I am a big Elly Griffiths fan, and love her Ruth Galloway series, so I was intrigued to try a book with different characters in it. The Stranger Diaries definitely feels like a different read, but it was just as entertaining and absorbing as her other novels, and the characters - which Elly Griffiths is always so great at shaping - read like real people I could, on the whole, imagine actually existing.

The plot is interesting and kept me intrigued; at some points it required some suspension of disbelief (definitely less believable than her Ruth Galloway series - sorry to keep comparing but, hey, I love those books) but it is a fun and engaging story, and has some enjoyable twists and turns. I have to say that Harbinder, the DS, shone in this novel - she's very confident, knows her own mind and rubs people up the wrong way, but she's a unique and interesting character who added something fresh to the story. I did like Clare but felt at times she was a little annoying/ snobby - I really couldn't identify with some of her opinions - however Georgie, though a predictably stuck up/ whiny teenager some of the time, seemed likeable and overall a sweet girl.

This is a well-written story and a good start to a new series, if that is what it will become (I'd read more of DS Kaur for sure) but it doesn't *quite* measure up to the brilliance of Elly Griffith's Ruth Galloway series. Definitely well worth a read, though

I found this to be a very clever, dark and compelling mystery and, being my first read from this author, I'm now eager to go back and read more from Elly Griffiths as I found her way of storytelling really enjoyable!

As a diary writer myself, the fact that Clare finds extra messages written in her diary after the murder of her close friend, Ella, made for creepy reading and set the tone as the hunt for this killer picked up the pace and could be one of many! I liked the way the different points of view - Clare, the detective Harbinder Kaur, and Clares' daughter Georgia - really helped the story develop with the different personalities and backgrounds.

With Clare teaching English and featuring the ghost stories of R.M Holland, whom she is also researching, that also added an extra creepy element to the story. Tales of the building being haunted had been told for many years, and you really felt the edginess when Clare or others were alone in the building and wondering what they might hear or see next.

When the body count increases that is when the tension and pace picks up quite considerably and once the pieces start falling into place it isn't too long before the killer is identified - if only I'd picked up on the clues earlier!

The perfect autumn/winter read to keep you thrilled and chilled!

Clare Cassidy has always written a diary. As an English teacher with a fascination with Gothic writer R.M. Holland she hopes to write a book about him one day. His stories form part of her curriculum for a creative writing class & she teaches in a school where the old part actually contains his study, more or less as he left it.

When Ella,her friend & colleague, is murdered she is shocked but the discovery of the words of R.M.Holland "Hell is empty" in her diary. It is not her writing! DS Kaur is very suspicious when she finds out about this- the same words were found on Ella's body.

When another member of the English staff's body is found, Clare becomes increasingly worried about the safety of herself & Georgie, her daughter. Will they be next.

Told from the perspective of Clare, Georgie & Harbinder Kaur this book does not flag for a moment, It was a terrific atmospheric read that keeps you guessing. Thanks to Netgalley & the publisher for this great five star read.

Not really my type of story book.This is a crime thriller with lots of characters ,some really unbelievable.
I will be looking out for the next Ruth Galloway story something to really enjoy!!!

The Stranger Diaries is an excellent murder mystery. The characters are well drawn and relationships are believable. I particularly enjoyed the ongoing ghost story interspersed with the main storyline. This is an interesting and successful strategy. I also like how the chapters are designed to allow each of the main characters to tell the story from their own view point.

It took me until 85% through to make a guess as to who was responsible which is always a good test of how well plotted a mystery is. I definitely recommend this one and would love to read more like it.

I enjoyed this book; it was the first Griffiths I'd read, and I purchased others by her afterwards as a consequence. I didn't see the twist coming, and found the book pacey and compulsive.

DS Harbinder Kaur investigates when a teacher (Ella) is found murdered at home. Her colleague and friend (or maybe frenemy), Claire Cassidy, seems to be hiding something, and she comes under more suspicion when she finds writing that isn't hers in her diary. Is there a link to RM Holland, a writer whose short story "The Stranger", is one of Claire's topics in the literature class she teaches?

Told from the viewpoints of three characters; Claire, Claire's teenage daughter Georgia, and DS Harbinder Kaur, I'm not always a fan of multiple viewpoints but this worked quite well. The story was well written and I liked the fact that it kept me guessing who the killer was and I was actually wrong in my final guess - something that doesn't happen very often. I didn't like Harbinder's attitude towards Claire - suspecting her and being quite judgmental about her mainly because she is an attractive woman. Both Harbinder and her boss refer to Claire as a "cold fish". Go the sisterhood! So, that irritated me a bit but it was still a 3.5 star read.

Thanks to NetGalley and publishers, Quercus Books, for the opportunity to review an ARC.

I tried very hard to get into this book, even going back to the start twice. I could not get into it all. So sorry. I have no doubt other readers will like it and this is purely my opinion. It does not mean it is a bad book

Fantastic read. My first book by this author, will be reading more that is for sure. Found the story gripping and kept me guessing all the way through.

A book with great atmosphere and tension. Will read others by Elly Griffiths as not a author I have read before.

Das Buch beginnt mit einem rätselhaften Fremden auf langer nächtlicher Fahrt in einer Kutsche, der damit beginnt seinem Mitreisenden eine gruselige Geschichte zu erzählen, die in seiner Jugend zur Halloween-Zeit spielt. Es handelt sich um die Kurzgeschichte, die die Protagonistin Clare gerade mit ihrem kreativen Schreibkurs diskutiert. Sie ist Englischlehrerin und gibt in den Ferien zusätzlich auf Talgarth High diese Kurse für Erwachsene. Der Autor der Erzählung lebte bis 1902 selbst in einem Teil der Schulgebäude und Clare arbeitet nebenher mehr oder weniger erfolgreich an einem Buch über Holland. Im Umfeld gehen Gerüchte über einen weiblichen Geist um. Es soll die unter mysteriösen Umständen verstorbene Frau des Schriftstellers sein.

Kurz vor Halloween wird Clare dann von ihrem Bereichsleiter Rick Lewis mit der Nachricht schockiert, dass ihre Kollegin und Freundin Ella in ihrem Haus erstochen wurde. Bei der Leiche wurde ein Zettel mit einem Zitat gefunden.

Vor fünf Jahren haben sie beide gleichzeitig dort als Lehrerinnen gestartet. Clare frisch geschieden, Mutter der heute 15-jährigen Georgina, auf der Sucher nach einer Veränderung und einem Neuanfang. Ella musste sich nach einer Affäre mit ihrem früheren Direktor auch ein neues Leben aufbauen. Trotz des schockierenden Todesfalls müssen das Leben und die Schulstunden weitergehen, besonders für die Jugendlichen kurz vor der Abschlussprüfung. Die Polizei beginnt mit der Befragung der Freunde und Bekannten...

Man ist direkt in der Geschichte drin, es wird sofort spannend. Clare ist einem schnell sympathisch, verhält sich aber teilweise etwas naiv. Die Geschichte enthält vielen Anspielungen auf klassische Bücher, Gedichte und geschichtliche Ereignisse. Der erste Teil des Buches endet in einem Paukenschlag und einem gruseligen Cliffhanger.

Die Perspektiven wechseln zwischen Clare, ihrer Tochter Georgina und der ermittelnden DS Harbinder Kaur. Das bringt zusätzliche Spannung und Einblicke in die Charaktere und die Ereignisse. Auch wenn ein Teil der Ereignisse dadurch erneut erzählt wird, was mich immer etwas unruhig und ungeduldig macht. Kaur ist eine interessante Figur mit Ecken und Kanten. Dieser Roman enthält auf mehrfache weise Buch-in-Buch Geschichten, die ich besonders mag.

Gegen Ende überschlagen sich die Ereignisse fast, den Täter kann man vielleicht kurz vor Schluss erraten, wie auch DS Kaur. Das präsentierte Motiv fand ich etwas schwach. Im Epilog kehren wir zu dem Fremden vom Anfang des Buches zurück und die Kurzgeschichte von Holland endet dann mit einem überraschenden Abschluss.

Für mich hätte das Buch ruhig noch etwas schauriger angelegt sein können. Trotzdem war es ein großes Lesevergnügen.

I love all the Ruth Galloway books due to the characters and excellent plot lines so I was excited to receive this stand alone novel to review via NetGalley.
There were many aspects of the book which I liked. The Detective Harbinder Kaur was a great character, well described with a fabulous sense of humour and I’m sure that she would make a great protagonist in future novels should the author decide to pursue this line.
I must admit the ghostly side of it was not my thing and I did skip some of the sections in italics which were from the gothic novel Clare was researching.
The storyline was interesting: Clare is an English teacher in the local south coast school and when one of her colleagues and friends, Ella, is murdered, she and her teenage daughter Georgie are cast into a frightening situation. This intensifies when she discovers someone has been writing in her diary and it could well be the killer! There are a number of suspects and the book proceeds to throw each of them in the spotlight in order to put the reader off the scent.
I did not find this book quite as compelling as the Ruth Galloway books but it was an enjoyable read and I’m sure it will do very well.

Enjoyed the approach used by the author to reveal the storyline using different characters viewpoints. I found this kept the story moving along and retained freshness and provided insight into the various impacts on the differing characters. As with all good crime novels, the real villain of the piece had been considered and dismissed so was a surprise at the end. Would read other novels from this author.

Thanks Netgalley and the Publisher. One of my favourite authors. This was a different sort of novel set in the Sussex Coast and I absolutely loved it.

A cosy gothic read, The Stranger Diaries has something for everyone: a murder, many possible suspects, a sarcastic detective, a teacher (who may know more than she lets on), a historical short story and mystery, teens (who may not know as much as they think) and Herbert (the adorable fluffy, white dog). He's a proper star!

I loved Georgie best of all characters. She was such a refreshing teen being mature beyond her years and full of passion for writing. Having a mother who is a literature teacher you would expect her to share but she keeps it private. Harbinder, the investigating detective is my next favorite as she is so unvarnished and doesn't suffer fools lightly. These two characters are similar in a lot of ways but thoroughly different too.

I enjoyed the meat of the murder story and the misdirection. The murder victim was a teacher who was a close friend of Georgie's mum, Clare. The impact of her death ripples wide as students, fellow teachers and even the school head add to the drama. The interweaving of current day story line with snippets of The Stranger, a short story that has high influence over the school and those who go there, is well done and piques your interest. All in all this is a well done novel that ended on a nice twist. I must go back and look up more books by the talented Elly Griffiths.

This is an unusual murder mystery because of its lterary theme, which makes a refreshing change. I liked the main characters and I was pleased that the police were pictured as competent and efficient for a change. The plot was well-paced, although I was not convinced when the true perpetrator was revealed, and felt a little let down by this. The epilogue made a satisfying conclusion to a well-written book.

“Hell is empty!”

Clare Cassidy is writing a biography of the writer RM Holland, who was best known for his terrifying ghost story, The Stranger. So she’s happy to be teaching at Talgarth Academy, a school in Sussex which was once Holland’s home and where his study is still intact, giving Clare access to his papers. Clare uses The Stranger as part of her lessons, both for her school pupils and for the adults who attend her creative writing classes in school holidays. But when one of her colleagues is brutally murdered, Clare is shocked to learn that a piece of paper was found by her body containing a line from Holland’s story. And soon, as the plot thickens, it becomes clear that somehow the story holds the clue to the case...

Elly Griffiths is brilliant, and so is this! I’m tempted to leave the review at that, since the real joy of the book is going into it completely cold and watching Griffiths gradually build up some great characterisations and a truly spooky atmosphere. So, if you’re going to read it soon, my advice would be to stop reading this and avoid other reviews just in case.

* * * * *

Still here? The book is told to us from three points of view – Clare, her daughter Georgie, and DS Harbinder Kaur, the detective in charge of the case. I found each of them a little off-putting at first for different reasons, but as Griffiths gradually developed them more fully, I grew to like them all – though not necessarily to trust them! In fact, as the saying goes, I trusted no-one – Griffiths left me happily in doubt all the way through as to everyone’s guilt, innocence, reliability as narrators, motives.

The pleasure of this one is not so much the destination as the journey. The three voices are distinct, and each is fun in her own way. Through Clare we learn a lot about the background to RM Holland’s story and the rumours that the school is haunted by the ghost of his wife. We also learn about her friendship with Ella, the victim, often through extracts from Clare’s diary. Georgie is a bright, intelligent teenager and her narrative shows her manipulating the adults around her by playing on their expectations of what a teenager should be like. Harbinder gradually becomes the star, however. Indian, gay and still living at home with her parents in her thirties, her sections are increasingly full of humour as the reader realises that her abrasiveness and sarcasm are really a kind of defence mechanism.

I loved the way Griffiths gradually fed us the story of The Stranger, which in itself is a pretty good pastiche of a real Victorian ghost story. But the spookiness doesn’t stop with it – the main story has some seriously goose-pimply moments, and at least two where I gasped out loud! Lovely Gothic stuff, with the old house and all the diary-writing and mysterious messages and other things I’ll leave you to discover for yourself. Even the investigation has a rather old-fashioned feel to it, with the emphasis on suspects, motives and clues rather than on forensics.

A great read, especially for this time of year. Griffiths is undoubtedly one of the most talented (and prolific) writers out there at the moment, and she shows here that she can step beyond the usual police procedural. I’ve seen a few reviewers say they hope Harbinder will get a series of her own. Much though I enjoyed her character, I vote no! I’m hoping Griffiths will continue to break free from the predictability of series and give us more standalones, complete in themselves, instead. Highly recommended!

A creepy Gothic tale, The Stranger, is the backdrop to this standalone novel by Elly Griffiths who is perhaps best known for her Norfolk based Ruth Galloway series of which I am an avid fan. The Stranger Diaries instantly immersed me with its well drawn characters from teacher Clare Cassidy and her daughter Georgie to the somewhat atypical DS Harbinder Kaur. The secondary school setting is well evoked in Talgarth High and this is also where the author of The Stranger R M Holland lived his reclusive life. These two stories become inextricably entwined with devastating effects and kept me guessing till the very end. I found this a very easy read that was both tense and creepy. Thanks to Quercus for an e-copy of this book.

I was really looking forward to The Stranger Diaries, a standalone novel by Elly Griffiths. I've heard only good things about the author but haven't yet managed to read any of her acclaimed Dr Ruth Galloway or Stephens and Mephisto series despite having a couple on my bookshelves (I promise to read them soon).

The Stranger Diaries introduces schoolteacher Clare, who is writing a book about Gothic author RM Holland. Her life begins to imitate fiction when a colleague is brutally murdered and a line from one of RM Holland's short stories is found beside the body.

When Clare writes about the tragedy in her private diary, she's shocked to find someone else has written in there too. Not recognising the handwriting, she realisies the murderer must be someone close to her. Detective Sergeant Harbinder Kaur believes Clare's family is now in imminent danger.

This book grabbed me from the get-go with its creepy Gothic undertones. I loved the contemporary setting with references to the past through RM Holland's storytelling. I thought the plot was highly original, with plenty of threads adding to the excitement. It's told from multiple viewpoints, which isn't something I'm overly fond of, but in this case I thought it worked well.

It was an enjoyable, if somewhat implausible, read. Startling errors by the police - their lack of basic research - seemed to prolong the investigation for the sake of the story. I really hope they're a little more thorough in real life!

Overall, it was entertaining and very well written. Yes, I did guess who the murderer was quite early on (I've been watching too many episodes of Vera on television) but the motive had me completely baffled.

My thanks to Elly Griffiths, Quercus Books and NetGalley for providing a review copy of this book.

<blockquote>‘Diaries don’t tell you what people think. Just what they think they think.' [loc. 2556]</blockquote>

I've been reading and enjoying Griffiths' Ruth Galloway books (most recently <a href="http://tamaranth.blogspot.com/2018/09/201859-chalk-pit-elly-griffiths.html"><i>The Chalk Pit</i></a>) for years, so was keen to read this standalone novel, set in West Sussex rather than North Norfolk: thanks to NetGalley for the review copy of <i>The Stranger Diaries</i>, in exchange for this honest review!

<i>The Stranger Diaries</i> is a Gothic thriller with three first-person narrators: schoolteacher Clare, whose friend Ella has been found dead; Detective Sergeant Harbinder Kaur, who (together with her partner DS Neil Winston) is investigating Ella's death; and Georgia, Clare's teenage daughter, who has quite a few secrets of her own, and doesn't share them <u>all</u> on social media.

Clare Cassidy is a divorcee who's moved to Sussex to start a new life with her daughter Georgia. Clare teaches English and creative writing at Talgarth High, formerly the home of Victorian ghost-story writer R. M. Holland, a figure who has fascinated Clare since she read his short story 'The Stranger' in her teens. She's working on a book about Holland, and wondering whether the school is really haunted by the ghost of his wife -- or his daughter, if she even existed -- when her comfortable life is interrupted by the death of her friend and colleague Ella. Someone (the killer?) had left a note by Ella's body: 'Hell is empty': not just a quotation from <i>The Tempest</i>, but also a line from Holland's 'The Stranger'. And then Clare begins to find notes in her private diary, in a handwriting she doesn't recognise...

This is a well-paced and twisty murder mystery with a feast of red herrings. The male characters are, on the whole, unsympathetic: Clare's ex-husband Simon is brusque and unreliable, Georgia's friend Patrick prone to dramatics, DS Winston ineffectual, Clare's head of department Rick an unscrupulous adulterer. In contrast, the female narrators have distinctive voices and intriguingly varied perspectives on the situation.

And there are diaries throughout: R. M. Holland's diary, much studied by Clare; the diaries that Clare keeps ('like the heroine of a nineteenth-century novel', says Harbinder disparagingly); Georgia's carefully-polished entries on the site MySecretDiary. ('I can’t imagine how it must feel to write your diary by hand, knowing that you only have one chance to express yourself, that the ink is on the paper for ever,' she muses.) The thing with diaries, of course, is that you can never be entirely sure that nobody else is reading them. Or that you've told the truth to yourself.

There were a couple of points, especially regarding standard police practice, where my sense of disbelief fell flat: but on the whole <i>The Stranger Diaries</i> is an excellent read, full of autumnal atmosphere and hints of the supernatural, and threading the text of R. M. Holland's (imaginary) story 'The Stranger' through the gathering menace of the contemporary plot.