Liz Loves Books.Com.

Hmm.

This is one of those moments where I need to be honest and don't really want to be because I LOVED this authors first book - The Couple Next Door - and enthused about it so would love to keep up that level of support but for me, A Stranger in the House was just another predictable psychological thriller of the dime a dozen kind you see everywhere. Boy I'm so sick of characters with either a drug problem that fogs their thoughts or some random amnesia as a plot device to hide the reveals that are pretty obvious anyway. Its tired and over used now and whilst I'm not saying NEVER use it a novel that relies on it entirely tends to fall flat for me these days.

Now having said that the writing is still excellent, I love the way Shari Lapena twists her language to tell her stories. I am not put off reading future books at ALL especially considering how truly great I thought The Couple Next Door was. It was solely the plot in this one that wore me out. It genuinely felt like I'd read it before, and beautiful as the writing was, I just knew the end as soon as I started and whilst I engaged with some of the characters I didn't find them as compelling as the ones from the previous book, not because of them so much but because I felt I knew everything about them already.

Its still a good read if you like the genre - I would not want to put anyone else off at ALL, this is very subjective. I'll look forward to Shari Lapena's next book. Its not you its me!