Watching You by Lisa Jewell on August 6, 2019
Genres: Fiction / Thrillers / Domestic, Fiction / Thrillers / Suspense, Fiction / Women
Pages: 352
Format: Paperback
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“You are the only woman I have ever met who I would want to be in a little house with, do you see? Other women make me want to get on boats and run away. You, you make me want to stay somewhere, so that I can see your face everyday. So that I can hold you everyday and watch you grow older. You make me want to be an adult man. You make me want to settle down.”
Melville Heights is one of the nicest neighbourhoods in Bristol, England; home to doctors and lawyers and old-money academics. It’s not the sort of place where people are brutally murdered in their own kitchens. But it is the sort of place where everyone has a secret. And everyone is watching you. As the headmaster credited with turning around the local school, Tom Fitzwilliam is beloved by one and all—including Joey Mullen, his new neighbor, who quickly develops an intense infatuation with this thoroughly charming yet unavailable man. Joey thinks her crush is a secret, but Tom’s teenaged son Freddie—a prodigy with aspirations of becoming a spy for MI5—excels in observing people and has witnessed Joey behaving strangely around his father. One of Tom’s students, Jenna Tripp, also lives on the same street, and she’s not convinced her teacher is as squeaky clean as he seems. For one thing, he has taken a particular liking to her best friend and fellow classmate, and Jenna’s mother—whose mental health has admittedly been deteriorating in recent years—is convinced that Mr. Fitzwilliam is stalking her…
This book was great! Once I could get the characters down! As most books are, it takes a few chapters for you to start knowing who all the characters are. This book has a lot of different points of view, so it took me a hot minute to get them all figured out. Jewell really has a way to write suspense that makes you feel creeped out rather than frightened. I think that is what I like most about her writing. She has the best way to really throw you off to what you think may happened compared to what actually happens. This book was no different. There were some things that I had figured out, but then she adds a twist to it that you just never see coming.
I gave this book a 3.5-star rating. Though it was not one of her best the book was still worth it for the journey alone. If it does manage to catch you off guard with a few of the twists, well that’s just the icing on the cake. As always, Lisa Jewell has provided a satisfying character study into the darker side of human nature.