My Rating ~ Four Stars
RELEASE DATE: 22 January 2022
Format: Paperback
Pages: 304
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Blurb
Best friends share everything. But murder is different. Isn’t it?
Keeley and Jude are closer than blood. Inseparable since childhood, they share everything: clothes, secrets, booze – and blame. So when they wake up after a new year’s party to find Keeley’s boyfriend stabbed to death beside them, they agree to share something else: the story they’ll tell the police. But who is that story really meant to protect? Is Jude risking her bright future to protect her friend? Is there more to sharp-eyed Keeley than she lets on? Or are they conspiring to let Keeley’s brother get away with the drugs he’s been selling in their small town? As the murder investigation sends ripples through their community, the history of the girls’ claustrophobic relationship comes under scrutiny – and they start to realise they might not, always, have shared as much as they thought. Can their friendship survive sharing everything?
Review
Thank you so much to Bloomsbury for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
Keeley and Jude have been best friends since they were 4 years old. Jude’s mum has always been hesitant about Jude and Keeley’s friendship. Keeley’s mother had loud parties with unsavory people until all hours of the night, until she died, and she thinks Keeley is much the same. After Jude attends a New Year’s Eve party at Keeley’s house, the girls wake up with Keeley’s boyfriend dead. One of them has blood on their hands and one decides they’ll come up with a story for the police, but which is which?
Police officer Rice is fighting his own life challenges when the murder case lands in his lap. He’s determined to solved the crime, even if he is being accessed of needing to retire.
As the police examine Keeley and Jude’s intense friendship, they have to piece together the lies and times the girls have covered for each other to get to the truth.
This was a great debut novel with a sinister undertone and interesting characters. I did work out the ‘who’ and ‘why’ about half way through, but it didn’t detract from the enjoyment of getting there in the end. Told from multiple perspectives, in both past and present timelines, the author cleverly wove together all of the threads, so that sometimes the police made discoveries first and sometimes we learned them first as the reader.
If you’re looking for a ‘best friends with a dark twist’ type of story, definitely pick this one up!
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