Bookclub #5

Another day, another book review. This is a part of the bloggers book club series with some other like-minded literary bloggers, be sure to check out their page links at the bottom of this post. #5: The Good Girl by Fiona NeillI feel like I was miss-sold this book! The blurb talks about a family moving to a new town and having a big dark secret looming over them. And yes, the book was about this big dark secret (in fact, there were lots) but the other plot line was so much more significant I don't really get why the blurb was chosen. Odd. Anyway, The Good Girl is about a (good) girl called Romy who has made a big old mistake. We learn about this in the first chapter, and then the book goes back to the beginning - telling us how this mistake came to be and the events leading up to it. Finally, a book that doesn't jump between time frames chapter to chapter! Hurrah. This did jump between characters, though, which helped tell the story from different perspectives. The blurb talks about a big secret. I counted at least four or five big secrets that we find out throughout this book, however! It's quite a long read, too long in my opinion. I did enjoy this book, but felt like an awful lot was packed in. There were enough secrets and lies to fill at least three books! So I felt it was a bit drawn out in places and could have done with more focus. I thought the theme surrounding the main secret was an interesting and topical one, but could have been made more of. The blurb just doesn't even cover this, which I feel was a mistake. Have you seen the TV series The Affair? Well, for some reason I pictured Harry (the husband) as Dominic West's character in The Affair (Noah) and Ailsa as his wife Helen. I think this had an impact on the way I viewed their characters as I found Noah and Helen both quite irritating in The Affair. It's funny how our brain makes links, hey?Overall, I did enjoy this book and found it to be a page turner that I wanted to tuck into on a Saturday afternoon. I just feel like the blurb was for a different book!See what Lorna said here, Leanne here and Charli here.