The start of the book was great and you were thrown right into the storyline. The pacing was perfect and the reveals drew me in. But as the book progressed it became a slow burn an very predictable that it lost my interest somewhat. As for the characters I wasn’t overly mad about any of them and just found them irritating. I did like the different narrators as I find it really adds to a listen. I really wanted to like this book as the blurb really drew me in but I’ve read other books with a similar storyline and just found this one had many holes and needed further development.

2.5/5 🌟🌟/🌟.

Thanks to Netgalley and Dreamscape Media for the opportunity to listen to and review #TheOtherMother

A solid listen with good narration. Complex characters and relationships that take a solid look at family dynamics.

Amanda Rijks hits another home-run with this one! This was super fucked up and I am totally here for it. There were a few twists and I loved each one of them. I also love a happy ending and that's what you got with this one.

#TheOtherMother
#NetGalley

Name of Book: The Other Mother
Author: Miranda Rijks
Narrators; Nicola Delgado-Stevenson, Lorna Bennett, and Emma Fenney
Genre: Psychological Thriller
Publisher: Dreamscape Media
Pub Date: August 10,, 2023
My Rating: 3.6 rounded up!
Pages: 282

Noami and Jane are friends as well as psychologists. Naomi has a training she must attend and ask Jane to collect her four-year daughter Florrie from nursery school and take her to her after school Dental Appointment, However, Jane arrives a little late and is told that Florrie was already picked up by Jane. Now the little girl is missing!
Jane is so upset with the school as well as herself for being late. The police are contacted and everyone seems to be a suspect and blamed for Florrie’s disappearance.
Jane starts receiving anonymous letters that appear to be from a father asking for advice regarding suspicions he has regarding his son’s behavior. Jane is worried that this sounds too close to her own life and her suspicions. (Have to admit ~ Jane and THAT sock had me rolling my eyes and telling at her to move on!)
Although the story was a bit slow, I was curious and the ending was a surprise. I was so caught up in who took little Florrie that I was clueless to another thing that was going on.

This in only my fourth Miranda Rijks story when I read "The Second Wife" which was my first and was GREAT!
I knew then I found a new fav author!
If you are curious about Miranda, here is a link for more info ~
https://mirandarijks.com/about/

Want to thank NetGalley and Dreamscape Media for this audiobook.
Audiobook Publishing Release Day was: August 10, 2023.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for allowing me to read this book. I enjoyed the first half and the set up of everything. The premise is that a mother can't get away from work so she asks one of her best friends to go pick her daughter up from daycare. When the friend (Jane) gets there, she is told that someone else claiming to be her has already taken the 4 year old child (Florie). The first half of the book is trying to figure out whodunnit but we find that out at about 50% and begin to get the kidnappers POV. I really don't care for books when the plot twist involves some underdeveloped character that we don't know much about and don't care about. As soon as we knew who had her, I kind of lost interest because then the 2nd half of the book is just trying to get her back. Infidelity is a major factor in this book and there are multiple cases of it and it all felt a little convoluted and cheap. I also felt like the mention of Naomi (the mother) being black felt weird and did not help anything given the way Naomi is poorly treated throughout the story. It also seemed like her reaction to her child being missing was a little understated. The ending was fine, but this book just lost its luster as it went on.

SPOILERS AHEAD:
Our main character (Naomi) is married to an abusive Italian man named Lorenzo. He was in France when Florie was taken but comes back in a rage. Jane is married to Robert with 2 bratty tween/teen kids and she writes a dear Abby column on the side of her therapist practice. Long story, Naomi and Robert had an affair and he's actually Florie's father but nobody knows that. Lorenzo had an affair with a woman named Carmen and she's the one who has Florie. She got pregnant by Lorenzo and lost the baby so she kidnapped Florie thinking she would be better off with her as a replacement for the baby that should've been. Its a big confrontation in the end and Jane kills Carmen and returns Florie safely.

A standard mystery about a missing child. Like most mysteries, when hidden secrets were revealed, it complicated the case and relationships. I like the twists the author threw in. But what distracted me from the story was the characters. I found most of them to be unlikable. Therefore, I didn't care or feel any connection to them.

Overall, decent story but needed likable characters.

***Thank you to NetGalley, Miranda Rijks, and Dreamscape Media for graciously sending me the audiobook to review. As always, all thoughts are my own.***

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

This book was so gripping and twisted! I really enjoyed the premise of the book and how the story was told by multiple points of views. I was in awe of the events of the books and who was behind the kidnapping and their reasons for kidnapping. Miranda Rijks has become a favorite author of mine as all of her books are quick and gripping reads with interesting story lines.

Ugh, I hate rating books this low but this one was not it. It took me forever to get through. It was boring and I truly could not stand any of the narrators. Usually, I would say the narrators voice and monotone and speed(they all suffered with this) would make the book not my vibe, but the story also severely lacked.

Maybe I’ve watched too many lifetime movies, but this has been done. & done. & done again.

Ugh, just not for me!

The Other Mother by Miranda Rijks is a captivating psychological thriller that I could not put down. As a mother, I can completely relate to the complete and utter horror Flossie's parents went through. The twists and turns are unpredictable! I did not guess the ending at all. The narrators did a fantastic job. I would definitely recommend this book and I'd love to read more books by this author.

First time reading anything by Miranda Rijks and after listening to the audiobook for ‘The Other Mother’ this definitely won’t be my last read with this author.
I went into the audiobook completely blind (as I normally do) and I was not disappointed!!! This had everything expected in a child abduction thriller plus so so so much more!! The twist and turns left me jaw dropped & I’m still wrapping my head around the audacity for the kidnapper.
Big thanks to NetGalley and publishing for providing me with a ACR in exchange for an honest review.

4⭐
Genre ~ domestic thriller
Publication date ~ book ~ April 19, 2023, audio ~ August 10, 2023
Page Count ~ 282
Audio length ~ 8 hours 51 minutes
Narrators ~ Nicola Delgado-Sievertson, Lorna Bennett, Emma Fenney
POV ~ multiple 1st
Featuring ~ missing child, infidelity, secrets, lies

Jane is asked by Naomi to pick up her 4 year old daughter, Florrie, from school. But when Jane finally gets there it turns out that someone else has already picked her up. Oh no, who impersonated Jane and why did the school allow a stranger to pick her up.

I do like me a missing child plot that gets my mama heart racing. Luckily we do get the POV of Carmen, the kidnapper, which lets us know that Florrie is unharmed.

I do feel like Naomi was not as frantic as I felt she should have been, and I could do without the infidelity, but without it we wouldn't have had the unreliable characters that gave us some twists and made for a fast paced, suspenseful read. I wasn't overly in love with the last little bit, though.

Narration notes:
So happy there were 3!!! They all did a great job.

What a great psychological thriller. Jane goes to pick up Florrie, age 4, from school to help out Florri’s mother, Naomi, when she discovers that Florrie has already been picked up by someone claiming to be Jane. Who took her? Everyone is suspect. I loved the multiple points of view. The only thing that felt off is that both, Noami and her husband, didn’t do as much as I would have done if my child was missing. Jane, as a family psychologist, seemed to be lacking in some of her therapy and professional skills. This was a fun, fast-paced, entertaining read, even if I did guess most of the plot twists ahead of time.

This was my type of thriller. The small group of people, each person with their own secrets they don't want revealed. Each with a potential motive.

The main event was one of my worst nightmares, a child goes missing at school and no one knows where she has gone. Jane, tasked with collecting her friend's child from school and taking her to the dentist, realises that another woman claiming to be her has taken four-year-old Florrie.

Infidelity, deception and rumours ran rampant as the search for the young girl hits dead-end after dead-end. The final scenes were filled with 'on the edge of your seat' suspense and I found the resolution satisfying.

This is a Thriller that was devoured and well savored. I loved every turn of the page. And even on the last page the author managed to surprise me. Congratulations to the author for organizing such a well-structured plot and for giving answers to all the questions that were left in the air.
In this Thriller, Naomi asks her best friend Jane to collect her 4-year-old daughter from school, because she won't be able to arrive on time that day, When Jane arrives at school, little Flori was no longer there, as Jane had already gone to collect her. How lcome? If only now Jane has arrived.... And a stupendous thriller begins. This is one of the few books I can say I liked every single word on it...
Thank you Netgalley and Dreamscape for yet another book that swept me away.

#theothermother, #MirandaRijks, #netgalley, #thriller, #dreamscape

This is my first exposure to this author and I was not disappointed. Rijks has delivered a fast paced and deliciously wicked tale. The characters are well-developed though not necessarily likeable. None of them are whom they appear to be. This provocative, somewhat dark and twisted story grabs you from the first page and keeps you guessing until the very end where the author inserts a deliciously wicked twist.

Thank you to NetGalley and Dreamscape Media who provided me with a copy of this book. I am voluntarily leaving an honest review.

I liked [book:The Arrangement|55164768] (4-stars) and was excited to read a child abduction story by Rijks. Unfortunately, this was a miss for me, even with the full-cast audio.

Initially the story was very gripping with a new take on an old story, but the rest of the book lacked any spice and there were far too many characters; some of whom were entirely unnecessary. I can't find a reason why Amira (a friend of the MC) was introduced into the story at all, or her son for that matter. Anything involving that family was pointless.

The MC also kept acting out of her own character or for a psychologist. For example, upon finding a child's sock in her laundry she immediately suspected her husband and teenage son of being pedo's completely out of the blue. I imagine the typical reaction would be denial, if anything? Plus she's a THERAPiST. Yet other times she was purposely an ostrich, such as not calling the police when the child goes missing because she assumes the school will or the mother picked the child up.

SUMMARY: Therapist Jane has been asked by her pregnant friend to pickup her 4yo at school and take her to the dentist as she (the mother) is stuck at work. When Jane goes to collect the child she learns from the school the child has already left with another woman and that woman had presented herself as Jane, the therapist.

The book loosely follows the case of the missing child but more focuses on Jane and how she is handling this abduction (answer: not well. She basically becomes unhinged and starts accusing members of her own family and goes nuts). There are the usual secrets like questionable paternity and affairs, plus a lot of time spent on Jane's family. I struggled with the characters and plot holes. There was also a fair deal of eye-rolling with the kidnapper.

Overall, the pacing was fine but it still felt slow and bleh.

The narrators did a great job, however.

Lastly, the cover of this really irks me. The child was taken from school not walked down a neighborhood street and the kidnapped child is black, not a little blonde girl.

While it kept attention, I found myself rolling my eyes over how unbelievable the characters in this book acted. A daughter goes missing, but I just didn't feel any of the panic of fear there. Add in the other drama, and poor Florrie was pretty much forgotten. The narration was decent, the story just didn't quite work for me. 2.5 stars rounded up.

I really enjoyed the full cast narration. It helped with being able to follow along with how many characters were in the story. While I was interested and engaged throughout most of the story I wasn't crazy with the big reveal. My first thought was uhh, okay. But she does explain everything and overall I really did enjoy listening to this audiobook!

I've heard so much about this author, and was excited to get an ARC to review. I'm always hooked by child abduction plots, and seeing that this audiobook was done by a full cast was even more exciting.

The start of the book was great - the pacing was on point, the reveals drew me in... As the book progressed, it seemed to have so very many plot holes and things that just weren't right. It got to feel a bit forced, like Rijks had a goal to pack in all of the genre's cliches into one novel.

The final 'twist' was the worst of them all, and it just left me feeling flat.

While I only felt it was 'ok', I do believe that new readers to the genre will enjoy this book, and that those who don't read nearly as many books a year and haven't seen these tropes done better will find this a good fit. If that's you, give it a go. For me, I'll check out another by the author and see if this is just a fluke.

I’m giving a really neutral opinion on this book. I honestly couldn’t get through the audio narration. I thought the accent was too thick for me to grasp what was being said.