A new dark, twisty psychological suspense by bestselling author Caroline England, author of Betray Her and My Husband's Lies.
Katy Henry is lost and lonely. A single mother, plagued by fatigue and anxiety, she rarely has time for friends. But when she encounters Sibeal Matthews, all this changes. Sibeal is everything that Katy is not: assured, headstrong and charming.
Katy soon finds herself pulled out of her isolation into a fierce friendship. But Sibeal is not all that she seems. Tragedy haunts her, and for all her feistiness, she is startlingly dependent on her brother, Gabriel. And when her life begins to spectacularly unravel, Katy is swept up in the storm.
As Katy fights to protect herself and her son, it's not just Sibeal who threatens to endanger them - Katy's own past starts to rupture. Who can Katy trust? Can she even trust herself?
It's such a pleasure to be hosting the blog tour for The Stranger Beside Me today. Many thanks to Caroline England for inviting me and for sending me an advance copy of the novel. Why not watch this short trailer before reading my thoughts.
Caroline England consistently writes such intimate portraits of people's lives in her psychological suspense novels, and The Stranger Beside Me is another skilfully-crafted emotional mystery which follows a group of characters, gradually peeling back the layers of secrets and lies until the terrible truth is finally revealed.
Loss and grief underpins much of what takes place in The Stranger Beside Me; Sibeal – she adopted the phonetic pronunciation at eleven rather than the Irish form – is mourning the recent death of her lover, Robin before suffering a second blow when her father, James passes away after a long illness, leaving just her and her brother, Gabriel. Meanwhile Katy is only just beginning to recover from the psychological and physical consequences of her own sudden loss, five years ago. When she agrees to attend James' funeral with her father, Alexander, she is immediately drawn to the uninhibited, impetuous Sibeal and the pair quickly strike up a friendship. At first, it's perhaps difficult to understand why Katy would choose somebody as patently damaged as Sibeal to be her friend. She drinks far too much and is evidently still dangerously infatuated with Robin and his family. However, tragedy unites them and when Gabriel needs to escape from his sister's crushing neediness, Katy becomes a willing shoulder to cry on.
The tentative steps Katy begins to make to reclaim the life which has been on hold for years, include opening herself up to love once again. She is a single mother to her son, Milo and hasn't been able to be in a relationship since she discovered she was pregnant but her health appears to be improving, although she still relies on her father, Alexander's near-constant presence in her life. As Katy seems to grow stronger, so Sibeal's problematic behaviour worsens but this cleverly structured novel is fiendishly unsettling and even as it appears that at least one person may find happiness, little hints of darkness are dripped into the narrative. This is a slow-burning, character-led novel which subtly reveals and conceals aspects of all their lives.
The Stranger Beside Me is intriguingly opaque until the end of the book but it's also an insightful exploration of the need to belong. The similarities and contrasts between Sibeal and Katy are especially compelling and it's their relationship which really drives the storyline. Katy is the more obviously likeable character but Sibeal's pain is so beautifully expressed as the novel progresses, I found it impossible not to be moved by her anguish. The men in the book are important too, particularly thanks to their respective secrets and as Katy finds herself in one distressing situation after another, I genuinely had no idea who I could trust. This is psychological suspense, so of course there are the inevitable twists and turns – I'm often able to spot the clues before the eventual reveal but not so with The Stranger Beside Me and there are some jaw-dropping surprises which made perfect sense after I'd recovered from the shock!
The Stranger Beside Me is a dark tale of love, grief and obsession; perceptive, empathetic and gripping from start to finish, I highly recommend it!
The Stranger Beside Me is published by Piatkus Books, purchasing links can be found here.
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