My Lovely Wife was a good, entertaining read that provided something a bit different that your typical domestic thriller. Dark, twisty and gripping.
Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for a copy of this ebook in exchange for my honest review.

One of the many attractions of this book is the unusual story line. Murder with a difference ! It is a tale of what should be a happy family but the parents are complicit in serial murders. Who will take the blame? It is a story of manipulation,deceit and love. It is very well written and keeps the reader wondering how it will end. What more could you want?

In 'My Lovely Wife', Millicent has designed her life just how she wants it. Nice house. Good job. Two kids. And a husband, she has been able to manipulate throughout their fifteen years of marriage- even to the point of sharing the same delightful hobby.

Murder.

Now, deaf 'Tobias' as he's known to a few select and unlucky few, (when he is scouting around for their next victim), is beginning to see how what they do is starting to affect their own kids. His daughter is scared of this 'serial killer' in their home town, and his son is learning to be as manipulative as his mother. But this is nowhere near his biggest issue.

Of course, 'Tobias' the husband is no saint, but he's been so well-trained in the art of doing what his wife Millicent tells him, he just gets on with his part of the job of victim selection, and let's her do the rest. This his how they get their kicks. He's never even questioned it.

Until the last woman they drugged, kidnapped and Millicent 'took care of' turns up dead in an abandoned building. She'd kept her alive for over a year and never even told him. What was Millicent doing with her all this time? Why didn't she keep him updated? After all, they were partners in crime, weren't they?

This is a creepy book about a couple with some very strange habits. On the outside they look like the average family, but together, in private they hold secrets that they'll take to the grave. At least hope to. But when murder becomes a dangerous game for life, and not everyone is playing by the rules, things are not always as black and white. And that, dear reader, is the deadly sting in this tale, which will have you reading until the sun comes up the next morning and the truth is revealed.

I couldn't read this fast enough! What a thrilling book this turned out to be!

Oh my goodness - what a book! Dark and twisted, it follows an ordinary married couple. Or so you think. He's a tennis coach, she works in real estate. What they both share is a twisted secret. One that starts to spiral out of control and threatens everything they hold dear, including the wellbeing of their children.

I'm really trying not to give away any spoilers but it's so hard with the biggest shock being delivered in the opening chapters. C.J. Tudor described it as "Dexter meets Gone Girl" and I couldn't agree more. Especially as the book starts to draw to a close and the twists start coming thick and fast! The only drawback of this one was the middle which starts to lose pace but it opens strong and ends even stronger.

If you think thrillers are getting predictable then this is the book for you!!

WOW! Brilliant book, completely different to any other crime/thriller I’ve read before.

Fast paced, believable characters and a fantastic story. I was hooked and couldn’t put this down.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the ARC in return for an honest and unbiased opinion.

An intriguing debut which gripped from the outset. Narrated by ‘Tobias’, an alias used by the husband of Millicent, makes the events more personal. I had given up on psychological thrillers as they had become rather similar, but this book has reversed my opinion.
My only observation was that the middle section had a slight lack of pace, but the twisted finale made up for this.

An unusual but very good take on a familiar theme. The story is told from the point of view of the husband and a complice of a serial killer and focuses on the impact on the family. I enjoyed it , any violence was implied rather than described which was very effective.

I was totally gripped by this from the start - or at least from the devastatingly smooth early reveal that we are dealing with an unusual killer couple here! I honestly don't think I can recall being so emotionally invested in a murderer, largely because one of the murderers is much, much more ...murdery...than the other. You have to pick one to root for, right? My Lovely Wife is a tricksy, twisty, tongue in cheek crime thriller with lots of tension, a rattling pace and an intriguing moral core. For us, presumably, not them. Would happily read more by Samantha Downing:)

#MyLovelyWife #NetGalley This debut novel started well and ended well but lost the pace somewhat during the middle. An interesting plot but I felt I couldn't really connect with the two main characters - Millicent and her husband and it didn't help that we never learned the husbands name only his alias. The ending was certainly gripping and had me on the edge of my seat with a final twist that left you guessing - this certainly earned another star from me but overall not the best thriller.

Millicent and her husband have been married for fifteen years and have two children. They appear to have a normal family life, however they get bored in their marriage so every now and again they spice it up to keep it interesting.

I’m not going to say anything else about the story because I don’t want to spoil it. I will say that the book was fantastic, It is written brilliantly and the characters were developed well. You don’t want to like the characters but you can’t help getting attached to them.

It is a brilliant debut novel and I honestly can’t wait to read more by this Author.
Thank you to Netgalley and Penguin UK for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review.

I loved the novel. From the moment I started reading, I was gripped by a sense of foreboding, and from that moment on, I couldn’t put the book down.

I’m not going to say too much about the story line as I don’t want to give spoilers and thereby ruin the moment when the reader learns something new, something that takes him or her by surprise.

The novel is written from the husband’s point of view. He tells the reader that he uses the name Tobias, but that Tobias isn’t his real name. He never reveals his real name, and the reader never finds out what it is, but you are inside his head at all times and know exactly what he’s thinking. ‘Tobias’ is a tennis instructor at an upmarket club, who adores his lovely red-headed wife, Millicent, and consciously tries to please her by what he does.

Millicent, who is an estate agent, encourages him, and each seems to know what the other wants without the other saying anything. The reader doesn’t know in quite such detail what Millicent is thinking as we don’t go inside her head. We know about her only what ‘Tobias’ knows.

They have two children, Rory and Jenna. Jenna, particularly, is susceptible to what happens in their community, whereas Rory is more rebellious.

On the face of it, this is a perfectly ordinary couple, comfortably off, but not excessively so, and working hard to secure the best for their children. But that’s only on the face of it.

Beneath the surface, ‘Tobias’ and Millicent harbour a terrible secret, both a secret they share and an extra one that they keep to themselves, and their secrets form the body of the story told in the novel. Inevitably, the secrets are revealed and lead to a really exciting, highly dramatic climax, after which the family will never be the same again.

This is a dark story, which captures the reader from the first page and doesn’t let go. It is full of surprises, and at the end, there’s still a final twist. When you’ve finished the book, you may find yourself looking at your apparently normal neighbours and wondering.

Anyone who enjoys psychological suspense novels, such as ‘Gone Girl’, will love this. I did – it’s a real page-turner!

My thanks go to NetGalley and the publisher for advance copy of the novel.

Thanks to Penguin Random House for inviting me to read this book in exchange for an honest review.


I was extremely excited when I got the email to invite me to read this book as a few days prior I had chosen this book to buy my friend for her March New Release book. I had read the synopsis but hadn't really heard much about the book, but it definitely sounded good.
This is a really easy book to read which is quite hard to put down. To begin with I enjoyed the book but didn't love it, I couldn't understand why we weren't being told more details about the murders. And then the twist came.
This is a very good debut which I would definitely recommend for lovers of the thriller genre.

This was rather a silly and pointless story. A marriage not made in heaven. Was he evil or her, who was the killer.
By the time I finished this book could not have cared less.
I did finish it, but should not have bothered.
Sorry but it was a big no.

A suburban couple with two teenage children hold a dark secret, but the worst is getting come.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, despite the fact that, as others have said, it begins fast giving away much of the plot, then slows down. I also didn't think it was full of twists either.

Some is quite unbelievable, (for anyone who has studied psychology who will know it's very rare for a female like Millicent to be true. ). The story still kept me engaged and wanting to find out what happened

So here's another suburban thriller where are a nice family isn't all that it seems. First of all, let's move away from any and all comparisons to Mr and Mrs Smith because the characters aren't spies, they're serial killers. And this is all pretty much revealed in the first chapter, which grossly overestimates how fast-paced the rest of the book is. I started off thinking this would be the kind of thing that I would power through in a couple of days, but alas it was not quite able to live up to the hype that it starts off with.

Millicent and her husband are almost a picture perfect family, with their great big house in a gated community, their two children and a very dirty little secret: they enjoy killing together. They pick their victims together, the plan what's going to happen and then she murders them. It's a way to keep the spark in their marriage alive, until things start to unravel. Between their daughter Jenna's breakdown and their son Rory's own secrets, how much longer can Millicent and her husband keep at this before they're caught? Because surely, surely they'll be caught sooner rather than later, right?

I will give Downing this: the first chapter is insanely fast-paced and I was seriously waiting with bated breath to see what would happen next. But after that ridiculous setup, we find ourselves in a position where the plot slows right the way down and instead we're treated to a lot of domestic scenes, a subplot about the narrator's friends and tennis lessons (we never do actually learn his name and everything is told through a first person narrative, so some of the tension in the book is diminished because there's just no way Downing is going to kill her narrator, is there?) until the plot picks back up again. My major issue with the book is that I couldn't really connect with any of the characters and even if ultimately both Millicent and her husband are pretty bad individuals (like seriously, say what you will about her, but he wasn't exactly dragged along in this against his will or anything), I still wanted to feel something for them.

On the one hand, the narrator doesn't really elicit enough sympathy to be fully believable as a victim of his wife's devious machinations. On the other hand, we see so little of Millicent as a person (and we're never treated to her direct thoughts) that it's impossible to actually feel like she could be an actual human being. Her interactions with secondary characters feel forced, at best (the scene in the restaurant with Rory's girlfriend's parents is a good example) and in the last third of the book she becomes even more of an aloof, almost emotionless individual. In the climax, it's like Downing completely undoes that image of a cool, collected and obsessive to a fault psychopath for the facile murderous rage. From such a promising build up, she really fails to stick the landing.

The epilogue itself, though it ends on a tantalising note, just feels like it ties up all the loose ends and also it feels a lot like Downing wrote herself into a sticky corner and couldn't write herself back out, which is a shame because I feel I ended up knocking off a whole star for that alone.

Would I recommend My Lovely Wife? Yes and no. It's fast paced, it's pretty damn brutal, none of the characters are really likeable but ultimately Downing just doesn't stick the landing for me.

Brilliant, a proper twister with a superb story. It certainly kept me guessing throughout, I really enjoyed the style of writing, easy to read, and although macabre in places, it had a sight fun element to it. A satisfying read.

Millicent and her husband live with their two children Rory and Jenna. The couple are both succesful and live quite comfortable. They do have a dark secret however, they have a very strange and morbid hobby.

I really enjoy a husband and wife thriller and to say too much would give the whole plot away. What I will say is to go into this book blind and enjoy the surprises.

The story is told from the point of view of the husband, who the reader never gets his name. Both the husband or the wife Millicent are not nice character's at all and even more unlikeable as the story progresses. At one point in the story the author had me feeling for the husband and being on his side, but then I remember that he is as bad as the wife.

This book is fun to read. It does make you want to know what is going to happen next and how it will end. I was certainly invested from the beginning. The story does have twists and turns thrown in for good measure.

I quite enjoyed this one and thank you to the publisher via Netgalley for the opportunity to read and review the book.

Thank you to Penguin UK - Michael Joseph for the invitation to read an arc of this book. All opinions are honest and my own.

The premise of this story sounded really interesting, but the first 80% of this book was not executed very well. The narration left a lot to be desired: it droned on, the time jumps were scattered and lacked any clear direction, and I didn’t feel any real connection to the characters. I have read previous books where the antagonist is the villain, but this one just didn’t have the same feel to those. I almost DNF’d it multiple times, but pushed on to try and complete it.

Glad I did, because then I got to the final 20% and it skyrocketed. Suddenly it was face-paced, interesting and all within the current timeframe. It culminated in a suspenseful climax which is what got it an additional star.

All in all, it’s an okay story, but it fell far below my initial expectations.

When I started My Lovely Wife I was fascinated but somehow I wondered if I would finish this book. It isn't the sort of thing I usually read. But boy, this was a great read and a fantastic debut. An apparently normal suburban couple with an outwardly successful family, nothing is as it seems. Very clever, gripping and rather nasty, this is a page turner. Highly recommended.. @smariedowning @BerkleyPub
Thank you #NetGalley for the chance to read and review this.

The narrator is one half of a very disturbing couple. Outwardly they are ordinary folk, striving to bring up their kids and working hard. The truth is infinitely more dark and twisted- this couple are definitely not run-of-the-mill and we should all be grateful for that.
The story gradually peels away the layers that reveal the transgressions that each of them has made in their relationship along the way, the basest lie at the root of their marriage, and ultimately the unleashed desire for revenge which brings their marriage and family life crashing down and leaves one of them facing a crucifying price to pay for having trusted the other.
The tale is loaded with characters who I struggled to feel any empathy for, and a darkness that is hard to shake off. I don’t read this kind of book often, and this reminded me why. It is, however, a good example of its genre...chilling but, alas for me, soul destroying. The ending? ... aargh, horrifying!!
Thanks to Penguin UK Michael Joseph and NetGalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
#MyLovelyWife #NetGalley