As easy as it was to read this book - in the way that the words just flowed, I struggled with one of the major plot points (and actually questioned on if I had read it right the first time).

I also was expecting more of a historical fiction based on the GR tags and although the time periods alternated, I didn’t get much history. It wouldn’t be classified as a thriller, although I kept expecting a plot twist.

I would read this author again entirely because of her writing style.

Tina's borne a heavy weight for many years about the death of her sister. Turns out, though, there's a family secret that can set her free. This is a well written emotional novel. A good read.

Alife between us by Louise Walters is all about secrets that families keep and how it can affect members of the family. A good read that held my attention.

Survivor’s guilt, revenge, memory tricks, childhood friendship and rivalry are at the centre of this family drama. In ‘A Life Between Us’ by Louise Walters, forty-something Tina visits the grave of twin sister Meg each week and holds conversations with her. Tina has buried a secret so deep even her husband doesn’t know it. Only one other person was there when Meg died, the twins’ Aunt Lucia. But this is a complicated family with so many stories of betrayal, flight, lies, secrets and denials that until the end I was waiting for someone else to appear as a witness.
The first half was a slow-burn and I longed to get to the first turning point of the story, which when it came was not a surprise. This slow-burn means this is not a psychological thriller but a study of the long-term effects on children violently bereaved, survivor guilt, misplaced memory and grief. We are told the story via multiple viewpoints: Tina, then and now; Tina’s childhood letters; Tina’s husband Keaton who loves his wife but struggles to cope with her depression and guilt; and Aunt Lucia, then and now. For me, this was too many viewpoints and too many characters, making it rather involved and at times repetitive. Walters’ story involves a large family and perhaps the story would be stronger with less siblings. Certainly the absent Robert and jailbird Ambrose added little to Tina’s story, and her parents are virtually invisible. The device of Tina’s childhood letters to cousin Elizabeth in California became repetitive and irritating, it is so difficult to write in the voice of a child. I also found myself sympathising with Aunt Lucia who is portrayed as something of a harridan in a dysfunctional family, though she too has experienced difficult times which she has kept secret.
An at times long-winded story which, at its heart, explores something deep, difficult and sensitive.
Read more of my book reviews at http://www.sandradanby.com/book-reviews-a-z/

A very enjoyable novel! I don't usually like a story that alternates between past and present, but it did work well in this instance. It is the first time that I have read any books by this author and am sure it will not be the last. Whilst I seldom write what a story is about for fear of spoiling for others, I do highly recommend.

My thanks to Netgalley and the Publishers. This is my honest review.

Reviews have been posted on Goodreads and Amazon.

This book was interesting... different than anything else I've read.
I really enjoyed the different takes on how the story was told.... past tense, present tense, and through letter writing.
Well done!

great read and easy to follow story line. look forward to reading more from this author.

4* review. We start this family intrigue drama in 2014 with the packing up of a large family home and then drift between 1963 and 1976 and back to 2014 alternately. The story is, however, easy to follow as we hear from Tina Thornton whose twin sister Meg died in a childhood accident, but for almost forty years Tina has secretly blamed herself for her sister’s death. However, when she visits her grave every week it forces her to finally question her memories of the day her sister died. Who, if anyone, did kill Meg? Tina, through flashbacks to letters she wrote in the hot summer of 1976 when Meg died, finds the courage to face the past and unravel the tangled family mysteries of her Uncle Edward the cold, bitter Aunt Lucia, whose presence casts a long shadow over them all, and who is keeping a deep dark secret of her own. The story was very well written and i could easily see it as a film or TV drama, and kept up a good fast pace with mystery, intrigue and possibly murder. The first of Louise Walters i have read, but definitely not the last.

How messy life can be. That could have been the title of this book. The story is well written, held my attention yet very troubling. It's starts with a very strong and intriguing prologue. Then for a while I was lost a bit as I struggled to figure out who was who and how they were connected. I had a hard time relating to any of the characters; actually I didn't like a single one. I often wonder if I can like a book when I don't like any of the characters. I've recently concluded I can admire that sort of book for the writing and storytelling but I prefer to like or minimally connect to at least one character.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Tina has never got over losing her twin sister Meg when she was 8 years old - she witnessed the accident that took her and has always blamed herself - now in her 40s she is still traumatised by it and still resisting seeking help that her husband desperately wants her to get.

Lucia is Tina's aunt and an embittered old woman - she also witnessed the accident but is she telling the truth about it and what are the secrets that she has been holding for years?

The story ranges from the sixties through to the present and is a great family saga that keeps revealing family secrets that have been kept for a long time and I really enjoyed it and will be looking out for this writer in the future

There are few books, in my opinion, that deserve a 5 star rating but this is definitely one that does. The story held me from the very first sentence to the very last one. The characters are completely believable and the author writes in beautiful descriptive prose. The story is told in past and present and ties everything together seamlessly. I would recommend this book to any one who likes to read about families and all the situations that occur and are overcome over time.

What I love the most about this book is the sense of time. Once I'd settled in to the different characters and the shifting timeframes, the transitions were seamless, and I couldn't wait to read on to the next one. There are so many books which go overboard to show when they are happening, name-checking endlessly. This book just knows where it is. Tina is a fabulous character, and I was completely drawn into her world, rooting for her all the way through. If I had one niggle, it was the revelation of Lucia's part in the tragedy not being quite as bad as I'd been expecting. I'm working really hard to find a niggle, though. Warm and with a huge heart, I hope this book fonds many happy readers. Oh yes, and the books that Tina loves? Bang on, every one!

Louise Walters’ novel shows to devastating effect how traumatic events in early childhood and adolescence can impact on someone: how with the right help, we might learn to cope, but without, they may colour the rest of our lives. While Tina can’t remember everything that happened on the day Meg died, it’s continued to haunt her, as has Meg, ever since. It’s also having such a damaging impact that her present state of mind and the future of her marriage are both in jeopardy.

If you believe in the bonds that tie us to loved ones, let alone the special connection which exists between twins, you’ll have little problem with the fact that Tina still talks to her dead twin, Meg. On a regular basis. It’s less a haunting than a continued need within Tina to have as a sounding board her sister, the only person who’s ever understood her properly. Meg was always the more confident and less fearless of the two, and it’s no wonder that Tina still looks to her sister for guidance and support beyond the grave. Tina’s husband tries but he’s distracted at work and his patience is wearing thin; more and more he simply urges her to seek professional help. And she finds precious little help elsewhere, though that may be changing thanks to the tentative beginnings of a new friendship.

In order to understand the adult, it helps to know the child that came before and Louise Walters cleverly helps us do so by including letters Tina writes to a pen pal, her cousin Elizabeth in America. It’s fascinating to read about events from young Tina’s perspective and see the truths only children can, while also wincing at how badly she misreads or misunderstands other situations.

A Life Between Us is very much Tina’s story: she has to revisit a painful event in her past in order to understand what really happened, and whether or not she was at fault, before attempting to move on. But there’s someone else’s story here too and it’s no less sad or distressing. Indeed, it goes a long way towards explaining why Lucia is the way she is but stops short of answering all the questions her character raises. And while she may well appear as one of the least sympathetic characters in the novel, I couldn’t help but feel for her. What she goes through, with minimal support or discussion, she then has to keep secret for the rest of her life. I can only begin to imagine how hard that was and what it would have meant to internalise it over that length of time. It’s all the more poignant when you think how her life could have looked considerably different, been considerably improved, had she been born only a generation later.

Just as in Louise Walters’ debut, Mrs Sinclair’s Suitcase, the narrative switches between past and present timelines. In A Life Between Us, the narrative focusing on Tina and Lucia’s stories covers periods in 1954, 1963-1964, 1967, 1975-1976 and 2013-2014. And once again, just as in Mrs Sinclair’s Suitcase, letters play an important role (as outlined above), an aspect of both novels which particularly appealed to me. Here, too, there’s a house which seems as much a character as the people who live in it or come to visit. In fact, some of those people, particularly the brothers besides Edward, were less distinct and it was sometimes hard for me to keep in mind which one was which. However, Louise Walters’ second novel has at its heart a twisted, yet intriguing Aunt Lucia and a relatable, if at times frustrating, main character in Tina, who I positively willed on to unravel the family secrets, unlock her own trauma caught up in the tangle of them, and come through it all able to move on with her life.

A Life Between Us is a moving and quietly powerful story of trauma experienced early in life and the ripple effects of that; of love and loss and guilt; of family secrets; of the power of friendship; of the kindness of a person who not only listens and helps but also guides you towards recovery. Above all, A Life Between Us is about exactly that: it’s the difference between she who survives, and those left behind, in life and death.

A Life Between Us is a truly beautiful book. It deals with difficult subjects - death, divorce, incest, grief, mental illness - with subtlety and grace & moves seamlessly between past and present drawing the reader into Tina's world.

Louise has created an unputdownable family saga that keeps you guessing until the very end & will stay with me for a good while yet.

I liked this book I do like books that alternate between past and present.
Its a family saga and a love story with dark secrets, betrayal and redemption.
There are 2 main characters Lucia and Tina.Lucia is Tina's aunt and Tina lives in the present day and has secrets about the death of her sister Meg as a child.
A great conclusion to the book I must read this authors other books.

Thank you to the Author Netgalley the Publisher for a chance to read this book.

Having loved Mrs Sinclair's Suitcase I was absolutely thrilled to be given the opportunity to read a advance copy of this new offering. I was in no way disappointed - A Life Between Us is another amazingly well written, instantly absorbing read. Once again the quality of of descriptive prose is superb and the plot flows effortlessly. This story of hidden family secrets is one of the best I've read so far this year. Loved it!

Tina Thorton has spent most of her life dealing, or rather not dealing, with the death of her sister when they were both age 8. The focus on Tina as the main character, with all of her hurt and questions and guilt was a compelling part of the story.

This story takes place in two different time periods and focuses on Tina growing up and Tina as a middle-aged woman. I found the pieces of Tina as an adult much more compelling as a whole.

Though well written, this backstory plot left me with questions and didn't feel wholly developed.

This is quite a complex story with several threads all coming together at the end. Essentially it is the story of three time periods in one family's history. We meet the older Thornton generation just as the final brother, William, is being born. The only daughter, Lucia, is six years old and not at all happy that there is a new baby. We follow Lucia and her brothers throughout the book until their old age. We also have Tina Thornton of the next generation in 2014/15 where she is still struggling to come to terms with the death of her twin sister almost 40 years previously. We also have childhood letters between Tina and her cousin in America where we learn about the events before and just after her twin, Meg's, death.

As you can see there are several threads throughout the book which need to be held together by the reader. I did follow it most of the time but I did occasionally get mixed up with the brothers & which child belonged to who. With hindsight perhaps it would have been useful for me to draw a family tree. I read the Kindle version but I wonder if the publishers thought to include a family tree at the beginning of the paper version? It would have been helpful. The author was quite sensible in not introducing too many extra and unneccesary characters thus allowing the reader to focus on the ones they had.

I enjoyed this book very much. There are many occasions where people could have altered their actions by just a small amount and the outcome could have been so very different. With the various threads it is not an easy read but it was certainly captivating.

I received a free copy of this book via Netgalley.

I'm very sorry to say that I didn't finish this one. For a book this short, it seemed to go on forever.

I found all the switching back and forth between characters and dates incredibly confusing. Flashbacks to the 50's, letters from the 70's and so on. I couldn't get a handle on things and found it very frustrating.

What a great book!

I really enjoyed this novel. I liked the structure of alternating between past and present, showing the world from the eyes of two main female characters, Lucia and her niece Tina. Neither of the women are amazing or outstanding. They are both flawed, Lucia more than Tina. Tina for better reasons than Lucia.

Lucia is actually a terrible,selfish person from almost the moment we meet her, hating on her younger brother without cause, torturing him as a toddler, something only their eldest brother sees. It’s hard to sympathize with her when she has to deal with a tough situation and an even tougher choice. It isn’t a choice easily made and one she carries with her the rest of her life, further influencing her selfish behavior.

Tina, seen both as a young girl writing letters to a far away cousin and as an adult living with her beloved husband, is easier to sympathize with. Her life wasn’t easy. She lost her twin sister, Meg, at a young age, blaming herself. Her mother runs off, her father abandons her to live with her aunt, Lucia. She does love her husband but finds it hard, even all these years later, to deal with her lose.

This novel deals with the past, how to move on from it, and how, even if you do, it is still a part of you, always.

I highly recommend this book.