I highly recommend this book. It had me on the edge of my seat and I was desperate to know what was going to happen.
It is beautifully written and I was totally there, in Province, during a heatwave. The author certainly knows how to build tension, create an atmosphere, and develop a main character we can relate to.
Sylvie is French but has lived in London for over ten years. She returns to her family home in France with her teenage daughter Emma following a small fire, and with the aim of selling the house. While there Sylvie has to confront her past and the loss of her first daughter Elodie.
Things are not entirely as they seem however and I was absolutely engrossed in the story.
I finished the book over a week ago and I haven’t stoped thinking about it.
It is a definite 5 stars from me, and I will be raving about this book to everyone I meet.
Thank you to the talented Kate Riordan, the publisher and #NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.

Kate Riordan really does write some gripping books. This one is no different and has an extra layer of creepiness and uneasiness which is always good in a novel.

Sylvie goes back to her family home in Provence which is now a crumbling mess. Fires have been destroying properties around the area and Sylvie's has also been affected. She has bittersweet memories of the house as this is the village where her first child Elodie died. Sylvie feels Elodie’s presence everywhere and even though she has come with youngest daughter Emma, she can not escape the tragedy of what happened.

She’s there to sell the house and to move on at last. This all happened ten years ago but Sylvie feels as if Elodie is still there with her. Haunting her. Well, someone is. Sylvie is troubled by dark recollections. We are taken back to that time and the human emotions attached to it and it’s a journey that you go on with the characters and end up finding out a very interesting state of affairs.

The setting really added to the story. A crumbling house in the middle of Provence? Dreamy. And the name of the house - La Reverie - itself alludes to that. However, the beauty of the area and the stunning landscape is meant to be so peaceful and far away from the world, then it’s even more effective when bad things happen. With such a small ‘cast’ of characters, the bonds between a mother and her daughters, it’s a study in what can go wrong and how fast life can go downhill.

Elodie is a very interesting character. Troubled and weird from the start. There are some important things for Sylvie to face up to and examine.

Welcome to Provence for a holiday stay you will not forget in a hurry!

The Heatwave by Kate Riordan has all of the elements that suggest a summer bestseller. Sylvie lives in London with her daughter Emma, a letter arrives informing her that she has to return to her family home in Provence. Sylvie finds herself confronting a dark and dangerous past which she had hoped to bury forever.

This psychological thriller has a dual narrative which moves fluidly between the past and present. A perfect summer read.

Elodie was smart and manipulative... and is now dead. Years later her mum Sylvie must go back to her family home in La Reverie and travels back with her daughter Emma. It soon becomes clear that something isn't right and the story leads us to find out what happened to Elodie all those years ago. A gripping read with twists and turns.

Scarily compelling! Kept me awake at night!
Elodie is a strange child and right from birth seemed to illicit fear in her mum Sylvie. Elodie is dead and no longer a danger to anyone but is she? The story twists and turns and in places I had to put it down for a few minutes to take a deep breath and read on, almost as if I was scared what I was going to read next.
Brilliantly written and totally addictive and I found myself thinking about Elodie long after I had finished the book.
Would definitely recommend - amazing!

The Heatwave is a gripping, well written psychological thriller that kept me interested right until the end. I can imagine that it would be a perfect summer read, given the page-turning nature and south of France setting of the novel, but even in miserable February I enjoyed it. Although the twists weren’t obvious (I didn’t really guess anything) they were mostly plausible, which isn’t always the case in this kind of book.

The Heatwave is the only book you need this summer.

Gripping, well paced and full of thrills. The characters are well written and realistic. A holiday must read!

The pacing and the tension in this book are spot on. It invites you to just keep on reading.
The mystery of Elodie and what exactly did happen to her,and to Emma unfolds over dual timelines,giving a drip feed of information leading right up.to the final chapter.
I sped through this book,sucked in by the idyllic French countryside,the sunshine,and the not so picture perfect story that went with it.
Good stuff.

An unusually written book set between 1965 and 1993. Emma and her mother return to the family home in France where her mother's memories are stirred and her other daughter. A gripping tale.

#TheHeatwave #NetGalley
Extraordinarily brilliant.
When Sylvie receives a letter calling her back to her crumbling family home in Provence, she knows she has to go. In the middle of a sweltering summer marked by unusual fires across the countryside, she returns to La Reverie with her youngest daughter Emma in tow.In every corner of the house, Sylvie can’t escape the spectre of Elodie, her first child. Elodie with the golden hair. Elodie, who knew exactly how to get what she wanted. Elodie, whose death the villagers still whisper about.
With her 14 year-old daughter Emma, Sylvie must return to France to sell her childhood home, La Reverie. She left ten years earlier after the death of her elder daughter.But when she returns, dark recollections begin to surface. Something - or someone - is haunting Sylvie .
This book is hell of a thriller. The writing and characterization are extraordinary.
Thanks to NetGalley and Penguin UK Michael Joseph for giving me an advance copy.