Second Sight in Aussie Readers

Apr 07, 2018 PattyMacDotComma rated it really liked it

Shelves: australian-author, mystery-crime-thriller, kindle, arc-netgalley-done, aa

4.5★
“We have circled back again to that night so right now we are both adults and sixteen at the same time.”

A second look with hindsight. Clifford has written two timelines, but the story is easy to follow (whew). Twenty years ago, Eliza Carmody and her friends were teenagers, skinny-dipping at a beach party when one runs away, supposedly to the city.

And then there’s today, where the memories of youth are still there when talking to old friends. The flashback chapters are clearly identified and ...more

55 likes · Like · see review

Apr 18, 2018 Brenda rated it really liked it

Shelves: reviewing-by-request, sent-by-publisher, suspense, 5000-books, mystery, crime, 2018-release, arc, own-read

4.5★s

Eliza Carmody was driving slowly through the middle of town, the traffic built up and congested when a minor car accident in front of her sparked a chain of events that changed the course of her life. Eliza was back in her home town of Kinsale in Victoria for a business meeting about a class action regarding the tragic bushfire in the town two years previously. She was a top-class lawyer and this case was pivotal to her career. But the tragic consequences of that unexpected accident brought ...more

26 likes · Like · see review

Jul 23, 2018 Bree T rated it really liked it

Shelves: arc, mystery, crime, australian, contemporary

This is Aoife Clifford’s second novel – I haven’t read her first but I remember that it generated a lot of good feedback so I was keen to try this one. In the opening scene, main character Eliza could be driving into the town I grew up in or one of the many that surround it. It has that real Australian summer country tourist trap feel and although Eliza doesn’t live there anymore, she has the feel of a weary local who knows to avoid the main street. Eliza is back in town to meet with an expert w This is Aoife Clifford’s second novel – I haven’t read her first but I remember that it generated a lot of good feedback so I was keen to try this one. In the opening scene, main character Eliza could be driving into the town I grew up in or one of the many that surround it. It has that real Australian summer country tourist trap feel and although Eliza doesn’t live there anymore, she has the feel of a weary local who knows to avoid the main street. Eliza is back in town to meet with an expert witness for a corporation she is representing who is being sued by basically her entire home town after a devastating bushfire. It’s not known she’s representing them yet but when it gets out Eliza can assume she won’t be high on anyone’s list of favourite people. The town collectively is mentioned to be suffering like a PTSD….very few were untouched by the fire and many are still feeling its devastating effects.

During that drive, Eliza witnesses someone she knew at school in a violent act and becomes the primary eyewitness. It seems that what she saw is very straightforward and now a man is terribly injured because he was a Good Samaritan. But it seems that nothing is ever simple and the more Eliza delves, the more she finds things that make her question not only what she saw, but also what happened to her teenage friend over a decade ago. Something is definitely going on in this town and Eliza could end up dying before she finds the answers.

So I enjoyed quite a bit about this book. I found Eliza a very interesting character and could well relate to her conflicting feelings about being back in her home town. She had quite complicated relationships with her father, formerly a police officer, and her sister. Eliza and her sister seem to have a lot of resentment between them and on Eliza’s part, it definitely goes back towards feelings of inadequacy and that her sister received more preferential treatment as young teenagers. I found all of that really quite heartbreaking. I also found the trips into the past, to learn more about Eliza and her friends when they were younger, to be quite well done. Reminded me of my own teenage years, sneaking out to parties or away from parents at the local town events.

I also liked the way the mystery developed and how certain things that seemed so straightforward became more complex and developed a few more layers over time. Eliza has maintained a strong friendship with one of her high school friends over the years but doesn’t seem particularly connected to the town and doesn’t even seem to have a lot of the details about the bushfire which meant that I felt like I didn’t know as much about the fire as I should. I wanted more information, some of it felt a bit vague, even in terms of Eliza representing the corporation. She doesn’t particularly seem to be doing a lot, so that portion felt a little underrepresented. The pacing was a little off for me too – the first half of the book felt quite slow and then the last probably quarter feels very fast and like everything happens all at once in a very short amount of pages.

The relationships were very strong in this and they were really what provoked a lot of my strong reactions reading this, particularly Eliza’s relationship with her father and the way that plays out with what her sister finally tells her. It made me think a lot about regrets and words unsaid and how sometimes it can be too late before you know it. I ended up getting really invested in the mystery of what had happened to Eliza’s teenage friend as well, and why. I wanted so many things to work out for Eliza – she was facing so many struggles throughout this book, both personal and professional. And I loved the portrayal of that town and Eliza returning to it. I can relate so much to that.

A few quibbles but I ended up really enjoying this and I will have to go dig up Aoife Clifford’s first book, All These Perfect Strangers so that I can read it.

***A copy of this book was provided by the publisher for the purpose of an honest review*** ...more

2 likes · Like · see review