Neve is having a routine, domestic morning and feels unappreciated and unnoticed by everyone in the family. The only bright spot is her affair with colleague Saul. But when she turns up to his flat and finds him on the floor, murdered with a hammer, her life becomes a nightmare. Neve decides to clean up the scene, to hide the fact of her relationship and to keep her family secure.

what follows is the slow unfolding of the story and Neve's life. Old university friends reappear and events come to a head.

This was a good, involving read. Neve's desperation and exhaustion come through clearly. Good characters.

This book was not for me it was too boring and long drawn out too much explanation about everything you find yourself shouting get on with it not a bit exciting I couldn’t even finish it.

I was looking forward to reading this new book by Nicci. French as I loved the series of Frieda Klein by the same authors. I did enjoy the book but the main character, Neve Connolly, is not as engaging. The novel is cleverly written though and makes you want to finish the book to find out who the murderer is. It keeps you in suspense until the end with a final twist.

This was a brilliant read! I really got to know Neve and her quirky family and friends but she turned out to be the master of keeping secrets. Highly recommended as a thriller and a family relationship story.

An affair. A murder. A cover up. Who is the murderer? This keeps me reading to want to find the truth amongst all the lies. The main character is annoying and the writing is a bit repetitive at times but a good premise that pulls you through the book. Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for letting me review this book.

Disclaimer: I received an ARC of this novel from the publisher, Simon and Schuster, via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I am new to this NetGalley and ARC business. A newbie, a greenback, a novice. I’ve received perhaps half a dozen ARCs in total, which is not many. Principally this is because I’ve not requested them at times when I am busy because I am trying to be fair to the publishers. But the Summer vacation arrived and I requested a few from NetGalley. And The Lying Room was one.

I was immediately put off by very significant layout and formatting issues: paragraphing was not consistently accurate; capital letter were mainly absent, both at the starts of sentences and proper nouns, and the word “I”. With the caveat that I am not massively experienced, I was surprised by this – even dismayed. It’s the only ARC I’ve received with those sorts of issues. I can only assume that the publishers are on top of this and editing furiously. For the sake of the review, I think I should – to be fair to the author and publisher – assume that those technical issues will be addressed and consider the book on its merits as a narrative.

And as a narrative we are thrust into the minutiae and Neve Connolly’s – neve connolly’s – domestic routine of breakfast, coffee and tea making, children being sent off to school, husbands, dishwashers being packed. It was detailed and a little – no very – pedantic in its detail to the point where it was taking me out of the story. Neve then receives a mysterious text message, heads off to a rendezvous with her boss, Saul Stevenson, with whom she is carrying on an affair, and finds him dead in the living room of his flat. His head smashed in with a hammer.

So what does Neve do? Scream like a gothic damsel? Provide first aid and call an ambulance? Phone 999? No. She tidies. To protect herself from the repercussions of her family she tidies up and washes and cleans and bleaches away that evidence. Really? Really? Methodically, calmly – with the body of her lover in the flat with her – she cleans. Then returns to work. The work at which Saul is her boss.

The remainder of the novel, obviously, depends upon her making that choice but that choice was so fundamentally incredible and ridiculous that it was absurd. It was the decision a psychopath would make: utterly devoid of any empathy. To dismiss it was the effect of shock feels flippant. That narrative decision – bluntly – did not work. But it did alienate me from Neve, my point of view character, for the remainder of the novel. And the clean-up as she describes it is likely to have been futile: it is inconceivable that she could have removed the evidence of her presence from the flat, from the bed, the mattress, the fabric of the sofa, the thousands of random places we touch and never consider. Interestingly and coincidentally, Tana French’s The Trespasser also contains a post-murder clean-up which was much more thorough and professional but still ultimately futile.

From that point, however, we get introduced to a range of characters – and possible murderers – in Neve’s colleagues, her family and her friends. We meet her husband Fletcher, somewhat depressed and somehow stuck in their house; we meet Mabel, their once-suicidal troubled daughter; we meet Gary, Tamsin and Renata, Neve’s friends from University with whom she had made an independent publisher, taken over by Saul’s company. Eventually Detective Inspector Alastair Hitching arrives – once Neve surrenders to the pickles of her conscience and phones in to report the death – and Neve becomes entangled in her attempts to keep her family and friends together, avoid the murderer and avoid being arrested for it.

I was sufficiently interested in the plot and characters that I wanted to see the resolution play out – although I did anticipate the final twist about half way through. Absurdities did continue to abound: Saul’s wife calling on Neve for support, a woman she’d never met before; an bizarre sequence of birthday parties and student reunions which seemed to take us off into (un?)intentional comedy, something a long way from the thriller genre. DI Hitching who may know more than he says, or may not.

French – apparently a husband-and-wife writing team – also had a very pedestrian writing style. In the same way that unnecessary details of who made what sort of tea for whom, or precisely how many minutes the quick wash took in the flat, her sentences seemed a little … monotone? Very subject-verb-object. Compounding rather than subordination. Limited discourse markers – golly I sound like a teacher! But take a look at this example (capital letters corrected by me)

The clock said seven-fifteen.

“Morning,” Neve said again, still cheery. One of her jobs had always been to crank up the day, get them all going.

It was Fletcher entering this time, his hair damp from the shower and his beard newly trimmed. He barely looked at her, staring abstractedly out into the garden instead. She was grateful for that.

“Tea?” he asked.

She didn’t need to answer. She always had tea in the morning. Fletcher always had coffee. It was his job to make them and empty the dishwasher and put out the rubbish. It was her job to get breakfast down the children and make their packed lunches.

She shook oats into a saucepan and added milk and a tiny pinch of salt, put it on the hob to heat. She did it without thinking. Connor had porridge with golden syrup on top every morning. Fletcher had toast and marmalade.

Pedestrian, I’m afraid, is the word. In every aspect.

I gather that French has published a series of novels involving Frieda Klein, a forensic psychologist. I’m not in any rush to read them.

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Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK

https://bookloverssanctuary.com/2019/09/07/the-lying-room-nicci-french/

Date: 3rd October 2019

Available: Amazon

This was an enjoyable read, if maybe just a bit unbelievable. Would you really mess with a crime scene and not just once either! But having said that the story was fast paced and there were lots of clues and false trails and I read it over just a couple of days because I really wanted to know the ending.

I really enjoyed this book and from the first page felt comfortable that the author was going to deliver a compelling story with intrigue and suspense along the way. I have not read any of the author’s books before, however this story has demonstrated that the author is one to be trusted and I will no doubt be ordering more.

The pressure on Neve to cope with her life and the way that it deviates from what she would like is incredible. The more her life gets complicated, the more you find her having to adapt and change. One to read and reflect on.

Nicci French never fails to deliver and they've done it again in this tale of a woman framed for her lover's murder. With her family and friends all suspects, can she find the killer before the police uncover her affair, destroying her life forever?

With plenty of red herrings, anyone could be the murderer as Neve gradually uncovers multiple secrets and learns that the people around her aren't as innocent as they seem. Fast paced with well drawn characters, this will keep you gripped to the very last page.

Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC without obligation.

Neve Connolly is the person everyone turns to for advice, Mother of 3,with her eldest troubled daughter, Mabel, about to go to university, Neve is having an affair with a colleague who she finds dead in his flat. Instead of calling the police, she panics, Fearing her world is going to come crashing down around her, she tries to hide the fact she’s ever been there. Things then start spiralling out of her control as she realises someone is aware of the affair and trying to set her up as the murderer.

A taut psychological crime novel, fast paced, with some very interesting characters. I would have liked the reasons for her daughters behaviour to have been explained, and Inspector Hitchings behaviour at times is inappropriate but these are just small niggles. This shows the lengths a mother will go to, to keep her family safe.

I was thrilled to be allowed to read this book as I’ve not read any Nicki French novels before but certainly will look for them again. Very well plotted, with characters that really live. A book that held me right to the end. A must read.

Thank you to netgalley and Simon and Schuster Uk for my chance to read this highly recommended read .

I received this pre-publication e-book from Simon and Schuster UK via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. (Also posted on Goodreads and Amazon.)
I’m going to come clean immediately – I have read Nicci French before, and was expecting good things from this book. I was hoping for a tight plot, believable characters, twists, surprises, and a satisfying denouement.
I wasn’t disappointed. The Kindle copy I received was very clearly a prepub galley (full of formatting errors, widows/orphans all over the place, and with a weird lack of capitalisation of the main character’s name almost all the time), and I thought – oh dear, I’m not going to be able to read this. As a professional editor, normally that sort of thing bugs me so much I can’t concentrate on the story – but not in this case. It says an awful lot that within a couple of chapters I’d (mostly) stopped noticing the shocking state of the manuscript and was immersed in the narrative.
The main character, Neve Connolly, has her neat middle-class middle-aged world brutally ripped open when she finds the murdered body of a work colleague. For reasons that rapidly become clear she doesn’t do the obvious thing and call the police; instead she cleans the murder scene thoroughly, removes all possible evidence of her presence, and goes back home to her husband and children.
The rest of the book follows the tangled web of lies she is forced to construct around herself and her family to keep them all safe, and the shattering truths that eventually emerge. Suspicion falls almost everywhere among Neve’s circle of family and friends at one point or another as she questions everything that her life is built on.
There were a couple of weaker points – sometimes the actions of the investigating Detective Inspector, Hitching, didn’t ring entirely true for me, and Neve’s collection of flighty and crisis-ridden university friends, all of whom descend on her home loudly and repeatedly, were occasionally a bit over the top.
However, these did not detract from the gripping plot, skilful pacing and real psychological menace in this story, which make it unputdownable. I read it in a couple of days, formatting errors and all, rooting for Neve throughout – even when I thought she’d done it herself. (See? Suspicion everywhere.) Highly recommended.

Neve made me so angry with her from almost the outset as she came upon a body and then manically removed all trace of herself and therefore the real killer, from the scene. I was shouting at her in my mind and questioning her dubious motivation of protecting herself from the fall out of discovery for adultery.
However as she tries to work out who the real perpetrator is you begin to understand more of her motivation in distancing herself and her family from the crime.
The immediate assumptions you make of the relationships in the book, and their various difficulties, are soon disrupted as the truth reveals itself inch by inch.
Extremely well defined characters with enough depth to keep you reading but no lengthy back story descriptions that would interrupt the flow of the book. Some I loved and empathised with, others I really disliked- hopefully exactly as the author intended!

Neve is a middle aged mum of 3 whose marriage has become stale and taken for granted by both members. She embarks on her first ever affair with a Senior Manager at work - then finds him dead!

Neve’s consequent actions can have you screaming out warnings, but are always tempered with an understanding of why she chooses what to do. Despite the horror, it constantly made me laugh out loud to what I felt were very real reactions to the tangled mess of lies she creates. Her wish to cover up her affair is not simply to avoid hurting her husband (and marriage) but also a very real need to protect her extremely vulnerable daughter. Her constant questioning of herself and how she is behaving in front of family, friends and police and the subsequent stress thereof, resonates with the reader – you understand why she did what she did (initially at least, and why the affair started at all), but then have no choice but to observe as she sinks under the pressure. Very entertaining.

I was so excited to be approved to read and review the new Nicci French book and I was not disappointed. This thriller grips you right from the start and had me literally holding my breath at points! Whilst I wanted to give the main character, Neve, a good shake at times, I think that was intentional. I certainly didn’t guess the ‘whodunnit’ and it was very cleverly put together as always from Nicci French. Huge thank you to Netgalley, the author, and publisher, it was a pleasure to read.

The Lying Room by Nicci French
I have read and enjoyed all of the Frieda Klein novels and also some of the earlier collaborations by Sean French and Nicci Gerrard such as The Memory Game. The writing is always of high quality and the storyline keeps your hanging on trying to work out what is going to happen next.
The story opens with Neve Connolly being sent a text by her lover asking her to meet him at the flat where they enjoy their extra marital relationship. Neve is the breadwinner who is also the lynchpin of her family. They have 3 children one of whom is obviously struggling with drug addiction but who is about to set off for university. She and her husband, Fletcher, have been married for 20 years but when Saul her work colleague pays her attention she is flattered and begins an affair.
She arrives at the flat and discovers the dead body of her lover. Desperate to keep her relationship with Saul a secret she cleans the flat erases all evidence of her presence there and then rushes home. So begins her roller coaster of lies and fear of discovery. She lies to the police about whether she has ever been to the flat, she lies to her friends about her relationship with Saul and she lies to her family. But, keeping track of all these lies is difficult to do and as persistent DI Hitching interviews her again and again we wonder whether she will be able to make her way unscathed through his barrage of questions.
The story twists and turns as we lurch from one idea to another in order to solve the mystery of who was responsible for the murder of Saul. This is a complex and tense novel filled with questions which makes it a compulsive read. I found it a convincing read but was unsure about whether a woman trying to cover her tracks and arrive very speedily at various destinations would always choose to cycle there although, I suppose in London this is often the quickest mode of transport.
I would recommend this to other readers who enjoy a tightly plotted story with interesting characters. Many thanks to Net Galley and the publishers for the opportunity to read this novel in return for an honest review.

Firstly, I was really looking forward to this book, as a rule I love anything written by Nicci French but I found the Lying Room to be disappointing. The tension building just wasn’t there for me, in fact I found it slightly farcical.

The writing, as always is great and allows you to really get to know the characters, I just found I couldn’t suspend belief sufficiently to go along with the storyline. I think I probably ramped up the expectation too far and the book couldn’t measure up. Apologies, this one wasn’t for me but that’s not to say I won’t absolutely adore the next Nicci French offering that comes my way.

Thanks to Netgalley for providing an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

While I was really sad to say goodbye to Frieda Klein, it's a treat to have a new stand alone from Nicci French, and I don't think fans will be disappointed.

It gripped from the first page, with characters who felt well drawn and fallible - the family dynamics were particularly convincing. The final denouement was unexpected and, to be honest, a little unbelievable but as I'd thoroughly enjoyed the rest of it I didn't mind that much!

I have loved all this author’s previous books and this one did not disappoint. A brilliant book, highly recommended.

Many thanks to Netgalley and Nicki French got the copy of this book. I agreed to give my unbiased opinion voluntarily.

When Niamh Connolly finds her lover, murdered, instead of calling the police, she tries to erase any trace of her ever having been in his apartment... The Lying Room is a clever whodunnit, with elements of family drama that compel the main character to act in such a way that will bring only suspicion upon her. The story is quite complex, with a lot of characters to contend with, all seeming to converge between the main character's house and her work environment, while she maintains the central pivotal role until the final reveal. Thanks to NetGalley and Simon and Schuster UK for the opportunity to read this ARC copy.

Tight prose and a compelling style that takes the reader through Neve’s world without giving too much away.

It’s quite the page turner by this accomplished author- you can tell they really know how to write a thriller!

Read and enjoy