Twitter@favouritenovels I bought my own paperback from Amazon. Hard to believe that this book is Laura Marshall's first book. In 1989 Louise did something bad to her friend Maria Weston. When Louise after twenty-five years gets an email from an old school friend Maria about a school reunion, could it possibly be pay back time to Louise for what she did at school. There is one slight problem here Maria Weston is dead. So many secrets in this thriller I'm not letting out to you all. Of course I highly recommend reading about all the secrets.

I read this book in only a couple of days! It had me gripped from the beginning. Full of twists. Probably the best book I have read in months ( I read ALOT ). I really couldn't put it down.

Louise Williams is divorced and is bringing up her four year old son Henry on her own. Henry has set days where he see's his Daddy and his new family and Louise is able to work from home which helps her juggle bringing up Henry and work. One day while working at home, Louise receives a friend request on Facebook - Maria Weston wants to be friends. Louise is immediately spooked. Maria Weston died twenty five years ago.....or did she ? This psychological thriller is fast paced and is written well. It deals with both bullying and facebook issues and the consequences both can have. The story alternates between 1989 and 2016 and there are many twists. A good read.

Although the main character in this book, Louise, is a woman around 40, a mother with a good career and a decent little flat in London the whole story revolves around her experiences as a teenager in a little East Anglian town. Torn between her need to fit in with the popular girls and her rapport with new girl, Maria, Louise allows herself to be drawn into bullying behaviour. Over two decades later she gets a friend request from Maria on Facebook and doesn’t know how to react – because, as far as she knows, Maria died at their leaver’s dance back in 1989… The plot swings back and forth between the present day – with more Facebook messages and a school reunion – and 1989 until the mysteries of both past and present are revealed. This was a good psychological thriller – and for once the narrator wasn’t so much unreliable as unaware of how much she didn’t really understand about her own childhood. She is, to all intents and purposes, a strong woman with a successful business and a bright, loving child but – in her own private thoughts and memories she is still under the influence of the bullies from her teen years. She blames herself for actions she was, in many ways, to weak to resist being bullied into herself. I really enjoyed this book – I didn’t work out what the twist was until shortly before it twisted – but only quibble is that she and her best friend seem to drive everywhere in London. Who can afford that?

I couldn’t stop turning the pages of this book. Totally up to date with Social Media, bullying and the like. Thoroughly engaged.