How far will a mother go to protect her only child? This theme appears in many books but you will never see all the twists and turns this one takes. Laura Cavendish's son, a medical student lives with her but wants to move out. Laura is worried about the changes that will occur with his moves and those worries increase when she meets Cherry, the new girlfriend. Cherry is after a way to escape her way out of poverty and what better way than to marry a doctor. Laura discovers Cherry's lies and how she has manipulated the relationship to cause a problem with the mother son bond. Laura feels she needs to get rid of Cherry, but Cherry is not going to go easily.

I would firstly like to thank Netgalley for providing me for a copy of this read in exchange for an honest review.

This book follows Laura, who has it all. A successful career, a long marriage to a rich husband, and a twenty-three year-old son, Daniel, who is kind, handsome and talented. Then Daniel meets Cherry. Cherry is young, beautiful and smart but hasn't led Laura's golden life. And she wants it.
When tragedy strikes, a decision is made and a lie is told. A lie so terrible it changes their lives forever.

This book, unfortunately, didn't really live up to it's hype. While I liked the plotline and was intrigued by the story, I didn't love this one. The whole book is rather slow-paced and yes, the story is decent, but for me it certainly wasn't as gripping or chilling as I had expected. There was no majorly obvious villian - just two woman that misunderstood each other massively. Just one conversation honestly would of just solved the whole situation! The ending for me was also very unsatisfying.

Overall, a decent read for a domestic family drama but in no parts is this book thrilling or spine-chilling. I'm a tad disappointed but I'm hoping that this author's new book, 'The Temp, is better!

This was a good enough storyline about a girlfriend set on advancing in life no matter the obstacles. It was just a tad bit slow for my taste but still enjoyable.

Slow burn comes to a complete stop.

I think the description for this book was misleading. It was not gripping, chilling or a psychological thriller. This was a family drama with a very slow plot. I kept waiting for something big to happen or be revealed.

In my opinion, the lie that was told was very small. And defiantly not life-changing. Just when I thought the book as going to pick up the pace, it ended, abruptly. I kept flicking the page on my kindle thinking it was locked up but sure enough it said 100% at the bottom of the page. This was one time I would have appreciated if the author wrote, “THE END”. At least I could be certain it was the ending.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book courtesy of NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

If I'm honest I wasn't a big fan of this book. I found the plot weak and the characters quite two dimensional and unbelievable.

A tense read a mother overly devoted to her grown son his new girlfriend something about her alarms his mother.Drawn in from first pages could not put down.
I don't want to say too much so I don't give anything away. If you want a book that sucks you in so you don't want to stop reading, this is the book for you.

One lie…one lie that changes everything.

Daniel and his successful parents have enjoyed a privileged life in London, living in the upscale Kensington area, with charming holidays to the south of France, and thriving careers for both Laura and her husband. Daniel is handsome, smart, talented and studying to become a doctor.

Then Daniel meets the beautiful Cherry, and things are about to change for all for them forever. Cherry sees Daniel as her way up the social and economic ladder. Laura has the life Cherry longs for and will do almost anything to achieve. As the women build a relationship centered around Daniel, scheming, reprisal, envy and dread arise. When tragedy happens, one lie is told and things are never the same again for any of them.

This psychological thriller will keep you turning the pages to find out who will do what to achieve a goal and at what cost.

I could not review this book as received by Netgalley. The formatting made it unreadable and to top it off, I only received 13 chapters! Please don't do this to reviewers without being upfront about it, . Our time is valuable too. I ended up requesting it from my library and my turn finally came up so here are my thoughts:

This book promises a “gripping and chilling debut psychological thriller”. It is gripping but it isn’t any of the other things. If you know that going in and you love reading about horrible people as much as I do, you’ll likely enjoy it much more. I requested it so long ago that I didn’t remember a thing about the blurb until I just went back and read it now and I’m glad of that!

Laura’s life is one of wealth and privilege but her marriage is devoid of warmth and love. She’s focused all of her love on her grown son Daniel. He loves his mom and seems to be a decent son, despite her smothering, but when a new girlfriend enters the picture Laura quickly decides that Cherry is nothing but a pretty, little gold-digger and she does not like her.

The first half or so of this book is an intense character study of Cherry and Laura. We get to know them, their motives, their desires, their vicious inner thoughts and their incredible flaws. You can see a true mess in the making and it so much fun to read. As things progress, you realize just how far these two women will go to have things go their way. They are both deviously awful humans. One is smothering, selfish, mean-spirited, and more than a little evil. The other is shallow, materialistic, vindictive, and totally evil. Horrid, terrible people and I loved reading about them.

Even though there are really no true surprises here and not a lot happens in the first half, the book is incredibly infectious. Once I started reading I just had to keep going to find out what nasty thing was going to be said and done next. When a whopper of a lie is told by one of the women, the book spirals into a pit of doom from that point thereafter I read it straight through until the end.

The Girlfriend, is the first book in my 45+ years of book reading in which I hated every character in it. From Laura, the overprotective , overbearing suffocating mother to Cherry the gold digging, manipulative ,hateful girlfriend. to the son Daniel whom I don't even know why Cherry set her sights on him, he lives off his parent's money not his. Both Laura and Cherry went to extremes to keep their hooks on Daniel. It was an interesting book but had no likable characters, except the dog and I felt sorry for that little guy being raised by nuts.. The ending was ok, should've been more characters going that route. I didn't hate the story line ,just the characters.

Compelling characters, a twisting plot, and a dynamic ending make this one a good read. Sort of like Girl on the Train or Gone Girl. Intriguing and can't put it down.

A gripping story with twists and turns throughout. This is one which starts slow but builds up to a great ending.

I didn't expect much from the story, really, it sounded like a regular thriller to me. Two things surprised me: this is a rather long book (almost 450 pages), and it's absolutely addictive. The twisted relationships, the backstories, the secrets and motives of the two main characters were so interesting that the first half of the book almost reads like a twisty contemporary. Then it becomes more traditionally thriller-like, and there are turns so often I was holding my breath!

On a less positive note, I didn't enjoy that although the story was about two women, the man who connects them both was so incredibly... dull. Daniel is so easy to influence and manipulate, acts very emotionally and makes awful decisions on the spur of the moment. He was just such a dead fly who allegedly had a great relationship with his mom, but was ready to ignore her for weeks, to gaslight her and to believe his girlfriend over her.

All in all, The Girlfriend was very intriguing, and I had to read it in two days because I couldn't put this book down. Cherry was such a complex character for most of the book (except for the last 10% or so, when she becomes typically thriller-villain-evil), which made me actually cheer for her for quite a long time throughout the book. And that was such a cool thing about this book, I will highly recommend it to fans of thrillers!

I thoroughly enjoy characters who are insane. I'm not sure what that says about me, but there you go. For years now I have been hoping to find some characters that made me stop and go, "Wait! What? No!" the way that Amy from Gone Girl did. Looks like I found them. Yes, them.

Laura is the ultimate overprotective mother whose biggest fear is losing her child. She will stop at nothing to protect him. Cherry is the ultimate gold digger. She will stop at nothing to nail down a life of leisure. This novel is what happens when these women collide.

What I most enjoyed about the characters Frances had created is that she does an excellent job of providing just enough information that you can't help but find yourself conflicted in regards to your own feelings about the characters. There were times when I didn't know who I should or wanted to be rooting for!

The Girlfriend is a roller coaster ride and so far the only book that should have gotten more of "if you liked Gone Girl" buzz.

I was really looking forward to reading this book but, sadly, it was disappointing. The idea of two women -- one a mother and the other a girlfriend -- fighting over the same man makes sense to an extent but for me this book took it too far.

Laura's love for her son is over the top and Cherry isn't entirely believable as a social climber. Instead Cherry just comes across as manipulative and controlling-- and entirely unlike. In fact, NONE of the characters are particularly likable and that really makes it hard to get through this book. There is no one to root for, and none of their actions are even understandable or believable in the slightest. I can suspend belief for the sake of a book but this was way beyond that point. The writing was ok, a bit too descriptive in places where it wasn't necessary and occasionally the point of view jumped around too much. Overall it just didn't work for me.

WOW! As a mother of just one son, this book is pretty much my nightmare! Except I'm nowhere near as equipped or wealthy as Laura & Howard!

What I loved and thought was unique about this book was that for most of the book, there wasn't a stand out protagonist that I sided with. I could both empathize and judge both of the female leads, but wasn't decidedly "for" either one until about the last quarter of the book. I liked the pace, it felt intense but not suffocating and it was subtly creepy a-la The Talented Mr. Ripley. I won't spoil the ending or re-hash out the plot but I will say this is a great thriller that is a cut above most and would make any mother of boys cringe!

Loved this book!! What we do to protect our children! I really enjoyed how you heard from both main characters and really felt you were in both their minds. Buy this book now! It won't disappoint.

Upon reading the descriptive matter, I was excited to delve into this book. Unfortunately, there was little else in the book besides what was revealed on the "flyleaf." I forced myself to finish it, but I was very disappointed.

The Girlfriend hooked me from the start and kept me in suspense the entire time. I immediately disliked Cherry, and I was happy that Michelle Frances crafting constructed such a villainous character---truly any mother's nightmare. Furthermore, I was happy that th e character of Laura was likeable but flawed. Overall, a stunning and fun read!

This one wasn't for me unfortunately. I didn't like the writing style and was struggling to finish it.

Wow - what an intense psychological page turner. Once I started, I couldn't put it down because I just had to know how it would end. It's so well written that it's difficult to believe that this is a debut novel - I can't wait to see what this author writes next.

This is kind of a love triangle. Daniel and his mother, a TV executive, have always been close. Even though Laura is married, her husband is too involved with his job and his mistress to pay much attention to her or to their son. Daniel is 23 and starting medical school when he meets THE ONE. Cherry works in a rental agency and when she meets Daniel does she see dollar signs or true love? She is very manipulative but continues to profess her love for Daniel. Laura sees Cherry for who she really is and Cherry goes all out to break the relationship between Daniel and his mom and make Daniel totally dependent on her. We have a mother with a too close relationship with her son and a girlfriend who wants him all to herself. It's a fantastic read to find out the answer to that question.

I received an advance review copy of this book from the Great Thoughts’ Ninja Review Team. All opinions are my own.