Here To Stay (English Edition) -

Mark Edwards

Thomas & Mercer

2019

380 páginas

12h 40m

ISBN-10: 1542006619

A beautiful home. A loving wife. And in-laws to die for.

Gemma Robinson comes into Elliot’s life like a whirlwind, and they marry and settle into his home. When she asks him if her parents can come to stay for a couple of weeks, he is keen to oblige – he just doesn’t quite know what he’s signing up for.

The Robinsons arrive with Gemma’s sister, Chloe, a mysterious young woman who refuses to speak or leave her room. Elliot starts to suspect that the Robinsons are hiding a dark secret. And then there are the scars on his wife’s body that she won’t talk about . . .

As Elliot’s in-laws become more comfortable in his home, encroaching on all aspects of his life, it becomes clear that they have no intention of moving out. To protect Gemma, and their marriage, Elliot delves into the Robinsons’ past. But is he prepared for the truth?

Resenhas (2)

2.5 (Razoável)

Flawed, but served its purpose

I was looking for a gripping read that could take me out of my current reading slump, nothing necessarily profound, just something that could entertain me and keep me engaged throughout. This book served its purpose! I stood up until now finishing it… unable to put my Kindle aside. So, I guess I can say, “Hurray! What a victory!”

However this book is very flawed. The main characters are so bland, poorly written, and give us very little to root for.

I am a lousy predictor, so when I do predict stuff it’s because it was either very poorly disguised or one of the author’s more obvious first choices. The twists that were revealed during the climax were sufficiently beyond my radar and they did pack a punch (props to the climax, by the way!), but the last chapter’s twist, the one that should be the most gut-wrenching, had been predicted by me a hundred pages before.

The problem with the last chapter is not exactly that, in fact! The major revelation being predictable was not totally a bad thing because the clues had been laid out fairly across the story and along with its revelation came the disclosure of another, very important fact in terms of character development. But how the author decided to wrap up the book after the big reveal (and how that came across the last sentences) was so disappointing! There could have been plenty of other, much more satisfying ways!!

The writing itself feels very uninspired and the dialogues are often immature and even childish. I don’t know if it was just an impression of mine, but I was sometimes turned off by the Dick Van Dyke-esque air of fake Britishness that the characters exuded, and I couldn’t help but blame that on the author being American.

But overall, because it served the purpose I had imposed it, the book leaves me with a satisfied feeling. I felt more engaged reading it than in a long while. Despite the protagonists being tasteless, the antagonists are so vile, repugnant and loathsome that I harbored such a deep anger towards them and couldn’t help but wish the main character’s plans somehow came through… 🙄 leaving me with a huge moral dilemma in hand!