Lauren keeps seeing a strange woman around the village, a woman that everyone else forgets they’ve seen immediately after they’ve seen her. Lauren remembers the woman though.
Lauren wants to remember her mother - she wants to learn more about her, but Niall just can’t bring himself to talk about her. He has been badly affected by their apparent abandonment: he drinks too much, stays out late and expects the neighbours to look after, and often feed, Lauren.
There is an undercurrent of dread throughout this novel. I was never sure if it was going to turn into a full-blown horror-fest, and I don’t think I would’ve been disappointed if it had. All the ingredients are there: a child left alone in a farmhouse away from everyone else; a still, dark forest; a constantly dimly lit farmhouse with strange smells and noises; a strange figure moving in the trees and around the local houses, that everyone sees and no-one rememberers.
I loved the atmosphere of this book. I had to remember to actually breathe, and the tension was set at just the right level to achieve this for pretty much the entire book.
I won’t say anything else about what happens in the story, in the hope that it’ll encourage someone to read it. It definitely WON’T be time wasted! This is one of my highlights of my January reading!
Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for my copy of this book to read and review.
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Leanne Crabtree (480 KP) rated Almost Just Friends (Wildstone #4) in Books
Jan 20, 2021
It's taken me a long time to finish this, mainly because other books on my Kindle were taking up all my attention and being a bit more angsty and action-packed than this one, but once I sat down and concentrated on this fully I got it finished in a handful of hours.
I grabbed this paperback from my favourite bargain bookshop: The Works for £2. I've had a taste of Jill's books and I do enjoy them so when I saw this, I decided to buy it.
It tells the story of Piper who's just celebrating - or rather not celebrating - her 30th birthday with friends at the local bar when she meets Camden, her next door neighbours oldest son. They flirt a little but shy away from anything happening between them initially but as they spend more time together, they start to care about each other.
This doesn't just focus on Piper, we also have her siblings' viewpoints, too.
Gavin, an ex trouble maker, has come back for various reasons and one of them is his love for CJ - the man he hurt several years ago. We see their re-connection and it is quite lovely actually.
Winnie, the youngest, has come back from college and wants to help Piper fix up the place so they can all live together happily - only she's got a secret of her own, that her brother and a handful of others know about but not Piper. Yet.
This is a story of family and love, grief and forgiveness. It's heartwarming at time and others I felt a little prick of tears as they tried to deal with their issues. I thought it was really well written.
There was one scene I really loved that was near the end with Camden and Piper when she tells him to throw her journal in the lake and then has a panic when he actually does it before jumping in the lake despite her fear of water to try and rescue the bloody thing.