The Other Side of the Wall by Andrea Mara

 Reading-wise, 2026 has been a mixed bag so far. My first book of the year was the brilliant The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell, then came two eminently forgettable books, and now here is Andrea Mara’s first novel, The Other Side of the Wall. Since I only post reviews of books I have enjoyed and would recommend, this one gets a guernsey, absolutely! I thought I had read all of Andrea Mara’s books, so coming upon this one, published in 2017, came as a hugely welcome surprise,

This is a fabulously creepy psychological thriller. Sylvia looks out her window one night and sees a child’s body floating in the pool in her new neighbour’s back yard. Or does she? Sylvia is exhausted from going back to work after the birth of her baby, on top of which the man who replaced her during her maternity leave is trying to sabotage her; she must have imagined what she saw. Sam and Kate are the people who have bought the next door house, and there is trouble brewing in their relationship as Kate is becoming ever more suspicious of Sam’s  behaviour.

This is the ultimate nail biter, page turner, unputdownabler. Andrea Mara obviously began the novel-writing part of her career in the  manner in which she intended to continue. In this one the suspense begins to build from page l and gathers momentum right up to the last line, leaving this reader needing a cup of tea, a Bex and a good lie down!

Published by Crimson

The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell

 

The Marriage Portrait is historical fiction based on the true story of Lucrezia Di Cosimo de’ Medici who in 1560 left Florence as a fifteen year old to live with her new husband, Alfonso Il d’Este, Duke of Ferrara. As a duchess, Lucrezia was dressed in the finest clothes and lived in luxurious surroundings; however, be they aristocrat or peasant, women  in Lucrezia’s world were all subservient to men; chattels whose very existence depended on the whims of their masters. Of course, men of low standing were inferior beings as well.

People are people, though, and in the 1500s the human spirit wasn’t any easier doused than it is today. Only one thing was expected of poor little Lucrezia, and that was to bear a child, hopefully a son, before one of Alfonso’s sisters did. Her feelings for Alfonso were of absolutely no consideration, but she got her emotional support from her maidservant, Emilia, and her self confidence from her art as she honed her skills as a painter. She loved nature and admired and respected animals, and although she is just a fictional character, wouldn’t it be good if the real Lucrezia felt that way as well, centuries before animal rights were to be recognised out here in the real world?

I fully expected to love this book after reading Hamnet, Maggie O’Farrell’s other brilliant historical novel, and I did. It has drama, beauty and ugliness, happiness and sadness, and love and hope. It was published in 2023 and I’m sorry I didn’t find it sooner than I did at the lovely Collins bookstore in Orange.

Published by Tinder Press.

Our Beautiful Mess by Adele Parks

 

I didn’t get up until 11 o’clock this morning. My dogs were waiting  patiently under my bed for me to make a move; however, I was enthralled by this book and had to stay put until I got to the end. When the first chapter is titled ‘The End’, you know you’re going to be in for a tantalising journey to find out how ‘the end’ came about.

Connie and her husband, Luke, are happy to have their three girls home for the holidays but when their eldest daughter, Fran, introduces her boyfriend, Zac, Connie is stunned at Zac’s resemblance to someone from a time in her life which she has tried to put behind her. It was at this point that I thought I had an idea how the story was going to go but as matters became more and more complicated, none of my guesses were proved to be right. 

Connie is not the only one keeping a secret. Someone else is in the most awful trouble, facing dangerous, even deadly consequences. There are twists and turns galore in this nail biter, and as the story came to its conclusion, I had a feeling of dread about which way it would go, always keeping the first chapter in mind.

I’m a big fan of the way Adele Parks casts a cynical eye over her stories. Her characters are always only too human: I’m thinking here of the book in which two couples shared a lottery ticket. That one had a twist in the tail too!

Highly recommended.

Published by Harper Collin’s

Someone in the Attic by Andrea Mara

 

Julia’s young daughter, Isla, has been following the latest craze on her phone where, through the wonders of photoshop (or some such), it appears that a black clad figure can emerge from the attic into the living area of a specific house, when one day Isla realises the house she is looking at is the same one she and her family have moved into after their arrival in Ireland from America.

There have been lots of books with a stranger in the attic theme, they are always creepy, and this one is no exception. It has the usual elements of fear and suspense but also explores making evidence fit a narrative. When videos keep coming showing more of the interior of the house and they have obviously not been made from copies of Isla’s  earlier posts, Julia has to try and work out who is targeting the house and why, and this involves delving into her past before she left Ireland.

There are some great red herrings and I did lots of second guessing which made this a most enjoyable book for me. I am a rusted-on Andrea Mara fan, and Someone in the Attic did it for me, as always.

Published by Penguin

The Piano Woman by Rozzi Bazzani

 

The Piano Woman by Rozzi Bazzani is a dual timeline story, one of my favourite genres. Maddison, a successful novelist living in Melbourne, is surprised to receive a letter from a solicitor in England informing her that she is the last surviving female relative of Lady Rose Hampton of Hebden in Kent, and it has taken many ears to find her. As such, Maddie reads, she has inherited an antique grand piano.

Maddie has been going through a troubling time, having discovered the man she loved had been pretty much a serial betrayer; to make matters worse, she is experiencing writer’s block for the first time, and the deadline for her new book is looming. Maddie has been an orphan since she was eighteen when her mother died, and has only vague memories of her grandmother, Abigail, who had died years before then. She makes a decision to go to Kent to claim her inheritance and, hopefully, learn about her family background.

This is a beautiful story which, as Maddie is finding connections to her English relatives in the present day, switches to the early twentieth century. The main characters are easy to keep track of because of each one’s individuality and it was easy to picture them and become lost in the drama, mystery and romance they were all part of. It is a very different book to the Detective Bec Harpin series, and just as engrossing. I read it in a day because I couldn’t put it down!

Top marks, Rozzi.

Published by S & B Books

A Sociopath’s Guide to a Successful Marriage by M K Oliver

Lalla Rook is a sociopath who will destroy (sometimes literally) anyone who gets in her way. She is very good at committing the most heinous crimes, blaming them on other people and getting away with them. The secret to Lalla’s success is that she is able to convince herself that the stories she comes up with in covering up her crimes are true, and sticking by them causes her no problems at all.

Lalla is the fascinating, mesmerising creation of M K Oliver, a man who has taken the brave step of writing in the first person from a woman’s point of view. Of course, Lalla, having no moral compass, is not your average woman and her innermost thoughts are up for grabs.

Although Lalla is incapable of loving other humans, I was pleased to see she has a degree of fondness for her cat.  Being a cat lady myself, I understand this perfectly. This book is great fun in a thieving, conniving, murderous kind of way and I’ve got to say I loved it.

Top marks, Mr Oliver!

Published by Harper Collins

How to Kill a Guy in Ten Dates by Shailee Thompson

 

Jamie has been working for a year on her dissertation: “All’s Fair in Love and Gore: The Intersection of Romantic Comedies and Slasher Films in the Late Twentieth and Early Twenty-First Centuries”, towards her PhD in Cinema Studies at NYU. She takes a break from her studies to have a night out with her best friend, Laurie. They are going speed dating.

After a promising start to the evening it becomes apparent to Jamie  that life is imitating art as she and Laurie find themselves in the middle of a slasher-movie scenario. Fortunately, Jamie has memorised a list of ten ways to survive a slasher, and the book then follows the story of the rest of the evening.

Wild and wacky, weird and wonderful and all that sort of thing, this is an immensely entertaining book, and like nothing I have ever read before. The rom-com bits are sweet and touching amongst all the gore and had me hoping desperately for a happy ending; I mean, I’ve watched lots of rom-coms but my only experiences of slasher movies have been accidental glimpses as I leave a room where someone else is watching one, so I didn’t know how it would end.

It was a riotous read, and great fun, and I would recommend it to anyone whose sense of humour has no set boundaries! Top marks, Shailee Thompson.

Published by Simon & Schuster.