thriller

In the first chapter, the protagonist comes home. To her unlocked apartment. Which she doesn’t lock because she lives in Italy. My daughter and I, who actually have lived in Italy, couldn’t stop laughing. It was so cute and naive. And just a bit lacking in any sort of research, of course.

Apparently this is not supposed to be a satire or a book of humour, so I pulled myself together and finished the book. It leaves Italy fairly early on (good move) and there is suspense and hiding from bad guys and stuff, and a most improbable deus-ex-machina rescue at the end.

I’m not sorry I read this book; it was worthy of a few hours of my attention. It was nice of the librarian to send it out with our weekly bagful of curbside-pickup lockdown reading matter. Apparently it was chosen as #OneBookLambton for some kind of county-wide reading club, so it’s got general appeal. ( )

I love Kelly Armstrong’s Otherworld series so thought I’d try her new standalone. It’s okay but nowhere near the same league as her series books. This one takes a little while to really get going. Gwen is a secretive young woman with a hoped for life in Italy with her boyfriend Marco but as the story opens…her life is about to fall apart because someone knows her secret and they’ve left evidence on her kitchen table. Our heroine…Genevieve is not a very likable or a very smart person and her actions…or sometimes lack of actions… brings the story down from what it could have been. For most of the book she is just plain stupid making it really hard to feel anything for her but exasperation. I do have to give the book and extra half star for a fairly strong mystery. Like I said…not a bad book or story…just not a good heroine. ( )

This standalone thriller by Kelley Armstrong is a real page turner. Genevieve Callahan is on the run from something. She has spent the last few years in Italy where she is building a new life. She teaches music and plays in a number of musical groups. She has a great boyfriend named Marco but she isn't ready to commit to him. Life is happy and satisfying.

But that all changes when a package is delivered to her apartment that indicates that someone knows about her past. The past where she was accused of sleeping with a married movie star Colt Gordon. The online furor painted her as the villain of the piece and hounded her almost to the point of suicide.

What happened was pretty simple. Lucy, as she was known then, got a job as the summer music tutor for Colt Gordon and Isabella Morales' children. She took the job because she admired Isabella who has a career as a star of telenovellas before she married Colt. Lucy looked up to her as a hero. She wasn't interested in Colt and, in fact, didn't even recognize his name when a music professor of hers at Julliard proposed her for the job.

But Colt was going through a mid-life crisis. At his anniversary party, he plied her with champagne and took her to a neighbor's hot tub where he came on to her. A mistimed photo by a paparazzi made her seem like a home wrecker. She wrote a letter of apology to Isabella and received a letter filled with vitriol in return.

Now, fourteen years later, Isabella wants to meet and offers her a paid vacation to New York to talk with her. Seems Isabella wants to tell the real story of what happened all those years ago. Genevieve doesn't want to bring all those horrible memories back but says she'll think about it. When she goes to Isabella's hotel the next morning, she finds her dead with the police knocking on the door.

She panics and goes on the run. She knows she's being framed for killing Isobella and doesn't want to trust the police and bring on all the new publicity. She has no one she can trust. The lawyer her mother steers her to has set up with the police and reporters to turn her in. When she gets a text from someone using the name PCTracy who offers to help, she thinks it is someone connected to the lawyer. She doesn't trust him but she needs his help.

But someone wants her frightened or dead and they aren't going to stop harassing her.

This was an excellent and fast-paced story. I couldn't put it down! I loved Gen and totally understood why she felt she couldn't go to the police. Her sense of helplessness and total confusion about who would want to do that to her came through well.

I completely recommend this to anyone who likes a good thriller. ( )

I really enjoyed K.L Armstrong's summer novel last year and was excited to see she was releasing a new book - today in fact is the day for Every Step She Takes.

Genevieve has a life she likes living in Italy - a home, a job and a boyfriend. Until the day she comes home and finds her door unlocked. And inside is a parcel from the US addressed to Lucy Callahan - a name Genevieve hasn't used in ten years.

"Too much time has passed, and I'm the only person who still cares what happened to me. Yet it takes only this unlocked door to slam me back to that life."

Okay, that's in the first five pages.....and I needed to know...who is Lucy, why is she hiding and what happened to her?

Every Step She Takes is told in first person, so the reader is along for the ride as Genevieve returns to the US to confront both the past and the present. The story unfolds in alternating chapters from ten years ago to present day. I always enjoy this story telling method, finding how the pieces fit together.

Although she thought she was putting the past to rest by going back to the US, someone else has other plans and Gen is in trouble - again. Determined to prove her innocence, she runs. Armstrong gives many us suspects to choose from as Gen tries to find the real culprit.

Armstrong adds some twists and turns along the way to the final whodunit. I appreciated not having a final answer until almost to the end. A few of the plot developments will require a grain of salt, but didn't detract from my enjoyment of the book.

I started Every Step She Takes with my morning tea on the back porch and finished up just before dinner. Armstrong writes many series (can't get enough Rockton), but I enjoyed having a stand alone to spend the day with. Armstrong's writing is very 'readable', moves along at a good clip and is entertaining. ( )