Cover Image: The Girl Next Door

The Girl Next Door

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Member Reviews

The Girl Next Door by Phoebe Morgan is a psychological thriller with quite a few twist and turns. This is the author's second book.

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A fantastic psychological thriller with so many twists and turns throughout the book . I couldn’t turn the pages quick enough., brilliant,

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Phoebe Morgan’s The Girl Next Door is marketed as a psychological thriller, yet I found it to be written more as a twisty community drama in the vein of Liane Moriarty’s Big Little Lies. Yes there were lots of secrets to be revealed but just like in Big Little Lies, a body (teenager Clare Edwards) is discovered early on and this becomes a why- done it as much as a who-done it.

We are drawn in by the use of three narrators. Jane Goodwin, who has built the perfect small-town life in Ashton as the wife of the local doctor, determined to shelter her children from the worst of the gossip surrounding the death of the girl next door. Although Jane was not always likeable, due to her judgemental thoughts, I felt she was very believable. Next we have DI Madeleine Shaw, a solid detective, who quite easily deserves a series of her own. And finally, the young victim Clare – a reminder that all is not as it seems in sleepy suburbia.

Morgan’s writing makes The Girl Next Door easy to race through and enjoy.

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This is an excellent modern family saga with the hint of a thriller. I really enjoyed it especially the giant twist at the end.

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Couldn't put it down and read it in a couple of hours. Loved the alternating narrative between the police and the neighbour afterwards and the victim recalling the time leading up to the attack. Good twist with the reveal too. Highly recommended!

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So here we have the perfect wife perfect life (or is it) book, I’ve read a few before but I loved this one, it is jam packed with lie upon lie and twist upon twist.

Lots of characters to get your teeth into and a murder to boot, totally gripping throughout in my opinion and I thought the ending was fantastic!

A great read and I got through it at break neck speed lol didn’t pause for breath, my favourite character was Jane and she reminded me of a neighbour we have haha!

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Firstly I would like to thank NetGalley for providing me an eARC of The Girl Next Door. All opinions and views discussed are my own.

This is another one of those books that should be right up my alley because the premise just seems to fit the sort of book that I love. And again there’s nothing wrong with this book per-see I just couldn’t connect with it, and didn’t find it overly gripping. All of the characters seem to be bland one note characters and there’s never really a point where I was gripped. The first half of the book did start off stronger but as it just went along I just found myself getting less interested in the book.

I think part of the issue in this book is the lack of wider characters; we get focus on so few characters and the overwhelming focus is on the male characters that its just so clear it’s not them. This sadly did dull the tension of the book because if you’ve got very few characters to suspect you don’t have that who dunnit feel. I honestly suspected the mum at one point because she was going on about how she wasn’t a good mother – and the detective even focused on that point, and then it just seemed dropped? Also the son was a legit creepy stalker and someone should really have words with him about harassing teenage girls.

The fact that Jane is actually revealed to be the abusive one and the murderer was actually a really good twist, and I didn’t see it coming. I think this is why the use of an unreliable narrator works in a book like this; Jane never came out and said in her perspective that her husband was abusing her but that is what you assume. She is an all honesty a completely nutty character though – like absolutely bonkers. The ending had me baffled, why on earth did the husband think that his wife was just going to let him leave. It was so obvious he wasn’t going to be able to just sail away and see his children whenever he wanted. Did he just forget who he was married too for the last few pages??

It wasn’t a bad book overall and I liked the writing style of the book, I just couldn’t connect with it or the plot. It just failed slightly for me. I won’t be getting a physical copy of this book.

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I loved this book and could have easily read it from cover to cover in one sitting.
This book was well written and kept me guessing right until the end.
This book completely hooked me with all its twists and turns

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Plenty of twists and turns in this page turner. I think this would be a perfect holiday read.
Thanks for the advance copy

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Thank you to Netgalley for allowing me to read an ARC of this book. The plot was interesting, written in an easy to follow way. The characters were well fleshed out, which can be hard to do with dueling narratives. Well placed plot twists. Would recommend to fellow mystery lovers!

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So dissapointed I couldn’t download I would love to get to read this I have emailed x
Sounds like a five star read to me

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Easy to read but with twists and turns you may or may not see coming. The story involves a teenage girl who is murdered in mysterious circumstances and a range of interesting characters ... one worth reading.

Thank you to net gallery for an ARC of this book.

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Thank you Netgalley for my copy of The Girl Next Door by Phoebe Morgan. This story had me hooked. I thought it was skilfully plotted where nothing is quite as it seems . We focus on a small town in Essex where a young girl has been found murdered. The story of the girl shakes this neighbourhood to its core. As the investigation progresses we see uncover secrets and lies begin to unravel. We see the extent to what people I'll do and the lengths they'll go to , to protect their themselves, their reputation and their image. There are quite a few u likeable characters but non more so than Jane the local GPs wife. It becomes quite clear that there is more to her than meets the eye. As a reader who enjoys psychological fiction I thought this story would be easy to figure out 'whodunit' however, with all the twists ans turns I hadn't predicted it at all. Cleverly written, genuinely chilling and a great, gripping read.

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Jane Goodwin is the perfect wife, mum, pillar of the community. All this is rocked when the whole town is shocked when 16 yr old Clare Edwards, who lived next door to Jane and her family, is found murdered.
Everyone is under suspicion and small lies and cracks start to appear.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book; the characters & various situations are very believable. As with all towns and villages, you dont know what happens behind closed doors. Genuinely had to keep reading 'just one more chapter'..

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A book with not much substance and as unlikely an outcome as you would ever come across. The story was unrealistic and the characters shallow. Not one for my shelf I’m afraid.

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Thank you to NetGalley and HaperCollins UK for this arc in exchange for an honest review.
Having read and loved this author's previous book "The Doll House" I was very keen to read "The Girl Next Door."
Wow - what a captivating read this was too, from start to finish.
For various reasons none of the characters were particularly likeable, barring DS Madeline Shaw. As the story unfolded, it became clear that neither Rachel, Ian, Jane or Jack were as quite as it first seemed. Some characters turned out to be cleverly mis-represented, but most didn't!
This book had one twisted and chilling plot, a handful of unpleasant people to add to the mix, with a thought provoking disturbing conclusion.

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After a fantastic debut novel, Phoebe Morgan is back with another twisty story that kept me captivated from the first to the last page. She holds the attention of the readers thanks to the different points of views, the gripping and dark plot, and the multi-layered and realistic characters that keep the tension always high.

Welcome to Ashdon where mothers gossip at the school gate, husbands mow the garden, and nothing bad ever happens… until 16-year-old Clare Edwards is found murdered. But who would kill a young and innocent girl? We found out through the narrative of the three protagonists.

Clare is the typical teenager, popular at school, beautiful, with high grades, and always on her cell phone. But Clare is also hiding a few secrets, a family secret that makes her anxious and scared and that makes difficult her relationship with her mother and her stepfather, and she is also exchanging texts with a mysterious man. So what did get her killed? Clare’s point of view was emotional and suspenseful at the same time. Emotional because you read about this young girl who, despite a difficult situation at home, is happy and excited for something that it’s about to happen, and yet you know that it’s going to end badly, that she will be murdered which adds tension to her story.

On the outside, Jane Goodwin has a perfect life. Three beautiful children, a husband who is the local GP, handsome, charming, all the women in town in love with him and jealous of Jane. Jane likes to show off her family and their wealth, being the perfect wife, the perfect mother, no matter what happens behind closed doors. She lives next door to Clare and her family and as the police investigate and journalists camp outside her house, Jane knows that she has to do everything she can to protect her perfect life. Jane’s character was the most difficult to figure out. She appears cold and distant while at the same time being a loving mother and wife and you don’t know what to make of her until the final shocking revelation.

DS Madeline Shaw arrived at Ashdon two years ago. We don’t know much about her personal life, but she is good at her job and she is determined to seek justice for Clare and, while her boss wants to close the case quickly, she tries to figure out how much of the local gossip is true and what Clare’s family is hiding.

THE GIRL NEXT DOOR is a riveting, thrilling, and well-written novel about how gossip and lies can be destructive, about the lenght people will go to protect their secrets and it kept me completely engrossed.

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This was a really good book, got me hooked straight away from the start. The writing was an easy style to read so you just wanted to keep reading as the story line was good and intriguing.

The setting was a village outside London where a young teenager disappeared on her way home from school, her mum and stepdad started to get worried about 8ish, the mum went to her neighbour to see if her daughter was with her son but she wasn't. The stepdad was reporting her missing to the police. About the same time, the police got a report of a dead body, a young teenager....

A superb book to read with a surprising twist, bit of a diary style but it works well as it sets the scene for the book and whether it was murder or an accident. I like the dates and it lets you know which person we are with, so its not confusing, I like that. 5 out of 5 from me.

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What a twisted web Phoebe Morgan weaves here with her second psychological thriller in which she peers behind the net curtains of suburbia to prove that one ever knows what goes on behind closed doors. When a 16 year old girl is found murdered, her next door neighbour Jane reacts with an unexpected fear of losing everything dear to her. This mother of three lives for her family, is involved fully in every aspect of village life and so Clare’s death forces her to look at the community around her as she vows to protect her own family. She desperately wants to help the couple next door cope with their loss but both families are very good at keeping their own secrets and someone knows more about Clare’s death than they are letting on…

There are twists and turns galore here as Jane follows her instincts whilst desperately trying to keep her perfect family together and not let this murder affect their happiness. And as I was reading I was desperate to find out more about the secrets being kept by Jane and her family. Phoebe Morgan slowly winds up the tension throughout her narrative, occasionally using the voice of the murdered girl in the lead up to her murder. And I found that an incredibly affecting part of the storyline as I recognised the usual teenage angst and emotions whilst knowing that the life that was just beginning for her was about to be cruelly ended.

I found myself completely wrong footed at times as just when you think you know what’s about to happen, another twist comes along and just shakes it’s head at you, disappointed that you’ve not quite got there yet! Jane is a wonderfully unreliable narrator, laying down a dark and disturbing trail of breadcrumbs for us follow until we reach the payoff.

This is a compelling domestic thriller that sucks you in from the very start. It’s full of untrustworthy and often unlikeable characters who are never quite what they seem. Phoebe Morgan has picked up lots of tricks during her career so far as a journalist and crime fiction editor and she has pulled them all together to give her readers what she knows they want-a truly gripping and twisty thriller!

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A phenomenally slick psychological thriller that will keep you guessing until the last page. Immaculate plotting and character development keep you pinned to the page. Absolute dynamite.

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