About three months ago, I got a text from one of my best friends who happens to live in England. She is a reader as well, but we usually gravitate towards different genres. She's more of a crime/suspense buff, while I tend to stick to romance and stories with romantic elements. We cross over into each other's genres for sure, but not as often. Which means that when she texts me to tell me I absolutely must read a book or she will no longer speak to me (a close approximation of the text), I take it seriously.

The book from that text was I LET YOU GO and at that point was not available in the U.S. I told her I put it on my TBR and would keep an eye out for it. All she told me about it was that it has stayed with her for months and she needed to talk about it with someone. I promised her that as soon as I could get my hands on it, I would.

So when I LET YOU GO became available as a reviewer's copy, I leaped at the chance to experience what my friend was going on about.

Y'all.

OHMYHOLYHELLGOSHDARNIT THIS BOOK.

I was late for work because I fell head first into this story. I ignored my husband for an entire evening because of this story. I now want to read everything Clare Mackintosh has ever written.

I will tell you nothing of the plot - but the comparisons to GONE GIRL and GIRL ON A TRAIN are not without merit. I will tell you there is a plot line involving domestic violence and one involving sociopathic stalking. They are properly depicted from my professional perspective as someone who has worked with abuse survivors for a number of years. In fact, let me take that one step further. One of my other best friends - not the lady in England - is a survivor of systemic sexual assault. She also happens to be a bookseller and so I told her to not pick up this book because the descriptions are so spot on and so graphic that I know it would trigger flashbacks for her.

And I say that all as a compliment.

If you enjoy taut thrillers with twists you can't quite see coming and plots that are properly tied up at the end - then get I LET YOU O. It's not perfect - there's a whole thing with a potential affair I could have done completely without - but it is so good and so worth your time. Read I LET YOU GO before everyone else does so you can be the smug expert when the rest of the world tongue baths it.

Book Summary

The next blockbuster thriller for those who loved The Girl on the Train and Gone Girl... “a finely crafted novel with a killer twist.” (Paula Hawkins, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Girl on the Train)
 
On a rainy afternoon, a mother's life is shattered as her son slips from her grip and runs into the street . . .
 
I Let You Go follows Jenna Gray as she moves to a ramshackle cottage on the remote Welsh coast, trying to escape the memory of the car accident that plays again and again in her mind and desperate to heal from the loss of her child and the rest of her painful past.
 
At the same time, the novel tracks the pair of Bristol police investigators trying to get to the bottom of this hit-and-run. As they chase down one hopeless lead after another, they find themselves as drawn to each other as they are to the frustrating, twist-filled case before them. Elizabeth Haynes, author of Into the Darkest Corner, says, “I read I Let You Go in two sittings; it made me cry (at least twice), made me gasp out loud (once), and above all made me wish I'd written it . . . a stellar achievement.”
 
*Peter James, author of Want You Dead

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