A very difficult read,not for the faint hearted .Nature V Nurture. A very troubled teenager,the product of her upbringing. Compared to the rest I found it drizzled out at the end.

I enjoyed the pace but found the storyline relating to the young girl quite hard to digest. It's a difficult subject and left me feeling a little unsettled.

I finished Good Me, Bad Me in one sitting and what a complete mind f*ck it was! Wow, its like a road accident as you drive by, you don't want to look but there's that morbid curiosity that makes you stare. I felt this book had that feel about it. Much of the time Ali (Author) tells us what has happened to Annie/Milly but ur imagination is left to do the rest and boy did mine do a number!

The story is told from Milly/Annie's point of view. Told from the view point of a 15 year old girl, at times i felt she came across as younger than her years, juvenile and childish. Then she would say something that would make me feel she was beyond her years, 30 maybe older. I've read a few books where there's been abuse and found this often is the case with victims and how their heads work. I can't say whether I liked Milly/Annie. She wasn't easy to like and you knew she wasn't always telling you everything. It made her unreliable and when she's our narrator it made it story confusing, but in a good way.

The other characters of which there were a few were well thought out and interesting. I liked Mike although the things that come to the surface at the end made me wonder about him. Phoebe was a great character even though completely unlikeable and let's not forget Milly/Annie's mum who were didn't really see any interaction with in the present just the past.

I don't feel I've read such a complex book in such a long time. At times this reads like a YA, obviously with the subject matters of abuse (Physical and mental) and murder it is not a YA book, but the language was there (If that makes sense). I'd put off reading this a long time as I knew I had to be in the mood for it, but boy was it a good read. If you like a thriller with a complex leading voice, a twisted story of a girl who's both good and bad. Then you must try Good Me Bad Me. 4 stars - NetGalley gifted me this book in exchange for a review. My review is 100% my own opinions and not guided at all by this gratis.

Fantastic read full of suspense kept reading till late at night real page turner read this you won't be disappointed

I enjoyed the first half of the book very much but then felt that it lost the plot. The author seemed to be trying to include too many sidelines into the story and it came across as quite unbelievable.

I really enjoyed reading this book by Ali Land, an author I've never read before. It was one of those books I couldn't wait to continue to read whenever I had a spare moment. The subject matter is nothing short of horrific, and yet, there are very few gruesome details; rather the reader must use imagination to fill in the gaps. An additional dimension is the inclusion of a psychologist as one of the main characters, leaving us to guess how much he knows or can discover about Milly's/Annie's past. An excellent book based on horrendous events.

I read this primarily as it was a Richard and Judy Book club thriller. I enjoyed the book it is beautifully written - not sure, for me, whether it could be classed as 'couldn't put down' or 'page-turner'. I found the pace slow for 70% of the book and I was waiting for something powerful to happen. It does build and as you read it you try to work out whether Annie/Milly was involved in any of the child killings attributed to her mother and what will happen with Phoebe - will she find out or worse? Definitely a very good book but, for me, lacked a 'wow never thought of that end'

I loved this book, the story was intriguing and unlike anything i have read before. Millies mother is a serial killer, after years of abuse at her hands Millie decides to hand her mother in to the police. The story that follows is dark and twisted, and certainly gives you a lot to think about. I would highly recommend.

Excellent, yet disturbing book. I couldn't think how it was going to end, there seemed to be no way to resolve the problems of the main character, Milly/Annie. And as in life, the happy endings aren't always as clear cut as we'd like them to be.
The bullying aspects were well written and frustrating to witness, and I felt I was witnessing something believable here.
I wanted to shake the well-meaning, social worker type Mike, for his blindness at what was going on under his nose...but of course, again this is horribly true to life.
A must read, I was on the edge of my seat all the way.

Definitely not the sort of book I would normally read but decided to give it a go as it was from the Richard and Judy booklist and I have always found them to be good. The story follows a girl whose mother is a serial killer. It is a page turner but some of the subject matter was very hard to read so much that I skimmed a lot of it desperate to get to the end. Not one for me! Thank to Netgalley for the opportunity to read this.

As this was an advanced copy it was rather sporadic in its paragraphs, because of this, I struggled to read parts of it.
I did enjoy the book and It was very well written, the author did a marvellous job of portraying Millie and her black thoughts. The characters were inforgetable and had me screaming .at certain points in the book. I have recommended this book to many of my friends.

Having heard and read positive reviews of this book (Radio 4, Richard and Judy Book Club) I was excited when my request to review the book was successful.
However, I was then surprised to find myself not agreeing with the reviews, and not getting on with the book.

For me, the book is poorly written for a number of reasons. The writing is quite simple - this could be explained by the fact that the narrator is a teenager. However, there is also little detail or evidence of research on the clinical and legal procedures - much of the procedures could be written by someone having watched television dramas. The writing in this area is rather superficial.
Further, there is little description of location, or character. And to me, all the characters seemed to have a very similar voice. The dialogue of the psychologist did not convince, and neither did the barristers sound like barristers.
All we are left with, is the central 'idea' or plot of the book. As a child, I was happy with just a good rollicking story. But as an adult reader, I expect a book to by multi-layered, and this did not seem to be that sophisticated.

I don't think I have ever read a better psychological thriller. I was captivated from page 1 wondering where the plot would go next. Really had a hard time putting it down. Great characters & a genius storyline. A real must read

Where do I, what an amazing debut novel from Ali Land, If I could give it more than 5* I would. Good me Bad me is a dark, compelling psyclogical thriller. From the first sentence to the gripping ending I was hooked and this book has been added at the top of my best-read books in 2017.

Milly has been given a new name, new life and new family because her birth mother is the “peter pan” killer. She grew up being abused and tormented by her own mother. As hard as she tries, even with a new life Milly can’t escape her mothers hold on her.


I love thrillers and have read so many, however this book cannot be placed in that list. It’s a stand-alone fantastic mind teaser; it is shocking at times and hits on a subject most of us choose to believe is not real. If you only read one psychological thriller this year then let it be Good Me Bad Me, you will not be disappointed.

Thank you to Netgalley and Publisher for letting me read a copy of this fantastic book.

Good Me Bad Me was an excellent thriller that I found hard to put down. I liked the character Milly even though it was sometimes difficult to know if she was telling the truth. I felt a lot of sympathy for her not only with her upbringing but also with the school bullies and the fact that she felt that she was so alone. I will definitely be looking out for more books from Ali Land. I would like to thank NetGalley and Penguin UK - Michael Joseph for my e-copy in exchange for an honest review.

Wow! This is a Fantastic Debut novel novel by ALI LAND
What a great year for Psychological thrillers.

GOOD ME BAD ME what an extraordinary and powerful book. Right from the get go you get drawn in to the story because...
MILLY'S MOTHER IS A SERIAL KILLER

This book is surely going to be a 2017 favourite for me and many others.

An interesting thriller written in first person which leaves the reader wondering if there will be a follow up novel - as there appears to be scope for this within the plot line. Believable characterisation reinforced with the staccato type dialogue of the main protagonist.

Very unusual read. Read in one sitting as I really didn't want to put it down. You can't help but feel for the main character but as the plot thickens you soon realise all may not be as it's seems. Who can you really trust? Nature over nurture. Will the bad blood out.......

Gripping. Page turner. Controversial.

These are some words used to describe this book. It is a psychological book that really makes you think about the age old argument of nature vs nurture. Milly has to decide if she will feed that good wolf in her or the bad wolf which is tied to her old life as Annie daughter of a serial killer of children. This book kept me gripped right to the last page. Some of the twists were slightly predictable but were no less exciting. This is definitely a book for those who are fans of Girl On The Train and I See You.

A compulsive page turner, but not for the squeamish.
Milly has a secret, which we gradually learn, and which threatens to destroy her new life. Her longed for new family are not so perfect and when something threatens her place in the family...

Milly is a strong character well drawn, she is damaged, but fights against her darkness. The psychological struggles rings true to this psychiatrist. For once the mental health professionals are relatively sympathetically portrayed, with caring professionals, and medication helping Milly's recovery; although I question the ethics of someone fostering a child in order to write a book about them.
An enjoyable, challenging read with some satisfying twists. Well worth a read!