#BookReview-‘The Neighbour’ by Fiona Cummins

About the book…

The gripping crime thriller of the year with a twist you’ll never see coming . . .

FOR SALE: A lovely family home with good-sized garden and treehouse occupying a plot close to woodland. Perfect for kids, fitness enthusiasts, dog walkers . . .

And, it seems, the perfect hunting ground for a serial killer.

On a hot July day, Garrick and Olivia Lockwood and their two children move into 25 The Avenue looking for a fresh start. They arrive in the midst of a media frenzy: they’d heard about the local murders in the press, but Garrick was certain the killer would be caught and it would all be over in no time. Besides, they’d got the house at a steal and he was convinced he could flip it for a fortune.

The neighbours seemed to be the very picture of community spirit. But everyone has secrets, and the residents in The Avenue are no exception.

After six months on the case with no real leads, the most recent murder has turned DC Wildeve Stanton’s life upside down, and now she has her own motive for hunting down the killer – quickly.

‘The Neighbour’ by Fiona Cummins is available in hardback, paperback and ebook formats and you need to buy it NOW!!!

Seriously, if you like challenging, whip smart thrillers that keep you guessing even if you think you knew whodunnit, you will need this book.

In The Avenue, there are a lot of people here responsible for a lot of crimes. If you solve one thing, I guarentee you won;t solve them all so let’s ignore the whole ‘twist you won’t see coming’ because the entire book twists and turns on a hairpin bend. This is a literary technique not a ‘insert plot twist here paint by numbers novel.

Dark, rudite and just a little bit nasty, this gave me Ruth Rendell vibes. Fiona Cummins sees the dark heart of a surbun street, an exclusive enclave which has seen better days-rather like its residents-and skewers the characters perfectly.

She sets up The Avenue, on what should be the happies day of the Lockwood familiy’s life. But they arrive mid media-storm as a serial killer named The Dollmaker has claimed his fifth victim in the woods behond their house.

But what secrets do the Lockwoods have?

And who amongst the neighbours does not have something to hide?

The scorching weather becomes a character of its own as the heat intensifies, so do the moods of the adults, children and teens as tempers flare, boil over and harm is done. The way that people are scape goated , the way that assumptions are made and the insidious nature of revenge are themes which run through this like lettering in rock-it’s not a serial killer thriller, it is not a crime novel, it is a literate piece of fiction which leaves you gasping in shock at the denouement.

It takes a lot to steal this readers breath away, but I have come to expect nothing less from Fiona Cummins, her first 2 novels were genre bending and this has quite possibly reinvented the domestic noir thriller.

Brava!!!

Recommended for fans of Belinda Bauer and Sharon Bolton

About the author…

Fiona Cummins is an award-winning former Daily Mirror showbusiness journalist and a graduate of the Faber Academy Writing A Novel course. ‘Rattle’, her debut novel, has been translated into several languages and received widespread critical acclaim from authors including Val McDermid, Lee Child and Martina Cole.

Links-https://www.curtisbrowncreative.co.uk/agent-sophie-lambert-and-author-fiona-cummins-stay-true-to-your-instincts/

Twitter @FionaAnnCummins

@panmacmillan