This book didn't grab me at first but did make me curious about where it was going. After the first 15 or 20 pages, I was totally engrossed and couldn't put it down. The twist and turns throughout kept me engaged and the ending made me both happy and sad.

This book is great! Would definitely recommend. Thanks so much to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

This amazing debut novel opens with 11 year old twin girls cold, scared and alone late at night at a Scottish harbor in Edinburgh. All they will say are their first names and that they are waiting for a pirate ship. Twenty years later one of the twins, Catriona, is back in Scotland, for the first time in over 10 years. She is there because her twin, Ellice, has disappeared at sea and is presumed dead. Cat is sure that she would know if El is dead, even though they had not spoken in 10 years. She has come back to see what games El is now playing, because El was good at playing games and getting what she wanted. Cat’s search for answers takes her back to their childhood and the fantasy world of pirates, witches and clowns that she and El created in a hidden part of their house which they called Mirrorland. Memories which Cat thought were all part of their fantasy world suddenly become part of her current reality and in order to find out what happened to El she must finally face the reality of their tragic childhood, and separate out fiction from the facts she has refused to remember. Mirrorland is a modern day gothic where every page brings a new surprise. A surprise which will have you wondering what is real and what isn’t in this unusual, scary and surprisingly atmospheric novel which touches on horrible abuse, a mother’s desperate efforts to save her children, love, betrayal and above all else the bonds between sisters – especially twins.

Sadly, this just isn't my cup of tea. I love a good twin mystery, but the writing just seemed to drag on and on. You'd start to learn something in one paragraph then be reading about something entirely different before the paragraph even ended. It also was a bit too long - there just wasn't enough story to cover, so much of it felt like filler.

I wish I liked this one more, because it really sounded great. I know a lot of other readers will love it, so don't skip this one just because of my review.

This ARC was provided in exchange for my completely honest review

A strong debut. Its an escape from reality. Mystery filled read with turns i did not expect. Would highly recommend reading .

This book did not hold my interest. Twins and one twin disappears. But I was so lost by the way the story was very slow. I did not finish this book because I lost interest. I was looking for so much more from this book. *This book was given to me for free at my request from Netgalley and I provided this voluntary review.*

This is beautifully written debut.....(combo/ infusion mix of genres) > stunning blend of literary fiction and mystery thriller. I loved the book. There are a lot of descriptions— (which often can be too much), but I found the descriptions in this book exhilarating, birthed from a wonderful imagination.
I WAS THERE...TRANSPORTED....into the different rooms > spooky, eerie, dark....with stories of clowns, witches, and pirates. What’s sooooo unusual for me is I’m just not a witchie-clownie-pirate type of girl. BUT THIS WAS DIFFERENT....( very different)... balanced with suspense...love...betrayal...revenge...and redemption.

Carole Johnstone is a writer to keep an eye on....her talent is spellbinding noticeable. An author I might compare her to is Daphne Du Maurier.

A LITTLE ABOUT THE STORY....[ but NO SPOILERS]
“Cat lives in Los Angeles, about as far away as she can get from her estranged twin sister El and No. 36 Westeryk Road, the imposing Gothic house in Edinburgh where they grew up. As girls, they invented Mirrorland, a dark, imaginary place under the pantry stairs full of pirates, witches, and clowns.
These days Cat rarely thinks about their childhood home,
or the fact that El now lives there with her husband”.

Cat returns home to the grand old house - after El had mysteriously disappeared after going out on a sailboat.

I loved the contrast descriptions between modern city condo living in sunny Southern California, (Venice Beach), and the grand old house, in Edinburg...with it’s landscape, windy swaying of the green orchard surrounding the mansion...
and the old house (a main character), itself.

At the beginning of the story, we get a photo of the layout of the house in the UK...
On the ground floor we see the kitchen, the pantry, the drawing room, The wash house, the exercise yard, and the orchard and grounds that surround the house.
On the rear end of the house,
there is a Princess Tower, The Clown Café, The Kakadu Jungle, The Donkshop, The Landing, and a bathroom.

THE OLD HOUSE .....LIVED LIKE A MAIN CHARACTER FOR ME

The story begins with the prologue September 5, 1998
An enchanting tidbit that tickled my pleasure bone right away was that El, was the nickname for Ellice.
I loved it.
With my name being Elyse...
I think I would have enjoyed friends calling me El sometimes ( god knows my name was dissected in so many other ways growing up)

Ok... back to our story...
I was hooked immediately!
Teeth chattering, bodies shivering, choppy waters, a loud splash, chilly winds, a sweater, a smell of blood?, a smile....
El and Cat smiled at each other. They said they would never leave each other.
“We will not leave each other”.
It was the day that their second life began.

I WAS CURIOUS....and/but....as I said before ‘because’ the descriptions were so interesting themselves ...( very creative storytelling)... I never felt rushed to need to know the final result to ‘the mystery’.... but OMG....I’m sure no reader saw that ending coming. I enjoyed being surprised....but it was the ‘entire’ crafting-storytelling I enjoyed.

So.....
After a long flight from Los Angeles to the UK ( lots of wine for Cat while on a seven hour layover)...
Cat is back home. She is greeted by Ross, El’s husband.
Ross was in London - when El took the sailboat out alone.
Ross, a clinical psychologist, was at a psychopharmacology conference. By the time he got back home, El had already been missing for at least five hours.

It was definitely odd - with mixed emotions—Cat being back in her old house - filled with childhood memories.
“The Clown Cafe was solely El’s invention: a richly imagined roadside American diner, with walls of red and white and glass tubes of pink neon. An Old record player was a jukebox playing fifties Elvis”.
As kids, Cat and El played in the Clown Cafe. It was their their favorite hiding places in the world—they played dress-up, made up stories, ate fried donuts.

As Cat looks around the house all these years later— many memories come strolling back.
Their grandpa was deaf enough that’s the entire house new every single football result by the end of a Saturday afternoon.
He listen on a radio
There was never a TV in the house only their grandpa‘s radio.
“Mum had many rules, but that we should read, that we could learn everything we ever needed to know in life from Books, was absolute and never wavered”.

Ross thinks El is dead. The search team thinks she’s dead. Cat knows she’s not.
Cat knew El ( her twin) in ways nobody did. Cat would have felt it — if she was dead.....(?)

A few facts...
....El hasn’t accessed either of her bank accounts since she disappeared.
....she hasn’t contacted anyone or turned on her phone.
....Ross found El’s passport exactly where it always is.
....El, Ellice MacAuley, was first reported missing by the Royal Forth Yacht Club’s Bomann at approximately 6:30 PM on April 3rd.

There are more few ‘questionable’ facts:
....El loved both her sister, Cat, and her husband, Ross.
....Neither shame or grief can erase Cat’s memory of El’s cleverness, her sometimes casual cruelty. Cat doesn’t trust El.
....many more ‘questionable’ to untangle.

There is an investigation. We meet Detective Inspector Rafiq ( Kate), and detective sergeant, Logan.

We contemplate Cat’s thoughts about El, often wondering if she has reliable character or not.

This is a very intelligent mystery thriller....very atmospheric & visual....
One, I think would make for a great movie.

A couple of excerpts:
“The house was more than old memories. It was like a museum, a mausoleum. Or a moment of catastrophe, preserved like a body trapped under pumice and ash”.
It’s where Cat, El, Mum, and Grandpa lived.
“I’m smiling as I look around at the wonky beige wood units. At the old boiler, it’s silver flue plugged into a hidden chimney that was forever trapping birds. Are used to listen to them, scratching and flapping, that sounds muffled as if they were underwater. Beneath the old hanging clothes rack, there’s a new Smeg fridge-freezer, an incongruent sapphire blue. I am beyond the towering Georgian window, with its many small glass panels framed with hardwood glazing bars, the old apple trees sit and sway”.

Bedrooms 12345
Every room in the house apart from the kitchen had a bell pull: a brass-and-ceramic lever connected to long copper wires hidden inside the walls.
Whenever El or Cat wanted to guess which room’s bell pull had been pulled by the other, they would stand inside the entrance hall instead.
“A rudimentary telepathy test that convinced no one because each bell also had a distinctive peal”.
They had their, “There’s a monster in this house”, games.

Towards the beginning of the book there was a quote by Alexandre Dumas from his book, “The Count of Monte Cristo” ( on my list to read this year)....
“When you compare the sorrows of real life to the pleasures of the imaginary one, you will never want to live again, only dream forever”.

5 very enjoyable stars
Thank you Scriber, Netgalley, and the talented Carole Johnstone

Mirrorland is a beautiful, complex and dizzying tale of sisterhood and coming to grips with the past via a rather horrifying trip through the present.

El and Cat – Ellice MacAuley and Catriona Morgan – were twins who lived in their own wild world when they were children.  The girls do not know who their father is – they are told that their mother destroyed her marriage, taking the twins with her to Edinburgh.

Alone, with only each other for company, the girls find themselves living in a sprawling, remote gothic estate with their mother and grandfather. The zone under the pantry stairs becomes ground zero for their wild pre-adolescent imaginations; they call it Mirrorland, a place where they can meet pirates, witches, and other fantastical characters. The intensely-bonded twins also bond intensely to the seeming fantasy of Mirrorland, and their inability to distinguish dreams from reality results in a fuzzily-drawn disaster when they are adolescents.

When they grow up, they grow apart, their estrangement solidifying them when El manipulates Cat’s boyfriend, Ross, a neighborhood boy and occasional part of their Mirrorland trips, away from Cat and into marriage with her.

The separation lasts for twelve years.  Cat escapes from the moldering world of Number 36 Westeryk Road and becomes an actress, now living far from Scotland in glitzy Los Angeles.  El never leaves, moving to the house with Ross.  But one day El disappears while sailing, and the investigation into what happened draws Cat home.  El’s medicated depression is blamed for her disappearance and she is presumed dead, but Cat knows something else is going on – and she assumes that El is seeking attention rather than intentionally trying to take her own life.  She starts finding notes – threats, really – from her sister scattered all over the estate, as well as her somewhat twisted diary.  They’re leading Cat back to the truth – back to Ross’ arms, which begins to reveal unsavory things about him – and back to the horror and wonder of Mirrorland.

Johnstone’s storytelling is an enrapturing, gorgeous thing, and she weaves such a transcendent adult fantasy that it’s easy to sink a full day into this book.  It’s an ugly, upside-down Alice in Wonderland cum We Have Always Lived in the Castle journey that’s suspenseful, repulsive and yet wonderfully alluring.  I could not put it down, even when the suspense had my stomach tied in knots. It’s a spooky story, and a unique one.

Cat is an interesting and slightly glamorous everywoman - haunted, tormented, creative, passionate, but very real and present in an unreal world.  El is more elusive - as well she should be – and their monstrous mother and jolly grandfather surprise at every turn; in several cases unpleasantly.  Ross seems the most devoted to Cat and El’s protection but – well, I will leave it to the reader to find out.

The reader will likely have difficulty untangling the fantastic from the mundane in Johnstone’s world, and fail to demarcate where dreams, delusions, fantasy and reality fork apart - which is just the way the author intends it. You will find yourself roaming the corridors of love, hatred and romance with her; you will see pirates, witches and clowns, and you will feel the awful, palpable fear that Cat goes through and suspect everyone – including her reliability as a narrator.  Mirrorland is an incredible place to visit – but you wouldn’t want to live there.  Thanks to Johnstone’s incredible sense of art, you won’t need to disappear into the cupboard under the stairs, however, to be transported.

Note: This book contains extreme violence and on-page rape and incest.

Buy it at: Amazon, Audible, or your local independent bookstore
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Mirrorland by Caroline Johnstone

Full disclosure I’m a sucker for twin stories, specifically identical twins, which is the main reason I chose this book. Tons of backstory which I usually love but it was told in a confusing way, in the middle of a paragraph without warning, then as soon as you’re in you’re out again. The author is fantastic with imagery and adjectives.

If this book was on a heart monitor it was flat lined, then there would be a blip a quarter in, then when part 2 starts the blips are continuous, by the time you get to the end your heart explodes!

Cat and El are sisters in Mirrorland. Mirrorland is their safe, imaginary world.

The story starts with the twins found on a Scottish pier, alone, scared and covered in blood. We don’t know what has happened, but we know they are traumatized. The story then skips ahead twenty years, when Cat finds out that her sister Ellice is missing, and she has to return to her childhood home, which her sister and her husband Ross had bought and Cat has been avoiding for the last twenty years. El went missing while sailing, and is presumed dead. But Cat knows that she isn’t. The twin connection.

To make things more interesting, we learn that Mirrorland is a magical world that the kids would use as an escape from their very strange childhood--a very complicated, pirate-ship based world. There are imaginary characters and characters that you think are imaginary that may not be imaginary at all. I had a hard time visualizing what Mirrorland would look like—even with the floor plans included with the book. As the narrative progresses, Cat decompresses as well—she isn’t sure that her memories, and new memories that she is uncovering are real. Add in a very unwise romantic dalliance, and someone sending her threatening notes, and Cat is as vulnerable as could be as we reach the climax.

Even though things got melodramatic towards the end, with a grab-bag of tropes thrown in leading to a surprise ending, I still enjoyed this book very much and couldn’t put it down.

This deeply twisted, complex psychological thriller kept me on my toes! 12 year old mirror twins, Cat and El, showed up mysteriously on the harbor docks in Edinburgh, with no trace of a past that they’ll speak about to anyone. By 19 they were out of the system and both fighting over the same man - Ross. El won and Cat fled to America, vowing never to return or speak to her sister again.

10 years later, Cat gets a phone call from Ross, telling her that El is missing. Cat frantically returns to Scotland, knowing in the way only mirror twins know, that El has to be alive. Returning to their childhood home, where El and Ross now live, Cat begins a journey through her childhood that has been locked away for decades.

<i>Mirrorland</i> forces through the dark and twisted past of the haunted childhood the twins had with their mother, grandfather and Ross in their home. Each room has a name and a terrifying history. As children, the girls would make up games and treasure hunts for themselves. As an adult, El left one for Cat, to find her - to find the truth behind her disappearance and to help her remember what truly happened in their house on that fateful day, before they ended up on those docks.

Johnstone takes the reader on a fast-paced, haunting ride that is so gripping, you truly have to stop yourself at points and really think back because there are so many turns you don’t want to miss. This thriller is one of my first 5 star reviews of the year and I can absolutely see why it was on Goodreads top thrillers to read in 2021. I couldn’t put it down. And <b>just</b> when you think the roller coaster ride is over, you’ve got another whole set of hills to go!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this advance copy in exchange for my honest review.

Fast paced book and I really enjoyed it. Good story line and I think people are gonna love it. I would definitely read again and recommend

This novel was very interesting to say the least. It was definitely channeling Gone Girl but in my opinion did not execute at the same level.

The story opens with Cat traveling back to a Scotland after news that her estranged twin sister is missing. We slowly learn that the sisters have not talked for twelve years after a fight over Ross, a man they both loved, who is now a grieving husband over his missing wife. Cat stays with Ross in their childhood home as police keep them updated on the search.

The plot sounds simple enough, but it is filled with all of these confusing, vague memories of growing up in an imaginary world. Cat speaks as if everything is real even though she knows it was all a fantasy. But it was very hazy while reading. Later, when things are revealed, I found I wasn’t very surprised because the build up was too confusing to follow.

I also felt this book went on way too long. It took forever to get to the climax and even then it lasted much longer after that. I felt much of it could have been condensed and allowed for a faster paced and more exciting story.

Without giving anything away, I was very unhappy with the ending. I would have preferred so many things to happen differently. I thought the story was still interesting overall, but it was more my curiosity and confusion that propelled me forward, not anticipation.

Thank you to NetGalley and Scribner for an ARC of this book.

An atmospheric debut novel by Carol Johnstone set in one of Edinburg’s gothic homes. Readers are not only transported between past and present in the search for a missing sibling but also thrown into an alternate reality created by childhood trauma. The first half of the go plot does pace itself but picks up relatively quickly in the second half. Full of dark underpinnings and secrets to uncover, an excellent read.

Thank you to #NetGalley and #Scribner for the ARC of #Mirrorland. All thoughts and opinions posted by Wayward Readers Book Blog are original and offered voluntarily.

I picked up this book because I’m a sucker for dark thrillers.

Dark and twisty from its opening to the end, Mirrorland is a page-turner. When Cat returns to her old family home after her twin sister’s death, she’s forced to confront painful memories she moved across the globe to suppress.

Cat’s convinced her sister El is alive. This disappearance just is more of her scheming.

Cat is pulled into a treasure hunt as mysterious emails lead her to decades-old pages of El’s diary, directing her to their imaginary play places in Mirrorland. But the clues lead to more mysteries rather than answers and unexpected friends of El’s come forward with warnings.

Johnstone’s writing pulls you into both the present and past, reality and make-believe in the old, gothic house and the brutal, creepy world of Mirrorland. You’ll also be pulled into Cat’s wrenching emotional journey. The story is fast-paced and twisty. It will keep you guessing to the very end.

Highly recommended, especially for fans of dark thrillers.

Trigger warnings: on-page violence and mention of attempted suicide.

I received a free advanced reader copy of Mirrorland in exchange for an unbiased review.

This review will be posted to Goodreads now and to Rebeccajallen.com on April 6th. I'll also post to Amazon and Barnes & Noble on pub dat.

Cat and El are identical twins who have been estranged since a fall out that led to Cat moving to Los Angeles while El stated in their gloomy home in Edinburgh. Cat only returns home when she receives a call that El has gone missing. Though everyone expects the worst, Cat is sure she is not dead and begins finding clues throughout the house that dredges up memories she has long forgotten.
As children their mother had helped them create a make believe world they called Mirrorland to escape from a grandfather who was cruel and abusive. They had bells set up as an elaborate alarm system and each room was a different land to which they could hide by listening to the bells. As Cat’s memories return the truth of what happened will finally be revealed.
This was a really slow book that I almost DNF but the second half picked up. I loved the storytelling but I think this is another story that we have read before. Fans of Stephen King will appreciate the references to Andy Dufresne from “ Shawshank Redemption” and recognize parallels. The theme of the book might well be described as “ you have to wade through shit to reach your happy ending”.
Thank you to #netgalley and #scribner for the advanced e-copy in exchange for my honest opinion. This is due for release April 21.

After Cat's sister El disappears, she returns from the states to her childhood home in search of what has happened. This is her first time in this home after a twelve year absence and has forgotten the treasures and imaginings that had occurred in their childhood home. This book was a little bit of a slow start and it was hard to grasp onto what was going on at first since a lot of it was from the imaginary world that the two sisters created to deal with the hardships of their life. Cat is thrown back into a relationships of sorts with El's husband, although there are so many different factors that are pointing the finger at his involvement. I liked that this book kept me guessing and created such an amazing tapestry between the past and present. I definitely want to read more from this author and will be recommending this book to others. Thanks for the ARC, NetGalley.

Thanks to NetGalley and to the publisher for the ARC of this title, which I received in exchange for my honest review. Mirrorland is Carole Johnstone's debut novel, which is quite surprising considering the complexity of the work. The novel focuses on mirror twins Cat and El. Now adults, the sisters are estranged with Cat residing in California and El in their childhood home in Scotland. When El mysteriously disappears, Cat is forced to return to Scotland to look for her sister and confront their tragic past.

The book alternates timelines and readers are transported from modern day Scotland to Mirrorland which is a fictional world the twins created to hide away from their traumatic childhood. Readers should be forewarned, this is not an easy read. I was expecting more of a traditional thriller but the author delves into some very serious themes of child abuse and trauma which may be difficult for some.

Once I acclimated to the constant switching between reality and Mirrorland I became more engrossed in the story. The end of the book delivers plenty of twists and turns perhaps a few that were a little too over the top. While I enjoyed the book overall it was a very dark tale and it is certainly not for everyone. The book is very well written however and I look forward to reading more works by this author.

Got my attention when I saw this story is listed as a psychological thriller.
At first I was super interested then it got slow. I hung in there as I so wanted to be supportive of a debut author.

Story is about identical twins Catriona and Ellice. After a falling out when El marries Cat’s boyfriend, Catriona ‘Cat’ leaves her childhood home where now “El and her husband Ross live!
Cal is living in Los Angeles, Ca but travels back to her childhood home in Scotland to find her missing sister.
Story unravels that the girls had a secret imaginary place they called “Mirrorland” under the staircase. Strange as well as abusive things were happening.
(In fact, there are illustrations of the house and their imaginary Mirrorland.)

I really am okay with dark and creepy not so good with abusive.

I did finish and ended up liking it better than I thought. ⭐⭐⭐.3

Want to thank NetGalley and Scribner for this early release granted to me in exchange for an honest professional review. Opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own.
Publishing Release Date scheduled for April 20, 2021

If you tell me a book is going to be like Gone Girl or Room, I will be reading it. Mirrorland does not disappoint. An amazing journey and a dark read. Highly recommend.