Her Sister’s Secret - S.E. Lynes

Reading Challenge Category: Free ARC from NetGalley

Official Blurb:

Why would you pretend your life is a dream when you’re living a nightmare?
Annie and Dom lead perfect lives in a lovely cottage in a quiet village by the sea, with flowers at the front gate and an apple tree in the garden. Everyone knows them: generous, loving Dom, creative, joyful Annie.
But their neighbours don’t see Annie as she sits waiting for Dom well into the night. They don’t see her smiling through her tears. They don’t know what the perfect couple are hiding.
They just hear the sirens that break the silence of the night and see the flames that rise against the dark sky.
And the morning after, what everyone wants to know is – which one was to blame?

My Thoughts:

I’m afraid this book was ruined for me by the title change halfway through me reading it. I was 55% of the way in, and I got an email from the publisher advising that it was changing from ’The One to Blame’ to ‘Her Sister’s Secret’. At this point, I had no clue that either Annie (or Isla) had a secret. I was just enjoying where the story was taking me. I was suspecting a few of the characters, and I was having fun guessing as to what could have happened. Then this new title came along, which made the book fall flat for me as it meant the book could only go one way. As soon as I saw the title, I immediately guessed the ending, and I was proved right.
To say I was gutted would be an understatement. ‘The One to Blame’ was a unique and ambiguous title and left a lot to the imagination, the new one not so much.
So, up to the 55% point, the book, for me, was brilliant, suspenseful and I had no clue where it was going to go. There are many twists towards the end, but these are hampered by the characters acting in a rather frustrating manner that doesn’t help keep the suspense going. In fact, it helped to solidify my guess for the ending.
So, unfortunately, this went from a solid 4/5 star read to a 2-star very fast. This isn’t my usual type of review, and I’m sorry for belabouring the title angle; this really did ruin the book for me. Maybe if I’d finished it just before this happened or even started after it had changed, it would have been a whole different reading experience.

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