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Spilling CID #1
Το μωρό στην κούνια
Η Άλις αφήνει τη μόλις δύο εβδομάδων κόρη της στο σπίτι με τον σύζυγό της Ντέιβιντ, για να κάνει την πρώτη της έξοδο μετά τον τοκετό. Όταν επιστρέφει, δύο ώρες αργότερα, επιμένει ότι το μωρό που βρίσκεται μέσα στην κούνια δεν είναι το δικό της. Παρά την ολοφάνερη συντριβή της, ο Ντέιβιντ επιμένει ότι αυτή κάνει λάθος.
Η αστυνομία καλείται να αναλάβει την υπόθεση. Ο ντετέκτιβ Σάιμον Ουοτερχάουζ είναι συμπονετικός, αλλά διατηρεί κάποιες αμφιβολίες για την ιστορία της Άλις. Η προϊσταμένη του, η αρχιφύλακας Τσάρλι Ζάιλερ, πιστεύει ότι η Άλις υποφέρει από κάποιου είδους φρεναπάτη, που οφείλεται σε επιλόχεια κατάθλιψη. Η στάση του Ντέιβιντ γίνεται συνεχώς πιο εχθρική και απειλητική, ενώ είναι πεπεισμένος ότι η Άλις ή έχει τρελαθεί ή ψεύδεται. Ποιος είναι ο ρόλος της πεθεράς της στο γεγονός αυτό; Πώς θα μπορέσει η Άλις να πείσει την αστυνομία για το δίκιο της πριν να είναι πολύ αργά;
Η αστυνομία καλείται να αναλάβει την υπόθεση. Ο ντετέκτιβ Σάιμον Ουοτερχάουζ είναι συμπονετικός, αλλά διατηρεί κάποιες αμφιβολίες για την ιστορία της Άλις. Η προϊσταμένη του, η αρχιφύλακας Τσάρλι Ζάιλερ, πιστεύει ότι η Άλις υποφέρει από κάποιου είδους φρεναπάτη, που οφείλεται σε επιλόχεια κατάθλιψη. Η στάση του Ντέιβιντ γίνεται συνεχώς πιο εχθρική και απειλητική, ενώ είναι πεπεισμένος ότι η Άλις ή έχει τρελαθεί ή ψεύδεται. Ποιος είναι ο ρόλος της πεθεράς της στο γεγονός αυτό; Πώς θα μπορέσει η Άλις να πείσει την αστυνομία για το δίκιο της πριν να είναι πολύ αργά;
424 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2006
364 people are currently reading
12717 people want to read
About the author
Sophie Hannah
106 books4,503 followersSophie Hannah is an internationally bestselling writer of psychological crime fiction, published in 27 countries. In 2013, her latest novel, The Carrier, won the Crime Thriller of the Year Award at the Specsavers National Book Awards. Two of Sophie’s crime novels, The Point of Rescue and The Other Half Lives, have been adapted for television and appeared on ITV1 under the series title Case Sensitive in 2011 and 2012. In 2004, Sophie won first prize in the Daphne Du Maurier Festival Short Story Competition for her suspense story The Octopus Nest, which is now published in her first collection of short stories, The Fantastic Book of Everybody’s Secrets.
Sophie has also published five collections of poetry. Her fifth, Pessimism for Beginners, was shortlisted for the 2007 T S Eliot Award. Her poetry is studied at GCSE, A-level and degree level across the UK. From 1997 to 1999 she was Fellow Commoner in Creative Arts at Trinity College, Cambridge, and between 1999 and 2001 she was a fellow of Wolfson College, Oxford. She is forty-one and lives with her husband and children in Cambridge, where she is a Fellow Commoner at Lucy Cavendish College. She is currently working on a new challenge for the little grey cells of Hercule Poirot, Agatha Christie’s famous detective.
Sophie has also published five collections of poetry. Her fifth, Pessimism for Beginners, was shortlisted for the 2007 T S Eliot Award. Her poetry is studied at GCSE, A-level and degree level across the UK. From 1997 to 1999 she was Fellow Commoner in Creative Arts at Trinity College, Cambridge, and between 1999 and 2001 she was a fellow of Wolfson College, Oxford. She is forty-one and lives with her husband and children in Cambridge, where she is a Fellow Commoner at Lucy Cavendish College. She is currently working on a new challenge for the little grey cells of Hercule Poirot, Agatha Christie’s famous detective.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 1,157 reviews
July 9, 2015
I bought this because a review quoted on the jacket of Lucie Whitehouse's superb The Bed I Made compared that book to Sophie Hannah's writing. First things first - the comparison is way off the mark. Hannah's writing is good, and I can see certain similarities in style, but she hasn't a fraction of Whitehouse's talent. While compelling and in parts intriguing, this was one of the strangest, most confusing and ultimately frustrating books I've ever read.
I don't normally describe plots in my reviews, but to explain my feelings about this particular book I will have to, so stop reading now if you don't want spoilers. The story centres around Alice, who believes her newborn daughter Florence has been abducted and replaced with another child, dubbed Little Face. Her husband, David, whose first wife Laura was murdered some years earlier, accuses her of lying, and later in the book proceeds to subject her to quite horrific emotional - and to some extent physical - abuse, apparently with the aim of convincing others Alice is losing her mind. It later transpires that Vivienne, David's mother, killed Laura - a fact Alice had discovered during her pregnancy, making her determined to escape from the family. This is where it gets very confusing. We're asked to believe that Alice was intending to run away with Florence, but for spurious reasons decided to invent the abduction story instead. It is revealed at the very end of the book that there has only ever been one baby, and that Alice has always been aware of this.
All very well and good; the problem is that Alice's part of the story is told in first person, present tense, and right up until the last few chapters she maintains that Little Face is not her child. I get that she is supposed to be an unreliable narrator, but her narrative is not presented as a story being told, rather as her thoughts and feelings as they happen. For example, we observe her horror upon discovering that all her photos of Florence have been destroyed, only to later learn that she did this herself, which simply doesn't seem plausible at all. I think you should be able to re-read a story with a significant final twist again from the beginning and find that it all still makes sense, albeit cast in a different light; this one doesn't. There is also the question of why Alice tolerates David's abuse. She doesn't seem to believe herself to be in danger of physical harm, yet she goes along with his disgusting, humiliating requests almost without question or any attempt to stand up to him. Is this supposed to be part of Alice's 'plan'? Or are we meant to assume the episodes are entirely fabricated? When we discover that Vivienne is the villain of the piece, does this mean she is complicit in David's behaviour, or are the two completely separate? It's never made clear whether David was involved in Laura's murder or not, and he receives no comeuppance for his treatment of Alice. This is particularly disturbing since the abuse scenes are so chilling they made me feel physically sick.
The best thing about the book was that I did find it very readable and constantly wanted to find out what would happen next; this was helped by the narrative structure, with every other chapter from Alice's point of view, and the rest written in third person, observing the police officers investigating Alice's case. I loved the character of Simon, until the end when he too inexplicably changed dramatically and suddenly. There is some proof here that Hannah has promise as a writer, but there were so many holes in the plot and characterisation, so many questions left unanswered, and on the evidence of this book there is no way she merits any sort of comparison to Whitehouse.
I don't normally describe plots in my reviews, but to explain my feelings about this particular book I will have to, so stop reading now if you don't want spoilers. The story centres around Alice, who believes her newborn daughter Florence has been abducted and replaced with another child, dubbed Little Face. Her husband, David, whose first wife Laura was murdered some years earlier, accuses her of lying, and later in the book proceeds to subject her to quite horrific emotional - and to some extent physical - abuse, apparently with the aim of convincing others Alice is losing her mind. It later transpires that Vivienne, David's mother, killed Laura - a fact Alice had discovered during her pregnancy, making her determined to escape from the family. This is where it gets very confusing. We're asked to believe that Alice was intending to run away with Florence, but for spurious reasons decided to invent the abduction story instead. It is revealed at the very end of the book that there has only ever been one baby, and that Alice has always been aware of this.
All very well and good; the problem is that Alice's part of the story is told in first person, present tense, and right up until the last few chapters she maintains that Little Face is not her child. I get that she is supposed to be an unreliable narrator, but her narrative is not presented as a story being told, rather as her thoughts and feelings as they happen. For example, we observe her horror upon discovering that all her photos of Florence have been destroyed, only to later learn that she did this herself, which simply doesn't seem plausible at all. I think you should be able to re-read a story with a significant final twist again from the beginning and find that it all still makes sense, albeit cast in a different light; this one doesn't. There is also the question of why Alice tolerates David's abuse. She doesn't seem to believe herself to be in danger of physical harm, yet she goes along with his disgusting, humiliating requests almost without question or any attempt to stand up to him. Is this supposed to be part of Alice's 'plan'? Or are we meant to assume the episodes are entirely fabricated? When we discover that Vivienne is the villain of the piece, does this mean she is complicit in David's behaviour, or are the two completely separate? It's never made clear whether David was involved in Laura's murder or not, and he receives no comeuppance for his treatment of Alice. This is particularly disturbing since the abuse scenes are so chilling they made me feel physically sick.
The best thing about the book was that I did find it very readable and constantly wanted to find out what would happen next; this was helped by the narrative structure, with every other chapter from Alice's point of view, and the rest written in third person, observing the police officers investigating Alice's case. I loved the character of Simon, until the end when he too inexplicably changed dramatically and suddenly. There is some proof here that Hannah has promise as a writer, but there were so many holes in the plot and characterisation, so many questions left unanswered, and on the evidence of this book there is no way she merits any sort of comparison to Whitehouse.
October 25, 2022
La trama del libro era prometedora, pero, a medida que avanzan las páginas, vas sintiendo antipatía por prácticamente todos los personajes.
Creo que están mal definidos, y sus comportamientos a lo largo de la novela te dejan perplejo en ocasiones. El final tampoco me parece demasiado elaborado.
Con todo, hay capítulos donde la narración está bien trabajada, y se nota que la autora es capaz de hacer cosas mejores. Es mi primera novela de Sophie Hannah, y es posible que le vuelva a dar otra oportunidad, pero tendrá que esperar un poco hasta que se me pase la decepción.
Veré qué más tiene publicado.
Creo que están mal definidos, y sus comportamientos a lo largo de la novela te dejan perplejo en ocasiones. El final tampoco me parece demasiado elaborado.
Con todo, hay capítulos donde la narración está bien trabajada, y se nota que la autora es capaz de hacer cosas mejores. Es mi primera novela de Sophie Hannah, y es posible que le vuelva a dar otra oportunidad, pero tendrá que esperar un poco hasta que se me pase la decepción.
Veré qué más tiene publicado.
December 4, 2017
I really thought I would enjoy this one more. It started out with a lot of promise, but became much too claustrophobic for my taste!
While I do enjoy a frantic tone and intense scenario, this one turned out to be very monotonous and redundant. I enjoyed the setting of the massive estate, The Elms and the fact that the wife/mother Alice seemed to be "trapped" inside and controlled by her husband, Simon and her evil mother-in-law.
The story line and dialogue just went round and round too much for me and I lost interest quickly. I finished the book because I really wanted to see what happened to their child, Florence/Little Face! I can't say the ending was satisfying to me. Sadly it just didn't work for me.
I really did like Sophie Hannah's writing style as far as descriptions and character development. This is a book from 2006, so I am looking forward to reading her newest novel, Did You See Melody? So the jury is still out on this author for me :)
May 10, 2013
psihološki triler... guta se u dahu... nažalost samo je jedna njena knjiga prevedena na srpski...
January 13, 2013
Creepy and disturbing, and not even in an interesting way.
The characters were either annoying or downright unpleasant. I resented having to spend my time with them. No one had any redeeming features.
The ending was a huge rip-off. I've noticed with Sophie Hannah that even though she sets up amazing mysteries that keep my turning the pages, she ruins them with the last chapter in which everything is explained in an implausible and awkward way.
I felt cheated by the ending of this book. All the way through, in chapters that were written in first person, the main character claimed her baby was missing and swapped with someone else's. There were whole paragraphs in which she agonised over what was happening to her missing child. Then in the last chapter it turned out that she had been pretending all along. There was absolutely no indication that this might be the case. It was blatant deception of the reader. Badly handled.
The characters were either annoying or downright unpleasant. I resented having to spend my time with them. No one had any redeeming features.
The ending was a huge rip-off. I've noticed with Sophie Hannah that even though she sets up amazing mysteries that keep my turning the pages, she ruins them with the last chapter in which everything is explained in an implausible and awkward way.
I felt cheated by the ending of this book. All the way through, in chapters that were written in first person, the main character claimed her baby was missing and swapped with someone else's. There were whole paragraphs in which she agonised over what was happening to her missing child. Then in the last chapter it turned out that she had been pretending all along. There was absolutely no indication that this might be the case. It was blatant deception of the reader. Badly handled.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 5, 2018
Είναι κάποιοι συγγραφείς αλλά είμαστε και κάποιοι αναγνώστες που πάμε και κάνουμε πρώτες μούρες στο Καβούρι την κάθε τυχάρπαστη που πιστεύει ότι είναι η νέα Αγκαθα Κρίστι. Πιο προβλέψιμο πεθαίνεις. Παίζει να είχα καταλάβει τι θα γίνει και από την πρώτη κιόλας σελίδα. Δεν είναι το πρωτο βιβλίο της που διαβάζω και τελικά αυτό που διαπιστώνω είναι ότι η Αγκάθα των φτωχών έχει μεν συμπαθητικές ιδέες που θα μπορούσαν να γίνουν ωραία βιβλία αλλά μάλλον βάζει όλη της την ενέργεια να σκεφτεί το σκηνικό και μένει από μπαταρία στην εκτέλεση. Δεν εξηγείται αλλιως. ΖΖΖΖΖΖΖΖΖΖΖΖΖ
March 8, 2012
I feel bad giving this book only two stars, because the writing was actually good enough to deserve more than that. By the end, however, it started feeling like a bad made-for-TV movie. I could picture Melissa Gilbert tearing up and trying to conjure a quivering lip in the lead role!
What was the point with the husband, by the way? Mild-mannered, "love-of-my-life"...? Is it just Me? Or, how do you turn him into this horrible, sadistic villain, replete with evil cackle and murderous stare, and then in the end he turns out to be merely suffering from the stress and anxiety of the situation foisted upon him? Really? You thought that was a good idea? And, no one..., not a single friend or relative proofreader, or editor read this and said, "Sweetie, you know we love you. You know that. But, if you publish this book with that ending we have little recourse but to disown you. It's out of our hands" -- no one thought to render that kindness?
That a book could start out so extremely well and end up as badly as it did is a talent in and of itself, I suppose.
What was the point with the husband, by the way? Mild-mannered, "love-of-my-life"...? Is it just Me? Or, how do you turn him into this horrible, sadistic villain, replete with evil cackle and murderous stare, and then in the end he turns out to be merely suffering from the stress and anxiety of the situation foisted upon him? Really? You thought that was a good idea? And, no one..., not a single friend or relative proofreader, or editor read this and said, "Sweetie, you know we love you. You know that. But, if you publish this book with that ending we have little recourse but to disown you. It's out of our hands" -- no one thought to render that kindness?
That a book could start out so extremely well and end up as badly as it did is a talent in and of itself, I suppose.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 14, 2008
If you like crime drama and psychological suspsense, don't miss this book. This is a magical onion kind of book--the surface is nothing like the center and there are hundreds of layers making it up. The complexity of the plot will take awhile to hit you, but when it does, you won't be able to put the book down. I literally finished the last 20 pages walking around my apartment because I was too exhausted to stay awake if I sat down but I HAD to see how things wrapped up. The premise: new mother Alice Fancourt leaves her two week old daughter for the first time for a quick outing, only to discover, when she gets home, that the baby in the crib is not hers. But she can't convince anyone else of that. Very British, very dark, very much full of surprises and very very much recommended by me!
November 20, 2012
This will probably include SPOILERS so stop reading now if that bothers you.
I'm torn about this book. I think my actual rating was about 3.5 stars. I couldn't put it down, which pleased me because I came across it by accident, and I'm often disappointed with kindle books I know nothing about. I found the author's narration style interesting: alternating first-person Alice narration with third-person police narration. At first, I was confused by this, but it grew on me.
Ok. Problems with the story.
1. Alice is an idiot.
This is where those SPOILERS come in.
Okay, so you're Alice Fancourt, and you've just figured out that you're loving and supportive mother-in-law is a murderous psychopath. Do you...
(a) ...run away while she is on vacation for two weeks on the other side of the Atlantic?
(b) ...go to the police, tell them what you know, and ask them to keep you in custody so she can't harm you during the investigation?
(c) ...stage a kidnapping of your own daughter, get the police involved and lie to them every step of the way (thereby losing their trust), succumb to the abuse of your apparently unstable husband without even trying to resist, and run away on foot in your nightgown in the middle of the night? And then, hypothetically, if you chose this as your response, would you hide at your friend's house until the cop finally believed you and then...run away from him?!?!?!
Seriously, Sophie Hannah, she runs away from Simon after she knows he believes her and is on her side? (Ps. The answer is clearly c.) and where does Alice go? Oh yes, to the club, frequented by Vivienne, to find evidence for a murder for which she had motive. Naturally, she got her FINGERPRINTS all over the evidence before dropping it in a pool. Go, Alice!
Speaking of the pool scene, this was a crappy wrap-up. Reminiscent of Rowling and Collins, our protagonist finds herself in a life-threatening situation and rather than facing the situation, the author has Alice lose consciousness and awake in a safe location. Bleh. Get your hands messy, people! Clearly, Hannah is not afraid to do this (think: bathroom scene). Anyway, Alice should have died at this point. She was in a secluded (and probably soundproofed) room, being held underwater by someone who wanted her dead...there is no way the police would have actually gotten there on time. I think I would have liked this book more (and would have respected SH more) if Alice had died during this scene.
Additionally, I spent half the book thinking Alice was crazy. This was underdeveloped. Was she a pathological liar? Maybe that's it...
Laura warned Alice. Maybe Alice interpreted it as jealousy and was blinded by love. But everything needs to be taken with a grain of salt.
2. Whatever happened to David?
There are many allusions to David having multiple personalities, and, in the end, everything is laid out for us so clearly that I found myself yearning for some explanation of David's behavior. Alas, there is none.
Ok, so Alice thought more highly of David than her only friend, who seemed to find him about as interesting as a brick wall, though not threatening.
David was loyal (to a fault) to his mother, still in love with his first wife, and did not doubt that the child in question was Florence. He was abnormally modest, so when did the shift to sadistic torturer happen? What prompted him to smirk at Alice behind his mother's back as she stood there, covered in food, and then stripping in the kitchen?
Maybe David's motivation was truly to push Alice to admit that she was lying, or to make her seem crazy or sick. Perhaps Alice is the sickest one of them all. That, in conjunction with a mental illness brought on by a period of high stress (like having a baby), might cause someone to lash out in a new way. It still seemed a little suspect to me.
3. The wrap-up sucked.
See comment on protagonist waking up and finding him/herself completely safe.
I'll probably read more by Sophie Hannah. I feel like she copped out a little, but she had me hooked, and I do love those psychological murder mysteries!
June 26, 2020
Well, this was an experience. Disappointing, kind of bonkers, somehow still readable, lots of plot holes. It felt good to clean it off my TBR, and I'll probably continue the series just because I'm curious about the bizarre relationship between the two detectives, but boy was it not what I was expecting.
The premise of this book is a good one, one that I don't think it really delivers on: a woman leaves her house for the first time since her two week old baby was born, and when she comes back she insists the baby she came home to is not the one she left. Someone has swapped them. No one believes her, not her husband or the police. Two weeks later, both she and the baby have disappeared, and there is something not right about her family and her house.
The book is told in dual alternating perspectives: first person POV from the mother, Alice; and third person POV from the lead detective on the case, Simon, with occasional interludes from his superior officer, Charlie. Alice's POV takes place two weeks before Simon's, so we see a weird bouncing back and forth between cause and effect.
The mystery itself, which turns out to involve a previous murder as well, and Alice's creepy family was pretty good in the sense that I couldn't look away from it. I also hated it. The investigation of what happened was interesting, until it wasn't because for some reason the author decided to have both of her detectives be so involved in their own emotions, it impairs their jobs, but in an annoying way, not a way that made me recognize our shared humanity or whatever. It's made clear that their relationship will continue to develop, and things are held back from us about Simon's past. It all just felt out of place and bizarre. It didn't fit.
And then there was the "twist."
I don't know if I would recommend this, but I'm curious to see what other utterly bizarre things Hannah can throw at me, so for now I'll probably pick up the next book sometime in the future.
The premise of this book is a good one, one that I don't think it really delivers on: a woman leaves her house for the first time since her two week old baby was born, and when she comes back she insists the baby she came home to is not the one she left. Someone has swapped them. No one believes her, not her husband or the police. Two weeks later, both she and the baby have disappeared, and there is something not right about her family and her house.
The book is told in dual alternating perspectives: first person POV from the mother, Alice; and third person POV from the lead detective on the case, Simon, with occasional interludes from his superior officer, Charlie. Alice's POV takes place two weeks before Simon's, so we see a weird bouncing back and forth between cause and effect.
The mystery itself, which turns out to involve a previous murder as well, and Alice's creepy family was pretty good in the sense that I couldn't look away from it. I also hated it. The investigation of what happened was interesting, until it wasn't because for some reason the author decided to have both of her detectives be so involved in their own emotions, it impairs their jobs, but in an annoying way, not a way that made me recognize our shared humanity or whatever. It's made clear that their relationship will continue to develop, and things are held back from us about Simon's past. It all just felt out of place and bizarre. It didn't fit.
And then there was the "twist."
I don't know if I would recommend this, but I'm curious to see what other utterly bizarre things Hannah can throw at me, so for now I'll probably pick up the next book sometime in the future.
November 22, 2009
Well the premise sounded good--Alice Fancourt returns home after a few hours out of the house and claims the baby in the nursery is not hers. No one believes her, not even the police....
The book jacket was loaded with rave reviews..."international bestseller" and "translated into nine languages" so I started reading with high hopes.
Well, that will teach me to believe in publisher's hype. I should know better by now.
This book has too MUCH psycho-babble. Every character is overdrawn; and I found none of the characters likeable. Every single character--including the two police leads--Simon and Charlie--are loaded with thier own pyschlogical problems. And the ending was a big disappointment.
I nearly gave one star but I gave two because of 1)an interesting premise and 2) there are a few really good flashes of writing here and there--but few and far between.
I would recommend this author try a novel and use much less psychlogical jargon and tighter plotting. I am in no hurry to read any of her other books.
Recommended for the truly desperate mystery reader with nothing else to read.
The book jacket was loaded with rave reviews..."international bestseller" and "translated into nine languages" so I started reading with high hopes.
Well, that will teach me to believe in publisher's hype. I should know better by now.
This book has too MUCH psycho-babble. Every character is overdrawn; and I found none of the characters likeable. Every single character--including the two police leads--Simon and Charlie--are loaded with thier own pyschlogical problems. And the ending was a big disappointment.
I nearly gave one star but I gave two because of 1)an interesting premise and 2) there are a few really good flashes of writing here and there--but few and far between.
I would recommend this author try a novel and use much less psychlogical jargon and tighter plotting. I am in no hurry to read any of her other books.
Recommended for the truly desperate mystery reader with nothing else to read.
July 31, 2018
Η ιστορία αρχικά φαντάζει πολύ μπερδεμένη. Πιο πολύ με κακόγουστο αστείο. Μια μητέρα, επιστρέφει από την πρώτη της έξοδο μετά τη γέννηση της κόρης της σπίτι και διαρρηγνύει τα ιμάτιά της, ότι το μωρό που υπάρχει στην κούνια, δεν είναι το δικό της. Ο σύζυγος είναι αδιάλλακτος ως προς αυτό και επιμένει ότι η Άλις έχει αλλοφρονησει. Η αστυνομία δεν παίρνει ξεκάθαρη θέση γιατί δεν υπάρχουν επαρκή στοιχεία.
Λίγο πρίν το τέλος του βιβλίου μας λύνονται οι περισσότερες απορίες μας.
Ευχαριστήθηκα την ανάγνωσή του, αλλά ούτε με "τρόμαξε", ούτε με συγκλόνισε.
3,5 αστέρια
Λίγο πρίν το τέλος του βιβλίου μας λύνονται οι περισσότερες απορίες μας.
Ευχαριστήθηκα την ανάγνωσή του, αλλά ούτε με "τρόμαξε", ούτε με συγκλόνισε.
3,5 αστέρια
August 11, 2017
Το συγκεκριμένο βιβλίο είναι αρκετά ιδιαίτερο. Διαπραγματεύεται ένα θέμα που είναι ο εφιάλτης για όλες τις μητέρες -και για όσες δεν είμαστε, μπορώ να πω. Η εξαφάνιση ενός παιδιού αποτελεί την πιο φρικτή σκέψη του καθενός από εμάς και νομίζω πως άπαντες νιώθουμε ένα σφίξιμο όταν ακούμε για τέτοια περιστατικά. Από την άλλη, μπορεί να αποτελέσει μια θαυμάσια λογοτεχνική αφορμή για τη δημιουργία μιας συναρπαστικής ιστορίας. Αυτό είναι το καλό με τα βιβλία, ότι τα δεινά παραμένουν στις σελίδες τους και συνήθως τελειώνουν μαζί με αυτές.
Η Sophie Hannah προσπάθησε να δημιουργήσει μια συναρπαστική ιστορία, όμως μάλλον δεν της βγήκε. Το βιβλίο είναι τρομερά καλογραμμένο, η χρήση της γλώσσας είναι πλούσια και περιγραφική, η πλοκή 'χορταστική' από αυτή την άποψη. Από άποψη περιεχομένου, όμως, ψιλοπάσχει. Το οπισθόφυλλο υπόσχεται "ανατριχιαστική αγωνία", "τρομακτικό μυστήριο" και έντονα συναισθήματα. Πράγματι, σ' αυτό το μοτίβο ξεκινάει, αλλά όσο προχωράει η ανάγνωση -και όσο πλησιάζουμε προς το τέλος- όλο αυτό μοιάζει να ξεφουσκώνει. Τα επιχειρήματα μοιάζουν απλοϊκά, οι εντυπώσεις δεν κερδίζονται πια, η κατάληξη φαντάζει η αναμενόμενη - οπότε χάνεται και το όποιο σασπένς. Αρκετές σελίδες πριν το τέλος έχεις ήδη καταλάβει όχι μόνο τι έχει παίξει στην υπόθεση, αλλά και το τι πρόκειται να συμβεί στον καθένα από τους ήρωες.
Οι οποίοι ήρωες είναι στην πλειοψηφία τους προβληματικοί και ασυμπάθιστοι. Οι χαρακτήρες τους δείχνουν από την αρχή και τον ρόλο τους στην υπόθεση. Σε ένα αστυνομικό θρίλερ όμως υποτίθεται πως αυτό δεν πρέπει να συμβαίνει, γιατί δεν είναι πολύ δύσκολο πια να μαντέψεις τις εξελίξεις. Η νευρωτική και ελεγχομανής πεθερά, ο άβουλος γιος, η απελπισμένη και 'χαμένη' νύφη, η στερημένη αρχιφύλακας, ο διστακτικός αστυνομικός... Όλοι τους έχουν εξ' αρχής μια διαμορφωμένη περσόνα που δεν εκπλήσσει καθόλου και ποτέ τον αναγνώστη. Προσωπικά, δεν συμπάθησα πολύ κανέναν τους και οπωσδήποτε δεν δικαιολόγησα τις πράξεις τους. Από την απαράδεκτη συμπεριφορά της αρχιφύλακα επειδή δεν της έκατσε ο γκόμενος, μέχρι την αλλοπρόσαλλη συμπεριφορά της μητέρας του μωρού, δεν μπόρεσα να βρω κανένα ελαφρυντικό.
Ούτε το τέλος κατάφερε να με πείσει. Ίσως υπήρχαν τα κίνητρα για όσα έγιναν και οπωσδήποτε ο καθένας πράττει κατά βούληση. Όμως, μετά από 400 σελίδες, περιμένεις κάτι διαφορετικό. Κάτι που θα σε σοκάρει, θα ανατρέψει τα όσα είχες σχηματίσει στο μυαλό σου ως τώρα. Εδώ το τέλος ήταν ό,τι πιο αναμενόμενο μπορούσε να υποθέσει κανείς - και να επαναλάβω πως ούτε τότε μπόρεσα να δικαιολογήσω την ηρωίδα για τις πράξεις της.
Απόλαυσα πραγματικά την ανάγνωση από άποψη γραφής, αλλά από άποψη πλοκής ήταν από τα πιο προβλέψιμα βιβλία που έχω διαβάσει. Καλούτσικο σε γενικές γραμμές, οπωσδήποτε όμως δεν δικαιώνει τον τίτλο του ως 'αστυνομικό ψυχολογικό θρίλερ'.
Η Sophie Hannah προσπάθησε να δημιουργήσει μια συναρπαστική ιστορία, όμως μάλλον δεν της βγήκε. Το βιβλίο είναι τρομερά καλογραμμένο, η χρήση της γλώσσας είναι πλούσια και περιγραφική, η πλοκή 'χορταστική' από αυτή την άποψη. Από άποψη περιεχομένου, όμως, ψιλοπάσχει. Το οπισθόφυλλο υπόσχεται "ανατριχιαστική αγωνία", "τρομακτικό μυστήριο" και έντονα συναισθήματα. Πράγματι, σ' αυτό το μοτίβο ξεκινάει, αλλά όσο προχωράει η ανάγνωση -και όσο πλησιάζουμε προς το τέλος- όλο αυτό μοιάζει να ξεφουσκώνει. Τα επιχειρήματα μοιάζουν απλοϊκά, οι εντυπώσεις δεν κερδίζονται πια, η κατάληξη φαντάζει η αναμενόμενη - οπότε χάνεται και το όποιο σασπένς. Αρκετές σελίδες πριν το τέλος έχεις ήδη καταλάβει όχι μόνο τι έχει παίξει στην υπόθεση, αλλά και το τι πρόκειται να συμβεί στον καθένα από τους ήρωες.
Οι οποίοι ήρωες είναι στην πλειοψηφία τους προβληματικοί και ασυμπάθιστοι. Οι χαρακτήρες τους δείχνουν από την αρχή και τον ρόλο τους στην υπόθεση. Σε ένα αστυνομικό θρίλερ όμως υποτίθεται πως αυτό δεν πρέπει να συμβαίνει, γιατί δεν είναι πολύ δύσκολο πια να μαντέψεις τις εξελίξεις. Η νευρωτική και ελεγχομανής πεθερά, ο άβουλος γιος, η απελπισμένη και 'χαμένη' νύφη, η στερημένη αρχιφύλακας, ο διστακτικός αστυνομικός... Όλοι τους έχουν εξ' αρχής μια διαμορφωμένη περσόνα που δεν εκπλήσσει καθόλου και ποτέ τον αναγνώστη. Προσωπικά, δεν συμπάθησα πολύ κανέναν τους και οπωσδήποτε δεν δικαιολόγησα τις πράξεις τους. Από την απαράδεκτη συμπεριφορά της αρχιφύλακα επειδή δεν της έκατσε ο γκόμενος, μέχρι την αλλοπρόσαλλη συμπεριφορά της μητέρας του μωρού, δεν μπόρεσα να βρω κανένα ελαφρυντικό.
Ούτε το τέλος κατάφερε να με πείσει. Ίσως υπήρχαν τα κίνητρα για όσα έγιναν και οπωσδήποτε ο καθένας πράττει κατά βούληση. Όμως, μετά από 400 σελίδες, περιμένεις κάτι διαφορετικό. Κάτι που θα σε σοκάρει, θα ανατρέψει τα όσα είχες σχηματίσει στο μυαλό σου ως τώρα. Εδώ το τέλος ήταν ό,τι πιο αναμενόμενο μπορούσε να υποθέσει κανείς - και να επαναλάβω πως ούτε τότε μπόρεσα να δικαιολογήσω την ηρωίδα για τις πράξεις της.
Απόλαυσα πραγματικά την ανάγνωση από άποψη γραφής, αλλά από άποψη πλοκής ήταν από τα πιο προβλέψιμα βιβλία που έχω διαβάσει. Καλούτσικο σε γενικές γραμμές, οπωσδήποτε όμως δεν δικαιώνει τον τίτλο του ως 'αστυνομικό ψυχολογικό θρίλερ'.
June 6, 2012
I was very disappointed with this book, and it was only sheer irritation that kept me going – I thought it MUST get better or reveal some amazing plot twist. I didn’t like the voice of Alice, she sounded needy and pathetic. I didn’t like the close, first person, present tense chapters with Alice as narrator, they just droned on with too much detail. None of the characters seemed believable, from the psycho mother in law to the stock sweary police officers. And all that terrible exposition in the final chapter. There must have been a more skilful way to tell the reader all that. Oh dear.
November 24, 2013
I admit that I didn't have terrifically high hopes for this novel being phenomenal. The plot is like something out of a 1940s cheap pulp novel. It's definitely an airplane read, not anything aspiring to be great literature. But I was nonetheless taken aback by how repellent the novel is. What makes it so bad? Well, let's start with the characters. Put simply, they're awful. There is a strong undercurrent of male chauvinism and conservatism throughout the story that made me gag. And while I initially harbored great sympathy for Alice, the main character, somewhere around the halfway mark it became clear that she was intended to be little more than a damsel in distress stock character with almost no dimensionality or depth to her character. She is painted as a helpless child of a woman, made worse by scenes of sadism that serve no true purpose, needing the rescue of her knight in shining armor, Simon. And while we're on that note, I simply did not buy that Simon became so attached to Alice after meeting her once, and that at one point it's strongly implied that he's actually in love with her. I suppose that sort of thing does happen occasionally on Planet Earth, but it's an awful lot to swallow for the purposes of this story.
The book has a strange quality of belonging to an entirely different era than the one it was set in. The characters are very old-fashioned and say and do things that don't come off as "modern." I don't know if this was a deliberate flourish on the part of the author, but it did seem a bit strange, seeing how relatively young the author is. At times it's distinctly unpleasant, especially given how weak and helpless Alice is sometimes portrayed as, and the cartoonish way in which certain characters seem to magically, suddenly become the embodiment of evil in ways that are just inorganic. A better writer or a more competent story might leave clues or hints that such characterization swings are imminent or possible; Hannah does nothing of the sort.
And then there's the ending. When skillfully done, an unreliable narrator can be a brilliant device, a fearsome prospect. Here…not so much. Hannah is simply not skilled enough to pull it off in a way that's remotely convincing, interesting, or clever. I could not understand Simon's anger and sense of betrayal in the end (Alice had supposedly done what she'd done to protect her child; isn't that understandable?), nor could I understand the bait-and-switch pulled with the character of David. He goes from a meek, mild-mannered mama's boy to a sadistic monster, and then back to a weak, ineffectual person. No character was remotely believable or consistent. Very weak effort.
The book has a strange quality of belonging to an entirely different era than the one it was set in. The characters are very old-fashioned and say and do things that don't come off as "modern." I don't know if this was a deliberate flourish on the part of the author, but it did seem a bit strange, seeing how relatively young the author is. At times it's distinctly unpleasant, especially given how weak and helpless Alice is sometimes portrayed as, and the cartoonish way in which certain characters seem to magically, suddenly become the embodiment of evil in ways that are just inorganic. A better writer or a more competent story might leave clues or hints that such characterization swings are imminent or possible; Hannah does nothing of the sort.
And then there's the ending. When skillfully done, an unreliable narrator can be a brilliant device, a fearsome prospect. Here…not so much. Hannah is simply not skilled enough to pull it off in a way that's remotely convincing, interesting, or clever. I could not understand Simon's anger and sense of betrayal in the end (Alice had supposedly done what she'd done to protect her child; isn't that understandable?), nor could I understand the bait-and-switch pulled with the character of David. He goes from a meek, mild-mannered mama's boy to a sadistic monster, and then back to a weak, ineffectual person. No character was remotely believable or consistent. Very weak effort.
January 11, 2014
After a very promising plot and some interesting opening chapters, I thought I was in for a truly chilling psychological thriller with a shock ending.
What I ended up with was a very melodramatic and unsatisfying ending.
I didn't feel there was any point to the side storyline of Charlie and Simon, and his rejection of her.
There was no comeuppance for David Fancourt, though he was not the main villain, his psychological abuse of Alice was repellent - in a way this was the best written part of the book.
What happened to Felix? All we hear is that he is now living with his mother's parents, what of the effect on him?
And, while obviously it is a relief that the baby of the story was unharmed, I still feel it was a bit of a cheap ending for the baby in the house to have been Florence the whole time.
Overall, a promising read turned sour in the last third or so, but it did keep me gripped to the very end so I could find out what happened -however I can't help but be disappointed with the finale.
What I ended up with was a very melodramatic and unsatisfying ending.
I didn't feel there was any point to the side storyline of Charlie and Simon, and his rejection of her.
There was no comeuppance for David Fancourt, though he was not the main villain, his psychological abuse of Alice was repellent - in a way this was the best written part of the book.
What happened to Felix? All we hear is that he is now living with his mother's parents, what of the effect on him?
And, while obviously it is a relief that the baby of the story was unharmed, I still feel it was a bit of a cheap ending for the baby in the house to have been Florence the whole time.
Overall, a promising read turned sour in the last third or so, but it did keep me gripped to the very end so I could find out what happened -however I can't help but be disappointed with the finale.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 3, 2017
This is not how I wanted to start my reading year. I can't overstate how bad this book was. Well, maybe I can, but let's pretend I can't for the sake of argument/this review. There was literally nothing redeeming about this book because nothing made sense.
Let me explain by going through each of the characters, and please be warned that a) this is so spoiler heavy I'm not even going to use the handy < spoiler> tag and b) it shouldn't matter because if you love yourself you won't read this:
1) Simon - so apparently he's some brilliant detective with a real knack for, you know, detecting and whatnot, but he has some secret that makes it impossible for him to be in a relationship with a woman but they DON'T TELL YOU WHAT THAT SECRET IS and it's like they're trying to make him into some asexual/on the spectrum/Sherlock type of police officer but this book came out before Sherlock so clearly the author had nothing to work with and just made a hot mess of a character. Best of all? He falls in love with someone he's literally met twice, and then when it turns out she's crazy he's like #jokes over it because he's just the worst. Who is even like that?
2) Alice - good try on the whole Gone Girl thing here, Hannah, but Alice is way too stupid to pull this type of thing off. Like, she spends most of the book being tormented by her husband (who we'll get to in a second) and then all of a sudden reveals #spoiler that she PLANNED THE WHOLE THING?! THAT IT WAS ALL A RUSE?! A FARCE, IF YOU WILL! If you're that smart to plan and somehow get away with this mother of a con, why can't you figure out how to outsmart your husband or just, I dunno, LEAVE YOUR ABUSIVE RELATIONSHIP? You can't tell me you had no back up plans. She was just so completely unlikeable, I wasn't rooting for her even from the start. The whole book I'm just like #yep #crazy and then the big reveal just confirmed all of that.
3) David - sweet. Mother. of. Black Pearl. Darkness. David is probably my favourite character, only because I think he realizes his whole life is a joke. He grows up with an oppressive mother who basically brainwashes him and then he basically just accepts that he's bound to be a nutjob and starts terrorizing his wife after she starts making ridiculous claims that her baby was replaced with another one. Seems fair, right? There's no way someone could hid their sadomasochism so well, though. He literally is torturing his wife at one point and his mother either doesn't notice or seem to care, and again, why isn't Alice doing anything to get out of this? She basically lets David have his fun and then at the end, when he's told that the baby had been his all along, he's like #ok #thisisfine and just stumbles back to bed. There's literally no punishment/consequence for his actions which is just absolutely ridiculous and not plausible. But at least he was relatively sane the whole time - even if he likes to torture people and gets off on making his wife cry (which she does, way too much).
4) Vivienne - my life, they just keep getting better. Besides getting annoyed at how often Alice talked about how "strong she is, because of the training and machines at the gym" (grrl, just say she lifts and moves on, don't keep mentioning the machines it's AGGRAVATING) Vivienne just made me mad because there's no way she'd get away with this crap in real life. And the reason she murdered Laura? SO RIDICULOUS. If she was actually that mentally unbalanced, people would have written it off as dementia and put her in a home ages ago. And again, ALICE, WHY NOT SOLVE THIS LIKE A NORMAL PERSON AND JUST INVOLVE THE POLICE SOONER?! Vivienne, with her dumb pant suits and her pristine house and whatnot, just made my blood boil in all types of new ways, and not because she's stealing her children/grandchildren from people. It's because she's just annoying and I'm SO TIRED OF THIS BOOK AND THESE CHARACTERS.
5) Charlie - GET OVER IT. YOU WERE REJECTED. If you seriously can't think about anything other than weird Simon all the time, you definitely wouldn't be a sergeant and you definitely shouldn't be a cop of any kind. If cops actually got so hung up on their personal lives they wouldn't be allowed back on the streets, that's for sure. I just can't you guys. Go look for love in all the wrong places in another book Charlie, I can't with you anymore.
The only character I liked at all was Briony because her name was great and she didn't really do anything to bug me - she just helped a friend.
Man, you guys. I had such high hopes for 2017. Let's hope the next book I read isn't a complete rag like this one.
Let me explain by going through each of the characters, and please be warned that a) this is so spoiler heavy I'm not even going to use the handy < spoiler> tag and b) it shouldn't matter because if you love yourself you won't read this:
1) Simon - so apparently he's some brilliant detective with a real knack for, you know, detecting and whatnot, but he has some secret that makes it impossible for him to be in a relationship with a woman but they DON'T TELL YOU WHAT THAT SECRET IS and it's like they're trying to make him into some asexual/on the spectrum/Sherlock type of police officer but this book came out before Sherlock so clearly the author had nothing to work with and just made a hot mess of a character. Best of all? He falls in love with someone he's literally met twice, and then when it turns out she's crazy he's like #jokes over it because he's just the worst. Who is even like that?
2) Alice - good try on the whole Gone Girl thing here, Hannah, but Alice is way too stupid to pull this type of thing off. Like, she spends most of the book being tormented by her husband (who we'll get to in a second) and then all of a sudden reveals #spoiler that she PLANNED THE WHOLE THING?! THAT IT WAS ALL A RUSE?! A FARCE, IF YOU WILL! If you're that smart to plan and somehow get away with this mother of a con, why can't you figure out how to outsmart your husband or just, I dunno, LEAVE YOUR ABUSIVE RELATIONSHIP? You can't tell me you had no back up plans. She was just so completely unlikeable, I wasn't rooting for her even from the start. The whole book I'm just like #yep #crazy and then the big reveal just confirmed all of that.
3) David - sweet. Mother. of. Black Pearl. Darkness. David is probably my favourite character, only because I think he realizes his whole life is a joke. He grows up with an oppressive mother who basically brainwashes him and then he basically just accepts that he's bound to be a nutjob and starts terrorizing his wife after she starts making ridiculous claims that her baby was replaced with another one. Seems fair, right? There's no way someone could hid their sadomasochism so well, though. He literally is torturing his wife at one point and his mother either doesn't notice or seem to care, and again, why isn't Alice doing anything to get out of this? She basically lets David have his fun and then at the end, when he's told that the baby had been his all along, he's like #ok #thisisfine and just stumbles back to bed. There's literally no punishment/consequence for his actions which is just absolutely ridiculous and not plausible. But at least he was relatively sane the whole time - even if he likes to torture people and gets off on making his wife cry (which she does, way too much).
4) Vivienne - my life, they just keep getting better. Besides getting annoyed at how often Alice talked about how "strong she is, because of the training and machines at the gym" (grrl, just say she lifts and moves on, don't keep mentioning the machines it's AGGRAVATING) Vivienne just made me mad because there's no way she'd get away with this crap in real life. And the reason she murdered Laura? SO RIDICULOUS. If she was actually that mentally unbalanced, people would have written it off as dementia and put her in a home ages ago. And again, ALICE, WHY NOT SOLVE THIS LIKE A NORMAL PERSON AND JUST INVOLVE THE POLICE SOONER?! Vivienne, with her dumb pant suits and her pristine house and whatnot, just made my blood boil in all types of new ways, and not because she's stealing her children/grandchildren from people. It's because she's just annoying and I'm SO TIRED OF THIS BOOK AND THESE CHARACTERS.
5) Charlie - GET OVER IT. YOU WERE REJECTED. If you seriously can't think about anything other than weird Simon all the time, you definitely wouldn't be a sergeant and you definitely shouldn't be a cop of any kind. If cops actually got so hung up on their personal lives they wouldn't be allowed back on the streets, that's for sure. I just can't you guys. Go look for love in all the wrong places in another book Charlie, I can't with you anymore.
The only character I liked at all was Briony because her name was great and she didn't really do anything to bug me - she just helped a friend.
Man, you guys. I had such high hopes for 2017. Let's hope the next book I read isn't a complete rag like this one.
October 27, 2010
Sophie Hannah has a gift for making me very, very angry. Little Face is a psychological thriller about a new mother who returns home to a baby she claims isn't hers, and who subsequently disappears with the baby. Told in alternating points of view (which, based on the only other book of hers that I've read, seems to be her gimmick), we see through the mother's eyes the week leading up to her disappearance, and a 3rd-person account of the investigation by detectives.
Hannah's gift really shows during those 1st-person accounts, which are by turns pitiful (pitiable? I felt sorry for the character?), harrowing and infuriating. I kept having to unclench my fists during some scenes because I wanted to punch several of the characters, victims and tormentors equally. I also wasn't really sure whether I should believe the narrator, and didn't figure it out until nearly the end, though I had suspicions.
As with the only other of Hannah's books that I've read (The Wrong Mother), the spell started to unravel for me a little during the 3rd-person episodes with the detectives. I found I really didn't like any of the detectives, and couldn't understand the tension between the two main characters. I mean, I understood what had happened, but couldn't understand why either one of them really continued to care about it after so long. They both need a good slap in the face, and I wish I could be the one to administer it. Also agree with one of the detectives that her partner is kind of an egotistical blowhard who thinks he's the only one who's ever right. That got old.
I will definitely continue to read more of her books, if only because they genuinely kind of freak me out. Could do without the cops' interpersonal drama, though.
Hannah's gift really shows during those 1st-person accounts, which are by turns pitiful (pitiable? I felt sorry for the character?), harrowing and infuriating. I kept having to unclench my fists during some scenes because I wanted to punch several of the characters, victims and tormentors equally. I also wasn't really sure whether I should believe the narrator, and didn't figure it out until nearly the end, though I had suspicions.
As with the only other of Hannah's books that I've read (The Wrong Mother), the spell started to unravel for me a little during the 3rd-person episodes with the detectives. I found I really didn't like any of the detectives, and couldn't understand the tension between the two main characters. I mean, I understood what had happened, but couldn't understand why either one of them really continued to care about it after so long. They both need a good slap in the face, and I wish I could be the one to administer it. Also agree with one of the detectives that her partner is kind of an egotistical blowhard who thinks he's the only one who's ever right. That got old.
I will definitely continue to read more of her books, if only because they genuinely kind of freak me out. Could do without the cops' interpersonal drama, though.
June 6, 2016
I remember reading this back in 2012. I really didn't like the characters and the plot :( I think this was a DNF for me.
August 8, 2019
I don't usually write reviews but I felt I should do something to counteract some of the negative ones I have read - because most of them are inaccurate and show a poor grasp of the characters and their personalities.
The inaccurate reviewers all claim to understand the concept of an unreliable narrator then complain that the author cheated. They claim that the narrator didn't just obscure the truth but flat out lied because they don't think the story told holds up once the truth is known. This is false. The story holds up 100%. I was really impressed by the care Sophie Hannah used in crafting the first person narration. It definitely created the impression the narrator wanted yet once the truth is revealed it still worked. It is possible that I had an easier time grasping this because I am trained for close reading of texts. I don't want to give any spoilers so I will just say that the author did not cheat - the narrator's thoughts stand up 100% on reexamination once the truth is known.
Another complaint I have read is that one of the "bad guys" got no comeuppance. SERIOUSLY? This happens all the time in the real world! People get away with misdeeds all the time. Why is it so awful for it to happen in a novel? Aside from that, it's simply not true. Sure there were no legal repercussions but the character definitely ends up suffering for their actions. We are left not knowing what happens to this person but I can easily see a downward spiral ending in suicide because this person loses their entire support system and is left as the empty shell of a person they are. I can easily see them committing suicide in the future beyond the novel. This is plenty of punishment as far as I am concerned.
One final complaint that cropped up frequently is that people don't like the change in one of main characters at the end of the novel. I don't understand this because it is perfectly in line with the character Hannah created. This is a person who is certain of their intellectual superiority, who is repressed and emotionally stunted. Someone who tends to feel others are against them and has anger issues. I felt that the change in attitude is exactly how this person would respond on finding out that someone they idolized had lied and manipulated them. A person like that would never forgive a betrayal of such magnitude.
I feel like people were maybe just disappointed because there was no tidy wrap up where all the bad guys go off to jail and the good guys end up happy but that's not real life, is it? In real life people have thoughts and feelings that aren't logical. They do things that make sense to them but not to anyone else. I feel like Hannah worked hard to create realistic characters and the result is that seems of their actions are inexplicable to us. But we as readers aren't in the middle of a nightmare scenario, trying to muddle through and acting out of desperation.
I highly enjoyed this novel. The ending felt a bit rushed and the characters aren't particularly likeable but that's okay because the author doesn't present them as if she expects sympathy for them. She worked really hard to make them real - and I feel as if she succeeded. I think that if we could read each other's minds we would all live in isolation because we wouldn't be able to handle the messes in other people's heads. Hannah does a terrific job of showing some of the ugliness we all have inside us - the judgemental or uncharitable thoughts, self pity and petty grievances. The awful things we sometimes think but would never articulate.
So yeah, I really enjoyed this novel. It's not entirely plausible but works well enough with a willing suspension of disbelief. The ending felt a bit rushed. There was a lot of psychobabble. I didn't feel any of these were serious issues though. It was well written and the tension mounted at a good pace. The characters felt real to me and I want to know more about them, even if I don't like them very much.
The inaccurate reviewers all claim to understand the concept of an unreliable narrator then complain that the author cheated. They claim that the narrator didn't just obscure the truth but flat out lied because they don't think the story told holds up once the truth is known. This is false. The story holds up 100%. I was really impressed by the care Sophie Hannah used in crafting the first person narration. It definitely created the impression the narrator wanted yet once the truth is revealed it still worked. It is possible that I had an easier time grasping this because I am trained for close reading of texts. I don't want to give any spoilers so I will just say that the author did not cheat - the narrator's thoughts stand up 100% on reexamination once the truth is known.
Another complaint I have read is that one of the "bad guys" got no comeuppance. SERIOUSLY? This happens all the time in the real world! People get away with misdeeds all the time. Why is it so awful for it to happen in a novel? Aside from that, it's simply not true. Sure there were no legal repercussions but the character definitely ends up suffering for their actions. We are left not knowing what happens to this person but I can easily see a downward spiral ending in suicide because this person loses their entire support system and is left as the empty shell of a person they are. I can easily see them committing suicide in the future beyond the novel. This is plenty of punishment as far as I am concerned.
One final complaint that cropped up frequently is that people don't like the change in one of main characters at the end of the novel. I don't understand this because it is perfectly in line with the character Hannah created. This is a person who is certain of their intellectual superiority, who is repressed and emotionally stunted. Someone who tends to feel others are against them and has anger issues. I felt that the change in attitude is exactly how this person would respond on finding out that someone they idolized had lied and manipulated them. A person like that would never forgive a betrayal of such magnitude.
I feel like people were maybe just disappointed because there was no tidy wrap up where all the bad guys go off to jail and the good guys end up happy but that's not real life, is it? In real life people have thoughts and feelings that aren't logical. They do things that make sense to them but not to anyone else. I feel like Hannah worked hard to create realistic characters and the result is that seems of their actions are inexplicable to us. But we as readers aren't in the middle of a nightmare scenario, trying to muddle through and acting out of desperation.
I highly enjoyed this novel. The ending felt a bit rushed and the characters aren't particularly likeable but that's okay because the author doesn't present them as if she expects sympathy for them. She worked really hard to make them real - and I feel as if she succeeded. I think that if we could read each other's minds we would all live in isolation because we wouldn't be able to handle the messes in other people's heads. Hannah does a terrific job of showing some of the ugliness we all have inside us - the judgemental or uncharitable thoughts, self pity and petty grievances. The awful things we sometimes think but would never articulate.
So yeah, I really enjoyed this novel. It's not entirely plausible but works well enough with a willing suspension of disbelief. The ending felt a bit rushed. There was a lot of psychobabble. I didn't feel any of these were serious issues though. It was well written and the tension mounted at a good pace. The characters felt real to me and I want to know more about them, even if I don't like them very much.
August 9, 2016
2.5 Stars
After reading some great reviews of the series, I decided to give this series a try and picked up Little Face, the first book in the series. This book was a bit of a let down. After reading the synopsis on the back of this book, I was looking forward to a good read and the mystery it was going to tell. What a disappointment!
The book was just merely okay, but I had a lot of issues with this book. First off, it left lots of unanswered questions. What was up with Alice's husband's abusive behaviour? I didn't like either of the two detectives, Simon & Charlie and found their backstory to be unnecessary and distracting. I found the switching narrative and dates extremely confusing: alternate chapters are set in different months. It starts off in September, the next chapter is in October and then the third chapter switches back to September, etc. The plot of the murder mystery was too predictable. I figured that out more or less after the first few chapters.
The ending was disapointing as well. There was no surprising twist, just an anti-climax. I was expecting something far more exciting and gripping. I'm not sure whether I should give this series another chance or not.
After reading some great reviews of the series, I decided to give this series a try and picked up Little Face, the first book in the series. This book was a bit of a let down. After reading the synopsis on the back of this book, I was looking forward to a good read and the mystery it was going to tell. What a disappointment!
The book was just merely okay, but I had a lot of issues with this book. First off, it left lots of unanswered questions. What was up with Alice's husband's abusive behaviour? I didn't like either of the two detectives, Simon & Charlie and found their backstory to be unnecessary and distracting. I found the switching narrative and dates extremely confusing: alternate chapters are set in different months. It starts off in September, the next chapter is in October and then the third chapter switches back to September, etc. The plot of the murder mystery was too predictable. I figured that out more or less after the first few chapters.
The ending was disapointing as well. There was no surprising twist, just an anti-climax. I was expecting something far more exciting and gripping. I'm not sure whether I should give this series another chance or not.
December 20, 2017
Was a great letdown in comparison with other books by the same author. I respect Hannah as a proficient weaver of intricate webs of psychological mysteries, but this story was so haphazard, so incongruous, and consisted of a major hole or two. Completed it only to know the ending, which seemed bizarre and incomplete. The last quarter taxed my brains by flitting from one idea to another, and rapid change of scenes.
Gist of the book - a distraught mother who thinks her neonate daughter's been substituted, whereas the father doesn't think so and the paternal grandmother is not sure. The Spilling CID takes over the case and skeletons tumble down.
Gist of the book - a distraught mother who thinks her neonate daughter's been substituted, whereas the father doesn't think so and the paternal grandmother is not sure. The Spilling CID takes over the case and skeletons tumble down.
July 15, 2017
Έχουν περάσει μόνο λίγες ώρες από την ολοκλήρωση της ανάγνωσης του συγκεκριμένου μυθιστορήματος και είναι αλήθεια ότι μου προκάλεσε πολλά και έντονα συναισθήματα μ’ εκείνα του θυμού να επικρατούν και να ξεπερνούν με διαφορά τα υπόλοιπα. Και μάλιστα θα έλεγα ότι είμαι θυμωμένη επειδή νιώθω ότι εξαπατήθηκα στον ίστατο βαθμό!
Διαβάζοντας το οπισθόφυλλο, θα περίμενε κανείς να υπάρχει σασπένς, αγωνία, ίσως και λίγος τρόμος αλλά προσωπικά, δεν συνάντησα κανένα από αυτά τα χαρακτηριστικά στο συγκεκριμένο βιβλίο.
Η ιστορία ξεκινάει μ’ ένα «δόλωμα», με στόχο να κερδίσει τον αναγνώστη στην πορεία όμως, η ιστορία εξελίσσεται διαφορετικά απ’ ότι θα περίμενε κανείς και ειδικότερα στο τέλος, η μεγάλη «αποκάλυψη» ήταν κατά την προσωπική μου άποψη μια μεγάλη, ανόητη μπλόφα!
Η γραφή της συγγραφέως είναι αρκετά καλή και σίγουρα έχει διδαχθεί αφηγηματικές τεχνικές ώστε να δημιουργεί μια κάποια ατμόσφαιρα όμως αυτό δεν φτάνει κατά την ταπεινή μου άποψη. Αν οι βάσεις είναι σαθρές, αν όλο σου το οικοδόμημα είναι χάρτινο αυτό θα έχει ως αποτέλεσμα να καταρρεύσει αργά ή γρήγορα.
Επίσης, οι ήρωες του βιβλίου, ένας προς έναν, είναι στην κυριολεξία ένα μάτσο προβληματικοί όπου δεν δίνεται η δυνατότητα στον αναγνώστη να γνωρίσει πραγματικά κανέναν ώστε να δικαιολογήσει τις αντιδράσεις και τις συμπεριφορές τους.
Λυπάμαι που θα το πω, αλλά πρόκειται για ένα ακόμα μυθιστόρημα που θέλει να δημιουργήσει εντυπώσεις και δεν φτάνει η καλή και «πιασάρικη» ιδέα. Αντίθετα, είναι μεγάλη η απογοήτευση όταν σταδιακά ανακαλύπτει ο αναγνώστης ότι το θύμα σε αυτή την ιστορία είναι ο ίδιος!
Θα μπορούσα να βάλω τέσσερα αστέρια για τη γραφή και την αφήγηση, στη συνέχεια σκέφτηκα να βάλω τρία επειδή από θέμα πλοκής ήταν αρκετά προβλέψιμο, όταν όμως έφτασα και στην τελευταία σελίδα, τα δύο αστέρια ήταν μονόδρομος για μένα!
Διαβάζοντας το οπισθόφυλλο, θα περίμενε κανείς να υπάρχει σασπένς, αγωνία, ίσως και λίγος τρόμος αλλά προσωπικά, δεν συνάντησα κανένα από αυτά τα χαρακτηριστικά στο συγκεκριμένο βιβλίο.
Η ιστορία ξεκινάει μ’ ένα «δόλωμα», με στόχο να κερδίσει τον αναγνώστη στην πορεία όμως, η ιστορία εξελίσσεται διαφορετικά απ’ ότι θα περίμενε κανείς και ειδικότερα στο τέλος, η μεγάλη «αποκάλυψη» ήταν κατά την προσωπική μου άποψη μια μεγάλη, ανόητη μπλόφα!
Η γραφή της συγγραφέως είναι αρκετά καλή και σίγουρα έχει διδαχθεί αφηγηματικές τεχνικές ώστε να δημιουργεί μια κάποια ατμόσφαιρα όμως αυτό δεν φτάνει κατά την ταπεινή μου άποψη. Αν οι βάσεις είναι σαθρές, αν όλο σου το οικοδόμημα είναι χάρτινο αυτό θα έχει ως αποτέλεσμα να καταρρεύσει αργά ή γρήγορα.
Επίσης, οι ήρωες του βιβλίου, ένας προς έναν, είναι στην κυριολεξία ένα μάτσο προβληματικοί όπου δεν δίνεται η δυνατότητα στον αναγνώστη να γνωρίσει πραγματικά κανέναν ώστε να δικαιολογήσει τις αντιδράσεις και τις συμπεριφορές τους.
Λυπάμαι που θα το πω, αλλά πρόκειται για ένα ακόμα μυθιστόρημα που θέλει να δημιουργήσει εντυπώσεις και δεν φτάνει η καλή και «πιασάρικη» ιδέα. Αντίθετα, είναι μεγάλη η απογοήτευση όταν σταδιακά ανακαλύπτει ο αναγνώστης ότι το θύμα σε αυτή την ιστορία είναι ο ίδιος!
Θα μπορούσα να βάλω τέσσερα αστέρια για τη γραφή και την αφήγηση, στη συνέχεια σκέφτηκα να βάλω τρία επειδή από θέμα πλοκής ήταν αρκετά προβλέψιμο, όταν όμως έφτασα και στην τελευταία σελίδα, τα δύο αστέρια ήταν μονόδρομος για μένα!
October 14, 2015
This book can be summed up as follows - a storyline that kept me thinking when I wasn't reading the novel (an abduction of a child to be replaced by another child from her cot - woozers!); short but boring chapters interspersed in the plot; and the most disappointing outcome since Gone Girl.
February 21, 2021
Nu prea mă aventurez în alegerea unei cărți, dacă nu am văzut-o cel puțin o dată recomandată pe grupuri. Știu că gusturile nu se discută, dar, de obicei, vreau să citesc măcar o părere despre cartea pe care îmi propun să o răsfoiesc.
Acum o săptămâna jumătate, ceream recomandări de thriller. Am primit titluri pe care le-am mai văzut, dar nu m-au chemat spre ele. Am găsit cartea de față pe Goodreads, am ales-o după titlu și copertă, nu avea review-uri în română, ceea ce m-a surprins puțin, având în vedere că a fost publicată în 2006.
"O păpușa sau alta" a fost o alegere extrem de inspirată, m-a ținut captivă între paginile ei. Nu sunt fană a descrierilor ample, dar totul a avut legătură cu acțiunea romanului, nu a fost nimic în plus.
Personajele sunt în jur de 10-12, fiecare personaj amintit în carte - are partea lui. Nu îi vezi numele o dată și, apoi, uiți că a existat. Toate au rolul lor. Am întâlnit unul dintre cele mai bine construite personaje negative din thriller-urile citite de mine. Toate personajele, de fapt, au fost extrem de bine conturate, mă simt de parcă le-aș cunoaște în viața reală.
Plotul a fost un deliciu, complex, complet. Am crezut încă de la sinopsis că știu finalul și îmi doream să nu fie așa, să am ocazia să citesc o carte bună. A fost o carte impecabilă, pentru mine.
Nu rămâne nimic neexplicat, nu am găsit nicio inadvertență.
Mă bucur că am citit-o, mi-a plăcut foarte mult!
5 ❤
Las mai jos sinopsis-ul, să vedeți ce m-a atras pe mine:
"A fost plecată pentru doar două ore.
Soțul ei, David, urma să aibă grijă de fiica lor de numai două săptămâni. însă în clipa în care Alice Fancourt intră în camera copilului se dezlănțuie teribilul coșmar, fiindcă Alice susține cu toată ființa că bebelușul din leagăn nu este fiica ei, Florence.
Din ce în ce mai ostil și amenințător, David jură că soția lui fie a luat-o razna, fie, din cine știe ce motiv, minte cu nerușinare. Cum va putea Alice, în această situație, să-i convingă pe cei de la poliție că ea are dreptate, înainte de a fi prea târziu? Și unde se află, de fapt, adevărata Florence?"
Citate
"Rațiunea este neputincioasă în fața fricii."
"Uneori, privind doar în direcția spre care ești dirijat să privești, ratezi esențialul."
"Mă gândeam atunci că, în general, prietenii se mulțumesc să îți ofere niște sugestii politicoase, ca apoi să te abandoneze, lăsându-te să răzbești singur prin viață, ducând pe umeri toată povara responsabilității. Da, prietenii nu țin să ți se bage în suflet ori să-ți impună opiniile lor, fiindcă, la un anumit nivel fundamental, nici nu le pasă de tine."
"modalitatea ideală de a trata cu un individ care se poartă agresiv cu tine este să aplici scenariul DESC: descrie, explică, strategii, consecințe. Îi descrii individului aspectele inacceptabile ale comportamentului lui și îi explici în ce mod te afectează pe tine. Apoi, îi sugerezi strategii de schimbare – în mod normal, le propui să renunțe la ceea ce fac, fiindcă te deranjează – și subliniezi consecințele pozitive ale unei asemenea schimbări, pentru toți cei implicați."
"Când nu faceți ce vă stă în putință înseamnă o dovadă de indiferență mai mare decât în cazul altora? Sau o indiferență mai mică decât la alții?"
Acum o săptămâna jumătate, ceream recomandări de thriller. Am primit titluri pe care le-am mai văzut, dar nu m-au chemat spre ele. Am găsit cartea de față pe Goodreads, am ales-o după titlu și copertă, nu avea review-uri în română, ceea ce m-a surprins puțin, având în vedere că a fost publicată în 2006.
"O păpușa sau alta" a fost o alegere extrem de inspirată, m-a ținut captivă între paginile ei. Nu sunt fană a descrierilor ample, dar totul a avut legătură cu acțiunea romanului, nu a fost nimic în plus.
Personajele sunt în jur de 10-12, fiecare personaj amintit în carte - are partea lui. Nu îi vezi numele o dată și, apoi, uiți că a existat. Toate au rolul lor. Am întâlnit unul dintre cele mai bine construite personaje negative din thriller-urile citite de mine. Toate personajele, de fapt, au fost extrem de bine conturate, mă simt de parcă le-aș cunoaște în viața reală.
Plotul a fost un deliciu, complex, complet. Am crezut încă de la sinopsis că știu finalul și îmi doream să nu fie așa, să am ocazia să citesc o carte bună. A fost o carte impecabilă, pentru mine.
Nu rămâne nimic neexplicat, nu am găsit nicio inadvertență.
Mă bucur că am citit-o, mi-a plăcut foarte mult!
5 ❤
Las mai jos sinopsis-ul, să vedeți ce m-a atras pe mine:
"A fost plecată pentru doar două ore.
Soțul ei, David, urma să aibă grijă de fiica lor de numai două săptămâni. însă în clipa în care Alice Fancourt intră în camera copilului se dezlănțuie teribilul coșmar, fiindcă Alice susține cu toată ființa că bebelușul din leagăn nu este fiica ei, Florence.
Din ce în ce mai ostil și amenințător, David jură că soția lui fie a luat-o razna, fie, din cine știe ce motiv, minte cu nerușinare. Cum va putea Alice, în această situație, să-i convingă pe cei de la poliție că ea are dreptate, înainte de a fi prea târziu? Și unde se află, de fapt, adevărata Florence?"
Citate
"Rațiunea este neputincioasă în fața fricii."
"Uneori, privind doar în direcția spre care ești dirijat să privești, ratezi esențialul."
"Mă gândeam atunci că, în general, prietenii se mulțumesc să îți ofere niște sugestii politicoase, ca apoi să te abandoneze, lăsându-te să răzbești singur prin viață, ducând pe umeri toată povara responsabilității. Da, prietenii nu țin să ți se bage în suflet ori să-ți impună opiniile lor, fiindcă, la un anumit nivel fundamental, nici nu le pasă de tine."
"modalitatea ideală de a trata cu un individ care se poartă agresiv cu tine este să aplici scenariul DESC: descrie, explică, strategii, consecințe. Îi descrii individului aspectele inacceptabile ale comportamentului lui și îi explici în ce mod te afectează pe tine. Apoi, îi sugerezi strategii de schimbare – în mod normal, le propui să renunțe la ceea ce fac, fiindcă te deranjează – și subliniezi consecințele pozitive ale unei asemenea schimbări, pentru toți cei implicați."
"Când nu faceți ce vă stă în putință înseamnă o dovadă de indiferență mai mare decât în cazul altora? Sau o indiferență mai mică decât la alții?"
October 23, 2022
Full Book Review: The One About The Wrong Baby In The Crib: Little Face by Sophie Hannah | Book Review
‘Little Face’ is the first book of a new book series by Sophie Hannah. It follows Alice Fancourt, a new mom to a beautiful little baby girl. When she leaves her two-week-old baby, alone, at home with her husband; she does not expect to come to find that the baby in their daughter’s crib is certainly not their baby. David, her husband, thinks different. He swears the baby is their daughter.
Not only are the couple conflicted, but the police are too. Detective Constable Simon Waterhouse is immediately called, and he has doubts about Alice’s story. His superior, Sergeant Charlie Zailer, concludes that Alice must be suffering from some sort of delusion brought on by postpartum depression.
With her own husband doubting her, how will Alice convince the police to find her daughter?
First of all, I really liked the premise of the book. After reading the book synopsis, I knew that this domestic suspense thriller is exactly what I want. It’s always makes for a tense book when a baby or child is involved in a thriller. The topic of post party depression delusions is very much a real thing, and I think that’s what made this fictional story realistic– and kind of scary. Because you find yourself doubting Alice, her intentions and everything about where the story is going.
This book had me ripped me during the first half– I was completely enthralled by the plot and the complexity of the theories. However, the second half was a lot slower. Honestly, it did feel a bit repetitive at times, and in my opinion, the book would’ve worked just fine if it was shorter. There were some scenes which I felt were filler scenes and added nothing to the overall plot.
The mystery surrounding the baby was the standout plot for me. Like I said, it was realistic– which makes it scarier. It’s every parent’s worst nightmare, and as someone who watches a lot of true crime– I would know that it’s a real possibility, unfortunately. I was so invested in the story that there were moments that made me, the reader, doubt myself as well. It’s also told in first person, so we get front row seats to Alice’s thoughts during her perspective. And although we get insight to her thoughts, there are still parts of her thoughts that remain hidden (for good reason!).
4 stars.
Novelstorian (Blog) ✨ Instagram ✨ Twitter ✨
‘Little Face’ is the first book of a new book series by Sophie Hannah. It follows Alice Fancourt, a new mom to a beautiful little baby girl. When she leaves her two-week-old baby, alone, at home with her husband; she does not expect to come to find that the baby in their daughter’s crib is certainly not their baby. David, her husband, thinks different. He swears the baby is their daughter.
Not only are the couple conflicted, but the police are too. Detective Constable Simon Waterhouse is immediately called, and he has doubts about Alice’s story. His superior, Sergeant Charlie Zailer, concludes that Alice must be suffering from some sort of delusion brought on by postpartum depression.
With her own husband doubting her, how will Alice convince the police to find her daughter?
First of all, I really liked the premise of the book. After reading the book synopsis, I knew that this domestic suspense thriller is exactly what I want. It’s always makes for a tense book when a baby or child is involved in a thriller. The topic of post party depression delusions is very much a real thing, and I think that’s what made this fictional story realistic– and kind of scary. Because you find yourself doubting Alice, her intentions and everything about where the story is going.
This book had me ripped me during the first half– I was completely enthralled by the plot and the complexity of the theories. However, the second half was a lot slower. Honestly, it did feel a bit repetitive at times, and in my opinion, the book would’ve worked just fine if it was shorter. There were some scenes which I felt were filler scenes and added nothing to the overall plot.
The mystery surrounding the baby was the standout plot for me. Like I said, it was realistic– which makes it scarier. It’s every parent’s worst nightmare, and as someone who watches a lot of true crime– I would know that it’s a real possibility, unfortunately. I was so invested in the story that there were moments that made me, the reader, doubt myself as well. It’s also told in first person, so we get front row seats to Alice’s thoughts during her perspective. And although we get insight to her thoughts, there are still parts of her thoughts that remain hidden (for good reason!).
4 stars.
Novelstorian (Blog) ✨ Instagram ✨ Twitter ✨
March 6, 2014
This was a very suspenseful read and had me guessing until the very end. This was a four star for the first 90% of the book and turned into a three star for the less than satisfactory conclusion. My issues with the book :
spoilers ahead
1. If the entire kidnapping plot was planned by Alice, how can the author reconcile the first person narrative where the readers knew Alice's thoughts and utter despair over not knowing what has happened to her daughter? This isn't a movie where there may be clues we didn't see before, the reader here only knows as much as the author feeds us line by line. This seemed like we were intentionally mislead. For example, when Alice goes to the closet to retrieve the film from the camera, "Thank God, I murmur to myself. Now, surely, I have a chance of being believed."
The author does seem to try and explain away this obvious discrepancy during Alice's last conversation with Simon when he questions how she could have been so hysterical and obviously upset over a lie and she mentioned something like that, she really WAS grieving for Florence or for what could have been, or could have happened or whatever...mmmm...no
2. David's storyline was never completely reconciled. He was evil, sadistic and calculating but suddenly gracious and contrite at the end. His sudden transformation made no sense.
The theory that I had formed was that Vivienne and David planned the entire scenario. Taking advantage of her less than lucid state at the hospital they switched Florence with the other woman's (Mandy) baby so that they intentionally took the wrong baby home from the hospital. Alice would have just accepted it as her baby since she was the first one she saw when she came to after the delivery. Then, they switched the fake baby for the real Florence when they were home. Alice freaks out, causes this whole unnecessary investigation and they do DNA tests to prove the baby is Florence. Alice is declared insane for not being able to recognized her own baby and they successfully get her out of the picture.
spoilers ahead
1. If the entire kidnapping plot was planned by Alice, how can the author reconcile the first person narrative where the readers knew Alice's thoughts and utter despair over not knowing what has happened to her daughter? This isn't a movie where there may be clues we didn't see before, the reader here only knows as much as the author feeds us line by line. This seemed like we were intentionally mislead. For example, when Alice goes to the closet to retrieve the film from the camera, "Thank God, I murmur to myself. Now, surely, I have a chance of being believed."
The author does seem to try and explain away this obvious discrepancy during Alice's last conversation with Simon when he questions how she could have been so hysterical and obviously upset over a lie and she mentioned something like that, she really WAS grieving for Florence or for what could have been, or could have happened or whatever...mmmm...no
2. David's storyline was never completely reconciled. He was evil, sadistic and calculating but suddenly gracious and contrite at the end. His sudden transformation made no sense.
The theory that I had formed was that Vivienne and David planned the entire scenario. Taking advantage of her less than lucid state at the hospital they switched Florence with the other woman's (Mandy) baby so that they intentionally took the wrong baby home from the hospital. Alice would have just accepted it as her baby since she was the first one she saw when she came to after the delivery. Then, they switched the fake baby for the real Florence when they were home. Alice freaks out, causes this whole unnecessary investigation and they do DNA tests to prove the baby is Florence. Alice is declared insane for not being able to recognized her own baby and they successfully get her out of the picture.
December 31, 2009
I really like Sophie Hannah's third book, The Wrong Mother, so I was looking forward to reading this one (her first) and was sorely disappointed. This book was so disappointing that it made me wonder if I should rethink how much I liked The Wrong Mother.
Hannah alternates chapters between first-person narrative of the protagonist and third-person narrative of the cops. In The Wrong Mother this works really well, but in this book it feels too much like a device (which, of course, it is in both books). In thinking through this I believe the heart of the problem here is in the rather poorly cobbled together characterizations; they just don't seem substantial or even internally consistent and this makes their actions ultimately unbelievable and mildly bland and predictable in a Wonder Bread and Miracle Whip kind of way. There is a terrible waste of a really interesting premise here and an even more terrible waste of some good writing that's buried in here along with all the clumsiness.
I'm reading Hannah's second book and will decide how I feel about her then, but at this point I'm feeling dubious and sort of jipped.
Hannah alternates chapters between first-person narrative of the protagonist and third-person narrative of the cops. In The Wrong Mother this works really well, but in this book it feels too much like a device (which, of course, it is in both books). In thinking through this I believe the heart of the problem here is in the rather poorly cobbled together characterizations; they just don't seem substantial or even internally consistent and this makes their actions ultimately unbelievable and mildly bland and predictable in a Wonder Bread and Miracle Whip kind of way. There is a terrible waste of a really interesting premise here and an even more terrible waste of some good writing that's buried in here along with all the clumsiness.
I'm reading Hannah's second book and will decide how I feel about her then, but at this point I'm feeling dubious and sort of jipped.
January 18, 2017
Little Face is a mind twisting psychological thriller that will keep you hooked from beginning to end.
When Alice Fancourt returns home after having been out for the first time without her two-week-old daughter Florence, she insists that the baby she finds at home, in the care of her husband David, is not their daughter but a child she has never seen before. David denies it, claiming that the baby is Florence and that Alice has gone mad.
The story that ensues involves murder, torture, manipulation ... or does it? Perhaps Alice truly is mad.
You will have to read to the final sentence to know for sure.
When Alice Fancourt returns home after having been out for the first time without her two-week-old daughter Florence, she insists that the baby she finds at home, in the care of her husband David, is not their daughter but a child she has never seen before. David denies it, claiming that the baby is Florence and that Alice has gone mad.
The story that ensues involves murder, torture, manipulation ... or does it? Perhaps Alice truly is mad.
You will have to read to the final sentence to know for sure.
April 14, 2017
Este libro me mantuvo en suspenso todo el tiempo, es un verdadero "page turner". Nos cuenta una historia donde no sabemos que es verdad y que es mentira.
Habia leido anteriormente la nueva versión de Poirot escrita por Sophie (que me encantó), pero nunca había leido otro libro de ella, con su propia voz y estilo. Me gustó mucho. Es bien entretenido e interesante, con un ritmo fluido y que te mantiente deseando saber en qué terminará la historia.
Lo recomiendo mucho, y definitivamente leeré otros más de ella.
Habia leido anteriormente la nueva versión de Poirot escrita por Sophie (que me encantó), pero nunca había leido otro libro de ella, con su propia voz y estilo. Me gustó mucho. Es bien entretenido e interesante, con un ritmo fluido y que te mantiente deseando saber en qué terminará la historia.
Lo recomiendo mucho, y definitivamente leeré otros más de ella.
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