A tense psychological thriller. I'm not sure how invested I was, however. Most of the book is told from the point of view of Stephanie - "Captain Mom"- widowed, stay at home mother of Miles. Then there is her best friend, Emily who asks a simple favour of Stephanie. That she looks after Nicky, Emily's son, for one evening after school. The same favour she's asked countless times before. Only this time Emily doesn't come home. Her stiff upper lip English husband, Sean, is in England at the time on business, and nobody but Stephanie appears to be worried. Then a body appears. The rest of the book focuses on Stephanie and Sean getting their lives back together with the two boys. But strange things are happening. Nicky thinks he sees his mom, Stephanie gets strange phone calls. Is Emily dead or alive? And what about the body? I found Emily a truly evil character, and Stephanie pathetic - seriously, she's so desperate for a friend that she thinks this is friendship? The ending did cause a gasp, although it shouldn't have been a surprise.

I believe that this is a debut novel and, if so, it is quite a promising start.
The positives are that it is a fast paced plot, plenty of action and a few twists. Three narrators contribute, Stephanie, Emily and towards the end, Sean. This does keep it fresh and makes it easy to read.
The negatives for me are that the twists are a little too obvious, the plot becomes too far fetched and too much is thrown into the mix. The characters are ultimately all unlikeable, not necessarily a bad thing in this genre, but combined with some threads in the story, I was left feeling a bit disappointed.
That said, it is a quick read and I was interested enough to want to know how it ended.
My thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for this copy.

This book is about Stephanie & Emily who are friends. Emily is a mum who has a stressful job in the fashion industry & Stephanie is widow and mum. Stephanie blogs about mom related issues. Both of these friends are keeping secrets from one another. One day Emily asks Stephanie if she will take care of her son for her whilst she goes on a trip. Emily then goes missing.

The main characters in this book were Stephanie & Emily and also Emily's husband Sean. The story is told from each of their points of view. The problem was that none of these characters were likeable and I wasn't rooting for any of them. The thing that attracted me to this book was the blog. I love it when they include different types of media In a novel. This blog really irritated me and it turned out to be my least favourite part of the book. I am unsure if it was the intention for the blog to be irritating or whether that was just my interpretation. The only thing that I found interesting and very telling was what she wrote in her blog verses what she was actually thinking and feeling. The first half of this book I struggled with a little bit. It was mainly told from Stephanie's point of view. The second half of the book was more interesting. The twist that comes in this book left me wanting to kick myself for not guessing it before the reveal.

Centered around Stephanie; widowed blog writing super mother to Miles and her "BFF" Emily. Emily asks Stephanie for one simple favour pick up Nicky her little boy after school and mind him for a few hours....except Emily never comes back to collect her son.
This book has everything murder, fraud, incest and three main charachters that you just want to slap. Emily...because she is just downright nasty, Stephanie with her simpering fake niceness and Sean....well he just deserves it.
I found it hard to get into the swing of this book mainly because the writing style sways between Stephanie's blog which gives the pretty rose tinted version of events and then real life from the perspective of all three characters.
By the end of the book I felt that they all got what they deserved. This was a fast moving book that threw up surprises at every turn and kept you guessing as to what exactly was going on. Overall a great read!

A missing wife and mother who has asked her best friend to collect her son from school. I read this over a 36 hour period. Totally gripped. Very Gone Girlesque but I thoroughly enjoyed it! Friends, betrayals, lies, incest. It has it all. One roller coaster of a ride. 4*. Highly recommend. You won't be disappointed! My thanks to the publisher & NetGalley for the advance reader copy.

Enjoyed this book. But found it quite long winded at times and because of that it seemed to take forever to read. Definately not a book you could sit and read for ages. Good plot and interesting characters, just felt seeing from everyones points of view dragged it on to much

The first character you get to know in this book is - Stephanie, she is a widow, a mother, and a blogger, she blogs about 'mom' things. She befriends the mother of her sons friend, Emily. Emily has a high flying job in fashion and is married to Sean who works away.

The pair spend time together, and because Stephanie doesn't work she cares for Emily's son after school. Then one day, Emily doesn't return to collect her son. Sean comes on to the scene and he and Stephanie try to work out where Emily is and jointly care for the children. Emily's body then turns up. I have to say that at this point I almost gave up. Firstly, Stephanie's blog drove me crazy. The over use of the word 'moms' drove me to distraction. Every entry begins 'hi moms' and then goes on to talk about collective 'moms'. I was then put off by the information about the children. Don't get wrong, I like children...I have a few grown up ones of my own. I just felt that there was a little too much information on the impact to them, their feelings etc.

Once this first half is over it picked up for me and it became more of a gentle psychological thriller. The pace increases, the use of the word 'mom' decreases and the action begins. The darker sides of the three characters emerge and secrets are revealed, to be frank they are all a bit twisted. It does have some plot twists and it maintained my interest in the second half. I had to suspend believe because some of the twists skirt to the edge of believability and some drop clear off the edge. Overall it's a fair debut novel which i'm sure will appeal to a range of people,. I'm siting it between 2 and 3 stars for me.


The first character you get to know in this book is - Stephanie, she is a widow, a mother, and a blogger, she blogs about 'mom' things. She befriends the mother of her sons friend, Emily. Emily has a high flying job in fashion and is married to Sean who works away.

The pair spend time together, and because Stephanie doesn't work she cares for Emily's son after school. Then one day, Emily doesn't return to collect her son. Sean comes on to the scene and he and Stephanie try to work out where Emily is and jointly care for the children. Emily's body then turns up. I have to say that at this point I almost gave up. Firstly, Stephanie's blog drove me crazy. The over use of the word 'moms' drove me to distraction. Every entry begins 'hi moms' and then goes on to talk about collective 'moms'. I was then put off by the information about the children. Don't get wrong, I like children...I have a few grown up ones of my own. I just felt that there was a little too much information on the impact to them, their feelings etc.

Once this first half is over it picked up for me and it became more of a gentle psychological thriller. The pace increases, the use of the word 'mom' decreases and the action begins. The darker sides of the three characters emerge and secrets are revealed, to be frank they are all a bit twisted. It does have some plot twists and it maintained my interest in the second half. I had to suspend believe because some of the twists skirt to the edge of believability and some drop off the edge. It sits between 2 and 3 stars for me.

This book is fast paced and full of twists from start to finish. Overall it is a really good story and I like that it is told from the perspective of the three main characters. It is hard though sometimes to try and work out who is plotting against who and with whom. I expected more from the ending. I wanted more of a conclusion than I got.

A Simple Favour is a twisting free-fall ride filled with betrayal, reversal, secrets and revelations, love and loyalty. Darcey Bell ratchets up the tension in a taut, unsettling, and completely absorbing thriller that holds you in its grip until the final page.
It starts with a simple favour - an ordinary kindness mothers do for one another.
When her best friend, Emily, asks Stephanie to pick up her son from school she happily says yes.
Their children are classmates and best friends. And five-year-olds love being together - just like she and Emily. As a widow and stay-at-home blogger mum living in suburban Connecticut, Stephanie was lonely until she met Emily, a glamorous and successful PR executive.
The trouble is that Emily doesn't come back. No matter what the police say, Stephanie knows that she would never leave her son. Terrified, she reaches out to her fellow mummy bloggers.
And she also reaches out to Emily's husband - just to offer her support.
What Stephanie hasn't shared are the secrets buried in a murky past.

My Review
A Simple Favour, an act of kindness by a best friend, Stephanie agrees to care for Emily's son after school one afternoon, but Emily never returns home. Missing persons case reported, a body found, Stephanie and Sean become close, a family with a common bond, seemingly the end. Both mothers hold secrets, lies they have told. Darcey slowly unravels the story building momentum, uncovering the secrets, the lies, showing the true colours of Emily the evil within her, also how gullible and naïve Stephanie is while revealing her dark past.
So many questions and red herrings throughout this storyline, Darcey leaves you second guessing.
A psychological debut thriller which will turn your head every which way, fantastic read for a debut, hope to hear more from Darcey Bell.

Wow. This was quite the psychological thriller. It kept me guessing the entire time. It is intense and filled with twists and unlikable characters - exactly the way I like my psychological thrillers. This one is unique in that a large portion of it is told through a "mum blog." This certainly adds an interesting layer to the story. The basis of the plot is a mom asks her friend to pick up her son..but then she disappears. It's every mom's fear. You'll be on the edge of your seat with this one. And it's surprisingly a debut, so I'll be on the lookout for what Darcey Bell writes in the future. If you loved Gone Girl, be sure to check out A Simple Favour. You won't regret it.

Darley Bell has written a novel that will grab you from the first chapter and make you read past when.your eyelids start to flutter with tiredness.

The story has you jumping about, thinking you know the direction it will take and immediately heading off someplace else.

I was surprised that I found myself at one stage not caring which character suffered the most as they all had characteristics that rubbed me up the wrong way; whether this was Ms Bell's intention or not, I don't know, but I found it made the book more enjoyable.

If your interest in stories lies with people or suspense/mysteries, then this is a book not to be missed.

A really enjoyable read.

Well written thriller that kept me guessing. I didn't connect enough emotionally with the main character to feel it was a five star book, but it's still quite good and there was no chance of giving up until I knew where all these twists lead to. Would def read more from this author as I enjoyed how the dialogue between characters flowed- never felt forced or fake. Excellent twists and the story progressed at a nice pace.

Excellent book! Great characters and a brilliant storyline. I would highly recommend this book.

It took me some time to get used to that a lot of the book reads like some blog entry. After a while I got a little annoyed with Stephanie. Why, why is she so gullible and believes everything she's told and does things she has to know are wrong. I got to the point I wanted to slap her for being so stupid. Emily her supposed to be best friend was as cold and manipulative as it gets and I definitely didn't like her. And in the end she got away with everything. Ugh. And then there is Sean. Not that likeable either. The only two characters, not giving me the feeling of being deceived are the two little boys, Miles and Nicky. I think this is not a book for everyone, you have to get past the unusual writing style, but I'm glad I gave it a try and would encourage all thriller readers to do the same.
I chose to read this book and all opinions in this review are my own and completely unbiased. Thank you, NetGalley and Pan Macmillan!