Today I’m joining the blog tour for The Mistake. My review is written with thanks to Tracy Fenton for inviting me on the tour and to the publisher for my copy of the book.

Blurb:

In this family, everyone is telling lies.

Pete never wanted another child. Before baby Erin was born, they were happy. If Natalie hadn’t got pregnant, he would never have done what he did.

Natalie knows things have been difficult since the surprise arrival of Erin. Life with Pete and their two other children – Emily and Zadie – has been balancing on a knife-edge.

Now their home is full of guests at a party Natalie didn’t want to throw – and she’s about to reach breaking point.

But so is her family.

Because everyone has a secret that they’ve been hiding and when Erin suddenly disappears everyone becomes a suspect.

Surely no one here would want to harm their baby? But after the events of the party there are plenty of people who would want to hurt Natalie.

Including her husband…

Review:

I have read a lot of books by these authors individually, so needless to say, I was very excited to find out what they’d do when they were working together. To be honest, The Mistake isn’t what I expected, but I still enjoyed it. I was invested in the central characters and their relationship and I really wanted to know how things would work out for them.

The Mistake is quite slow burning, particularly at the beginning, as we get to know all the characters and what makes them tick. This is valuable groundwork, as every one of them is potentially a suspect in Erin’s disappearance. I love novels where the reader has the opportunity to guess who the culprit is, and my opinion changed several times over the course of it.

MJ Arlidge and Lisa Hall are both very talented writers, and this is demonstrated brilliantly in the portrayal of Natalie’s post natal depression. Despite not having experienced this myself, I was taken into Natalie’s mindset really well and was able to understand how she was feeling.

As the plot begins to take shape, The Mistake gathers pace, the tension increases and it becomes clear that nearly everyone has something to hide. I enjoyed reading as all the different secrets, and their implications on the characters’ lives were revealed. 

The Mistake is available from Amazon.

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