Strangely, this is the second book I have read recently titled Two Wrongs. What are the chances?

Mel McGrath's novel has an excellent opening, with a prologue in which a woman walking home from her hospital cleaning shift happens upon a younger woman climbing the fence on Bristol's Clifton Suspension Bridge, about to jump off to her certain death. I liked the choice to show this from the viewpoint of the stranger who tries to help, who has no idea what to say or do but knows she must try to make a connection.

The story moves on to several young women at the fictional Avon University, principally Nevis, friend and flatmate of Satnam, the girl on the bridge. Nevis Smith - "student mathematician, bird lover, and keeper of secrets" - is an interesting character. She seems not entirely neurotypical, though this is never named as such, and has been raised on a barge by her mother's friend after the death of her young mother, Zoe, when Nevis was a baby and Zoe and Honor just nineteen years old. The story follows events from Nevis's point of view ("If only people were as simple as mathematics") and that of her adoptive mother, Honor, as well as peculiar maths professor Christopher Cullen.

An apparent rash of suicides among students - the term "suicide contagion" is mentioned a fair bit - has the university worried, though more about its reputation than the welfare of students. There are certain matters they really don't want getting out....

Two Wrongs was an engaging and readable story - I was invested in the characters of Nevis, Honor and Satnam. Of the other characters, Cullen's head is an... interesting, if not pleasant, place to be inside. I also liked the "bargee" element of the story, although this is a fairly minor component.

A recommended read.

The characters in this book are artfully written with each awkward, painful teenage interaction very true to life along with the overwhelming creepiness of the university professors, conspiring to hide the truth but none of them are particularly likeable.
The plot is bitty in parts- a bit more detail into the interactions between the characters would not have gone amiss but enough is shown to allow the reader to surmise the events as they unfold.
however, overall a well plotted and easy to read story.

I’ve previously enjoyed a book by this author and was a little disappointed with this thriller.

Granted at the minute we aren’t seeing many books with a completely new trope but this was predictable and a rehashed version of a few other books I have read.

The characters do have great detail with some real flesh to them but overall this was too slow and quite disappointing.

Full disclosure: I was given a free ARC for my review on Net Gallery. Below is my honest and spoiler free review.

I was really excited by the premise and blurb of the book… McGrath took a pretty heavy subject, suicide, and tried to make a thriller out of it. Unfortunately, for me, it failed to achieve that outcome. I failed to connect with any character except Zoe and you only know Zoe from other people’s memories of her.

Ordinarily, I love characters from minority groups. I believe representation is important in Literature to ensure that multiple narratives are told, not just the mainstream story, and heroes should come in all shapes, types, and sizes. Nevis should have appealed to me… It appeared Nevis has some of the hallmarks traits of being neurodivergent, she was not Caucasian, and she was a main character. These were huge ticks for me. However, this is where it went wrong… McGrath’s wrote Nevis’ neurodivergent characteristics like a pastiche. She was unable to portray difference without “othering”, and emphasised the most obvious traits without the nuance of the lived in experience, and it really failed to add value to the storyline. Instead of making Navis someone who’s the hero of her story, the way McGrath wrote her, and how the other characters saw her, makes Navis only worthy of pity and a potential victim even in the ending. I don’t believe McGrath did any real research into this aspect, and this is poor form.

Honor was a “bargee” and I enjoyed her free spirit, but again her character just felt a bit two dimensional – like how a writer THINKS a person who would live on barge within a community of hippie barge travellers would be like; but overall, McGrath was not able to portray her as a real person, outside of her loss of her best friend, Zoe. Her chosen lifestyle was almost irrelevant to the plot.

The only person who was actually believable was Cullen. The slimy self-serving sense of entitlement reminded me strongly of Brock Turner. As McGrath wisely didn’t try to create any kind of moral conundrum for the reader, it just made me hate him. The ending didn’t really provide me with any kind of satisfaction.

Actually, I take that back, Sondra – Sondra was a wonder. The Prologue was spot on, and what I wanted every character to be like. McGrath drew you in and helped you visualise the scene – it’s late after a gruelling physically demanding job and there’s a young woman on the bridge, ready to jump. Sondra’s (and therefore the reader) doubts, fears for the jumper, and her anxieties of doing the wrong thing or saying the wrong thing that could stop her from saving a life is put on full display… Perfect! I’m hooked. BUT… She’s a throw away character. Once she leaves, so does my enthusiasm.

Overall? The twists were broadcasted and easily foreseen because McGrath wanted the villains to be obvious. The crumbs were the sizes of houses, so even when villains were being unmasked, so to speak, it just felt ordinary and unremarkable villainy that it lacked any real punch that actual rape and abuse of power marks their survivors. It was story of multiple tragedies for a relatively large number of victims, but there was no thrill in this so-called-thriller. The “come-uppance” was unsatisfying and the hero was barely that, even in her own story. I finished the book because I wanted to give a proper review of it and to do that justice, I would need to do so. Disappointing - it started with such promise. I will not be reading another book by this author.

3.5

A dramatic incident on Clifton Suspension Bridge starts a chain of shocking events involving students from Avon University. Central to the story are student Nevis Smith, her mother Honor and Professor Chris Cullen. The story is told from their perspectives.

The pace at the start of the book is very slow and plodding; the scene on the bridge should have been dramatic and tense but manages to miss the mark. The impersonal reporting style for the first part of the book makes it hard to enjoy it but fortunately this changes as the book progresses, becoming more fluid, easier to read and engage with the plot. It’s almost like it’s written by two different people! As it gets into its stride, it becomes more compelling as it’s clear there are huge coverups, unscrupulous manipulations, secrets by the barrel load with buried lies that are now beginning to float to the surface with devastating consequences. The characterisation is good with Nevis being fascinatingly complex as she sees things numerically, struggling to understand people and is more than likely on the autistic spectrum. She’s a loyal friend and is determined to get to the unsavoury truth. Her mother Honor lives an alternative lifestyle which sounds fantastic, she’s a loving, caring mother with an understandable desire to protect her daughter. Cullen is a horrible character changing personality like a chameleon. There are some dark issues covered in the book which centre around #MeToo and so it’s not necessarily an original theme, following a fairly predictable path. I do like that the plot centres on a university and clearly shows the pressures that students face with the seething ambitions and politics of the university hierarchy which lurks JUST beneath the surface adding an intriguing element. The ending is good with fear, tension and suspense.

Overall, once it gets going it’s a decent psychological thriller.

With thanks to NetGalley and HQ for the arc for an honest review.

Thank you Netgalley for this ARC copy.

Nevis is a quiet girl, studious girl who attends university in Bristol. One night her best and only, friend attempts suicide and everything changes for Nevis. Why would her friend do this? Why did two other girls follow her attempt and succeed? As Nevis digs deeper into what happened her mother worries that her biggest secrets will be revealed and destroy Nevis forever as the past and present collide.

I did enjoy reading this but found very early on that I could see where it was headed. After that I just wanted it to get on with it. I didn't really feel anything, or any connection, with any of the characters. BUT please don't let my personal opinion put you off as it was a great story.

Thank you to NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read this book.

This story centres around Honor and her daughter Nevis. Honor isn’t Nevis’ real mum. Nevis’s real mother was Honor’s best friend Zoe, and Zoe committed suicide 3 months after Nevis was born. Nevis goes to Avon University, and her best friend, Satnam, attempts to kill herself after taking a mix of drugs and alcohol. Satnam ends up in a coma. Nevis is shocked as she didn’t see this coming, and she tries to investigate why she would do this. After talking to Satnam’s other friends, things get more confusing than before. Then one of those friends, Jessica, kills herself. And the story gets stranger and stranger, and it’s very clear that many of the characters are keeping secrets. But it also becomes clear that there are links to Honor’s and Zoe’s past.

The writing was ok, and the story flowed nicely. The characters were also just ok, I didn’t feel any kind of bond with them, and none of them were really relatable to me.
Overall I did enjoy this book, and would recommend.

Set in Bristol and focusing on the secrets and intrigues of a group university students, this story had great potential. The first chapter or so was compelling, but the story dragged on far too long, it needed some editing. Towards the end of the book the pace did pick up and although the ending was predictable I did manage to finish. The characters were not very likeable, and that made the story hard going. The book is modern and current, but the writing sometimes too stilted and cliched. Errors in the book made it a struggle too, needs work!
Thanks NetGalley for the arc.

This was my first novel read by Mel McGrath. I didn’t know what to expect when I went in, and I wasn’t disappointed.

The story is told from three points of view, which in my opinion is the best way to start a thriller novel. McGrath’s writting is amazing. It made me feel part of the story at all times, giving clues and making the overall story enjoyable. The book deals with trauma incurred after sexual harrassment which in itself is a heavy topic. I think that McGrath has done an exemplary job and brought to the forefront the internal struggle that victims often deal with.
The twist was a good, alas predictable. The story however made up for the predictable twist. The relationship between the mother and the daughter in the story is loveable and heartwarming. Overall Two Wrongs is a stelar novel that doesn’t shy away from the hard hitting topics of rape.

I found this a strange story exploring the concept if suicide contagion. The idea that a group of people can somehow all begin to feel the same way and act on these feelings.
The story is set in modern times with modern technology available. The characters are unusual although their backstory is interesting and eventually leads to the explanation and final reveal. The main character is obviously unusual and has very specific abilities, and little social skill. The Dean appears to be seriously damaged by his childhood and all his previous actions lead to his dreadful behaviour towards the end.
I was interested in the conclusion but I found it difficult to enjoy.

Although this is billed as a thriller, I think that the description doesn't really begin to cover the complexities of this book, a story that, whilst fiction, could easily have been ripped from the headlines. This is a story which explores a very difficult subject, but in a sensitive way, one which not only draws out the drama of the narrative but also the emotion. It is about the abuse of power, but it is also about the strength of love that can be felt between a mother and daughter, even if the bond is not there by blood.

The story is told predominantly from three perspectives, those of Nevis, a University student, Honor, her adoptive mother, and Cullen, a professor at the University. Nevis receives a call from a stranger in the middle of the night urging her to get to the Clifton Suspension Bridge as quickly as possible as her friend and housemate, Satnam is ready to commit suicide. This in itself is shocking enough for Nevis, a young woman who has always struggled to fully understand the emotions of others, but she is not remotely prepared for the truths she will uncover as she tries to find out what drive her friend to such a drastic act.

There are many angles to this story, some of which I don't really want to go into directly due to the fact that they may act as spoilers. The book examines the pressure upon the young students that Nevis knows and that come into her circle following Satnam's suicide attempt, the complexities of their relationships and the nature of those who would seek to take advantage of their desperation to be the best they can. To not be seen as failing. It is an all too familiar tale, one which makes the skin crawl, even as the lines are blurred between who was, and wasn't a fully willing participant in what came to pass. There is a great deal of conflict in the novel as we are made to examine not only the lengths some students may be willing to go to succeed, but also the lengths that others will go to in order to ensure that their actions remain undiscovered. And there is a long and complex history for some of the characters, one which is slowly drop few to readers throughout the story, increasing the tension and the suspense, one which made me feel compelled to keep reading, if only to discover if what I thought was happening actually was the truth.

Mel McGrath has created a very complex but intriguing character in Nevis. The more I learned about her, the more I wanted to see her succeed. It is clear that she doesn't have the same kind of awareness as most of the other students, her practical naivete keeping from her that which is glaringly obvious to the reader. And yet it feels very authentic with Nevix making up in smarts what she clearly lacks in her awareness of those around her. Hers is a complex psychological condition but although she cannot always gauge the mood of those around her, she feels quite intensely, something that is obvious from her relationship with her adoptive mother Honor. Now here are two characters who could not be more different and yet they compliment each other perfectly, Honor's love for Nevis and determination to protect her screaming from the page. Although hers may be a simple life, and she is a seemingly disorganised and slightly bohemian character, she carries a lot of emotional scars and I felt such a connection to both her and Nevis as characters that they really drew me into the story.

As for Cullen ... well he is a difficult character to like. It is hard at first to decide if he is a man trapped in a loveless marriage and acting as the keeper of the blind eye when it comes to his career or something far, far worse. I never warmed to him as a character, his sense of self preservation overtaking the needs of his students being just one of many things that made my skin crawl. Whether my judgement of him was warranted you will have to read to find out, but he certainly has echoes of the kinds of unscrupulous character you may well have read about.

There is such a sense of authenticity to this story, the simplicity of what occurs almost the most horrifying thing of all. There are no needs for major shocks or plot twists, although some of the things which occur will leave you reeling. It is a far more thoughtful piece than that, one which will draw you in and keep you hooked regardless. It is a slower paced read, not quite what I would class as a psychological thriller, although its style is often bordering on the shadows of that genre. There is a sense of urgency towards the end, the story building to a climax which. has been some twenty years in the making and is more powerful for it, but it the poignancy of the story, the understated and yet impactful ending, which has left a lasting impression on me in this oten moving read.

A bit of a slow start but worth the wait.
Cleverly written in a very modern style and engaging throughout.
An interesting premise and one that will make you stop and think.

Thanks to NetGalley for an ARC
Sadly I didn't really connect with this book. None of the characters were likable which means you didn't really care what happened to them. The writing style was a bit odd with some very strange phrases - retinal veins like comets? Spelling errors that need to be corrected. Doesn't make sense. It took a while to get going after a promising start but the plot is a well trodden path that's been done before. It got slightly confusing at the end with character name changes for no apparent reason. I would try this author again

I was attracted to this book by the description and the fact that it’s set in Bristol, a beautiful city that I know a bit. I’ve walked across the Clifton Suspension Bridge and it is a well known for it’s countless suicides and that’s how the book starts with a young university student Satnam attempting to throw herself off the bridge.
It’s a powerful opening which drew me in but then the next third of the book was quite hard going. I’ve not read any of Mel McGrath books and definitely didn’t enjoy the writing style in the first part of the book, quite stilted I felt. I hadn’t really taken to any of the characters either. Satnam’s flatmate, Nevis, is quite odd and her adoptive mother so bohemian and hippy! The only character I did really like was an aside really, the potential boyfriend of the mother Alex - he was the only normal likeable character.
I got close to giving up but I hate to do that, so I continued and the story really picked up and became the thriller I had hoped for! From that point on I couldn’t put it down.
It also felt that the writing style changed a bit too and wasn’t so stilted It’s hard for me to say that I really enjoyed it as it’s a dark subject and there is nothing ‘cheery’ about rape, suicide and such topics but it definitely kept me page turning right till the end.
My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced copy of this book in return for an honest review.

At a fictional university in Bristol a student attempts suicide and others follow suit, sparking a mother's fears for her daughter and an investigation into what exactly is happening. All the protagonists have secrets, making the first half of the novel really compelling and hard to put down, and some really good atmosphere is built in transporting the reader to a wet and windy Bristol. However, the plot was predictable by the second half of the novel, which was quite disappointing given its strong start. A well-written, enjoyable mystery nonetheless.

"Two Wrongs" has a pretty original and interesting premise: a young female student in Bristol throws herself off a bridge; now other girls are killing themselves too, in what might be a 'suicide cluster'. I was intrigued when I read the blurb, but honestly, that does not do this novel justice - it is about so much more, and is so complex and well-written.

Every single character, from central to extra, is fully realised and beautifully explored, and I loved that this felt like both a thriller and a literary novel. The relationships are so fully fleshed out that these felt like real people to me, and it hurt when bad things happened to them.

I don't want to say too much for fear of spoiling the novel, but this is a brilliant thriller and I would highly recommend it - complex and realistic characters I fell in love with, an intriguing central plot that works almost like an undercurrent for the first two thirds of the novel, carrying the reader along almost before we realise what is going on, and all with the added bonus of just fantastic writing.

This is one I'll remember, for sure.

Thank you to NetGalley, and to the publisher, for granting me an ARC copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

This is the first book I’ve read by Mel McGrath but it won’t be the last. Ooh, I do love a book that is hard to put down! I found it utterly compelling right from the start, (why on earth did that lovely young girl feel she had to commit suicide?) and I stayed up way after bedtime to finish it. It contained everything for me that makes a great story - friendship, secrets, fear, betrayal, murder, corruption, rape, to name a few. There were people that I loved – Satnam, Nevis, Honor and Alex, and some that I loathed – Cullen, his dreadful mother, and his awful wife Veronica. The author gave a good insight into all of the characters and this is why they were totally believable and made it such a good read. I didn’t spot ‘the main culprit’ till near the end, and this was due to the many twists and turns. I love the writing style of this author, and I loved the ending, where everything worked out and the story came full circle. No spoilers here – just a great book that I highly recommend.

Two Wrongs is a mystery thriller set in Bristol, told from the perspectives of three main characters: Nevis (a student at Avon University), Honor (her adoptive mother) and Cullen (the Dean of the University).

I struggled at first with maintaining interest in the story, as it was very slow building and I didn’t feel any real connection or empathy with the three main characters.

I almost gave up on it but am glad I didn’t as the story picked up pace from about the halfway mark and became a gripping page turner as it barrelled toward a dramatic climax. Personally, I feel it could have done with heavier editing at the beginning to make the pace more consistent and to build on the drama.

The twists and mysteries were a bit predictable but it was still a good concept, and I particularly liked the exploration of complex family relationships, the vulnerability of young adults and the intricacies of University ‘politics’.

Maths student Nevis receives a call in the middle of the night to come to Clifton suspension bridge, where her friend Satnam is threatening to jump. As the weeks pass, she’s not the only young woman at their university to try suicide, but is it “suicide contagion” or is there something else that links their deaths? It’s an intriguing premise and the book has a strong opening. I liked the relationships between the women. However, the tension flags in places as the narrative gets bogged down, and the story doesn’t quite live up to its potential.

Strong, well crafted tale of friendship, deceit, power and murder.
Set in a fictional university of Avon, in Bristol this unusual story follows the lives of four female students and their lecturers.
Satnam, one of the students, tries to commit suicide off the Clifton Suspension bridge but collapses with overdose before jumping.
A series of suicides follow and the past rests its ugly head as Nevis, a brilliant Maths student, tries, with her mother Honor, to uncover what is causing these.
Surprises and twists abound in this unique book.
Murder, betrayal of trust and the past all make this a thoroughly enjoyable read.
Thanks to Netgalley and Harper Collins for
allowing me to read this book in return for a fair review.
4 Stars ⭐️.
Thoroughly recommended.