A Tidy Ending: The latest dark comedy from the Sunday Times bestselling author

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I picture a lot of people sitting around on furniture in relaxed poses—unnecessary visuals, enough is enough. A slow-burn thriller that follows a suburban wife's fascination with a former tenant might lead to frightening revelations about the person she thought she knew best.

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I feel that I might have liked this book slightly more if I had read it, but I doubt it would have been a 5 star read for me even then. ABOUT 'A TIDY ENDING': Linda has lived in a quiet neighborhood since fleeing the dark events of her childhood in Wales. The remainder of the book is written in the “now”, when someone is writing from a mental institution.

There’s no gratuitous violence described in gory detail, just an ongoing story that mainly surrounds a couple dealing with the daily news as time goes by. But the loss of her father has never left Linda; she thinks about him constantly and how his death affected her small family. Linda and her mother moved from Wales when Linda was a child, hoping to leave the shame and scandal of Linda’s father behind. There it waits, trapped in a silver frame, watching me live my life and pointing out all my mistakes. A serial killer, a traumatized woman, the quirkiest of characters, such perfect observational writing-- Joanna Cannon is a superstar.With red herrings, twists and distractions, and a chilling last line, Cannon’s latest novel is brilliantly plotted and deliciously dark. As a child she discovered what would become a life-long fascination with words, stories and character. Then: she accelerates her lifestyle changes, and gradually the layers are peeled back - why they had to leave Wales when she was a child, her attachment/detachment to Mother, and the monochrome of her life gradually becoming coloured. People have started to go missing in the neighbourhood and Linda will soon discover that some secrets can't stay buried forever. She’s lonely and would love a friend or two but she’s rather socially awkward and frequently misreads signals and body language and imagines every new acquaintance as a best friend and at times you worry that she’s being taken advantage of.

Under-stimulated by her humdrum life, and the frequent target of ridicule and gaslighting from both her husband and mother, Linda finds a private delight in poring over fashion and lifestyle catalogues that arrive in the mail for the mysterious Rebecca, meanwhile fantasising about a more exciting existence of her own. The backdrop of murders of young women in the village has everyone on alert, but also really keen to know all the details and speculate who’s responsible. When Linda was young, her father did something very bad which forced Linda and her mother to leave town and start a new life.

It started slightly slow, but then quickly picked up and started giving “Single White Female” vibes. I'm the type of reader who's more interested in character development and the little things, I don't care as much about the plot. Joanna Cannon is a psychiatrist, and it shows in every morsel and detail of this novel I absolutely loved analyzing. The story gets even more interesting when a body of a young woman is found nearby and it doesn’t end there.

But that seems fairly standard—until he starts keeping odd hours at work, at around the same time young women in the town start to go missing. A compellingly crafted and compulsive read, full of twists—and twists on twists—that keeps you guessing until the last page.He’d probably say, She’s Welsh or She’s five foot nine because Terry doesn’t really deal in anything other than facts. Early into this audiobook, I realised it was a thriller/suspense novel and was considering whether to finish it, as I want to take a break from the genre. I thought I was going to enjoy this book as it sounded Kaye’s back but by page 60 I had enough a murder missing girls and the prime suspect is Terry who is married to Linda who hates her life, you see Terry always belittles her but she puts up with it why 🤦‍♂️I could not stand reading about Linda what a complainer she had her nose in the former owner Rebecca Finch life. I get it; her father was the only one who understood her, unlike her mother who scoffs and scolds her nearly all the time. Further details on how this Booklover Book Reviews site manages data can be found in our Privacy Policy.