Don’t Start Reading This At Night . . .
Unless Your Hearing Is Good, The Lights Are On,
And, Of Course, You Aren’t Sleepy
ABOUT THE BOOK
A picture-perfect suburban life fractures . . . and a darker reality bubbles beneath the surface.
Mona Ellison’s life is as perfect as the porcelain dolls lined up on her shelves. She has a successful husband, a loving son, a beautiful home, and a supportive group of girlfriends ever ready for their weekly wine night.
But when Mona’s son gets entangled with the wrong crowd and runs away from home, her blissful suburban world begins to unravel. She tells her friends that boys will be boys, that he’ll be back as soon as his money runs dry . . . but deep down she knows there’s something else going on.
Then the police show up at Mona’s door. A young girl has turned up dead in their quiet town, and her missing son is the prime suspect.
Determined to reunite with her son and prove his innocence, Mona follows an increasingly cryptic trail of clues on social media, uncovering a sinister side of suburbia and unveiling lies and betrayal from those she trusted most. And as Mona spirals further from her once cozy reality, a devastating revelation shatters everything she thought she knew. Now the only thing she’s sure of is that she can’t trust anyone . . . not even herself.
With unrelenting psychological suspense and a wicked twist, What They Don’t Know marries small-town thriller and domestic mystery—suburban paranoia at its best.
- Genre : Mystery, Thriller, Suspense, Detective
- Rating : 4 Stars
- Publication Date: May 17, 2022
- Publisher: Seventh Street Books
- Length: 286 pages
Oh, my, goodness. I picked this up to read last night and couldn’t put it down. I can tell you one thing, I was glad the lights were on and I wasn’t reading my Kindle in the dark.
This story grabbed me quickly with lots of questions, creepy dolls, and characters who had me snuggling deeper under the covers. Who were these people? Could any of them be trusted?
When I’m reading a good book, a niggling voice is always whispering from the wings: Will the ending ruin the whole story? But as I read What They Don’t Know, for some reason I felt confident Susan Furlong wouldn’t let me down. And she didn’t.
I’m one of those odd people who don’t usually read a synopsis since I don’t want anything to ruin my discovery of a story as it unfolds, so as this story unfolded I was intrigued and continually making guesses. I couldn’t close the book. So I read on. And on. And on.
Mona Ellison, the protagonist, kept me going like a yo-yo. She had porcelain dolls that she seemed far too attached to. She acted completely paranoid, or was she? And then there is her bad-boy son who had disappeared. Not to mention her husband, who might be absolutely wonderful, or is he just acting the part? So I read on. And on. And on.
My Concerns
It was either due to the hour, I finally finished the book at 3 a.m., or there is some truth to my concern, I don’t know since my mind was a little fuzzy, but I felt the last third of the book was too repetitive.
Final Thoughts
- The need-to-know will keep the pages turning.
- I feel sure this suspenseful book with a twist at the end won’t disappoint.
- It is a well-written story that you will want to allow lots of time to read.
Whose reality can be trusted in this small town-story of friends?
Since this is the first time I’ve read anything by this author, I’m definitely adding Furlong to my watch list.
My thanks to Seventh Street Books and the author for a gifted copy to review.
About the Author
Susan Furlong is the author of several mysteries including the acclaimed Bone Gap Travellers series and SHATTERED JUSTICE, a New York Times Best Crime Novel of the Year. She also contributes, under a pen name, to the New York Times bestselling Novel Idea series. Her eleventh novel, WHAT THEY DON’T KNOW, is now available. She resides in Illinois with her husband and children.
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Thank you for taking time to read and review. Much appreciated!