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The Wrong Girl

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The Wrong Girl by Laura Wilson

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By Laura Wilson

avg rating

5 reviews

A dark and gripping mystery of celebrity obsession and the lies families tell each other.

Reviews

09 Nov 2016

x

Good but not great. Would recommend.

31 Jul 2016

A grandmother, mother and 10 year old daughter find each other and secrets from their pasts are revelaed. Set against a mystery of missing children and missing memories from the drug fuelled 1960s this book moves along at a good pace and is definitely a page turner.

20 May 2016

Janice Keaton, living an easy, affluent life and distant with her family, is called out of the blue by her long-lost adopted daughter Suzie who it appears has been staying with her brother Dan in the family home in Norfolk; Janice was unaware of this. Suzie has called to say that Dan has died. Janice travels home where she finds that Suzie also has a daughter, Molly. Janice was a child of the 60s/70s, following rock bands and having a nomadic life. She is twice divorced and is portrayed initially as rather an unsympathetic character, concerned mostly with her own creature comforts and avoiding personal involvement.
When Janice meets her new family she is quick to judge and doesn't seem to be sure how to handle the situation. She discovers that the village is also home to reclusive former rock star, Joe Vincent, a former lover and that there is more to Dan’s life that she supposed. We are taken back to the 60s and 70s to discover more about their past. These storylines are interwoven with Molly’s life. She has a lonely existence, having been uprooted from London and is convinced that she is not Suzie's daughter, that she is really a missing child who has been the subject of much publicity. Molly is a determined character; she is perhaps the most decisive person in the story.

The author weaves together all these different strands; the lost children, rock culture, and dysfunctional families. She develops her characters very well and The Wrong Girl, as well as becoming an intriguing detective story, also poses questions about fame and celebrity, about events in the past eventually catching up with you. You begin to warm to Janice and the mother/daughter relationships rang true. By the end she has helped this broken family see a way forward. It is a novel about wounded people and relationships; three generations of women in one family uncovering each other's dark secrets and hidden crimes.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book; I liked the references to the 60s, which was well researched and authentic. I would look out for others by this author.

18 May 2016

I'm afraid I did not enjoy this novel and had difficulty getting to the end. I did not enjoy the writing style or the subject matter. I didn't engage with any of the characters and found Janice, the main character, vague and indecisive. I was also unimpressed with the plot, finding it annoyingly convoluted, contrived and unconvincing with an unsatisfyingly abrupt and lame ending.

14 Apr 2016

JennyC

A very interesting book about a crime which happened in the dim and distant past, intertwined with a very believable but nonetheless complicated family history. The crime is solved purely through analysis and logic. There are no detectives sleuthing or courtroom dramas, just an ordinary person using her powers of deduction to interpret the facts which unfold as the story develops. In the sense of it being an “armchair” solution it is similar to Josephine Tey’s “The Daughter of Time” but is so much better done and far more absorbing.

The characters are believable and developed in such a way that you actually care what happens to them. This is especially true for Janice and Molly both of whom are genuine and likeable, each trying to deal with their problems in the best way that they can. The complex relationships surrounding adoption, family and ex-partners are all dealt with sympathetically.

If I had to come up with a “negative” I would say that the ending was a little weak but this is being very picky. The end result is an absolutely gripping mystery which is easy to read, moving and utterly compelling.

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