The Nanny's Child (The Lies We Tell #2) by L.G. Davis
Genre: Psychological thriller, Domestic thriller, Domestic suspense
Read: 8th September 2023
Published: 11th September 2023
★★★★★ 5 stars
DESCRIPTION:
I’ve always had the urge to look after other people’s children. To pour care and love into their lives, because I know what happens when you don’t. There are terrible people out there, who have been neglected and hurt and want to see the world burn. You don’t want people like that in your home…
I look up at the beautiful woman with perfectly painted red lipstick standing on the front steps of her grand Victorian house. Harper already trusts me to take care of her two little girls: believes the lies I’ve told her about where I come from and how many other mothers have welcomed me into their homes. Then I see the familiar form of her husband. My ex. The man who knows where my own missing baby boy is.
I know Troy will never admit to knowing who I really am. Not after what he did to me. But I still expect to see shock and recognition in his cool blue eyes when he meets me: the woman his wife has employed to care for their children. But he simply smiles. He welcomes me into his home.
I’m determined to get the truth out of Troy. But soon I realize I made a terrible mistake in coming here. Someone has been in my room. And the gun I hid under my mattress is missing.
Troy thinks he can scare me away. But if he won’t tell me where my son is, he has no idea how far I’ll go to get revenge…
A deliciously addictive and heart-pounding thriller. Readers of The Housemaid, The Marriage and Gone Girl will be shocked by the endless twists in this unputdownable page-turner.
MY THOUGHTS:
Now this...THIS...is more like it! The first book "The New Nanny" just didn't live up to what I know Liz Davis can do. Everyone was just a little too weird and it just didn't sit right with me. But this is sooooo much better! Others are saying you can't read this one without reading the first but I say you can. While they do go hand in hand, this one is probably so much more better without the first one. You are given all the information you learn from reading the first book but without all the long-winded faffing about. This one is just so much better and is right up there back to Davis' usual tempo and fine calibre.
The dived straight into this upon finishing and reviewing the first book so everything was still fresh in my memory. The only thing you will really get by reading the first book before this one is a vehement hatred for Wyatt. In this book, he turns up and shows his sinister side but you don't get that true evil like you did in the first book. I wanted to see him get his comeuppance as I found him truly evil and I expected to see him under every rock and around every corner, so when he failed to materialise I wondered whether Davis was gaslighting us into believing what he was capable of.
At the end of the first book, Christa gave birth to a baby girl she named Heather, after returning from her harrowing experience in Austria upon discovering that Wyatt wasn't her missing son she believed him to be. However, the bond she developed with him he refused to relinquish firmly believing she was his mother regardless of what the DNA tests revealed. She fled New York in the hope to put as much distance between her and Wyatt but also because of a note that was left in her mailbox. All it had was a name and an address alongside a note which read "what you are looking for is here."
So now Christa finds herself back in Kentucky not far from where she grew up in the cult from which she escaped as a teenager. The name and address she was given lead her to Troy and Harper Wells, but as soon as Christa walks into their home she knows she is looking at a face from her past. Although he goes by another name now, she would know Brett Lawson anywhere...after all they shared a child together. A child she has travelled the world searching for. A child that was ripped from her when she was locked away for being unfit and unstable. When she returned to the community, her baby was gone. A week later, she escaped with the help of Emily whose family delivered groceries to their community a couple of times a week. She owes Emily her life. But she owes Brett Lawson nothing. She is here only to find out where her child is...and then she will leave.
But nothing is as straightforward as it seems. She came to Esterford and garnered the position of nanny to Troy and Harper's seven year old twin girls Ella and Leah. The family dote on her now six month old daughter Heather who she takes with her whilst nannying the twins. She didn't want to but it isn't long before Christa begins to become attached to the girls and her new life with the Wells. Harper and Troy and the perfect couple, so obviously in love. And they go out of their way to help others, sprinkling kindness and compassion in their wake. They almost seem too good to be true if Christa hadn't seen it with her own eyes. And you know what they say - if it seems too good to be true, then it probably is.
And then there is the proverbial fly in the ointment. Wyatt, you may ask? Well, yes. But someone a little closer to home in Esterford in the form of neighbour Madison Baker. She watches Christa from her window daily as she goes to and from the cottage on the lake that the Wells' have made available for her and Heather. Madison is sure Christa is hiding something and is up to no good and she is determined to find out what. Harper is like a sister to her, her soul sister, and she would do anything to protect her. And if that meant uncovering what their new nanny was up to, then so be it.
But like all good domestic and psychological thrillers, every character is hiding something. We know what Christa is hiding and we're with her all the way, but what about everyone else? Is Troy who Christa believes him to be? Is Harper really whiter than white? And as for Madison...what is really her agenda here? And then there is Wyatt. Like a bad smell he lingers in the background refusing to go away. Is he really determined to harass Christa forever? And above all, does Christa find her son?
So many questions...and so many answers are finally given. Including to those left unanswered in the first book. This book is waaaaaay better than the first and I raced through it at breakneck speed almost devouring it in one sitting if not for the pesky need to sleep. I left an hour to go to finish today and I devoured it, irritated by the slightest noise or interruption that took me away from the unfolding events for even a second. It's that addictive! Easily one of her best. Do you have to read the first book? I don't think so. In fact, as I said, I think it reads better without the first book and leaving what happened in Austria just as a backstory of "what came before" kind of thing.
THE NANNY'S CHILD is so addictive, so engaging and so brilliant it is easily one of Davis' best. She orchestrated some classic twists that even I didn't see coming. It's so twisted, so wicked and so creepy your paranoia will be ramped up along with the palpable tension. Could it be improved? The ending maybe a little twee but who cares? It has closure. Everything has come full circle and at last there is an ending. Does it need a third book? Definitely not. Leave well enough alone. It's perfect as it is.
I would like to thank #LGDavis, #Netgalley and #Bookouture for an ARC of #TheNannysChild in exchange for an honest review.
MEET THE AUTHOR:
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She now lives in Vienna, Austria, with her husband and two children.
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