Happy Valentines Day everyone! I’m delighted to be on my first blog tour today for Red Door Publishing and what a book to start off with-Because I Was Lonely the debut novel by Hayley Mitchell.
About the book…
Meet Rachel. She is caught in a spiral of endless crying, dirty nappies, and sleepless nights. She fears for her sanity and the safety of her children.
She’s lonely.
Meet Adam. Suffering from the pain and trauma of a terrible accident that he blames himself for, he stays at home, unable to bring himself to leave the house.
He’s lonely.
So when Rachel and Adam rekindle their long lost friendship online, what starts as a little harmless flirtation, soon becomes an unhealthy obsession, and slowly the threads of their lives unravel before them.
Four lonely people . Two unhappy marriages . One dangerous, but inevitable climax.
My review…
I had seen some stunning reviews of this book before I picked it up to read so I was rather worried after the first forty or so pages that it wasn’t going to be for me! The description of Rachel and her descent into mental illness, a severe case of post natal depression, was so achingly lifelike and realistic that I found it very hard to read and my own mood dipped accordingly. Added to the mix was my pure rage and frustration at David and his inability to cope with, or even really see, what was happening to his wife. His total lack of support and understanding was tough to read but then my feelings started to shift. I heard David’s side of the story and realised maybe things weren’t quite as straightforward as I had first concluded. And when Adam and Julia’s story started to unfold, the book began to weave its spell over me. Adam’s mental health issues hit me in the face with such a deeply fierce and raw emotion that I was then utterly hooked. So do make sure you don’t give up on this book because the more you read, the most unputdownable it becomes!
Both Adam and Rachel are lonely in their marriages due to the problems overwhelming their everyday lives. But a chance “like” on a Facebook post starts an online relationship between the two old friends. And part two of the book is when it becomes a hugely powerful psychological suspense that I physically couldn’t put down and my initial reaction was forgotton. Once the two of them start to private message, I was gripped, watching with a fascination and mounting horror as these two damaged individuals began a potentially dangerous obsession.
This is a dark and disturbing book, perfectly pitched and filled with characters I mostly disliked, but it was absolutely riveting with its “car crash” of a storyline that I couldn’t tear my eyes away from. Hayley Mitchell has completely captured the feelings experienced by her characters in this snapshot of modern day loneliness. Her intelligent and probing writing style has produced a very self assured debut novel that I thoroughly enjoyed. I can’t wait to read more from Hayley Mitchell and she is definitely a name to watch out for in the future.
My thanks to Anna at Red Door Publishing for my review copy of Because I Was Lonely.
Because I Was Lonely
Meet the author…
Hayley Mitchell spends most of the time writing books in her head and was finally able to put finger to keyboard and capture some of those words in the form of her debut novel Because I Was Lonely.
A law graduate she has spent most of her life working with people and much of her career as an advice worker for charities. Always fascinated by people and their relationships she began to write fiction. She is very lucky to live in Wiltshire with her husband, whose support has been invaluable and their two children who amuse, inspire and exhaust her everyday. She now divides her time between her family, running a small business encouraging creativity in children and writing her second novel.
is published on 24th November and you can buy it here at Amazon UK
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