🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

A pure delight from start to finish, this fiendishly-clever thriller hooks its claws in sharply from page one, leading the reader down a twisty ever-deepening labyrinth of lies, murder, and intrigue, until the final dazzling drop – seemingly out of nowhere – into one of the most deliciously-diabolical endings encountered in a long, long while.

Lucas Forrester, our first-person POV narrator, is a thirty-two year old Englishman, living in Chelmsford, Boston. And that’s about all we can say, with any degree of certainty, about this fascinating and meticulously-ambiguous character, perfectly crafted to both confuse and enthrall. For Lucas, as we get to know him, is the oddest mix of amoral psychopath, charming fast-talker, and surprisingly, at his core, vulnerable misfit, – furthermore one who loves dogs, worries about homeless people, donates to children’s charities, and tenderly cares for his ailing father.

“I was good at hiding things – my history, true thoughts, emotions and habits. There were so many things about me my wife had never known. “

Lucas is married to Michelle Ward, a gorgeous, ambitious, competitive and entitled woman who importantly (from Lucas’ point of view ) is the heiress to her father’s construction empire.

“I didn’t hate her – my wife annoyed the bollocks off me.”

Without giving too much of the plot away (no spoilers here), as Lucas embarks on a devious murderous scheme which will rid him of his annoying wife, leaving him both rich and freely unencumbered to enjoy his spoils, the world, it seems, is Lucas’ oyster – until all of a sudden, it isn’t.

As his carefully-constructed world begins to collapse all around him, leaving both Lucas (and the reader) wondering just what the heck is going on, it’s crystal clear that the fun (for the reader at least) is just beginning.

A brilliant read, I absolutely loved this book,- laced all the way through with colorful characters, taunting questions, mind-tripping mysteries, trap-doors, and red herrings, all wrapped into a story told entirely in the voice of an increasingly-unreliable and rapidly-deteriorating narrator.

As his story progresses into mayhem, one cannot escape the unmistakable feeling, growing ever stronger, that when you come right down to it, Lucas’ plan may not have been quite as brilliant as originally perceived.

A great big thank you to @HarperCollinsCA #BooksofHCC for an ARC of this book. All thoughts presented are my own.