Okay. Another limbo reading for me. Firstly I love Sandra Brown and I enjoyed most of her action packed/ romantic suspense novels. This time she used her pseudonym name Rachel Rayne, chose mystery/ psychological thriller genres but unfortunately the MCs’ dysfunctional marriage and communication problems took too much place at the story and their arguments turned into something repetitive without any solution. 

Normally this book is about Georgina and Bren’s son Cody’s imaginary old lady friend who gives him chocolates, telling him she wants to be her new grandma. 

Georgina gets suspicious, searching clues as her husband Bren tells her this is only their son’s coping mechanism to deal with his grief. Georgina recently lost her mother and she has more trouble to concentrate on her own grief as she also tries to face her marriage problems. 

Cody acts strange, talks on the phone with his imaginary friends and all their neighbors start acting like creeps. And Georgina thinks that somebody following her with his/her car, watching their house. 

This mysterious parts are good but I wish there were more because the couple problems overshadowed those exciting parts. 

There is a pattern between marriage couple;
Georgina found out her husband Bren kissed his ex at a special friends union when he was drunk. Georgina cannot move on because she cannot absorb the cheating and cannot forgive him but also she mentally hurts herself instead of confronting him. She gives him silent treatment. They argue. She finally starts talking to him. Then she finds another fact , asks her husband, he confesses, more silent treatment. They argue, more cold shoulder. It goes on and on! 

I thought that Georgina’s mental state may be connected to a childhood drama. That would be more logical so we can think she is inaccurate narrator and we may have suspicions about her moves. But grief and the other psychological breakdown she has gotten through for a few years back didn’t seem like proper explanation for me. She’s not delusional woman. She is just sensitive and she bottles up her feelings instead of showing her anger, resentment. This doesn’t make her mentally disturbed. 

Last third was so much better, action packed and the emotional angst part about couple finally ended at those part ( thankfully) 
And the final twist, revelations were also satisfying. 

I give last third of the book: four stars 
And I give 2.5 stars to the rest of it. 
Average: 3.25! 

It was okay reading. Definitely not bad and boring ( if you exclude couple’s lack of communication) but I was expected a little more from this brilliant author. 

It’s still easy, fast pacing, riveting reading and it’s still good choice for spending your time with a mysterious page turner. I recommended it to author’s fans and thriller lovers. 

Special thanks to NetGalley and Gallery Books for sharing this fast paced ARC with me in exchange my honest opinions.

Whoa.... What a book!!  This book was absolutely thrilling, creepy, suspenceful and so much more.  Definitely read it, it's so awesome.

I don't give a summary of the book that has been done, I will say this was a great read!! I would totally recommend it!!

The Publisher recommends this new thriller to fans of Lisa Jewell and Mary Kubica, and I coulnd't agree more. The Woman Outside My Door is fast-paced, creepy and mysterious, dealing with sanity and mental health., which are some of my favorite topics in this genre of literature. And it's done really well.

The novel follows Georgina, a young mom who's not really at her peak. Her husband might be cheating on her, definitely something fishy going on, and her son Cody has a new imaginary friend from the park - only that the friend seems more real than imaginary. Georgina is confused, and her husband accuses her of losing her mind based on a true precedent.

I loved so many things about this book: the quick pace, action, plot, a terrible husband. At the same time, I didn't love Georgina as much as I would have liked to, so I think that character development could have been better in the case of the main character. However, I still honestly recommend this book to any fans of psychological thrillers because it's definitely a haunting one with a highly intimate narrative.

*Thank you to the Publisher for a free advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Date reviewed: September 2, 2020

When life for the entire universe and planet turns on its end and like everyone else you "have nothing to do" while your place of work is closed and you are continuing to be in #COVID19 #socialisolation,  superspeed readers like me can read 250+ pages/hour, so yes, I have read the book … and many more today. And it is way too hot to go outside, so why not sit in from of the blasting a/c and read and review books?? 

I requested and received a temporary digital Advance Reader Copy of this book from #NetGalley, the publisher and the author in exchange for an honest review.  

From the publisher, as I do not repeat the contents or story of books in reviews, I let them do it as they do it better than I do 😸.

From an unforgettable new voice in suspense fiction, The Woman Outside My Door is a thrilling page-turner about a young mother who can’t shake the feeling that her son’s “imaginary” friend is putting him in very real danger, and she will stop at nothing to keep him safe—perfect for fans of Lisa Jewell and Mary Kubica.

All children have imaginary friends, Georgina tells herself. It’s perfectly normal, and they all grow out of it in the end. But when her seven-year-old son, Cody, tells her about New Granny, the new friend he’s met in the park, Georgina is instantly suspicious. Something—call it maternal instinct—tells her he isn’t making it up.

But maybe Georgina is losing her mind. It wouldn’t be the first time, after all. And with her own mother’s recent death leaving her bereft and trying to cope with life as a busy working mom, it’s no wonder she’s feeling paranoid that Cody has invented a “New Granny” to replace his beloved grandmother.

Her husband, Bren, becomes the voice of reason, assuring Georgina that it’s just a game, the product of their son’s overactive imagination. But what if Cody’s imaginary friend is not so imaginary after all?

One thing that I ADORE about Netgalley is finding new authors and this is an AMAZING book, new author or not.  It is expertly crafted and inherently spooky and it made me wonder if imaginary friends should be banned by parents just to be safe. I can absolutely see this as a movie on Netflix or Amazon Primes as it was so visual in my head that I was casting the movie in my head as I wrote it. (Yes, social isolation has made me stream a lot of TV series and movies as I can read while I watch TV - I just cannot sit and do NOTHING!)

As always, I try to find a reason to not rate with stars as I love emojis (outside of their incessant use by "🙏-ed Social Influencer Millennials/#BachelorNation survivors/Tik-Tok and YouTube  Millionaires/etc. " on Instagram and Twitter... Get a real job, people!) so let's give it 🍑🍑🍑🍑🍑

While the plot and description sounded very intriguing to me-I just was not impressed. I found it to be very cliche. There were no unique qualities that stood out to me. In all I was just disappointed and didn't really enjoy the reading experience unfortunately.

Georgina isn’t sure what to believe. Her seven year old son, Cody has told her all about his new friend, New Granny, whom he met in the park. Georgina’s mother has recently died, so maybe Cody is pretending he has an imaginary grandmother to take her place. Still, something about the whole thing makes Georgina uneasy, even if her husband believes she’s overreacting. What if Cody isn’t imagining his new friend? This book had me wrapping myself up in a blanket and chewing my nails while I read. Be prepared to seriously creeped out