The Sister-in-Law

An Utterly Gripping Psychological Thriller

By: Sue Watson

Narrated by: Diana Croft

Length: 10 hrs and 40 mins

Publisher's Summary

"You don't think Jamie and I have secrets, do you? No, we tell each other everything", she smiled. "Including your dirty little secret. So, thinking about it, maybe it's time to start being nice to me?"

The wife: Clare is ready for a break. It's been a tough year and now she wants to put her feet up. Arriving at the Italian villa for their summer holiday, she decides it's high time her husband and his family did some of the work. After all, her husband owes her....

The husband: Even though Dan had his head turned by someone else, he's realised the error of his ways. He's here now, and he says it's for keeps. Clare can trust him, can't she? At least he'll have his brother there, to keep him in line....

The brother: Jamie is the prodigal child, back in the family fold again, after years of travelling abroad. But when he gets to the villa, he's not alone. He's brought a wife, someone none of them have met before. 

The sister-in-law: Ella is everything Clare isn't. Glamorous. Young. Influential. But she knows a secret about Clare. Something that has the power to break the whole family apart. 

And there's someone who will do whatever it takes to make sure that this deep secret never comes to the surface. 

An utterly gripping, twisty psychological thriller perfect for fans of Before I Go to Sleep, The Girl on the Train, and Date Night. 

"Tense, atmospheric psychological thriller with more twists and turns than a rollercoaster. Impeccably written and a big fat 5 stars from me. Awesome!" (Number one best-selling author Angela Marsons)

©2020 Sue Watson (P)2020 Bookouture

Skip it.

How to sum up this book? I fell asleep and missed two hours and felt relieved.

Don’t skip it...very enjoyable

If you hate this it’s because you don’t like this genre. The characters are not always “likable” that doesn’t mean it isn’t a good book. Why do people insist characters be “likable”? I think some ppl are just perpetual curmudgeon who hate everything. This was a good book and as this genre goes...ticked all the boxes. I know because I’ve devoured these for years.
For instance , don’t pick a romance or or a family drama then say it’s too mushy or dramatic. Change categories! As Domestic Thrillers go....this one was very good.

A Dumb Story Full of Dumb Characters

I tried to hang in there just to see if some of my guesses about the "twists" were accurate, but I just can't anymore. Abandoned with ~4.5 hours left to go. The writing is so poor--not only are all the characters stupid (the main character being the biggest idiot of them all), they also apparently seem to be deaf? No one ever seems to hear any of the horrible things Ella says to Clare despite being literally right there, feet away from them. And when Ella doesn't even pretend to be discreet with her insults, it doesn't matter as no one seems to ever get she's being insulting. It's like the author is incapable of writing a conversation between more than just two people, or like she doesn't understand how sound works, or something.

If you like dumb people doing dumb things, then this will be right up your alley. Otherwise, save yourself the trouble and find something else.

Simpering and whining.

If you only knew how hesitant I am to write and bad review; but this book was torture, and not in a good way. I am cursed with a “see it through” gene, but I fund myself wishing the whining main character would commit suicide and put herself and more importantly my ears out of their misery. In the last hour finally there were some twists and turns. I just regret the torturous hours it took to get there. Pass on this one. It’s neither a thriller nor psychological.

A MUST READ!

Oh my gosh, I was hooked the entire time. It’s a story that was very relatable to me, so there was a bit of bias there. But it was also incredibly written: I felt I really KNEW these characters. And very clever also. Definitely recommend this to anyone looking for a light read with some edge, comedy, and psychological game playing! On to Sue’s next book!

The Sister in Law

Wow!! What a book!! I could not stop listening to it!! Every chance I had I was plugging in my phone bro hear more!! Truly many twists and turns, with fear and anxiety between every character!! At first I was sure the new wife was the evil one, but it turned out so many others had their evilness too!! I really enjoyed this book!!

VERY LONG WINDED

This book had a very interesting premise, i was excited to get into it. However it DRAGGED. I gave up at chapter 7 and skipped to chapter 25 and hadn’t missed a thing! Opening chapters spoke of a “secret” that was finally revealed at the end of chapter 25. For the book to have become interesting, it would have needed to be at least 5x’s more sinister.
This is a story that’s been told before, only in much more interesting ways.

nice tight story .. recommended

A very easy book to listen to. Nice tight storyline with a welcomed twist right up to the end.

loved it!!!

The character development was fabulous!!! The feelings the main character seemed so accurate. Definitely lots of twists and turns and very satisfying ending. Narrator was great too!

Great book!

Could not stop listening to this book. The finale seemed far fetched when you think of the whole story leading up to it but overall quite a capturing tale. Very descriptive of Claire’s resentment of the new gorgeous sister in-law and her own insecurities of her own marriage. It all came together with how the brothers were raised and how her in laws controlled everything in their lives.

Another depressing tale of a ditchwater dull wimp

Ok ...... it was a great cover - a glamorous holiday setting, an intriguing premise and a writer whose books I have enjoyed in the past - well one or two which I thought were well written but became rather unbelievable.

This one started off so well and I was licking my lips as the story got going but then it took a turn for comedy with the main character quickly melting down into a stereotypical stooge and wishy washy wimp.

It was hard to know if it was meant to be funny or not but it certainly was fairly broad comedy and disappointing that this is yet another overweight, frumpy, boring woman, obsessed with her children and trying to keep her marriage from collapsing while blaming herself for not being a supermodel.

I soon began to far prefer and identify with the glamorous sister-in-law especially when there is so much anti- vegetarianism and veganism spouted against her by Mrs Dull (yes I cannot recall her name) - she only develops a backbone when she feels awkward about eating a hunk of lamb. "I am an animal lover ........ but I love eating meat! Also do not mention the benefits of not eating meat or how Veganism can benefit the planet as it is hard enough to get my kids to eat meat as it is."

Yes, it was then I jumped ship to team Ellie as she cooked fabulous Vegan meals for 5 adults and three children and Mrs Mopey moaned about not being able to make Meat Balls with her Mum in Law like she did every year.
Jeepers woman - you are a full time nurse as well as a mum of 2 very young children and a 9 year old - what are you complaining about and if you are so worried about being porky, maybe this might actually help you lose some weight.

So as cartoon style baddies and stereotypical downtrodden frumpy wives go there were really no surprises here but it could have been so much better if it had not been laid on with a trowel and if the protagonist had not been quite such a drip. She is meant to be a nurse so rather unbelievable that she could be such a pushover as that is one tough profession and this puddle of patheticness and self doubt would not have lasted a minute on the wards.

Of course Mrs Dull is just a character but she was so submissive (except about the thought of not being able to eat meat) and just such a sad domestic drone, I lost patience with her feelings being hurt and the secrets she mentioned that she was so afraid of coming out, I felt might be on a scale of swapping butter for margarine in her scones or having a gym membership that she never used.

YAWN!

Not sure if the narration or writing made this character so insufferable, I think maybe a different, less downtrodden sounding narrator might have saved the book. Weird accents, mumsy delivery and so much saliva in the read that sometimes the voice sounded like a wet bag flapping - voluminous and sloppy.

The worst thing about the book was how drearily repetitive it was, just the same topic covered in 36 different ways and rehashed again and again so the book became stagnant and I just gave up as just so many unlikable characters, bad accents, slurpy narration and nothing happening for chapters and chapter as we just covered the same old topics said in slightly different ways.

I will look out for Sue Watson again as she has written much better books before and I will also watch out for Diana Croft with a view to avoiding as just too insipid and irritating to listen to.

Good story appalling narration

The narrator would be more at home reading children’s stories I nearly gave up as I couldn’t stand her narration but the story kept me going

Okay - but narration not for me

I found the story engaging, but couldn’t listen in too big a timescale due to the narration. The narrator had a sing song style and a bit manic approach and it was not a relaxing listen. The story kept me going and I finally managed to listen to the end this morning.

Summary - story okay, but narration annoying.

Guessed the ending

I guessed exactly how this plot was going to go and guessed the ending/revelation much earlier than the author intended the reader to.

I also did not like the narration

Not for me

I don’t like writing bad reviews but the characters were so predictably annoying and weak. The narrator was very difficult to listen to as was making every small non event sound dramatic. Really disappointing

Awful narration

I didn’t listen to the end of this so couldn’t tell you if there is a shocking twist but it feels very predictable and slow. The narration is awful, I couldn’t continue to listen to it.

Good story

Good plot with many twists but spoilt by narration. Made Claire sound whiny . Better read than listened too I would think

Well I didn’t see that coming.

Read, read, read.
I loved every moment, couldn’t put it down and literally can’t wait to read it again and again.

Twist

Great book, literally couldn’t stop
Listening to it. Thoroughly great read & love the twists in it.

Slow

For the first time ever I had to increase the speed of the narrator as at ordinary speed the narrative did not flow. This didn’t help as the storyline is full of holes, so rather than keeping you in suspense, it just slowly drags on and on and you end up questioning the motives over and over, which were never explained satisfactorily. I did reach the end, which felt somewhat deluded and underwhelming in its finality. None of the characters are that believable. Sorry, but not an author or narrator I will be returning to.