The Happy Family: The gripping new psychological crime thriller from the No.1 Kindle bestselling author of The Perfect Couple

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I’m not a huge consumer of psychological crime novels or thrillers but I do turn to them whenever I need to give the brain a break after reading a string of powerful or immersive books. But they still have to deliver something more than just the entertainment value of thrills and suspense. A protagonist with a complex personality is a must. A strong evocation of a specific location or time period is important. Ideally I want both to be matched with an interesting issue or a theme.

Throughout the story, THE HAPPY FAMILY is, of course, anything but. But the mystery, the suspense, the tension...oh, it was a car crash moment. We simply couldn't look away. We were baited in the beginning then slowly drawn in and by this stage were well and truly hooked as we witness Beth's slow decline into self doubt and self destruction. This is one of those books where a really good review could completely spoil the plot. So i will proceed without spoilers. The premise is that Beth is a divorced women with two children, a boy and a girl. The relationship with her ex and his new partner is excellent and the children are happy to live with Beth and equally happy to spend time with Dad and Crystal. Her father is in a brilliant care home and she visits him regularly. She works as a practice manager for a doctors’ surgery. She is friendly, efficient and happy. She has good friends at work and two very good friends as neighbours. The only blot on her horizon is the nightmares that frequent her dreams. These she associates with the disappearance of her mother when she was very young. She can recall the unhappy woman and can almost understand why she left her father who was 40 years older than her. Still…From the very first chapter I was hooked into this story. Lapena wastes no time jumping into the nitty-gritty and it kept me guessing until the very end.

That is actually the case with the whole book. It seems like it was brought to us in such... passive way that the it was hard to be emotionally invested. This was just great entertainment. It’s a book I wanted to find as many hours a day as possible to listen to. I tore through it. I had no clue who committed the murders. Such a great ending! When the storyline was recircling, many times I felt that the text was repetitive and drawn out, like the author had a word count to meet.This was an extremely unique narrative tone for me. The story is told from a distant third person perspective, yet I felt fully connected and engrossed within this twisty and suspenseful tale. I loved the short chapters of this family drama that always left me on edge wanting to read “just one more”. My suspicions flew all over the place, suspecting every single character at one point or another. They gather together for the Easter dinner from hell, where Fred makes an announcement that has all the children leaving hurriedly, angry and upset. Even Irena, the housekeeper who had been the children’s nanny, leaves. Audrey, Fred’s sister, missed the dinner, but she has a complicated history with her brother, and was my favorite character. Her loathing of the Merton children was visceral.

Now everyone in the family is a suspect. They all had a motive. Most of them had an opportunity. Who done it? I’ve read all of Shari Lapena’s suspense novels (except her last one, which I plan to make right soon), and I have loved all of them. My god- "The Happy Family" had so many emotions running through it I really felt for Beth, I felt it when she was happy and content, and I really felt it when her life started to go a bit pear shaped!!. stars. For the first half this book is familiar, a multi-perspective look at a modern family where the parents are immigrants who have built a successful life but the children are starting to flounder. What makes this book really different is that it has a very specific idea of how this dynamic is unhealthy but also how it can be repaired. And their vindictive, extremely irritating auntie Audrey knows their secret, already pissed off to be excluded from half share of the wealth, smelling blood, coming after them. She thinks one of them killed her brother. Is she right?From the outside, the Joshi family is the quintessential Indian-American family. Decades ago, Bina and Deepak immigrated to America, where she became a pillar of their local Indian community and he, a successful psychiatrist. Their eldest daughter, Suhani, is following the footsteps of her father’s career and happily married. Natasha, their middle daughter, is about to become engaged to the son of longtime family friends. And Anuj, their son—well he’s a son and what could be better than that? Mr Biff and Mr Bop are boxers and deadly rivals too. Mr Bop is fit and lean and Mr Biff . . . Well, Mr Biff likes a cream cake or two. Will he ever be able to toughen up in time for the annual charity match. Gulp!