Startling.
The story and the storytelling are amazing. Startling. Modest. Understated.
A murder took place within a home 25 years ago, for which the father was assumed to have been the assaulter, in what could have been mistaken identity in both victim and perpetrator. The father disappears and the family is left with the pieces, whatever they might be, honestly this is where Flynn shines., because it’s in the everyday minutiae that you realize how this has permeated this family’s individual sense of self., internally and outwardly.
In addition, the story has an extra sense of urgency to it, that it speaks to current awareness and issues concerning women/victim safety/ self identification, white privilege, class and money, without ever being heavy handed.
So the story is told through the eyes of the daughter, hos she gages herself and life, she has never stopped looking for answers.
So the continual undercurrent is, what she thinks happened, did it happen that way? And not in the weird way some authors handle this type of persistent question.
This is everyday questioning of herself, it hinges on her self doubts.
Outwardly she is a productive and successful physician, whose identity is changed, no one knows her relationship to that night.
Flynns lines are almost thrown away, but they are written so beautifully,it blows you away.
“There’s a relief in knowing the truth—a completion, a block finally dropping into place— but I’m also so stricken it hurts to breathe....I’d thought there might still be a way out of this. A notch in the circle through which all of us... could escape.”
“I don’t answer. I don’t run or start screaming, because part of me is expectant, like I’m about to learn the answer to a question.”
HIGHLY recommend, although ps the Kindle format version was terrible and distracted from the sheer joy of reading this story.

2.5*
Sometimes a book can capture your attention immediately, grabbing you tightly from the start. Leaving you to fully expect a great read you can sink your teeth into. And sometimes, no matter how hard you try, you just cannot get that connection. Unfortunately, with this read I fell into the latter category.

Claire grew up having to shoulder the knowledge that her father may have been a killer. She hasn't seen or heard from him since she was a child. Is he on the run because he was guilty? Or is he hiding until he can prove his innocence!

Though Claire has managed to create a successful life with a high-end profession, she's never given up wanting him to face justice and either prove his innocence...or guilt, if that's the case. Is she even prepared to see him after all these years?

I have to admit I had struggle somewhat with this book. It never quite came into focus for me until the final 10%.

The majority of the reviews for this book are extremely positive so don’t let this review sway you. It might be the perfect fit for you!

A buddy read with Susanne🌸

Thank you to both Penguin Publishing Group - Viking, NetGalley and Flynn Berry for an ARC to read and review.

Published by Viking on July 31, 2018

The police have been looking for Colin Spenser for 26 years. He is wanted for the murder of his wife’s nanny, Emma. The police theorize that he mistook Emma for his wife Faye, who survived a subsequent attack and was able to identify Colin as her assailant.

The case made headlines because Colin Spenser was Lord Spenser, an earl. His brother and sister helped him flee and then told the press that his wife hired someone to kill the nanny so that Colin would be blamed. The family has enough money to mount an effective smear campaign and the British press laps it up, because smears are so much more interesting than the truth.

Colin’s daughter Claire has changed her name but lives in unlikely fear of her father’s return, concealing pepper spray in various locations inside her home. Claire’s other worry is her brother Robbie, whose drug addiction causes seizures and other problems.

A Double Life gives the reader a glimpse of Colin’s courtship of Faye, their honeymoon and separation and short-lived reconciliation. Sometimes the backstory is told from Claire’s childhood perspective and sometimes in the third person, focusing on Faye. Other flashbacks acquaint the reader with Claire’s perspective of the night that Colin committed murder. On occasion we get some insight into Robbie’s life, although he is largely a secondary character.

The main plot follows Claire’s clandestine search for answers about the role various people played to conceal her father’s guilt and current whereabouts. During the course of her stalking and still disguising her true identity, she befriends the daughter of her father’s brother, who has not seen Claire since childhood. She meets other family members, considers rumors about their actions on the night that her father killed the nanny, and plots a course of action after learning where he might be living.

I admire the fluid style in which A Double Life is written and the careful attention Flynn Berry pays to the details of Claire’s strained life. Berry does a fine job of depicting British aristocracy in the unflattering light that the story requires without turning them into stereotypes. While it is easy to sympathize with Claire and to understand her obsession with her father, Berry does not make a convincing case for her continued fear of him a quarter century after he disappeared.

The buildup to the climax generates a modest level of suspense, but the climax is underwhelming. The plot resolves with a couple of twists, but the story’s construction creates the anticipation of a more surprising ending than the one Berry delivered.

Colin is loosely based on Lord Lucan, who is suspected of murdering his wife’s nanny before disappearing. I suspect that the true story is more interesting than Berry’s fictionalized version. While much of the story is strong, the ending dampened my enthusiasm for the novel as a whole.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS

The premise of this book is intriguing. A man seemly vanishes into thin air after killing his children’s nanny, whom he had mistaken for his wife. Fast forward 26 years and his daughter, Claire, is still on the lookout for him and wondering what had motivated the attack in the first place.

The story bounces between Claire’s current life and her past, which includes the past of her mother and father as well. There are many actors in this story. It took me awhile to get used to the movement between different time frames but eventually it fell into a rhythm.

Flynn Berry writes beautifully and the book is quite descriptive, especially concerning Claire’s surroundings and her reactions to them. However, the story did lag now and then and the summary at the end was a little more than was necessary in order to finish it. I would give A Double Life 3.5 stars and I will definitely pick up Ms Flynn’s next book.

Many thanks to Net Galley and the publisher for providing a copy of this book for review.

A different sort of thriller. I expected more of a murder mystery, not a book about how a tramatic experience shapes your life. Who exactly was leading the double life? Claire or her Dad? I felt sorry for Claire, but I didn't like her at all. Her life was full of horrible events, hut she kept trudging along. The book ends very quickly, but lags in the middle. Thank you for a galley in exchange for a honest review.

Claire's father Colin disappeared after his estranged wife and his children's nanny were attacked, presumably by him. After 26 years, Claire is obsessed with finding her father and she stalks his former friends for clues to his whereabouts. She is also terrified that her father will reappear and kill her. The story switches back and forth (rather jarringly) between the marriage of Claire's parents and the present day Claire. Somewhat improbably, Claire is now a doctor. I don't know how she would have made it through med school. Stalking takes a lot of time. I made it a third of the way through this book before giving up. There was no suspense and the writing was very choppy. I also didn't like "Under the Harrow", so at least I now know that I should avoid this author, no matter how intriguing the blurb may be. I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.

Wow, what a book! First, I thought the book is about Lord Lucan. However, it isn't, the same premise, I think this would make a great movie! The book is slow; the writer makes you feel as though the grown daughter has severe mental problems, from her childhood. The author has written an excellent book; I loved the ending! I would advise Googling Lord Lucan; then this story makes tremendous sense to the reader.
I highly recommend.
Carolintallahassee

I love the premise of this one. Claire, whose father goes missing after a young girl is killed and her mother injured, decides after many years of supposed sightings of her dad to try to track him down. Claire has never been sure if her father was guilty or innocent and now she must decide if she can handle the truth. I'll admit, this set up sounded riveting but I'm not sure the execution played out that way. Claire is a Dr in the story which led me to believe she was highly analytical and intelligent, however, she often came across as grating, irritating and off putting in her ways. By the end I didn't care too much about whether she got what she wanted or not. Overall, I felt that the book missed the mark on the excitement and suspense factor

Thanks for the early review copy!

I recommend this novel to fans of thrillers. It was well-written and interesting novel.

It took me a while to get into the book as the beginning was somewhat confusing to me. The scenes with Claire and her brother were very touching. They also emphasized the impact violence can have on young children’s lives. Other than the scenes with her brother, Claire didn’t really seem to come to life for me. I found it amazing that she was able to walk away from her life as a doctor, as well as her dog, to track down her dad in Croatia. The ending seemed too abrupt and unrealistic. I was left wanting more. Thank you to Flynn Berry, Penguin Books, and NetGalley for affording me with the opportunity to read this book.

This was a mediocre read at best. The book had a weak foundation, a storyline that did not create any suspense, and a rather flat ending. This is not a book that I would recommend to others.

Flynn Berry presents a storyline based on a famous unsolved crime in the twentieth century involving Lord Lucan. Lord Lucan was to have killed their nanny and brutally attacked his wife. And he simply disappeared. I truly enjoyed this book as I traveled with Clare along the road to finally find this man who is her father. Is he truly the murderer she thinks him to be? Is he still alive, walking about in freedom while Clare and her family are tied to what they believe he did? I appreciate that the author took a great approach to this crime and didn't try to muddle it with crazy twists and turns. While straight forward, I really enjoyed it because of her writing!

Thirty years ago Claire woke to loud noises downstairs, only to discover her nanny Emma covered in blood. Claire’s mother and father who were estranged at the time whose names are Faye and Colin. Faye said Colin attacked her when she found him over Emma’s body bloody. Faye had escaped and ran for help and Colin disappeared. His car was found abandoned near the English Channel with blood stains on the front seat. His powerful wealthy friend maintain his innocence. Colin hasn’t been seen since. This story is told completely in the POV of Claire whose obsessed with finding her father and bring justice to her murdered nanny and her mother who was hurt. She’s now a doctor leading a quite life living in fear every time there’s a supposed spotting of her father. Her brother Robbie is addicted to pain meds because he has trouble dealing with what there father did. This story was well written but I didn’t like the bouncing back in forth of now and in the past without warning but the book held my interest. Apparently this book was inspired by the unsolved lord Lucan case. I give this a 3.5 stars ⭐️ .!

A true crime case -- that of Britain's notorious Lord Lucan -- acts as touchstone for Flynn Barry's nimble A Double Life (Viking, digital galley).  Narrator Claire is a London doctor whose real name is unknown to her colleagues and friends. She's actually Lila Spenser, daughter of Colin Spenser, the Eton-educated lord who vanished when she was a child after being accused of attacking her mother and killing the nanny. Many believe that Spenser's wealthy friends helped him escape, and he supposedly has been sighted in a number of countries over the last quarter century. Claire always has had trouble reconciling her childhood memories of her handsome father with her mother Faye's account of her unhappy marriage. Mostly, she wants to find him, obsessively following Internet forums tracking the case and privately stalking his old friends. Barry mixes past and present to good effect, but the thrills really begin when Claire travels to Croatia on an apparent wild-goose chase. Maybe it is. Maybe not.

from On a Clear Day I Can Read Forever

I thought this book was very interesting. I was intrigued by the blurb and I found that the book did not disappoint. I thought the characters were well written and the plotting was fine. I received a copy from NetGalley and the publisher and this is my honest opinion

The author, Flynn Berry, executes A Double Life in a taut writing style. The story starts out in a gripping voice as tense as a tight-wire on which to read upon. This proves to enhance the feeling of apprehension to the reader; an anxiety that the protagonist, Dr. Claire Alden, is undoubtedly experiencing.

“In the next window, a man reclines in a chair while a barber brings a straight razor up his neck.

Cold air cuts through the thin fabric of my jumper, and I zip my coat.”

For me, sentence combinations like this help me to clearly see that Claire is terrified to let her guard down – even for a moment. I am relishing this writing style; it has me on the edge all the time. It also makes me want to find out what happens next. However, I felt that the ending sort of fizzled out. I guess I was expecting this spectacular fireworks of an ending, you know – where all the best and biggest fireworks are let off at the end.

The author meticulously gives out little bits and pieces of information as the story goes along. Even the characters are built up this way. A Double Life is a murder mystery, so there is a fair amount of violence, but it is not overly graphic. There are no steamy sex scenes. The story line weaves in and out of time, from different parts of the past to the present; which helps explain Claire’s motivation.

The editing, on the kindle edition at least, needs some help. In the first paragraph of every chapter, the first letter of the first word is separated by double blank lines. Even when I tried to decrease the font size it made no difference. It is quite distracting. Also, randomly throughout the story, out of the blue, will appear either the author’s name or the title of the book in bold lettering. This tends to draw the reader out of the story in the most irritating way.

Overall, I liked this story: 3.5 stars. Claire is a likeable character who pieces together the night that changed her family’s life. She was only a child at the time, but the damage has left Claire and her brother rather dysfunctional. Claire sees the man who attacked her mother in every stranger on the street, and her brother has addiction problems. Claire finally has her answers in the end and she does some things that had me asking why she would do that.

I have thankfully received this book from PENGUIN GROUP Viking and Netgalley in exchange for my honest review.

3.5 ⭐️‘s. I was intrigued by the fact that the book was loosely inspired by one of the most notorious unsolved crimes of the 20th century—the Lord Lucan case. It was well written and interesting, but I didn’t care for the way it jumps between present and past, without warning at times. But it held my attention enough to make me curious about the details of the actual case.

The story is told by the POV of the daughter—Claire—who is obsessed with finding her father. She is now a doctor, leading a quiet life in London. Her younger brother Robbie is a mess, with an addiction to pain meds. They’ve both changed their names so their past can remain hidden.

Almost thirty years ago, Claire woke to noises and went downstairs to discover the body of their nanny—Emma—covered in blood. Her mother and father—Faye and Colin—were estranged at the time.

Faye said Colin attacked her when she found him over Emma’s body. She escaped, ran for help and Colin fled the scene. His car was found abandoned near the English Channel, with bloodstains on the front seat. His powerful, privileged friends maintained his innocence and the first lord accused of murder in more than a century has been missing ever since.

Thank you to NetGalley and PENGUIN GROUP Viking for this ARC, in exchange for my honest review!

#AdoubleLife #NetGalley

I love a good psychological thriller but this story lacked the thrills I like. In this story we have Claire, a doctor living in London, who becomes obsessed with finding her father who disappeared from her life when she was a child following the brutal killing of her nanny and beating of her mother while she and her baby brother slept. When I started reading it pulled me in but after chapters and chapters of her "quest to find the truth" I got bored. Honestly, I could have cared less where her father was and if he really did it, I just wanted more twists and thrills! Maybe that wasn't her intent, though. I believe Berry built this story to be more of an examination of violence against women and the effects of childhood trauma. She is an excellent writer and this book had potential but it just wasn't for me. If you like your suspense to be more character-based with serious prose, this is for you!

Loosely based on a true crime, A Double Life introduces us to Claire. As a young child, her nanny was killed and her mother attacked in a shocking act of violence. Her fathers car is found abandoned with bloodstains on the seat but has vanished into thin air. Fast forward 30 years and we see Claire as an adult. The police come to see her to let her know that there has been a sighting of her father. This sighting doesn't pan out, as has happened for her entire life. Frustrated, Claire decides to take the matter into her own hands and find out the truth once and for all. Was her father the murderer? Or was he just in the wrong place at the wrong time, or even involved at all? She goes on the hunt and what evolves is a thrilling page turner. There was a lot of build up throughout the book but I found the ending lackluster. This was an interesting story with a strange ending that did not seem to fit the rest of the book. For me, A Double Life was ⭐️⭐️⭐️/5 stars. Thank you @vikingbooks for this advance reader in exchange for my honest review.

A taut, psychological tale in which a daughter becomes obsessed with finding her father. He disappeared over twenty years ago as the primary suspect in a gruesome murder which took place as his two children were asleep upstairs. Although fiction, a small notation indicates that Double Life was “inspired by actual events,” most likely those surrounding Lord Lucan. He was a British peer who disappeared after his wife was mysteriously attacked and their nanny murdered in November, 1974. The story is told through the eyes of Claire who is now a 34 year old doctor living in London. However, she was born in another place with another name and the narrative alternates between her two lives. The book is much more about her “research” and quest to locate her father than the crime itself.

As one might expect, Double Life reads like a cross between a tense drama and true crime. Overall, I thought it was very well done with just a few exceptions:

Some of the flashbacks, or transitions between time periods, just weren’t clear to me. The resulting confusion throws me off and disrupts the flow. However, the plot just cried out for this device and, as the book went on, either the transitions got smoother or I caught on.

I was puzzled by Claire’s choice to become a doctor and wondered why it mattered. It seemed pretty ancillary both to the character as well as the story line. There was one place where she wondered about how to become a person who helps…. perhaps this was the key but there wasn’t an obvious connection.

I also wasn’t quite able to understand her relationship with her brother and the connection between his issues and their family history. Again, it seemed a bit ancillary to the main story line.

Bottom line…. I’ve put Flynn Berry on my “watch list.” I also think this would make an excellent movie and hope the television/film rights are optioned as was Under the Harrow..


FYI - I received a copy of this book through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.