Meg and her daughter Grace are the most beloved family in Ashford, the lynchpin that holds the community together.

So when Meg is found brutally murdered and her daughter missing, the town is rocked by the crime. Not least because Grace has been sick for years – and may only have days to live.

Who would murder a mother who sacrificed everything and take a teenager away from the medication that could save her life?

Everyone is searching for answers but sometimes the truth can kill you…

Hardback | 346 pages

Publisher: Sphere (20th February, 2020)

Here’s the thing. I got this book on a whim and maybe if I’d read the acknowledgements first, I wouldn’t have picked this up. I feel kind of cheated.

Easy to read, nothing problematic about it.

If you’re familiar with the Gypsy Rose and Deedee story, then you can guess what Megan and Grace were like. It’s only in reading the story that what the characters stood for changes. While I was reading this I got strong vibes of Gypsy and Deedee. I was confused for most of my read because I couldn’t understand the amount of similarities between the real life event and this book. I made me view the characters falsely and without much of an opinion.

It was easy to visualise. I already felt like I knew the characters portrayed.

If I had known this book was ‘inspired by’ Gypsy Rose and Deedee, I probably would have left it on the shelf. I already know that story quite well. This book is ‘inspired by real-life events but it is still a work of fiction by the author’ [as said in the acknowledgements], but I couldn’t see this as anything other than a retelling and it annoyed me because I thought I was getting an original story.

I think it is pretty clear that I didn’t enjoy this and that I felt I was cheated by the story being told. I think the book itself was alright but it clearly wasn’t the right book for me and I was very disappointed by it.