Day: October 12, 2022

Let me catch my breath. The Wife Next Door by Rona Halsall is a psych thriller that kept me guessing the entire time.

That’s no lie. I was at about 80% of the book and still didn’t know where the author would take the story. It’s a difficult feat these days to keep me that engaged, but I honestly had no clue.

I mean, I had several theories, but just when I was certain I was right, the author would drop something that made me re-think my position.

Because of that, Jess (the main character) is inherently relatable. She lives in a pinball machine, with one thing after another pushing and spinning her around until she pretty much starts to even question her own sanity.

That’s not to say that she is a shrinking violet heroine who thinks she’s going nuts. But the author does a great job of crafting the events in Jess’s life in a way that makes her (and the reader) suspicious of everyone and everything.

It is very entertaining.

There are a few parts that I feel were a bit overdone. Ruby, for example, seems more like a plot point or caricature at times. And her part in the bigger scheme was….well, I was going to say something, but I just realized why the author wrote her the way she did.

So, scratch that – because now I realize that everything that happens in the book has a point. Whether it is an actual point, a red herring, a clue to something later…there is nothing that is unimportant in this story.

And when you think you know what is really going on, I guarantee you don’t. Trust me. You really don’t.

I’m going to stop there because I could dig myself a hole. But I loved how Jess finally figured everything out, and I loved this book. Rona Halsall has written an absolute stellar psych thriller in The Wife Next Door. It should vault to the top of your TBR list.