#BlogTour-‘Blood Orange’ by Harriet Tyce

About The Book

An utterly addictive, spectacularly dark psychological thriller that explores
the power of desire, jealousy and betrayal.
Alison has it all. A doting husband, adorable daughter, and a career on the rise – she’s just been
given her first murder case to defend. But all is never as it seems . . .
Just one more night. Then I’ll end it.
Alison drinks too much. She’s neglecting her family. And she’s having an affair with a colleague
whose taste for pushing boundaries may be more than she can handle.
I did it. I killed him. I should be locked up.
Alison’s client doesn’t deny that she stabbed her husband – she wants to plead guilty. And yet something about her story is deeply amiss. Saving this woman may be the first step to Alison saving herself.
I’m watching you. I know what you’re doing.
But someone knows Alison’s secrets. Someone who wants to make her pay for what she’s done,
and who won’t stop until she’s lost everything . . .
A disturbing, toxic and compelling novel that explores the power of fear and desire, jealousy and betrayal, love and hate, ‘Blood Orange’introduces a stunning new voice in psychological suspense.

I know that however hard I try with this book review, it will come nowhere close to being able to describe how reading ‘Blood Orange’ made me feel.

The sharp, no word spared, articulate sheer wordsmithery-is that even a word? – of Harriet Tyce teases you into the story and then grabs you tight to the very last page.

Alison is both has it all and yet nothing at all.

A barrister who has finally been given her big break-a murder case-, she has an enviable homelife, a househusband of sorts who handles the childcare with aplomb as well as being a therapist , a beautiful child, friends, a social life.

So why is she risking everything for fumbles in alleyways and against desks and toilets with an office junior? Why does she feel the need to drink so much ? What is it about this open and shut case that makes her feel so uneasy? This is the case that could make her so why would she risk it?

Alison just made me want to weep. She is clearly being gaslighted by her awful horrible husband but even worse than that, she is being demonised by the very soicety that tells her she should be the perfect mother/wife/career person and damned at the same time for self medicating with alcohol.

Her affair with Patrick is almost a form of punishment- she doesnt really seem to enjoy it but the juxtaposition between her when she is with Patrick ,and her when she is with Carl, is startling. Her husband manipulates her and makes her feel worthless as does Patrick who uses her when he feels like.

As a mother she fully feels the weight of expectation upon her from inside the family and without and berates herself for being a failure-in a few swift pen strokes, Harriet Tyce lays bare the savageness of the school yard and I could feel my teeth grinding for Alison as she is dismissed for leaving it all to her husband.

In the murder case , her first big case, Alison faces Madeleine, a woman accused and found next to, the dead body of her husband Edwin. As the facts in the case emerge, each more startling than the last, it is as if a veil begins to slowly fall away from Alison-she looks at Madeleine as though she would never put herself in the position of being a murderer ,yet in her attempts to understand and fight for her client, she begins to fight for herself.

Constantly undermined and belittled, she is a walk on character in her own life and this is what I loved so much about this novel-it is utterly fearless to depict such a woman, to be so bold and brave is astonishly affecting.

I am trying so hard not to spoil anything in the novel because I am hoping so many people rush out and buy it, but there is one scene, where after Matilda, Alison’s daughter, has cut herself preparing an orange, the second time she does it she gets it right and does not bleed. I had such shivers because it worked on so many levels and now I need to stop in case I end up saying too much !

‘Blood Orange‘ has layer after layer that are slowly revealed, building to a truly unforgettable crescendo-it may only be February, but, holy f*** will this take some beating as one of my books of the year.

HUGEST thanks to the wonderful team at Headline, Anne Cater of Random Things Tours and the wonderful Harriet Tyce for the opportunity to read this amazing debut-and if you can get to one of Harriet’s events , do try, she is just such a gifted speaker !

About The Author

Harriet Tyce grew up in Edinburgh and studied English at Oxford University before
doing a law conversion course at City University. She practised as a criminal barrister in London
for nearly a decade. She is currently doing a PhD in Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia.
She lives in north London. Blood Orange is her debut novel.
Find Harriet on Twitter on @harriet_tyce