Today I’m joining the Books On Tour for The Teacher’s Secret. My review is written with thanks to the team at Bookouture for inviting me on the tour and for my copy of the book.

Blurb:

On an ordinary Friday afternoon, popular teacher Mrs Walker and her eight-year-old son leave the school playground. But they never make it home…

Being called in as a substitute teacher to replace a missing teacher – and mother – is the hardest job I’ve ever done. Cate Walker should still be here, in the role she loves. Her son Archie should be sitting in class with his friends. But instead they’ve disappeared and nobody has heard from them since…

At drop-off and pick-up, the other parents are hunched together anxiously. I can see the confusion in their children’s faces. The whole village is full of whispered rumours: that Archie and Cate will never be found, that someone else will soon be next… and that Cate’s charismatic husband, Oliver – our headteacher – is involved.

After the chilling way Oliver looked at me on my first morning, the thought makes my blood turn to ice. I’m determined to uncover what’s really happened to Cate and Archie, especially after I find photos in Cate’s classroom cupboard that change everything…

Then an anonymous note turns up threatening me. My home is broken into while I sleep. I know the longer I stay at this school, the more danger I’m in.

But whoever’s trying to scare me doesn’t know who I am – or why I’m really here.

Or just how far I’ll go to expose the truth…

An absolutely gripping psychological thriller, where no one is who they seem, that will get your heart pounding! Perfect for fans of addictive page-turners like The Housemaid, The Family Across the Street and The Family Upstairs.

Review:

This title is a little bit misleading! Everyone has a secret in The Teacher’s Secret and I loved trying to unravel it all. Lauren North very cleverly drops hints and clues throughout the novel and these raised so many questions for me. I was desperate to get to the bottom of what was going on and how the different strands of the story were connected.

The Teacher’s Secret is split into chapters from the perspectives of different characters, mostly Oliver, Lexi and Gemma, who are all teachers, and Jeanie, a middle aged woman who lives in the village. This insight into the characters gave me some idea of who was lying and what secrets they were hiding – things that the characters did not necessarily know about each other. I didn’t find any of the characters particularly likeable, but this didn’t matter, as I was fully invested in all of their stories and the events from their histories that led them to this point.

Lauren North is a skilled plotter (I don’t even want to know how many postits she has on her wall to remind her who’s who and how they are connected to everyone else) and I enjoyed reading as the novel built to a crescendo and everything came together. There are a lot of twists and turns as the truth is revealed. The ending is especially tense and the sense of jeopardy coupled with the fast paced writing makes the novel very gripping.

The Teacher’s Secret is available from Amazon.

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