I'll start this review by saying that I was so very excited to read the second novel from this author, as I absolutely loved their debut novel back in 2021. So my expectations were set high for this one. 

Unfortunately, this didn't live up to the hype that the first book had. Sadly, not by a long shot. 

Let's start with the positives: the first half of the book was a real page turner. It had the tension and the mystery to keep you wondering what was going on and you genuinely wanted to keep on reading to ultimately reach that finish line. The characters had the right amound of shadiness to their past that made you want to discover more about them. Especially on the second half of the book, there was one particular character, which I thought could actually have an entire book for themselves. 

However, with that being said, and despite the first half of the book being an absolute brilliance, the second half, was an absolute mess. The plot felt all over the place, poorly edited, things that didn't stand and made a lot of the things that happened in the first hald of the book not make sense, loop holes popping left right and centre. It was a lot. One after the other, which made everything feel too farfetched and unbelievable. And sadly, ultimately, by the time you reach the end everything felt so over the top, you didn't even care to reach that finish line anymore. 

The saving grace in all of this however is the writing. This is an author I would buy from again, as the writing is so compulsive and good, it did kept me up reading this book till 2am. So that, at least shows me that despite the messiness of the plot, the writing kept you going. 

Definitely has it's fair share of twists and turns, and if you don't mind an unbelievable plot and you're a fan of the genre, then definitely include it in your TBR. 

Kindly thank you to the publisher for accepting me for an early review copy.