A Good Mother by Sam Hepburn
Genre: Domestic thriller, Domestic drama, Psychological thriller, Suspense
Read: 20th May 2021
Published: 26th May 2021
★★★★★ 4.5 stars (rounded up)
DESCRIPTION:
I see my son’s scooter lying in the undergrowth. Time stands still. Where is he? Deafened by my own heartbeat, I keep looking but I can’t see him. This is all my fault. My punishment for the things I did, and the things I should have done.
All I ever wanted was to keep my son safe. I married the perfect husband, built the perfect home. I’ve tried to give Finn the life I never had.
Everything was going so well. Until now.
It’s just small things at first – a punctured tyre, an open gate that I'm sure I locked. But then I see the photograph of two young girls, and a night I’ve tried to forget.
I know I have to stop pretending that nothing is happening. I can’t escape the truth.
Someone knows my secret. But what do they want from me?
A gripping and suspenseful thriller with a jaw-dropping twist, fans of Friend Request, The Wife Between Us and The Girl on the Train won’t be able to put this down.
MY REVIEW:
I am excited to be taking part in the #BooksOnTour #BlogTour for Sam Hepburn's gripping domestic thriller A GOOD MOTHER.
This is my first read by Sam Hepburn and I have to say I'm impressed. Her calibre for the domestic thriller is up there with Shalini Boland and K.L. Slater in her ability to engage the reader and keep them turning the pages throughout. Not to mention a riveting plot line different from anything I've read before. Her characters are not perfect; they are as flawed as the rest of us, making the protagonist in A GOOD MOTHER someone readers can sympathise and identify with and asking ourselves the question "what would we do should we find ourselves in the same situation?"
Nicola Cahill grew up in foster care after the suicide of her mother when she was five years old, shunted from home to home before the system spat her our at 16 and left her to fend for herself. Caught up in the only world she was familiar with, her foray into adulthood was filled with hardships and desperate measures.
Until one day, something happened to turn her life around. She became a mother. And from that day on, Nicola vowed to be a good mother and protect her son at all costs.
Six years later, Nicola has put the past behind her and now lives in a gorgeous house on affluent Juniper Close with her perfect husband, a successful dentist at the practice where she works as a receptionist. Ian is wonderful with her son Finn, taking him under his wing spending time with him teaching him chess and even coaching his soccer team. The sight of the two of them together warms her heart. To think all that she has come from to where she is now, Nicci had never thought it possible.
But then strange and bizarre things start happening. A dead blackbird on her car. A gash in her car tyre. Glass sprinkled by an open gate that she had securely locked. But it's not until she receives the photo that she knows her troubled past has come back to haunt her. She thought she had left all that behind her...but she was wrong. Because not only is her marriage not as happy as it seems, someone knows her secret...and are now threatening to destroy her carefuly composed life. But worse than that...they will stop at nothing to get at what she values most in the world. Her son, Finn.
And when a face from Nicci's past comes knocking on her door, she knows then that the facade of lies she has built around her is about to come tumbling down. How far will Nicci go to protect her son? Can she keep the secrets of her past hidden? And what happens if it all goes wrong and her lies are uncovered?
An intense psychological read, A GOOD MOTHER is fast-paced from start to finish that I could not put down. It is told completely from Nicola's perspective, in both the past and present narratives, as her past is slowly revealed to the reader. It's easy to sympathise with Nicola as a product of an uncaring system that just chews people up and then spits them out, leaving them without support or the resources to fend for themselves. This in turn leads to a sad chain of events of exploitation and abuse that in the end also dumps them when they become a liability. How are those in the foster care system supposed to make anything of themselves without the proper resources or support? It's appalling. It's no wonder Nicci ended up the way she did in her early years...but it was Finn's birth that was her saving grace. From that moment on, she stepped up to make something better of herself while caring for her son.
But Nicci's life was never meant to be an easy one for though she had escaped the cycle of an uncaring system she unknowingly swapped one form of abuse for another. That being in her marriage to husband Ian who I saw from the beginning was coercive, controlling and manipulative although she thought herself incredibly lucky to have found him. And he reminded her of that fact almost every day whilst at the same time insidiously chipping away at her self esteem and confidence therefore making her completely dependent on him. He was abhorrent and completely unlikeable and I wondered throughout the entire story how he would get his comeuppance because, let's face it, the bad guys usually do.
While A GOOD MOTHER is a fantastic read that is addictive and compelling, it's also one of those books that you can't help but dislike just about every character. They are pretty much all selfish, keeping secrets and out for themselves. I went from sympathising with Nicci to wanting to throttle her sometimes, knowing she was just digging herself in deeper and deeper. But despite it all, she just went from strength to strength that in the end she kicked butt majorly and I was cheering for her all the way.
The brilliant twisty has a frisson of tension running throughout as Nicci's tragic troubled past intertwines with her present in ways even I didn't see coming! Everything is woven expertly together in a way that leaves you breathless. So many secrets, so many lies. A GOOD MOTHER is a good...no, a bloody brilliant read that will have you turning the pages into the night...and still leave you reeling.
Perfect for fans of domestic thrillers and fans of Shalini Boland, K.L. Slater, Sheryl Browne and Ruth Heald.
I would like to thank #SamHepburn, #NetGalley and #Bookouture for an ARC of #AGoodMother in exchange for an honest review.
MEET THE AUTHOR:
Sam has worked and travelled widely in Africa and the Middle East, and is a trustee of the Kenyan’s children’s charity, I Afrika. She now lives in London with her husband and children.
Social Media links:
Website | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads
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