A Simple Favor: Darcey Bell

"A Simple Favor is a feverish and expertly plotted tale of psychological suspense--a twisting free fall filled with betrayals and reversals, secrets and revelations, love and loyalty, murder and revenge.  Darcey Bell exposes the dark underbelly of female friendship in this taut, unsettling, and completely absorbing story that holds you in its grip until the final page.


"It starts with a simple favor--an ordinary kindness mothers do for one another.  When glamorous Emily asks Stephanie to pick up her son after school, Stephanie happily says yes.  Emily has a life that would make any woman jealous. She is the perfect mother with a dazzling career working for a famous fashion designer in Manhattan.  Stephanie, a widow with a son in kindergarten, lonely in their Connecticut suburb, turns to her daily blog for connection and validation.  Stephanie imagines Emily to be her new confidante and is shocked when Emily suddenly disappears without a trace, leaving her son and husband with no warning.


"Stephanie knows something is terribly wrong.  Unable to keep away from the grieving family, she soon finds herself entangled with Sean, Emily's handsome, reticent British husband.  But she can't ignore the nagging feeling that he's not being honest with her about Emily's disappearance.  Is Stephanie imagining things?  How well did she really know her 'best' friend?

"Stephanie begins to see that nothing--not friendship, love, or even an ordinary favor--is as simple as it seems."

My friend and I wanted to see the film adaptation of this book when it came out a short while ago, but we never got around do it.  When I finally saw a copy of the original book on the shelf at my local library, I knew it was something I had to check out.  The promos made the book look deliciously twist and suspenseful.  After beginning my journey into this book, I was not disappointed.

We open with Stephanie's blog posts -- a blog she writes to reach out and connect with other moms out in the world, for kinship, validation, and friendship (whether or not she even truly realizes the last).  She and her son, Miles, make their lonely way through life after the death of Stephanie's husband, Davis, and her brother, Chris, in a tragic car accident.  Stephanie, perhaps, doesn't realize how lonely she really is until she finds what she believes to be a true and honest friend in Emily, the mother of her son's favorite playmate in school.  They bond over shared secrets and wine, as well as the challenges of raising sons in their Connecticut suburb after leaving the bustle of New York.  Stephanie is very quickly enamored of Emily and her lifestyle, her seeming perfection and elegance.  Having no one else to turn to, Stephanie quickly turns to her blog when Emily doesn't show to pick up her son from Stephanie's house after school one evening.  At first, Stephanie believes she may have misheard Emily or perhaps Emily's emergency had pulled her away for longer than anticipated.  It's only when Emily's continued unresponsiveness and days pass that Stephanie's concern blossoms into true fear.  She reaches out to Emily's husband, Sean, while he's on a business trip overseas.  At first, Sean's lack of concern and knowledge of Emily's hectic schedule makes Stephanie feel like a worrier.  It isn't until Sean returns to the States and Emily still hasn't returned that the two of them find a shared bond over their fear for Emily's safety.  Where had she gone?  Why had she left?  Was she still alive?  As more and more evidence is uncovered, more questions seem to pop up rather than answers.  What happened to Emily?  These questions seem to be answered...but there were far too many pages left in the book for this to be tied up in a nice, neat little package -- I always find this terrifying; when everything seems to work out, but then there is too much book left for this to actually be the case.  What on earth can the author have in store for me?!  This was absolutely the case with A Simple Favor.

The many twists and turns of this dark and suspenseful story kept me guessing.  I was so sure I knew what was coming right from the very beginning, but I admit that I changed my guess several times over until the truth was finally revealed.  The complex plot and multifaceted characters made for a psychological thriller that was difficult to put down; the tension never really abated.  The first lines of the book ring true throughout:  no one tells the truth and everyone has secrets.  Sometimes even the most innocuous of individuals have the deepest, darkest secrets of all.  Can you ever really, truly know someone?  This book definitely plays off of insecurities about opening up to one another, and the possibilities that people we hold dear are not actually who they seem to be.

At first the narration bounces back and forth between Stephanie's blog and her point of view (which is far more honest and revealing than her public online posts).  This is the first clue that there is a lot more to all of the characters than we see.  Gradually, more is revealed about Stephanie's past and she's not the perfect woman/mother she portrays on her blog -- then again, is anyone really as perfect as the profess to be on social media?  We realize the depth of her relationship with Emily and why Stephanie felt the two of them were so close.  This sets up the tension surrounding Emily's disappearance quite well.

Eventually, we become privy to the points of view of a couple of the other characters.  This adds even more depth and complexity to the plot.  What secrets have these characters kept?  Are they even telling us, the readers, the truth?  What are they choosing to omit and how much will it impact the story?

This is a book that will well and truly keep you on the edge of your seat.  I finished it in the matter of a few days and found it difficult to stop reading.  There are so many violent turns and rapid twists that I couldn't see what was coming at me around the next bend.  This is the mark of a good suspenseful psychological thriller, is it not?  The characters had layer upon layer of personality and secrets.  It was nearly impossible to trust any of them, even when you really wanted to do so.  I was captured right from the start and drawn into this mysterious world of secrets, lies, and questions.

I'm definitely even more interested in seeing the film adaptation of this book.  I wonder how true to its dark nature they will keep.  From what few previews I've seen, I think the casting was done well, given the descriptions in the book.

I recommend this for those of you who like darker psychological thrillers.  Fans of Gone Girl will really enjoy this one as it makes you question reality and the reliability of the very characters themselves.

Sometimes I Lie: Alice Feeney

"My name is Amber Reynolds.  There are three things you should know about me:  1. I'm in a coma.  2. My husband doesn't love me anymore.  3. Sometimes I lie.




"Amber Reynolds wakes up in a hospital.  She can't move.  She can't speak.  She can't open her eyes.  She can hear everyone around her, but they have no idea.


"Amber doesn't remember what happened to her, but she has a sneaking suspicion her husband had something to do with it.  Or her sister.  Or maybe both.




"Terrified and trapped inside her own body, she slowly begins to remember a night that changed her life.  Is she in a coma due to an accident?  Is her sister having an affair with her husband?  What happened at work with her horrible boss?  And who is the person who is silently visiting her bedside each night?




"Alternating between her paralyzed present, the week before her accident, and a series of childhood diaries from twenty years ago, Sometimes I Lie builds into an ending that will leave readers speechless as this brilliant psychological thriller asks, Is something really a lie if you believe it's the truth?"


This was another of my Pinterest finds and it was, once again, a very different choice from my normal reading material.  It's definitely been interesting to branch out and experience new authors and types of stories.


This book definitely plays with your mind and it suits the term "psychological thriller" to a tee.  You are just as lost as Amber as she tries to sort through her damaged mind to figure out how she got into that hospital bed; you experience her last week of normalcy and get a taste for her life before the accident; and you witness the development of a child's mind via the diary entries from twenty years prior.  I won't sugarcoat it:  There are more than a few disturbing moments in this book (then again, would it really be a psychological thriller if there weren't?).  You don't know who or what to believe -- especially because the narrator has come right out and said she can sometimes be a liar.  Whose truth do we believe?  What is reality and what is fiction?  In literature, there can be "unreliable narrators," but what do we do when the narrator outright admits that she's unreliable?  There are so many twists and turns throughout that I had no clue what was coming until it hit me right in the face.


The chapters were short and routinely cycled from Amber's paralytic coma, before her accident, and the diary entries.  Each section had a very unique perspective.  This form of writing kept me captivated because I wasn't bogged down by long chapters (not that I mind them, I just think the format used by Feeney here was particularly well-suited to this type of book).  It kept me on my toes and whetted my appetite for more.  I couldn't wait for what little tidbit or clue would be revealed in the next section.  Being kept in the dark with Amber as the narrator meant we felt her pain and lost what little consciousness she had just as she did; we experienced her deeply troubled mind and past in broken pieces; as well as we learned right along with her slowly-healing memory what had happened to her.  The dark secrets she carefully covered up, the lies which slowly come to light, all serve to craft a very deep, dark, and infinitely complex narrator.  So much lies beneath the surface that the differences between fact and fiction become blurred in such a way that even reality sometimes feels like one of her troubling coma-induced dreams.  Rather than more answers, we're often left with more questions as we get deeper into the story; which is, of course, the perfect thing to get a reader to devour a book in a short span of time.  This happens quite a bit in the old diary entries and some of those happened to be my favorite sections.


Characters who seemed normal and/or reliable were rarely so.  Whether it was Amber's paranoia or her hyper-perceptive nature, we're never quite certain.  Her husband, Paul, is a great source of anxiety for Amber.  A great deal of the sections taking place before the accident revolve around her belief that he is having an affair; it's hinted quite strongly that his affair is with Amber's sister, Claire, which could be a reason why Amber seems to have a great deal of anxiety when it comes to her.  However, it's not until much, much later in the story that we realize the true source of this anxiety and mistrust...and the revelation is frightening on so many levels.  What we believe to be jealousy of Claire -- her perfect appearance, how she always seems to be one step ahead of Amber on life's journey even though she's younger, and how Claire was able to give her husband children (even if she had to go through IVF) -- turns out to be something much darker.


The writing, itself, is masterful in the sense that Feeney never reveals too much.  She waits for the exact moment to reveal a hint and then promptly never mentions it again until all of the pieces finally come together at the very end.  I kept finding myself wondering how all of those pieces could possibly fit in a satisfying way, but it ended up working in such a way that I had to sit back and think to myself, "Wow...that was one hell of a ride."  I was kept captivated by the style and careful glimpses of clues, which is perfect for this genre.


I will once again caution you that this book is dark and parts are very disturbing -- it's certainly not for everyone.  There are some very intense scenes, twisted themes, and very troubled characters.  This isn't a traditional mystery:  Of course, we don't know "who done it," but there is so, so much more to this book than that -- especially because the "victim" is alive...and she's also the unreliable narrator.  ***SPOILER:  There are scenes of rape, stalking, and violent murder.  I suggest staying away from this book if you're squeamish about any of those things.***  I recommend this book if you're not afraid to try something new and experience an author who will have you on the edge of your seat.  Feeney hasn't had many books published as of yet, but I expect that we'll be seeing a great deal more of her in the future.  Happy reading!


SIDE NOTE:  I'm excited because I just realized that this book technically fulfills my "book set at Christmas" requirement for my 2018 reading list!  You can find the reading challenge HERE.