This was a great premise for a story, like none other that I have read. We have a city bus with 8 passengers aboard when it falls into a sinkhole. A couple escape and there are 6 left. Each chapter depicts the lives of the news reporter, her ex-husband (fire department liaison) and several of the passengers.
It was interesting to get to know and listen to everyone’s story. Hearing from a news reporter’s view, then the rescue teams view, a survivor and then the family members. I thought the author did a great job of representing them all. Some I liked, some I didn’t. My only con is that I wish she would have given a bit more detail in the actual accident and more detail in the rescue. Other than that, this is a heartfelt tale covering multiple emotional situations of loss, love, forgiveness and especially hope. I enjoyed it.
I want to thank Legend Press and NetGalley for allowing me the opportunity to read and review this book for my honest unbiased opinion. This is a 5-star review. Highly recommend.

I was trying to get interested in the descriptions and details. I liked the characters and feel of the book. Very heart warming

Well, this was a book with a difference and a refreshing read that I really enjoyed. Totally unexpected in so much as the different emotions it stirred in me. This is a brilliant plot and if you like a book to kick off with a bang this is one for you. The pace is then fast all the way to the end. I read this in one enjoyable sitting.

As a sleepy town in rural Ireland starts to wake, a road subsides, trapping an early-morning bus and five passengers inside. Rescue teams struggle and as two are eventually saved, the bus falls deeper into the hole.

Under the watchful eyes of the media, the lives of three people are teetering on the edge. And for those on the outside, from Nina, the reporter covering the story, to rescue liaison, Tim, and Richie, the driver pulled from the wreckage, each are made to look at themselves under the glare of the spotlight.

Do you save yourself before others? A split-second decision opens up one heck of a can of worms in this story.

Imagine, you are trapped in a bus that has sunk into the ground as the road gives way on a perfectly normal day. Horrendous. This book really portrays how the media can influence and misdirect public opinion. Everybody seems to have their view on this disaster and those involved.

We here from many voices. The most harrowing being the voices of those trapped in the bus. Oh my. I could really feel the terror and there are some very moving parts in the book that will no doubt touch your heart. It's both a novel with excitement, pace tightly intertwined with characters with flaws, emotions and both hope and grief.

A really great read, highly recommended if you love a page-turner!

Where the Edge is by Grainne Murphy

The book, a debut novel, tells the story of a terrible accident in a rural village in Ireland, in which an early morning bus drops into a sinkhole. The main character, is Nina, a reporter, who is recovering from her own tragedy, the death of her little girl, Aisling, and its aftermath, including the breakup of her marriage to Tim, a firefighter.
The novel focuses on key characters, who have been affected by the accident, including the driver, Richie and Alina, a Lebanese woman, who is suspected of being involved in an act of terrorism.
It is a compelling read, but takes its own time, as it slowly explores how we are all affected by trauma and loss and how we all have our sad stories.
Certainly, it is not an easy read, and ultimately there are not neat happy endings, but there is still a sense of hope, and the belief that we can survive terrible tragedies and loss.

An incredible debut novel an author I will be recommending raving about..A bus accident three people bare trapped.We are told the story through different passengers perspectives.We learn about the passengers life.A tense story that kept me turning the pages late into the night,#netgalley#legend

What a wonderful debut novel! Truly great things are to come from Grainne Murphy!
I truly was not expecting the depth this book provided; I expected a tense, suspenseful thriller, but I got so much more.
Where The Edge Is begins with an early morning bus crash in Ireland; the passengers on the bus, and in truth the people responding to the crash as well, are all literally suspended in a perilous moment.
Nina is a journalist who has just returned to work after a period of time off grieving for a lost child. Her ex-husband, Tim, is also covering this disaster event and their story is compelling and complex. It all unravels slowly, drawing us in bit by bit.
We also meet the passengers on the bus, Lucy, for example. The bus driver and Alina, the first passenger rescued have their own stories, and the common thread with all of these is so intricately woven by Murphy -- each of these people truly and literally discovering "where the edge is" in their own lives.
Don't miss this one!

This was a good story but it needed better editing. Very good writing for debut author but she needs a better editor. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher.

This book wasn't quite what I expected. It appeared to be an interesting story about a bus that disappears down a sinkhole, with people trapped inside. Two escape immediately, the rest are still trapped.

The story doesn't touch on this much however, instead focusing on the main characters of a female journalist and her ex, a fireman, both who are present at the scene. They've experienced misfortune and sorrow in their lives - their only child dies as a baby - and the focus of the book is around their grief surrounding this event.

I managed to get 60% through before deciding that I wasn't really invested in any of the characters, on or off the bus , and couldn't really care what happened.- so I gave up on it and stopped reading.

If this book appeals to you because of the story about a bus ending up in a sinkhole, be aware that that plays a very minor role in this story.

If you like books examining the grief of others in detail, then this might be a good book for you.

This book told the story of a bus crash over just a few days, and I enjoyed how each chapter was written from the perspective of a different person involved in the tragedy. This kept me interested as I kept wanting to get back to that same character a bit further along the story. Well written and enjoyable.

Where the Edge Is is a moving study of grief, centred around journalist Nina and her estranged husband Tim, who lost their baby daughter Aisling a few years before the start of the book. Nina and Tim are thrown back together when an early morning bus is swallowed by a collapsing road and the rescue attempt for the driver and passenger begins.

The book was well written, but I was far more interested in the bus occupants, particularly Lucy and Orla, than in Nina and Tim. The grief storyline was just too overwhelmingly sad for me, I think I need a bit more hope and/or action in these quarantine times.

A recommended read for fans of Jodi Picoult and tough emotional writing.

Thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for providing a review copy in exchange for honest feedback.

I was excited about this book. I LOVED the cover, the setting, the alternating perspectives, but I just couldn’t get into it.

This is a story of grief, loss and the complexities of being human.
It’s early morning in rural Ireland when a bus tumbles into a collapsing road trapping five members inside. As rescuers struggle to save their lives and a successful recovery becomes grim, each character is forced to deal with their own personal tragedies.
I had expected this novel to be about the tense scenario caused by the accident, however, through Grainne Murphy’s beautiful prose this becomes an insightful and often emotional read. It becomes so much more than the rescue efforts and the media attention outside of the bus. It is about what happens within each character, the life they live, the decisions they have made and the way they cope. This is a very well constructed, wonderful read.
My thanks to NetGalley and Legends Press for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This had the potential to be 5 stars but the characters were all over the place after a bus accident. It tells about why each character was on the bus leading up to the accident and then each of their stories in the aftermath of a terrible accident. Some of it was good and some of it was predictable. I really wanted to enjoy this more than I did especially when the premise was so good and the awesome cover. I am a sucker for interesting covers.

Still recommended.

Thanks to NEtgalley, Grainne Murphy and Legend Press for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Available: 9/15/20

This is the first book I read of Grainne Murphy. Where the Edge is, is a different book then I usually read. It was good. It starts slow but gets much better in the end. I love books set in Ireland, it is such a beautiful country and the people are amazing. Just like the characters in this book. This book will stay with you for awhile.

This novel is written with infinite care, in the choice of words and images and the modeling of each character. The common denominator among the primary characters is trauma, some of which is the worst imaginable. The event that happens in the present time of the novel is a sudden accident that brings nearly twenty-four hours of torturous waiting to loved ones. This period brings forward an intense reliving of loss by two characters in particular, Tim and Nina, and the doubling of their trauma is very dark indeed. The question of suffering, its meaning, the acceptance of deep change in one's self and others who are affected by even the radiating shock of what has happened...all of these and more are treated by Ms Murphy with great delicacy, imagination, and characterizations that ring true to an exquisite degree. For those interested in metaphors, the "edge" in the title is echoed repeatedly in various examples of delineations in life, some barely noticeable, others catastrophic.

I am afraid I struggled with this book.I didn't find it very interesting,and it didn't hold my attention.The characters didn't resonate with me, and considering the subject matter I thought it lacked tension because I wasn't engaged by it.I am so sorry and hope other readers find it more captivating than I did.

This is a hard book to read, not because of the writing but because of the subject matter. Major themes are grief and loss and how people deal with what is arguably the worst loss of all - the death of a child.

Nina is a journalist and she and Tim had a child Aisling who died around eleven months old. It broke up their marriage and Tim is now with another partner, Deb. Nina has recently returned to work and covers a bus accident which has fallen into a sink hole trapping most of the passengers inside. Retrieving the passengers safely is incredibly difficult after managing to get out two - the bus driver and a Muslim woman, both of whom Nina interviews. Using a crane proves to be fruitless because of its weight and so much time is wasted while trying to find an effective strategy. Tim is with emergency services and now works in a more public relations role rather than at the coal face and so he and Nina need to work together at times during the assignment which leads them to reflect on the death of their daughter and how each has managed their grief.

The story could easily be lifted off the nightly news and so the humanity is expressed through the characters who take turns in telling the story from their own position as part of the bus tragedy. It's well written and structured but for me there seemed to be something missing. I found it hard to really visualise the characters and although the story gripped enough to keep reading, it didn't stay with me when I took a break. Perhaps this was my own doing in subconsciously distancing myself from the gruelling subject matter or perhaps the author intentionally structured it so that some distance was built in because who can bear being immersed in loss and grief?

Ultimately it's a successful story exploring these difficult themes from multiple points of view. But from a personal perspective the subject matter was tough to read in these Covid-19 times.

Interesting take on how people react in tragic circumstances and there were some good parts, I particularly liked the relationship between Orla and Lucy. But all in all, it felt like reading a Grey’s Anatomy episode. I felt manipulated by circumstances but never delved deeper into any individual character.

Sadly I only made it 27% of the way through before admitting defeat....
This isn’t something I ever do if I can help it, as I know that some stories are growers and need a little time to develop.
However, by almost a 1/3 of the way through I had to admit that I had no idea where it was going and I just felt lost and a little bored.
It just wasn’t for me :(

This book by Irish author Grainne Murphy is about a group of bus passengers that crash into a crevice of some sort, which leads to a dramatic rescue mission and an evacuation of nearby school and hospital.

I struggled with this one. The writing style is unique, and as a Canadian I can see how there were certain words or stylistic choices that might have been a struggle for me. I think the writing is still sharp, and Murphy is a great storyteller - I just personally had a hard time buying into this story. It was a bit of a slow drag for me, and I didn’t connect to every character.

I wished I loved this book like others, but it wasn’t for me. Thank you NetGalley for the ARC.