This had been on my TBR list for months but hadn’t gotten around to reading it, and it wasn’t until I heard that Netflix would be releasing the adaptation that I felt the rushing need to actually get on and read it. And what a read!
I loved the start of the book! I felt so bad for Louise, a working single mum who meets that gorgeous and perfect man-in-the-bar only to discover that not only is he her boss, but he’s married to. I cringed when Louise bumped in to his wife, Adele, and wanted to scream at her to walk away and don’t even go there! But obviously, she does; Louise finds herself drawn to Adele and entering in to a deep friendship at the same time that she Perseus her affair with David, the husband/man-in-the-bar.
It made for an interesting start to the book, but somewhere between the half-way and three-quarter-of-the-way mark, I found myself feeling really bored.
I desperately wanted to love this book and devour it, but I found that I was rolling my eyes at Louise’s sheer stupidity at the whole mess she had found herself in. I wanted to just shake her! And at the same time, when it became clear that Adele was manipulating the situation, I began to really dislike her character.
For all the annoyance and boredom I felt during the book, I did LOVE the ending! It wasn’t just a cliff hanger but it was a really double whammy! I sort of saw part of it coming but not all of it! And that I was really thrilled with!
I did sit down and watch the first episode of the Netflix adaptation and I wasn’t keen-in fact, watching the first episode had me bored like the middle of the book (don’t hate me!). Louise was portrayed as a total simpering moron, Adele seemed robot-like and David was trying too hard to smoulder and it really wasn’t working for him (in my opinion). Since watching the first episode, I have come across a lot of mixed reviews so I’m not particularly eager to sit down and watch the rest of the episodes (I really did want to love the book and find I couldn’t stop watching the series, but that just isn’t the case).
I’m happy to place Pinborough’s other titles on my TBR list of they’re recommended to me, but I’m not overly excited about them if I’m being honest. Her characters were written well and I did like how my opinions of David changed and the cliff hanger was amazing, but there was no “grip” holding me or pulling me in. I could be very wrong and her other titles might just be utterly amazing, but unless someone says to me “you just need to read this; it’s so much better than Behind Her Eyes” then it’s not likely.
Morelli’s Reads 