The End Of Her - Shari Lapena

Thriller

Rating: 6/10

This was a tricky review for me because I didn’t love the book, but I didn’t hate it either.  For more on how I dispense by affection via my ratings system see the footnote below.

The story follows a couple with newborn twins who get a visit from a woman from the husband’s past.  Something that never works out well for a marriage.  This woman makes some accusations about the death of his first wife, among other things, and sews the seeds of distrust in the couple’s relationship. Quite a few additional characters get wrapped up in this story, which felt a bit like a ploy to pad the book and give the appearance of complexity.

What we end up with is a lot of malice and bad intent, with pretty much everyone considering doing harm to one another at some point. The setup was fine but I found the struggle in getting me over the hump in my rating was the smirking vapidity of the characters and their lacklustre motivations. 

In the end I couldn’t have cared less who did what to whom.

Footnote: It’s probably not entirely fair, but with the volume of thrillers/mysteries I read I tend to rate them on a sliding scale.  If you see one that’s an 8 or higher then it’s a standout in more than one way, I am not generous with the high marks! A 7, which is where most land, is good but not spectacular in any particular way. And anything at the 6 level, as this book is, indicates it was fine, but I will likely forget all about it the minute I am done this review.