A book that’s been waiting to be written fir a long time. If you ever worry about how we as a society are going to end then this is a cautionary tale.

Fantastic read. I have been completely unable to put this one down. I cannot wait to read more by this author.
Full review to follow on publication.

Erin and her Australian fiancé Raf seem to have a perfect life with their small baby, Erin seems to find motherhood difficult though still showing her perfect life on Instagram with thousands of followers.
Then an old friend of Raf`s from Australia turns up and takes over looking after the baby, with lots of twists.

Erin`s husband is very controlling from the beginning pretending he is caring for her.

For me the characters were very week and not interesting, though there was lots of twists they weren't interesting enough to keep me interested in the plot, though many times I wanted to slap the phone out of her hands as she was too busy to look after her own child, unfortunately this is the way the world is going with people obsessed with other peoples lives.

Thanks to Netgalley for this ARC in exchange for my honest review

Well, this is a very modern take on the psychological thriller. The premise is that Erin lives happily with her fiance Raf and fairly unhappily with her baby son Bobby, who is difficult and demanding attention (as babies are). But Erin wants it all; a failed actor who missed her big opportunity because she was on holiday, she then decided it was a good time to have a baby and then is drawn into the obsessive world Instagram, at which she finds herself very good. She spends her days constructing silly pictures of her and baby, projecting a happy life she isn't really living.

Her chance comes when she is approaches 100K 'likes' and is offered a contract by an agent; finally a chance to earn money (which she could have been doing had she not decided a baby was a must-have fashion accessory). However, juggling a baby, fiance and job proved difficult, until an old friend of Raf's from Australia appears on the scene, who loves Bobby and seems to cope well with him. However, she has a stalker, who is torpedoeing her burgeoning succcess on Instagram.

The first half of the book was pretty annoying - this woman who ignores her child in favour of gawping at her phone endlessly (you see it so often). The second half, as the tension builds, is much more exciting.

Overall a reasonable read with a good conclusion.

Thank you to NetGalley, Random House UK, Vintage and Harvill Secker for allowing me access to the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

"The family friend" is described as "an unmissable psychological thriller about a famous insta-mum influencer and what happens when someone starts to stalk her every move". If this is a thriller, I'm Mother Teresa, and let me tell you, white and blue are not my colors! Where were the thrills? Cause I certainly didn't notice them! True, when she gets insta-famous she gets a troll, but from that description you would believe she had a full-on stalker and nothing further from the truth.

More than a thriller I would describe this as a cautionary tale about how social media and this influencer (fake) world can really fuck up your life.

I had many issues with this books and only forced myself to finish it cause it was an ARC. Besides the no thrills already mentioned, it moved so slow with nothing happening for so long that I would read a chapter and then leave my Kindle to go to Instagram and try to become insta-famous myself (you can check my Bookstagram https://www.instagram.com/diagnosisbo..., wink). Shame on me, advertising myself! 😂

But the two main problems I had were two. One, the plot was so predictable that my initial hypothesis, the one I made in the first chapters, proved to be the correct one, and two, Erin was dumb. Plain and simple, making it so much harder to connect with her. At first she came as selfish, self-absorbed, and some of her actions were truly ridiculous and questionable (the eye drops, the adultered baby bottle). It took her 80% of the story to wake up and realize the situation of dependency she was immersed in.

The ending was also a bit unrealistic. The sudden turn of thinking of THAT character with just a couple of words, and the forensic details (or lack of them rather) that allowed THAT ending were quite far-fetched.

On a positive note, it portrayed well the perils of social media and how what at first sight might look all perfect lives and glamour hides a much darker reality.

Thanks to NetGalley and Harvill Secker for providing an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Marvellous read! Couldn’t wait for the end. Nail biting tension prevailed, kept me guessing! Loved the twists and turns. . Anybody looking for a gripping page turner, just grab a copy of this fantastic thriller. Brilliant for a debut book. Waiting for more from this #1 writer.. I appreciate his style of writing too. Kudos Mr. MacDonald👍🏼

I found it hard to keep reading this book. I didn’t like any of the characters. I think that parts of the plot are good. It was probably just not my type of book.

Thank you to NetGalley for my copy.

The premise of the story starts off well as the plot kicks in and characters are introduced. The community of insta-mums around Erin is shrewd and competitive. In addition, everyone carries a secret making them all suspects.

Somewhere along the way, though, you miss the thrill factor. The suspense meant to shock and awe, fails to surprise you. Barring the nitty-gritty details, it is not impossible to figure out the direction it is taking, which is where I lost interest.

The highlight of the novel is the portrayal of Erin’s character - her struggles of being a new mom and a social media influencer while trying to earn financial independence. It reveals the dark side of being an insta-celebrity, something one cannot fathom when on the other side.

It may not have ended as a nail-biting psycho-thriller for me but it does resonate on a social level.

This ARC courtesy of NetGalley and Vintage Books.

The Family Friend wasn’t the correct book for me. DNF. Not a fan but others will be.
I don’t badly rate books I haven’t finished so 3/5 for fairness.

The Family Friend is CC MacDonald’s second psychological thriller, and focuses on Erin, who has recently had her first baby and is rapidly building a following on Instagram with her positive, funny posts. Scoring representation, and along with it, corporate sponsorship deals, is a major triumph for Erin, who is unemployed and dependent on her fiancée Raf after a failed acting career. However, things become unexpectedly difficult after Raf’s old friend, Amanda, suddenly arrives to stay. Amanda is eager to help out with childcare, so at first, this seems like a godsend, allowing Erin to make the evening events that are essential for building an Instagram career. But soon, Erin starts to suspect that Amanda is taking an unhealthy interest in both her partner and her child. Even worse, somebody is posting revealing videos of her on Instagram that threaten the following she’s building. Could it be Amanda?

This thriller is pretty slow burn, so don’t expect it to be especially fast-paced or twisty – there is a twist, but it’s easy to guess. However, because he gives himself this space, MacDonald is able to take a more interesting and intelligent look at Instagram than the other thrillers I’ve read that focus on social media. The way that Erin interacts with the app just feels more authentic, and MacDonald emphasises the upsides as well as the downsides of her Instagram career – although I was frustrated that [SPOILER] the book still ends with her giving up all social media, even though it could have provided a useful source of income – I don’t know why every social media thriller has to end on this unrealistic and moralising note [END SPOILER]. Erin is an unusually well-rounded and engaging character, and because I cared about her, I wanted to continue reading even though the plot was relatively predictable. I’m now keen to read MacDonald’s first book, Happy Ever After. 3.5 stars.

I will post this full review to Goodreads closer to the publication date.

3.5*

I loved the premise of this story and I also really like that you think it's going to be one kind of story...only to turn the tables and it becomes something else entirely. That also made things slightly complicated because there are essentially 3 plots going.

I started out having very little sympathy for the main character, Erin. I really dislike all the instagram influencing stuff - it feels like such a lie - and in this case, we get to see behind that lie and find out how Erin really lives; a totally different perspective to the fictitious postings she puts up. I ended up rooting for her though!

My bigger issue was with the ending, which other reviewers here seem to have enjoyed but for me because the denouement started approximately 85% of the way into the book, it felt like a long wrap-up. There was a lot of repetition too in Erin's conversation with another character at the finish and it felt like it was really building, only to find that the other character did an abrupt about-turn of thinking. Also, I'm not sure the coroner would have found one element as "cut and dried" as the author would have had us believe, but this is fiction, after all.

A fun book that I think will be really popular. It's a quick read - might be a good one to jam in the bag for a holiday!

Many thanks to Harvill Secker, NetGalley and CC MacDonald for a copy of this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

So many people post their lives on the various internet platforms these days to get massive numbers of followers for their posts. Erin posted regularly on her Instagram account and was updating all of the time. The number of likes grew too, to the point that she now has full backing from an agent. Erin had grabbed it with both hands, knowing that the life she showed the world of the perfect little family doesn’t reflect her real life, but it would bring in much-needed cash for her. All she had to do was more of the same, loving pictures, tips and advice to other young mums.


Erin gained a troll, who it seemed was determined to ruin her and the relationship with her Fiancée, as pictures were posted online of when she was off guard and not coping. The frightening thing was that someone had got so close to her physically, someone she would know.


The story feels very current with today’s trends, but I loved that the author turned it into the worst possible scenario that could happen. At times it felt uneasy at how quickly people could turn on you.


It is so easy in the story to jump to a conclusion as there was more than one candidate that I could see doing this to her. The story at first seems quite cut and dry but it is much more than that. I thought that the author caught the stress and paranoid reactions perfectly. How can you trust anyone if something like this happens? I liked that ending.

I so so SO wanted to like this. The premise sounded fantastic and I was really looking forward to it.

Ultimately I found it very slow going a as can be told by the fact it took me a week to read (I normally average a couple of nights per book). I had difficulty keeping interest each time I picked it up to the point where I nearly DNF'd 2-3 times only carrying on with a "well it must amp up soon...". A nice twist at the end was just a case of too little too late sadly.

You win some, you lose some. Not for me sadly.

So I did not actually get into reading this book that easily- I was going to give up but saw the other reviews were good -so kept going - and it did reel me in. I thought the actual story was quite obv<ious what was going to happen but it was an easy read and something I ended up looking forward to, which is always for me the sign of a good book.

The characters were realistic and the story line true to life. I don’t think I would rush to recommend this though, which is. a shame.

Not an easy book to review.... Coercive control, child abuse, manipulation and manipulation with a lot of crystals, wicca and social media trolling make this a unique read.
For me it was obvious who Donny and the troll were very early on.
Did I enjoy this book? Not sure

This books appeared at the outset to be a story about a new Mum that had found 'fame' on instagram, but it turned out to be so much more.

Erin is a Mum blogger, who posts her life on instagram. When an old friend of her fiancee comes to visit, then Erin suddenly finds she has someone to use as free babysitting while she does promo stuff for her instagram life.
We see insights into the life of the family friend Amanda, and it quickly evolves that not everything is as it seems.
The book gains in momentum as you read and displays many aspects of family life and relationships that are underreported.

A mum starts to create the perfect life on instagram but it doesn't reflect real life at all does it? When the trolls arrive, it shows just how dangerous and unstable the world of social media can be. This is uncomfortably true I imagine for many bloggers who make their perfect life on line. People get jealous and then things can get out of control.

This book was a really good read!
The plot is all set up around Erin and how she initially lives a fake online life whilst struggling to be a new mom. But when all the stars align and Erin thinks that her career is going to take a turn for the better and she is going to take off, some online trolls put all of it on the line for her, again.

I really enjoyed the book and the twists and turns throughout the plot. I also really liked the premise and how modern the themes were, with online bullying/trolling as well as the social media dependency being explored.

The writing was really amazing and I really loved the characterisation of Erin and also the antagonist in this novel. The plot was really well thought and I really liked how it all unravelled. I could feel the desperation of Erin and I couldn’t stop myself from reading chapter after chapter until I found out what had happened.

Overall I think this was a great book and would definitely recommend it to fans of thriller and mystery books.

I would like to thank Netgalley, Harvill Secker and Random House Vintage Uk for an advanced digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest and unbiased review

Erin Braune is struggling with provincial life, missing her dissolute friends and saddled with a wailing ball of rage she finds hard to love. The baby descriptions are so on point — Bobby’s face almost fluorescent, more and more mucus sludging out of his face — it’s hard not to laugh. But you can also ‘hear’ that screaming and feel Erin’s desperation. She is financially reliant on her fiancé and with no job, she is bogged down with student debt. Rafael Donadoni - Raf - spends more time with baby Bobby, sleeping with him at night and unable to understand why Erin is so disengaged. The tension in their relationship is palpable and at times uncomfortable. Eggshell-fragile Amanda’s presence doesn’t help. She’s too mellow, too good with Bobby, too in control. The whole dynamic is unnerving.

While Erin appears on brand with her parent/toddler support group, she is screaming inside. It’s her Instagram followers that keep her afloat and her posts are relatable, shareable and funny. She longs to talk to her followers, anything to numb Bobby’s constant screaming. She misses her brother, Alex, whose Richmond life is perfect and a mother, who doesn’t think much of Raf. Why was Erin’s acting career botched? It’s easy to root for Erin when there’s no one else for her to turn to.

Grace’s pitch has landed Erin a place on the MotherBoard podcast, things begin to look up. Celebrity guests and mega-influencers could be a huge thing for Erin’s profile. Again, Amanda steps in to babysit and Erin finds herself with the best agent she could possibly hope for. Until the video. The one thing she dreads the most. All eyes are on Erin and her addiction to her phone, how toxic social media is, how it’s destroying her. With coercive and controlling behaviour at the heart of this story, it’s easy to come away feeling the same trauma some of these characters have experienced and to ask yourself the question; who’s threatening who?

It’s a brilliantly written book by an author well worth watching. Thank you to Netgalley, Random House UK Vintage and author CC MacDonald for the privilege of reading this book.
#TheFamilyFriend #NetGalley

The dark side of insta-glam is revealed in this edgy thriller, telling the story of an online celebrity and the truth behind her claim to fame. A really good yarn!