This is my first BP Walter book. I have to say it was not what I expected. The timeline all works around before and after. The chapters are marked as before and after an explosion (which really had nothing to do with anything except possible as metaphor) but it is really more about before and after the loss of a family.

There is a touching story of love, friendship, and acceptance woven through this story. Unfortunately, it is presented as just another secret on the cul-de-sac. There seems to be an effort to make it taudry. You can see it coming from the beginning.

The truth about the locked attic itself was disappointing. I didn’t even really care about it. The characters revealed were already completely horrible. There was no need to make them more so. I felt it took away from the actually story here.

I went back and forth between 3 and 4 stars. I think I’m rounding up for the touching tale that underlied everything else.

Stephanie's son and husband are dead. The only person who can explain what happened is her son's friend Jonathan who lives across the road. When explosions in town force residents to stay indoors, Stephanie makes it a point to be in her neighbour's house so she can find out the backstory.

I kept waiting for the locked attic to come into the story...and boy, when it did, I was shocked! This book ambled on and I thought it was a little predictable, until it wasn't. Super intriguing but dark read. If you like twisted disturbing thrillers, you will enjoy this one. I'm excited to read more by this author!

I was disappointed with this latest offering from BP Walter. After the thrill of The Dinner Guest and the suspense of the Woman on the Pier, I was ready to be gripping the pages of the book eager to find out the big twist.

And then I got there and I was like, "really? That's it?" Hoping for some redeeming yikes moment I hurried through the rest of the book. And there was none.

It was a pleasant book to read and a little on the creepy side but comparing them to the two prior works mentioned, I wanted more. I wanted to be scared, white knuckled, holy cats! Instead I got, hmm... eh.

I hope the next book has more of the fright factor I was hoping to find.

What's it about (in a nutshell):
The Locked Attic is a psychological thriller about a woman who lost her husband and son in a tragic car accident and the many secrets they kept from each other.

Initial Expectations (before beginning the book):
I have had mixed experiences with books by BP Walter, so I'm not sure what to expect from this latest novel. I loved The Dinner Guest but couldn't finish The Woman on the Pier. So, my initial expectations are blank as I don't want to preset my mind in any direction.

Actual Reading Experience:
I enjoyed the narration and pacing, which I will have more about in that specific section. Still, a whole host of other aspects presented a challenge for me, so writing my typical kind of review is also a challenge.
One reading challenge I had was that I didn't get it. I didn't understand the story's point except to unearth the secrets, but to what end? The knowledge of the secrets didn't go anywhere. We learned what they were, but I didn't find them shocking or unexpected. There are plenty of hints about the direction they will take all the way through. And the locked attic – well, I could have lived without knowing what was in there, but as I said, I already figured it was something on the line that it was.
There were also loose ends that I didn't understand. Even if they were plot devices, I expected an explanation or tie-in to the story's central premise. The main one was explosions going off in the neighborhood. Very little is said about them, so I had no idea why or if this is some kind of regular occurrence in that area of the world or what.

Characters:
Character development was so-so. All the secrets caused a barrier for me when it came to learning more about their choices and why. The best thing in the story was the relationship between Danny, the main character's son, and Jonathan. It was sweet to watch it develop, and it felt like a genuine depiction.

Narration & Pacing:
The narration is done in the first person through Stephanie's eyes. She is also hiding secrets which makes the reliability of her narration questionable, and she is going through a lot that can be a bit tiring in the beginning. It calms down in that regard about halfway through. And, the narration does change POVs to Danny periodically, which also helps break things up.
The pacing is super-fast, and I enjoyed the pacing most out of all the aspects of the story.

Setting:
The setting is a well-to-do neighborhood outside of London in Kent. And the timeline switches around to tell what's going on in the present and what happened at different points in the past. This aspect also kept the pace quick, I believe.

Ultimately, I guess this book just wasn’t my cup of tea though I did enjoy certain aspects of it.

I am a big fan of BP Walters and loved all his books so far. This one is no different. It is structurally very different to his others books and the characters are well developed. It is a great read and one that I would highly recommend,

A surprising plot - not what I was expecting at all.

Stephanie has lost both her husband and son Danny in a tragic accident she knows that something wasn’t right with Danny before he died and it involved the neighbours.
Why is Stephanie being watched? And why was the neighbour’s son Jonathan acting suspiciously on the day Danny died?

It took me a few chapters to pull the threads of this story together to understand what was going on but once I did the twists kept coming.

Sinister undertones and wonderfully dislikeable characters made this an edge of your seat thriller with plenty to keep you guessing.
Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read The Locked Attic.

Thank you HarperCollins UK, One More Chapter, One More Chapter and netgalley for this arc.

Uh. Mixed feeling about the reason some people had to die. Without that it could be a 5 star reading for me. Anyway I loved the greeping fast page turning story. Told in two perspectives and many time-lines. That made the story relly teriffic. I could immagine easly moving from a big town to a small one. There were strange neighbours, strange family, but also will to change and live better. It was also heartbreaking, losing someone is never easy but in that way. And having those neigbours, those feelings, desire was a really difficult situation

The Locked Attic by B.P. Walter is a psychological thriller

First, let me thank NetGalley, the publisher Harper Collins - One More Chapter and of course the author, for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.


My Synopsis:    (No major reveals, but if concerned, skip to My Opinions)
Stephanie, her husband Pete, and their son Danny move from London to a small town.  She was used to the anonymity of a large city, but here everyone wants you involved, and they gossip.  She'd prefer to be left alone.

The Franklin family across the street is strange, but Danny eventually makes friends with Jonathan, who is the same age, and in some of his classes.  Danny finds the family strange as well.  There is a lot of anger in that household, and the father spends a lot of time in the attic, supposedly working.

Danny starts acting a little strange himself.  Neither Stephanie nor Pete can get to the bottom of what is troubling their son.

When Pete and Danny are killed, Stephanie retreats further into herself.  She knows there is something wrong with the family across the street, and she is sure that Jonathan knows what was bugging her son.  She desperately needs to find out.


My Opinions:
Although it felt rather disorganized, the overall story was quite good.

I usually don't mind  when a story goes back and forth between time lines, but this was too much.  From 7 months before the explosion, to the day of the explosion, to four months before the explosion, to two years before the explosion,  to five months before the explosion,  to one year, eight months before the explosion, to now...on and on, and back and forth.  Just too much.  I didn't mind that the story was told from both Stephanie's and Danny's perspective, but the shifting time-line was annoying....and almost had me giving the book a 2 star review.

However, about half way through, that no longer mattered.  The story had me hooked.  Yes, it was a long time to be frustrated, but apparently it was worth it.  Everyone was keeping secrets, some of them not worth keeping, and others really creepy.  I loved the relationship between Jonathan and Danny, and I loved how much Stephanie cared for her son.

The book is about secrets, and friendship, and love, and abuse.  Some of it was sweet, some of it was creepy.  Some had me smiling, some had me angry.   It was those feelings that I got from the book that allowed me to give it a 4 star review.

3.5 stars.

I struggled with The Locked Attic at the beginning. It felt like it took forever to get to the build-up. But once it started to play out, I was entranced by the interpersonal relationships unfolding.

Some of what happens doesn’t really seem to make sense (please explain the explosions to me!) but I was only interested in Danny anyway. This story is told from the point of view of both our female main character, Stephanie, and her late son, Danny. His story is trickled to us and we’re on the edge of our seat wondering what happened to him before his death.

I came into The Locked Attic expecting a twisty thriller, but instead I was given a coming of age story that broke my heart. I’m glad I pushed through and continued to the end, or else I would have missed the best part of the story.

Thank you to One More Chapter, Harper Collins UK for the review copy.

Not at all what I expected… and that’s not a bad thing. Just a surprising, one-off kind of read.

The publishers’ blurb is completely misleading. (Very sneaky!) I was expecting a dark, twisty thriller but it really wasn’t that at all. Well...not really.💁‍♀️

Told in multiple timelines:
The present –Foggy and confused, Stephanie wakes in a hospital following a head injury. She has no idea why she’s there.

The past – The events leading up to the day of the “boom" heard around the neighborhood, as well as the actual day of the explosion.

That’s as far as I dare go…I’ll leave it there and let you discover this one on your own!
I found it strangely addictive and hard to put down, squeezing in a few chapters whenever I had a quiet moment.

Looking for something a bit different? Not your run of the mill thriller? This might be a good fit!

My second read by this author and will definitely be looking for his next. I’m always guaranteed something just a bit different!

Thank you to HarperCollins UK One More Chapter via Netgalley

This is my third book from B P Walter. I loved “The Dinner Guest” and “The Woman on the Pier”. But this one is a mixed bag for me. While it is a solid mystery and an intriguing coming-of-age story, there is too much going on and there are so many topics and some of them are only touched briefly.

It begins with Stephanie waking up in a hospital and being disorientated. Her memory is fuzzy but as the story progressed we learn how she ended up here. Then the story jumps back and forth to different occasions in the past. We learn that Stephanie and her husband and son moved into a new house just outside of London. Stephanie does not find it easy to connect with the neighbors. She does not fit into this posh community. But her son Danny fiends a friend in a boy living next door. We also get a closer look into this friendship. But the story jumps a bit too much back and forth and sometimes it is all over the place. There are so many issues and some of them would have deserved a closer look. There are also some events, like f.e. the explosion which kept me asking for what reason it was put into the story. Surely there would have been other ways to put Stephanie into the neighbor’s house. It felt a bit overdramatic.

I love the work of BP Walter. He surely can write and I enjoyed his previous complex stories. But here it is too much for my taste. There is so much crammed into this book. It is still a heartbreaking story and it kept my interest all the time. I felt for Stephanie and especially for Danny. But I did not feel satisfied at the end. I still would recommend this book to fans of domestic thrillers.

I adored The Dinner Guest so much, and found myself loving this one too! Maybe not as much, but that’s fully a preference thing, and this book is still an intense and gripping thriller you NEED to read!!
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BP Walter is certainly one that I will be keeping an eye out for their next book!!
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Thank you to Netgalley & The Publisher for the ARC

I found this book to be gripping and quite intense throughout, with interesting characters and story build up. I did find that the story jumped around a lot, and the end fell a bit flat for me - it lacked the wow factor. I did enjoy reading it, however, and I would definitely read B P Walter's other books.

Thank you NetGalley and Harper Collins UK for an ARC of this book to read and review. The Locked Attic will be published on 24/11/22.

Loved THE DINNER GUEST but this book was not a keeper for me. I don't mind multiple story lines or dual time lines but I wasn't fond of the story jumping all over the place from years ago to Now in no particular order. Stephanie made some dumb decisions, but in her despair over the loss of her family, that was mostly understandable. Of all the characters I liked the children, Jonathan, Mimi and Danny the most. Janet and Richard were despicable. Sorry I read this book but would need to read it again now that I have some idea of what is going on.

Stephanie wakes up in the hospital with no idea of what happened but a faint recollection of an explosion. We follow her as she tries to piece it all together, from her husband, Pete, son, Danny and her's move to this new neighborhood to the friendship development between Danny and one of their neighbor's son, Jonathan, to their falling out, and later, Pete and Danny's death in a car accident...
This is a psychological thriller told in multiple timelines and dual POV (Stephanie's and Danny's). I did read it in one sitting, turning the pages hungrily because I wanted to know what happened and what was in the locked attic (which is only mentioned very late in the book for the first time), but it kept on dragging, and jumping from one timeline to the other, which made it very confusing, and a lot of information is not necessary... All along, I was trying to guess the final twist, and I was expecting something big, like Verity, The Housemaid or The Last Mrs. Parrish... These books are not from this author, I know, but the story was giving these vibes... Boy was I disappointed! It fell so flat! I was like... "that's it"? Is it twisted? Yes. Is it jaw-on-the-floor, throw-the-book-across-the-room twisted? Nope. It hat a looooot of potential, but it didn't work for me. Also, towards the end, Mimi's character was super annoying (she could've induced some book throwing). I did, however, love Danny's and Jonathan's characters and friendship!
I received an advance review copy for free and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

When Stephanie picked her son up from a local boys birthday party she noticed how different he acted with his best friend Jonathan. For weeks after his mood would change and he became sullen and moody but after Stephanie suffers a devastating loss and she can no longer get the answers that she wants from her son she knows that the neighbors son knows something. Then one day then something in her neighborhood explodes and everyone is told to stay indoors but after leaving her sons room that morning she decides today is the day she’ll get answers and she won’t leave her neighbors house until she does. When she first arrives across the street her neighbor Janet looks baffled as to why she would visit but due to propriety asked her inside. She stays long enough for things to get awkward but eventually she’ll stay so long thanks good dangerous. This was such a good book about a mother in search of answers for the questions or sun wouldn’t or couldn’t answer. I felt so sorry for poor Stephanie end it made me really dislike her neighbors Janet and Richard. This really is such a great a different original plot and one that I totally and thoroughly enjoyed. I highly recommend this book if you love great mysteries and thrillers this is a good one. I received this book from NetGalley and the publisher but I am leaving this review voluntarily please forgive any mistakes as I am blind and dictate my review.

I love B P Walter's novels and was super excited to read this novel.

This was such a good read and I enjoyed reading this.

The blurb reads
"There’s something in my neighbour’s attic.
Something steeped in shadows. A secret to everyone. Seen by no one…
He stands sometimes at the window. Hidden in the corner of my eye.
I know he’s there. I know he’s watching.
Now my son is dead. My neighbour is not.
And I’m going to find out why."

The characters in this novel are really deep and I thoroughly enjoyed reading about Stephanie. She wakes up in the hospital and we then go backwards and find out what she has been through. Stephanie is a well rounded and likeable character but she has been through some really tough times. This novel can be quite sad to read at times, Stephanie has lost her husband and son and its super heart wrenching to read.

This novel will keep your attention well into the night, I found that I read this novel within a day which is quite quick for me.

Thanks to B.P Walter, NetGalley and the publishers for allowing me a copy of this novel in exchange for my review.

Stephanie wakes up in a hospital. Unsure of what happened and how she got there. What happened to her? As her memories slowly begin to make sense, she believes/suspects that her neighbors are behind her hospitalization.

When she, her husband and their son move into their new neighborhood away from London, Stephanie feels promise. But she soon begins to feel uneasy about her neighbors. Something isn't quite right. Their son, Jonathon, is nice and has becomes friends with her son, Danny. Jonathon's parents, on the other hand, are weird, uptight and pretentious.

Then something, as it usually does, happens and the boys are no longer the close friends they once were. Then there is a devastating car crash, an explosion, and a quest to find out the truth.

This was a psychological thriller which saw my attention going up and down like a child on a teeter totter. I liked it, I felt meh about it, I enjoyed it, I wasn't wowed. The characters in this book have questions, secrets and are dramatic. Stephanie goes looking for answers...

Again, I was all over the place with this book. It was a solid three stars for me. I can’t fault the writing or the pacing as both were very well done. This book does deal with various themes such as family, friendship, sexuality, secrets, and grief.

Many enjoyed this book more than I did, so please see out their reviews as well.

I really enjoyed reading this book. It was very well written, and incredibly creepy and suspenseful. I did not expect the twists and turns

BP Walter continues to give me sleepless nights. This, his fifth novel, his most chillingly compelling to date. His novels are always impossible to put down with characters so real they could just step off the page and with gripping, unpredictable plots.
Grit and sentiment combine in the relationship between a mother, her dead son, and the person who loved him. It is powerful and unbearably moving in places.
The story here, the mystery in it, intrigues from the very beginning. A superb book by a hugely talented writer.