I picked this book initially because it was based in Edinburgh - a city I know really well. I was surprised at how much I enjoyed this thriller as it’s not my usual genre. I was pulled in straight away and kept engrossed by the twists and turns as Cat investigates the disappearance of her twin sister, El. You will. be hooked right up to the last page!

Anyone who reads this should know it's heavily laced with magical realism. I do enjoy a little magical realism, it was to the extent that I really struggled with the first 50% of the storyline. It did pick up and I'm glad I finished, as I really enjoyed the ending. While it was too fantastical for me, those that enjoy this type of book will find a story imbued with a large dose of atmosphere, fairy tales, and family drama.

At the root of the story is a woman returning home when her sister goes missing. While there, she begins to realize that her sister's husband, a man she had a relationship with when she was younger, is perhaps not the man she thought he was. She soon begins to question everything as the past and present converge and real life and fantasy become more confusing, and long-suppressed memories from the fantastical Mirrorland begin to emerge.

Wow!

From the start this book reeled me in! The prologue was eerie and quickly gripped my attention, I needed to know who these girls were and why they were out alone!

The story was fast paced, with suspense throughout, it held my attention. So much so I finished the book in a couple of sittings! A fabulous storyline, cleverly written and the characters were described well enough that you felt like you knew them.

The ending was amazing! I didn’t predict it at all although parts of it you could see coming as it was dramatically built up, despite cat’s denial!

Really enjoyable read! Thank you for the opportunity to read it :)

Utterly bewitching, this is a book that cast a spell on me and held me captive until the last page was turned.

Told from the point of view of Cat, who has returned from California to the house where she and her sister, El, grew up in, on hearing that her sister is missing. She is convinced that her sister is alive, particularly when she starts to find a series of clues hidden around the house. The clues provoke memories from the past, the time she spent in the dark faerie tale Mirrorland. This creates a wonderful atmosphere; are Cat's memories the result of an imagination fractured by guilt and grief, or did things happen the way she remembers them, the pirate characters and wicked villains conjured as the only way for her childhood psyche to make sense of the chaos and dysfunction in her life?

As the police continue their investigation and Cat follows the treasure hunt to its conclusion, it is clear that she is in very real danger. The slippery, uneasy feeling of the novel really ratchets up a notch and the tension became almost too much to bear.

The finale of the novel is amazing, the twist is both shocking and heartbreaking. This is a book that will stay in my mind for quite some time and I am looking forward to seeing what the author writes next.

My thanks go to the publishers and Net Galley for the advance copy in return for an honest review.

A weird, twisty, mind bendy thriller which focuses on the relationship between sisters and the idea that what we pretend can become real: our own creations can swallow us. This was not what I was expecting at all but it was so immersive and original that it completely captivated me. It’s a slow burn start and you do have to pry your way in. If you don’t like a touch of the fantastical in your thrillers, this may not be for you.

With thanks to HarperCollins UK, HarperFiction and Netgalley for the ARC.

Not really my cup of tea unfortunately.
Too much mysticism for me.
My fault for requesting it.

Apologies.

Cat hasn’t seen her identical twin sister for twelve years since she moved to America, and now she may never get to see her ever again. El had gone out on her boat, and now both her and boat were missing. After days of rescue teams out looking for her, she was presumed dead.


Unforgivable things had happened between the sisters, and now it was too late to be mended. Then Cat begins to find clues for her to follow. Is it El or someone that knows what happened to her? What is clear is that everything is becoming very sinister.

This is a story that requires your full attention when you are reading it as the past begins to crack and the world that twins lived in as children begins to emerge. El’s husband, their childhood friend, is there to support Cat as the Mirrorland world and the characters that had been deep in her memories becomes all too real for her again.


It is a creepy read with fuzzy images that I didn’t know if they were real or not. I love to read or listen to a book where it is silent as it adds to the intensity of the scenes that the author brings to life. The story is far more dark and disturbing than I thought it was going to be. It took over every thought that I had to become all-consuming. A fabulous story, one of those that is not over until it finishes with you!

I wish to thank NetGalley and the publisher for an e-copy of this book which I have reviewed honestly.

This book totally surprised me. Reflecting on it I actually think I enjoyed it more after reading it than whilst reading it - strange comment but once completed the complexity and the very clever weaving of the story all came together. For a lot of the book I was not quite sure what was happening - were we in an alternate childrens world, a figment of imagination? Gradually as the story untold the reality and the imagination became together and the unfolding of the troubled childhood of the twins became clear. I thought this was an excellent book and cannot recommend it too highly.

Mirrorland is such an incredible novel. I was completely invested in this story of two sisters, actually mirror (identical) twins and the world they invent at 36 Westeryk Road. The plot is really original, creative and clever. It is suffused with gothic fantasy, mystery, myth and folklore.

When El and Cat are children they invent their own world, Mirrorland, within the confines of their house. The detail is so intricate that the author provides a map. This is their playground where they act out stories of pirates and fairies. One night the girls are found outside the house in a harbour yard, cold and very scared.

Twelve years later, Cat, now living in the US is forced to return to her childhood home which is now owned by El and her husband Ross. El is missing, presumed dead and Ross is wanting to move on with his life. Cat does not believe that El is dead and when she starts to received mysterious and sometimes threatening emails she is even more convinced that El is alive.

The narrative is complex, claustrophobic and intense, as the reader you are never completely sure what is true and real and what is a lie and fantasy. The writing is so evocative and the tension is tangible. The analogies between the ‘real’ world and the ‘mirror’ world are so clever and bit by bit you begin to understand what happened to the girls and the way they coped; absolutely extraordinary.

The characters are unreliable and fascinating; you are never sure that you are on safe ground with them. They are very well drawn both as children and adults and entirely unpredictable. The supporting characters are equally intriguing.

This is quite simply an amazing read. It is complex, layered, challenging and ultimately so rewarding. The author has an astonishing imagination. I doubt I will read anything quite like it for some time to come.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Harper Collins for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Cat and El endure a horrific childhood in an Edinburgh house. To get through it, they invent an elaborate fantasy world.
Now in their thirties, they have been estranged for many years. Cat is informed that El has gone missing and is feared dead. Cat must return to the childhood home to separate fact from fiction and find out what happened to her sister.
It's a gripping psychological thriller. In childhood, sometimes things happen that are so horrible that you have to block them out. Can Cat remember enough to stay safe, and find out the truth?

I went into this thinking that there was a fantasy/magical realism angle by way of alice in wonderland so when I ended up with a psychological murder mystery I was disappointed but intrigued enough to keep reading. The winding narrative between reality and Mirrorland was well done and kept me second guessing everything that happened but ultimately, the book wasn't for me.

This one was a bit of a challenge for me. The concept sounded really interesting, but when I started reading it kept switching between present and past tense, which threw me off. This was because basically it's written in present tense (which I detest) but there are a lot of references to things that happened in the past.

I came close to DNF several times but the number of 5 star reviews kept me hoping I would eventually be able to get into it.

Twin sisters Cat and El grew up in an old house in Edinburgh and created their own imaginary world, Mirrorland, in a basement room. This will tie in with them being identical mirrored twins. Cat has been away for twelve years but when her sister goes missing, she returns to the family home. She insists that her sister is alive and that she would feel it if El was in pain or dead. The evidence suggests it may be wishful thinking.

The outcome was fairly predictable, though the reason for it was a surprise. I never did quite get caught up in the story though.

It is a widely accepted belief that young children live a large part of their life in a fantasy world. But where do they get the ideas and information that underpin that world? And what happens if fantasy and reality merge? These are deep questions and this excellent and hugely enjoyable book explores them.
El and Cat are mirror twins, brought up in secret in a large house by their mother and grandfather. They have no access to the outside world and no real concept of what it is like. Mother provides all of their education and reads to them constantly, largely from classic ranging from Treasure Island to the Shawshank Redemption. They are 12 when they escape, seeking a pirate ship to take them to their father; that’s when fantasy hits reality and where the book begins.
Twenty years later, Cat who has been estranged from her sister for many years and living in Venice Beach, Florida, returns to Leith, near Edinburgh, because El and her yacht, Redemption, have disappeared, presumed sunk in the North Sea. El is married to Ross, the “boy next door” and the only person outside the family to have entered the girl’s world. Bizarrely, they have bought and now live in the old house. Even stranger, when Cat arrives she discovers that the interior has been decorated and refurnished to resemble how it was when they were trapped in it. Everything except the old back door which led to Mirrorland, a covered over bricked in alleyway. When she enters there, it is exactly as it was when they left, areas designated as the bar, the boardwalk, and most importantly the sailing ship “Satisfaction” where all their adventures unfolded.
Through Cat’s memories we learn about their life for the first twelve years, where Mirrorland and the house are populated by a range of imaginary characters; The Witch, the Tooth Fairy, Bluebeard, Blackbeard, Annie, Mouse, the Clowns. And Ross, who can enter Mirrorland through a window in the garden shed that is too high for the girls to reach, and who becomes an integral part of Mirrorland. These recollections overlap with the investigation into El’s disappearance, stimulated by mysterious messages from El. But is Cat an unreliable witness, has she ever really escaped from Mirrorland?
This is a very complex novel, much more than just a psychological mystery or standard thriller. The pace is relentless and yet it all runs so smoothly that the reader can feel immersed in this unique world and feel part of the life that Cat led and is now living. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the final acts and resolutions are as complex and surprising as the world of Mirrorland itself.
I would like to thank NetGalley, the publishers and the author for providing me with a draft proof copy for the purpose of this review.

As you might have expect, there's a nice balance and symmetry of all the elements of Carole Johnstone's thriller Mirrorland, a balance between real life and fantasy, a balance between love and loss, and it's intriguing that this whole balance is maintained in the relationship between two twin sisters, Ellice and Catriona Morgan Nonetheless something has happened to knock all those elements out of balance, an event that took place 20 years ago, separating the sisters El and Cat on either side of the Atlantic. Even more serious, it's been reported that El has disappeared on a boat at sea, and putting aside their difficulties Cat goes back to Scotland to look for her sister, certain that despite the evidence, she is not dead.

As a twin, she's sure she would have felt something, but it's not just that. Someone is sending Cat emails and messages, clues that reveal things that only the twins would know about that set her on a kind of bizarre treasure hunt. El's distraught husband, Ross MacAuley however was also their childhood friend who shared their adventures in an imaginary world that they created for themselves, Mirrorland, but he couldn't know the things only Cat and El shared as twins. Could El's disappearance be tied into the fact that she and Ross are now living in El and Cat's old childhood home where those adventures played out. Cat finds this very strange indeed.

But it's no more strange than the conflicted messages she gets from Ross and from other friends who knew El suggesting that things were not well in the days leading up to her disappearance. Even more worrying however is the nature of the anonymous messages and clues she is receiving that can't be from anyone else but El. But why would her twin sister resort to obscure messages if she wants to communicate in secret with Cat, particularly as them seem to carry warnings? Could Cat's life also be under threat as the messages seem to suggest?

There are a lot of questions, or perhaps hurdles to credibility, that you have to get over in Carole Johnstone's novel. If El was in danger, why didn't she act on it in a more rational manner rather than apparently disappear at sea and set a treasure hunt with obscure clues? Cat’s response to her sister's disappearance is also baffling and makes little sense. Why does Cat ignore the warnings about Ross and share them with no-one else? Well, she still has feelings for Ross herself and finds herself drawn to him again against her better judgement (not that there's any sign anywhere of her acting on any good judgement). Perhaps it's being back in Mirrorland that makes her act the way she does but the romantic complications lack any credibility or sympathy you might have for Cat, Ross or El.

Since it's called Mirrorland however you can be sure that everything is not as it seems, and indeed there turns out to be a reason for some of Cat’s more irritating and baffling behaviour. It takes a long first half of a book before things pick up and we get some rationale for the mysteries of the MIrrorland fantasy worlds of the two girls. There probably aren’t too many surprises however, and you’ll find you might guess where it’s leading. Little of it is credible and worse, it feels like you've been cheated by a rather contrived situation and weak one-dimensional characterisation - particularly of men who all behave in the most unlikely manner - which rather spoils any sympathies or deeper attachment you might have for the characters and their predicament.

Mirrorland is a book full of dark mystery which is centred round the underground cellarage areas of a typical grey stone Edinburgh house. it is to this house, where she spent the first nine years of her life, that Cat returns on hearing the news that her twin sister El has gone missing. El and her husband Ross bought the old family home after they got married and Cat, who has lived in America for 12 years, finds returning to it anything but comfortable. She finds it revives memories of the cruel upbringing she and El experienced when they spent many hours playing imaginary games in the cellars - the only place they could escape the grim and dangerous world they otherwise experienced. As Cat explores rooms and cupboards she uncovers secrets that lead her to understand what has happened to El. There are no light moments in this book but, for those who like dark, true evil and suspense this is the book for you.

Catriona and Ellice are ‘mirror twins’ who spend an isolated childhood in an imposing Edinburgh stone house with their mother and grandfather. Fed on tales of Bluebeard and Blackbeard, the girls need to create a safe place through their own complex made-up world - a subterranean Mirrorland - where they can board an imaginary ship accompanied by invented characters and sail away to enjoy swashbuckling adventures.
Descriptions of their early lives are superbly evoked. The author, Carole Johnstone, gives us snapshots through a distorted lens – we feel discombobulated as if in a fairground mirror maze. We feel that awful things are happening but we don’t know what, other than that in the Prologue the twins are found at night down at the harbour in blood-soaked jumpers when ‘their second life began.’
It is this second, or perhaps third, life that we are immersed in from the outset of the novel. Cat, now thirty-one, lives in the States whilst El has married Ross, a former neighbour, and moved back into their childhood home. El is missing – a sailing accident is the most likely explanation – and Cat is reluctantly drawn back to Edinburgh staying, once more, in their strange childhood home. She tells the police, she in convinced that El is not dead, believing that she would somehow know if she were. This seems more and more likely when she begins to receive emails directing her to revisit parts of their fantasy world and seek out clues clearly left for her.
Johnstone’s story is not only an incredibly carefully structured mystery and a mesmerising tribute to the power of storytelling; it is also a superb exploration of childhood trauma and the ways in which it can influence the future. This is a beautifully written, fascinating and moving read, all the more impressive for being this author’s first novel.
My thanks to HarperCollins UK, Harper Fiction for a copy of this novel in exchange for a fair review.

Wow, just wow.

I usually find when a story is really dark and twisted, I do not enjoy being absorbed in this world and I have to admit that at 20% I was thinking it's too much for me as it's pretty intense. I am glad I persevered as the story developed, you understood the story more and the revelations continue to come to you.

It was such a gripping story with a very well thought out story arc throughout. I HAD to finish this last night at 1am.

Brilliant story and I am still thinking about it now!

Thank you to NetGalley & publisher for the opportunity to read this advanced copy in exchange for a honest review.

‘Mirrorland’ is a thriller like no other; it’s dark, twisty and nothing is as it seems.
The story follows twins El and Cat whose lives took place in an imposing house in Edinburgh but their world was created in a secret place called Mirrorland. They sailed the seas on a pirate ship and hid in disguise from the tooth fairy and they ran from the murderous Bluebeard.
Thirty years on and the sisters have become estranged but then word reaches Cat that El has gone missing. So Cat returns to their childhood home, now owned by El and her husband, but there are more secrets to be found within its walls as clues and threats begin turning up.
I really loved this thriller and loved its originality and brilliant layering of stories. I cannot say too much without spoiling its wonderful twists and turns but in Mirrorland the lines between reality and fantasy are constantly blurred. One of the best releases for 2021!

Cat and El are identical twin sisters but have been living apart for the last 12 years. Cat lived in L.A. and El in their old family home in Scotland, 36 Westeryk Road. When El has gone missing presumed dead on the family yacht. Cat returns home to be met by Ross El’s husband and childhood friend. Cat thinks that El is not dead otherwise she would sense it, but Ross has accepted the fact that she has gone. Cat hasn’t told Ross that she has been receiving letters and emails that Cat thinks are from her and that she is punishing her for the things that happened when they were children in Mirrorland.
I thank Harper Collins and NetGalley for a copy of Mirrorland by Carole Johnstone. I really wanted to like this book, but I am afraid this wasn’t for me. This novel reminded me a mix of Neverland and Gone girl all rolled up into one. Don’t get me wrong I have read and liked magical books of people in other realms. But in this just confused me on what is real and what is not and the characters were unlikeable.

Billed as a "psychological drama", this is unlike any other book I've read in that genre.

This is quite a difficult read in many ways. It is fairly rambling, peppered with descriptions of bizarre rooms, stories, and figures - hard to tell what is real and what is imagined for a long time. Gradually though the truth begins to emerge through the fog - and it is a bleak and disturbing truth. I was genuinely upset by what can only be described as abuse on many levels, and by the relationships between the twins and other characters - including their Mother and their sad "cousin" Mouse.

There are many twists and turns, revelations and nobody is quite who they seem to be.

The writing is good - somewhat rambling in places (I actually fell asleep at one point) - but evocative.

I'm giving this two stars because of the way it made me feel - whilst reading it and now afterwards. It has genuinely saddened me, as I am aware that there are people out there who have been through childhood experiences like this.

My thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for an ARC. All opinions my own.