BLOG TOUR – All my lies by Sophie Flynn

Thank you to Anne @RandomTTours for my place on the tour and to @simonschusterUK for my ebook via NetGalley in exchange for review. All opinions are honest and my own.

Blurb

Anna wants to escape.
She doesn’t know when her marriage to James began to feel like a trap or when he became so controlling. All she knows is that she needs to leave before it’s too late.
And she has a plan.

When Anna reconnects with her childhood sweetheart, Sam, she sees it as the answer to her problems. Finally, they’ll have a life together, like they’d always planned – the life she was meant to have.
But the lies are catching up with her . . .
On the morning of their escape, Sam goes missing. Anna knows he wouldn’t leave her, that something must have happened to him.
Her search for answers will force her to confront her past, something that she has been running from for a very long time . . .

Perfect for fans of Louise Jensen, Phoebe Morgan and K.L. Slater, this is a twisty, tense psychological thriller about one woman’s hunt for the truth and her ultimate fight to break free.

My Review

This book made me feel as if I was reading some chapters from my own life story. As, like Anna, I had a controlling husband and then reconnected with a childhood love. Luckily that’s where the similarities ended. However it did make me feel more empathetic towards Anna and my heart was in my throat more often than I care to admit as I recognised the subtle gaslighting techniques and manipulation used by her husband James that in turn become cruel.

Anna’s backstory explains her longing for warmth, love and family, making her extremely vulnerable. So when Sam breaks off all contact her past and present collide and I was left questioning everything and everybody including Anna.

For a debut the author has astounded me with her characterisation. They frustrated me, angered me, brought out my maternal instinct to protect and my strong stance of sisterhood against domestic abuse. James was so well written that I would happily have gone to their house packed her bag and stood up to him myself. The women in this book are all beholden to the men in their lives in one form or another. Rosie is the only one she’s really close to and her being James’ sister makes telling the truth even more difficult and complicated and added another dimension to how closed off and alone Anna actually is.

The walls felt like they were closing in as she becomes more trapped not only be her marriage but by all the lies. And as Rosie herself said “they always catch up with you in the end.”

About the author

Sophie Flynn is a Cotswolds based psychological thriller author with an MA in Creative Writing from Oxford Brookes. Alongside writing, Sophie is the Head of Marketing at Jericho Writers. After being awarded a place at Swanwick Writers’ Summer School on the TopWrite scheme for young writers in 2017, Sophie began writing short fiction. She has since had many stories published and placed in competitions with organisations such as Writing Magazine and The Cheltenham Literature Festival.
When not writing, Sophie can mostly be found on muddy walks with her husband and rescue dog or disappearing to Cornwall whenever possible. She is represented by Kate Nash of Kate Nash Literary Agency.
To find out more, visit her website or follow her on Twitter. sophieflynn.com | @sophielflynn

Link to buy

Don’t forget to check out all the other blogger’s thoughts on the tour. Happy reading!