Book Review | The End Of Her by Shari Lapena

Penguin Random House South Africa kindly sent me a review copy of “The End Of Her” and I am a thriller/mystery junkie, so this made my heart so happy!

Published: August 2020
Pages: 320
Pace: Medium
Genre: Mystery, Thriller, Suspense, Psychological thriller, Psychological Fiction, Domestic Fiction

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 4 out of 5.

The blurb for the book goes as follows: “

It starts with a shocking accusation . . .

Stephanie and Patrick are recently married, with newborn twins. While Stephanie struggles with the disorienting effects of sleep deprivation, there’s one thing she knows for certain – she has everything she ever wanted.

Then a woman from his past arrives and makes a horrifying allegation about his first wife. He always claimed her death was an accident – but she says it was murder.

He insists he’s innocent, that this is nothing but a blackmail attempt. But is Patrick telling the truth? Or has Stephanie made a terrible mistake?

How will it end?” Gripping right?! 

Well, I’d be lying if I didn’t say that this book had me hooked. I found myself reading until way past midnight because I just needed to know what was going to happen!! This book takes the reader on a wild ride of domestic life that goes backward and forwards. We are introduced to an array of characters that are linked to the protagonists and you never know if their connection is good or bad. So you keep reading and the more you read, the more crumbs are left for you to gobble up to try and figure out what is going on here?!

I enjoyed the domestic nature of this book – seeing the everyday life of Patrick and Stephanie’s marriage with newborn twin babies. I can relate to this as I am in the stage of life with small kids. But then some dodgy characters start to come into the story and things start to change, paranoia sets in. And slowly we just watch the wheels of their marriage falling off and more twists and turns just keep on coming. 

It was a suspenseful book for sure and the ending was just shocking. Truthfully, it was not the ending I expected but it was an ending I could understand. I loved the thrill of the story. I loved all the drama and intrigue. I was gunning for Patrick and Stephanie the whole way. 

I rated this book four out of five stars. I recommend this one to anybody who enjoys thrillers and suspense. This is domestic fiction that keeps us coming back for more. I loved every minute of this book! 

To add it to to your TBR on Goodreads, click here. 

To buy yourself a copy, click here. 

Until next time! 😊
Chevonn

Book Review | skins by Anita Arendsen

This is a brand new book by a brand new South African author: Anita Arendsen! As someone with an incredible personality and character but who has a life story that needs to be told, Anita’s produced this book which tells a true life story using the character of Amelia and many others.

Published: May 2021
Pages: 292
Pace: Medium
Genre: True Life Story

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 4 out of 5.

“Skins” is a story based on true life events that takes us on Amelia’s life journey from childhood right through to being a woman with her own family and career. The thing is that along this journey, she experiences a lot of hurt and betrayal and devastation which leads to her appropriating a deep hatred and mistrust as she grows up. This story is raw and emotional and deals with some very difficult topics, including sexual and physical abuse, difficult family relationships, homelessness and deep-seated fear and insecurity. It’s tough to read what Amelia went through. But on the flip side, it was incredible to see a character with such a hopeful and positive outlook, who could be so determined and who constantly sought to improve and do the best she could in the situation. I also absolutely loved the setting and that these are names and places I am familiar with – there’s always an extra special feeling when reading a book like this. The writing created vivid pictures and scenes and helped to draw me, as the reader, right into the story being told. I would issue a word of caution to readers wanting to dive into this book as there are some aspects that could be distressing and triggering, but at the same time, this is such an important book especially in our South African context. We need to address this epidemic in our country and we need to create an open dialogue for those who may be experiencing similar things to what Amelia experienced. And as human beings, we need to #dobetter! Raw, emotional, honest and ultimately healing and hopeful! What a read! Also, what a beautiful cover! Absolutely love it. There is a lot to be said for this book that I haven’t even mentioned. Do yourself a favour and grab a copy!

To learn more about this book or the author, please click here.

To add it to your Goodreads to be read list, click here.

Until next time! 😊
Chevonn

Book Review | If I Had Your Face by Frances Cha

I was so grateful to receive a review copy of “If I Had Your Face” from Penguin Random House South Africa. I am always so excited when I receive copies of interesting and unique books. This one was no exception! 😃

Published: September 2020
Pages: 288
Pace: Medium
Genre: Fiction, Contemporary

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 4 out of 5.

The cover of this book is beautiful! And the inside of the cover is trippy as there are flaps that open up into hundreds of white dots on a black background. It’s so cool. Unique things like that make a book stick in my mind for longer as well. We all know the emotional bond we create with each book we have the privilege of reading and so when books have special features, it helps to entrench that experience of the book and make more of an impression on the reader! Smart!

My first impression was that I was excited about and daunted by the fact that this book was set in Seoul. I have very little knowledge and absolutely no experience with Seoul and so I was nervous that I wouldn’t be able to connect or appreciate the story. Luckily I was wrong. If I Had Your Face is set in contemporary Seoul and it follows 4 women in various life stages in “a place where extreme plastic surgery is as routine as getting a haircut, where women compete for spots in secret ‘room salons’ to entertain wealthy businessmen after hours, where K-Pop stars are the object of all-consuming obsession, and ruthless social hierarchies dictate your every move.”

Of the four women whose lives we follow, I enjoyed Kyuri and Ara’s stories the most. Kyuri is a beauty obsessed “room salon” girl – basically a prostitute and is working her way up the ladder until she makes a fatal error later in the book by getting too close to a client. Ara works as a hairdresser but she is mute due to an attack on her when she was younger. These 2 characters were the most interesting to me out of the four women.

This book touches on many different topics, such as crazy beauty standards, people just having surgeries for superficial reasons, obviously prostitution, the battle of the sexes, money and how that helps or hinders people and many others. It seemed like a lot of stuff to cover in one book. I enjoyed how we were reading about their current lives but every now and then, we would read about a memory or something that happened in the past that explained certain things about their lives now.

There were a couple of times that things happened that would be quite shocking or jarring and then nothing would be said about it again! I found that slightly confusing and it made me wonder what its purpose was.

Other than that, I thoroughly enjoyed this read. It was different from anything I’ve read before. It’s obviously very character driven and they are imperfect people for sure. I would still recommend this book to anyone who enjoys character driven books.

To buy yourself a copy, click here!

To add it to your Goodreads list, click here!

Until next time! 😊
Chevonn