I stayed up late on Saturday night to finish this book. I read this book during silent reading time in my two classes over the past 2.5 weeks. But it became so intense on Friday that I just had to bring it home to finish it. The Couple Next Door is certainly a book that fits my style because it's an adult contemporary suspense mystery thriller fiction. (Enough adjectives for you? !!) This is not the kind of book to win any literary awards or to really challenge your intellect. But it's still a great book. It's a real page-turner and I couldn't put it down.
The mystery of this book is what happens to Cora. Cora is Anne and Marco's 6 month old baby daughter who is taken from their home one evening while her parents are next door celebrating their neighbour's birthday. Anne and Marco are immediately the prime suspects, but it's difficult to see them as responsible because they are so terribly distraught and worried. However, throughout the plot, we begin to learn a variety of both Anne's and Marco's secrets and indiscretions. These secrets become more and more intense and scary and lead to more suspicion on the couple. We begin to see that these seemingly perfect adults have far too many motives for kidnapping their own daughter.
The final 50 pages of the book is pure suspense with new information being revealed on every page. It's virtually impossible to put the book down in those final pages because I just had to find out what was going to happen. It was intense and interesting. It was worth staying up late even though I am paying for it today!
I love thriller, who-done-it books and I enjoyed this book very much. I especially liked reading that the author, Shari Lapena, lives in Toronto. I'm not sure if she was born in Canada but she lives here and it's always nice to read books by Canadians.
I have to say that, like many thrillers, this book is a little predictable in some instances. I easily figured out a few of the twists and anticipated the final, "shocking" twist on the last page. However, there were certainly some surprises that I did not see coming. I don't want to spoil any of the details because it's not fair to give away the surprises. You should read this book for yourself to see just how engaging it is. The characters are believable and real in their complexities. The plot twist and turns quite frequently, keeping the reader engaged and enthralled.
I needed to read this kind of page turner since my last few books were more literary and flowery. They were good books, but it's been too long since I read a book that I couldn't put down. I have seen this book in Ms. Plourde's library and in Chapters and have wanted to read it for a while. Although I have a stack of other books I should have read first, I grabbed this from the library and I'm so glad I did.
Pick it up. You won't be disappointed!
