After the Lie by Kerry Fisher

About this book…

Your past will devastate your family. But your lies could destroy them. What would YOU do?

Sometimes a lie can split your life in two. There is “before”, and there is “after”. Try as you might – you can never go back.

When Lydia was a teenager, she made a decision that ruined her family’s life. They’ve spent the last thirty years living with the consequences and doing their best to pretend it never happened.

Lydia’s husband, the gorgeous and reliable Mark, and her two teenage children know nothing about that summer back in 1982. And that’s the way Lydia wants it to stay. The opportunity to come clean is long gone and now it’s not the lie that matters, it’s the betrayal of hiding the truth for so long.

When someone from the past turns up as a parent at the school gates, Lydia feels the life she has worked so hard to build slipping through her fingers. The more desperate she becomes to safeguard her family, the more erratic her behaviour becomes. But when the happiness of her own teenage son,Jamie, hangs in the balance, Lydia is forced to make some impossible decisions. Can she protect him and still keep her own secret – and if she doesn’t, will her marriage and family survive?

My review…

This was the first book I have read by Kerry Fisher and it certainly won’t be the last! I knew as soon as I started reading this book that it was going to be one I would totally identify with and I was right!

After the Lie has at its heart a secret, one that Lydia has been hiding from everyone for years, since 1982 to be accurate. In the eighties something happened to Lydia that was so colossal she changed her name and then her family had to move away from their home in a small village in Norfolk. Now though, she is happily married to hardworking Mark, has two teenage children and a successful business. But meeting a new family, who have just moved back from the States is about to bring that past back to haunt Lydia but this time she’s not the only one that could get hurt.

I do love a good family drama full of relationship misunderstandings and hidden secrets! Kerry Fisher has written a great book here with a wickedly dark humour and perfectly observed anecdotes about family life. The small town mentality and that “schoolgate” hierarchy are totally believable and the scenes where the committee had their meetings had me chuckling at how true to life it was. It brought back memories of all the competitiveness of school mums and the cliques that exist within groups of grown women! The story itself wasn’t quite what I was expecting and neither was “the big secret” but in a good way as it kept me guessing throughout.

Most of all I absolutely loved Lydia. She was funny and real with a sense of duty, a mother who had a good relationship with both her children (despite her over protectiveness!) and her husband (although he too is unaware of her secret!). She was typical of a woman of her generation caught between teenage children and her aging parents. I think it helped that I related to Lydia due to being a similar age (and size!) and also having grown up in the Eighties. We were so lucky then not to have to deal with social media demanding our every minute and recording our mistakes for posterity!

I will certainly be looking out for more books by Kerry Fisher as I enjoy her writing style and the social commentary that she does so well while bringing us current issues surrounding today’s families.

I received a copy of this book via netgalley in return for an unbiased review.

Publication date 28th April 2016

Available to order from Amazon