One Click

You’ll remember that I gushed about the amazing The Other Side of The Wall (seriously, read the book! Review here) from the creator of the brilliant Office Mum blog (here) . In fact I’m pretty sure that it was my most recommended read that year. I loved the creepiness of it and the ending that was a lesson in how to grip! And here we have it again, a book that I really enjoyed with a twist I didn’t see or perhaps I did but I discounted it and had moved on by the time the explosive ending had come about. But sorry, as usual, I’m running on.We begin with imagery that is impeccable, and puts us right there enjoying the holiday with Lauren and her daughters. Our lead, Lauren, is on a beach and sees a woman that is the definition of relaxed and it makes her think back to how she spent her time before the daily grind became a grind. So she starts a hashtag and shares the photo.I love that it was her teenage daughter that called her out on it and Lauren trying to backtrack and justify something she warns her children about. It was hilarious that I jumped straight into their holiday, enjoying the vividness of all of it and then, as I often do with thrillers, suddenly remembered (and noted on my Kindle) ‘crap, this is going to get bad.’There was so much I loved from the start-the ease of the interaction with the lead and her daughters, the background to her work as a single parent psychologist, and soon all was muddied by tweets by an unknown wanting to know who the girl in the photo was. Saying that I have to admit as much as I enjoyed the first half for the everyday, when I got to the jumps and the scares I realised I could have done with just a few more, and a teeny tiny bit less about the morality of use of social media, although that is supposed to be the talking point of the book so I’m probably in the minority on this.Speaking of the thriller aspect to the book, it’s funny that I decide what way I want a book to go and so I was very excited when we came across the girl a second time, as suddenly, as I’d prayed for (YES!), we’ve got her pov too!There’s a series of unpalatables in the book, giving us some choices as to who the person who is now openly stalking Lauren, not only online but in real life too, and I was all over the place trying to figure out our culprit. We were led around and about every garden path and I savoured it, adoring the unease created (at one stage there’s a home alone scenario that had my eyes wide and my heart actually thumping as I was reading at one o clock in the morning in the silence of our own home!) and gobbled up the latter part of the book, in particular a conclusion that was right up my street. Beyond enjoyable, and a book that has (if she hadn’t been already as I do know her from IWI) most definitely cemented Ms. Mara as an author I will continue to read and shout about.Rating: 4.5/5

Very interesting and clever book but setimes rammbled.

I’ve read a couple of other books by Andrea Mara and enjoyed them. This was a disappointment, it felt like 3 short stories that were cobbled together and drawn out with waffle! Each coming to an abrupt end with little follow up explanation. Some characters were so obviously and ridiculously the red herrings that they became annoying to read and added little to the story. I have other Andrea Mara books in my kindle so I’ll give her another chance, had this been the only book I’d read then I definitely wouldn’t.

Great read . Very well written . Would highly recommend it

Enjoyable book, I like I’ve recently discovered Andrea Mara and I’ve downloaded a third novel to read. They seem to be a bit formulaic but most authors do this. I’m certainly a fan.

First time I’ve read from this Author. I’m definitely going to be reading more. Was gripped from the off right to the last page. Loved the twists and turns.

This is my first book by this author and for once I paid for someone new to me as it sounded so interesting. I wasn't disappointed and I have only deducted one star as there were a few too many mistakes that her "forensic" proofreader should've spotted if I did.The story is full of twist and turns and just as you think you've resolved it you learn you're way off-track !! There were some very funny remarks in it that made me giggle at times, mostly what Lauren was thinking, and one shocker of a passage actually made me gasp out loud ! Her first book had somehow passed me by but I'll definitely be looking out for it now on the back of this one.I wasn't sure about Cleo but I liked Lauren. Marcus and Jonathan were pigs......she created a wide dearth of characters. I liked Grace, too, and I was pleased Lauren had Rebecca apologise for her rudeness to her as well.I did think that she wrote about the colour of people's cheeks too often and her characters had too many headaches. This sentence left me pretty baffled as well, "Molly and Lill have changed their names to Molly-ween and LillWitchGirl for the night that's in it" ?? I just wrote 'huh ?'Now the mistakes I happened upon....and there were none till we were 35% into this book and it was all going so smoothly....mycooking needed a space, she kept spelling dyeing as dying (another thing entirely), wrote enflame and not inflame,"the lady who who lived next door" is obviously wrong and these lines lost words, "...what happens if they allow their fingers tap out hateful messages" or "His mouth sets in petulant line." Then the biggest spelling mistake for me was writing Valuim as opposed to Valium, which she did get right at another mention.There were missed apostrophes and fullstops and then speechmarks used where nobody was talking and also a few more peculiar phrases but I can't be bothered to type anymore out right now. These errors did let it down, though, as it would surely have been 5* from me otherwise.

A good mystery and suspense story for holiday reading. This is my second novel of A. Mara’s and I enjoy the twists and turns of her writing.

This is my third Mara novel and was as good as my first 2. She writes about Ireland, a fresh change from authors in the US. Anyway I love her twists of plot, I have yet to predict the correct bad guy. I will continue to read the rest of her work.

Andrea Mara’s second novel confirms her talent as an author. It’s an ideal holiday read. The plot deals with the unintended consequences of posting an image of a stranger online. As the story progresses and the main character questions her behaviour on social media over the past few months, it makes you really think about the online world we increasingly live in. From the benefits of a wider support network, to worrying about how to protect the privacy of yourself and others. Where should we draw our boundaries? What is morally acceptable to share? What’s safe to show the entire world? It’s an interesting story with plenty of twists, but doesn’t rely on the plot alone to make the book a great read. The characters are believable and very relatable. The pacing is great, and the story will suck you in and and keep you reading to the very last page.

The plot is very original and the reader is kept guessing until the very end. What kept me from giving it 5 stars is that I didn't like the main character very much... But I would definitely recommend this book!

I could never quite put my finger on the culprit here, and that's a good thing. Wasn't expecting it to come together that way. Wish the MC had put her husband in his place long before she did. Goid read.

Way too confusing. Couldn't keep track of who was who and who was living where. On top of that story was just boring. Only got halfway through and then gave up.