are right, she does have a secret…

The book switches between two timelines; the first being Aimee today and the second being Aimee’s childhood. We get to enjoy these parallel stories and understand how Aimee’s childhood directly influences her decisions as a grown up.

‘’Sometimes it only takes one person to believe in you, to change your life forever. Sometimes it only takes one person not believing in you to destroy it. Humans are a highly sensitive species.’’

Alice’s writing is brilliant, and when reading the two timelines, you feel the child and you feel the adult. A skill not many writers can perfect.

Aimee’s whole life has been about being a different person. That is why she choose to become an actress. She can change into different people as she wants, and keep her true self hidden somewhere safe. But she didn’t learn this all by herself.

The book will leave things unpredictable until the very end. I had my theories and they kept changing all the time. The moment you feel you are close to the truth, something happens and you are back at the start. I loved it!

I wasn’t disappointed with the ending, but I did feel grossed out and disgusted by a certain someone. At times, some scenes felt like too much, but they were crucial to the story.