Closer by K.L. Slater @KimLSlater @bookouture #bookreview #Closer #NetGalley

It’s always a pleasure to join a blog blitz for one of K.L. Slater’s books! My thanks to Kim Nash at Bookouture for the invitation and for the review copy, which I received via Netgalley. Here is what Closer is all about!

Author : K.L. Slater
Title : Closer
Pages : 331
Publisher : Bookouture
Publication date : October 24, 2018

I know my daughter better than I know myself and if there’s one thing I know for sure at this moment: it’s that Maisie is not ok.

My ex-husband Shaun and I are still friends.
We would do anything for our beautiful little girl, Maisie.
But now Shaun has moved in with Joanne and suddenly, Maisie has a brand new family.
And there’s something not quite right about it…I know Joanne isn’t everything she says she is. Yet no-one will listen.
I need to discover what she’s hiding.
Because if I don’t, my daughter will be in terrible danger.

And the award for some of the most unlikeable and infuriating characters ever goes to …. well, pretty much everyone involved in this story except for ten year old Maisie. I dare you to read this and not feel incredibly sorry for her. I just wanted to wrap her up in great big bear hug and keep her safe from harm.

Emma and her husband are separated but still live in the same house for the benefit of their young daughter. Everything seems to be going well until Shaun falls in love with Emma’s boss, Joanne. Talk about making things complicated. But the person suffering the most in these new circumstances is ten year old Maisie. It becomes clear to Emma quite quickly that her daughter is not okay. But who’s responsible for the change in Maisie?

This is quite the slow burner. For the longest time, it felt as if little was actually happening when in fact, the scene is set perfectly for what is to come. With references to events from both Emma’s and Joanne’s past and flashback chapters by an unknown character, K.L. Slater kept me guessing until the end about how things were connected or how they would pan out. There are some incredibly dark secrets to unravel and the tension builds up slowly to quite the shocking conclusion.

Did I mention the unlikeable characters? Joanne irked me from the moment she was introduced to me. And let’s not even waste words on her dreadful daughter, Piper. However, the one I wanted to slap fiercely more than anything was Maisie’s father, Shaun. Either he’s ridiculously oblivious, blind or just stupid. I haven’t quite decided on that bit just yet. I do know he was utterly infuriating.

Full of suspense, this had me hooked from start to finish. Although I must admit it has left me with a few unanswered questions, making me think I missed something along the way. I’ve come to expect solid psychological thrillers from K.L. Slater and this one is no different. In a genre that’s often up and down, K.L. Slater manages to remain absolutely consistent!

So is Emma a reliable narrator or just paranoid? What’s lurking in Joanne’s past? Will Shaun open his eyes? But more than anything, will Maisie go back to the wonderful girl she used to be? If you want to know the answer to these questions, there’s only one thing to do.

Buy your copy of Closer right now as it’s published today!

Amazon US | Amazon UK | Kobo | Goodreads

For many years, Kim sent her work out to literary agents and collected an impressive stack of rejection slips. At the age of 40 she went back to Nottingham Trent University and now has an MA in Creative Writing.

Before graduating in 2012, she received five offers of representation from London literary agents and a book deal which was, as Kim says, ‘a fairytale … at the end of a very long road!’

Kim is a full-time writer, has one grown-up daughter, Francesca, and lives in Nottingham with her husband, Mac.

She also writes award-winning YA fiction for Macmillan Children’s Books, writing as Kim Slater.

Author links : Facebook | Twitter