Following the death of her brother, Elizabeth is consumed by grief and is on a quest for revenge.

The Confession is a gripping rollercoaster of suspense and psychological twists that kept me on the edge of my seat from start to finish. Despite the dark nature of the book, the FMC was quirky and hilarious, and that lightened some otherwise heavy scenes.

Elizabeth is a compelling and complex character whose life takes a dark turn when an accidental murder occurs. Bodies are piling up; the lies get more elaborate, and it leaves the reader wondering whether Elizabeth is revealing more than she knows.

The pacing of the novel is expertly done, with each chapter revealing new layers of the mystery, making it nearly impossible to put the book down. The author skillfully plays with the reader's expectations, keeping them guessing until the very end.

The twist at the end unfolded quite beautifully!

Thanks to Netgalley, the publisher, and the author for my free copy of the book.

Thank you Netgally and Charlotte Bigland for letting me read this ARC of The confession.

This is the first book Ive read?listened to by Charlotte and I wasn't disappointed. The narrative is told in first person which really gave the feel of being right inside Ella/Elizabeth's head. The narrator, Freya Parker kept a great pace throughout the book. I have heard her narrate a few other books from audible and recognised her immediately.

The whole narrative of the story has a great medium pace. Some slow bits but I feel are great to build the tension up with the twists and turns as Ella's mental health deteriorates. It's also interesting to see Ella dehumanise the people around her. I did find it a little disorienting at first but it really does show how low Ella was.

On the whole, a great book!

4.5 stars if half stars were allowed.

This is a great book to contemplate in relation to the question of whether characters have to be likeable for us to truly love a story. Like several other recent novels, this one explores the developing psychopathy of the main character, Elizabeth / Ella and despite her humour in places, she is not someone with whom I could say I have been glad to spend time.

It really *does* feel like being inside her head, since the whole narrative is in the first person, which allows the author to explore Elizabeth’s puzzlement when others confess to crimes she has confessed to us she has committed. It also gives an opportunity to convey the faulty logic she develops as her mental health deteriorates.

Apart from her two brothers, Elizabeth doesn’t have access to empathy for the people she describes. Often they are reduced to descriptors, their names stripped away: Step Dad, Step Nan, Friend Number 1, Friend Number 2, The Ex, The Fake Boyfriend … you get the idea.

It seems logical that someone with psychopathy would dehumanise their targets, but it means that as well as being hard for readers to relate to Elizabeth, we don’t have much of a choice of other characters to whom we can become attached - in dehumanising them in her own head our narrator has dehumanised them for us as readers.

It’s extremely clever, and allows for clever twists. But I suspect the distance is also why I can’t wholeheartedly call this a five-star read. I’m really glad I read it, and grateful to NetGalley and the publisher for the AudioARC which I downloaded. But I can’t fall in love with it.

On the other hand, I’m more than a little in love with Charlotte Bigland’s writing and am off to download her earlier novel on Audible.

Three Word Review: clever but cold.

What an amazing book, a real slow burner, building up to an eventful climax that really torments. Troubling in some ways and carefully composed in others, a thoroughly entertaining and absorbing read. The audio book narrator is awesome!

Fascinating, a bit crazy, unique and intriguing!

It’s a thriller and lots of people die, but I also found myself laughing out loud at some points!

Elle wants revenge for the death of her little brother, that’s all, but things aren’t going to plan for her. It’s fine though, as someone else has confessed to the accidental murder she committed and has all the details needed to convince the police they have the killer. Who would do that and why?

It did get a little bit slow in parts, but the ending was stunning and more than made up for the lag.

Excellent narration from Freya Parker.

4 ⭐️ Thanks to Netgalley, Charlotte Bigland and Bonnier for an ARC in return for an honest review.

Narrated by Freya Parker ⭐⭐⭐
by Charlotte Bigland ⭐

**please note due to low rating I will not be leaving a public review for this book as I have not paid for it.**

I'm really sorry but I have nothing positive to say about this story. I disliked the narrator, pace of the book, Ella's non stop babbling, and the fact barely anyone had actual names.

Would I recommend this book? - No

Would I purchased this book for a friend or myself? - No

This was a quick read and had a few unexpected twists which was good, I did struggle with bits of it and found a lot to be a bit far fetched and struggled to keep up with the characters that didn’t have names.
I listened to this on audio and the narrator was really good.

The storyline was absolutely crackers and so unbelievable. Even the MC wondered what was going off! I did wonder what I was reading many times. Much like a car crash, I couldn’t stop reading. Possibly to see how much more weirder the storyline could go.

I normally love audiobooks, but I don't like it when the accents are wrong. It just didn't sound like the accent where it was set and totally spoilt it for me. I had to switch to the ebook after a couple of chapters. Which was totally out of character for me.

The story line is brilliant no boring parts and kept me guessing to the end. Great author Can't wait for the next one!⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This book was not at all what I was expecting, and wonderfully entertaining for a psychological thriller. I loved the main character of Elizabeth, and listening to her thoughts as she unravelled what actually happened to her brother was a great way of keeping engaged with her story.

I took a little while to get used to the northern accent of the narrator, but given that this was the setting of the novel it worked really well.

I found the audiobook harder to get into than the e book. The narrator made it hard for me to keep going as I couldn't always follow what they were saying.

This book took me a while to get into but I am glad I persevered. I began to enjoy this off the wall tale of revenge and murder. It’s a real roller coaster with a great ending. Give it a chance. You will be glad you did

Middlesbrough was the star of this implausible tale which kept me reading when I was at the point of giving up. As was the narrator who infused feeling and distinct accents into a plot that was more confused than suspenseful.
An odd book, as on the face of it, it had a great premise but that was exaggerated to the point it became unbelievable. A pity. My thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for a copy of this audio ARC.

⭐️⭐️
The Confession by Charlotte Bigland, an audiobook narrated by Freya Parker is a psychological thriller and there are some twists but I found it a little bit of a struggle to listen and lost interest in it at the start. I was hoping that it would pick up and get better but as further it went less I cared. I finished just to find out what the hell was going on and yes, I didn't expect the twist, but even a twist could not save this experience for me.
It was confusing and I truly believe that one of my problems was - to connect with the narrator. I struggle with her accent and I hoped that it would grow on me but it didn't :( Somehow the narrator didn't connect with the book, at least for me. I do appreciate all the hard work but this time it didn't work for me.
And the plot was sort of over the top, ridiculous, and out of place. In some way, it didn't make any sense for most of the book!
I am so sorry for the low rating and my confusion, I am easy but I must stay honest and the truth is that If I hadn’t been listening to this as an ARC I would have given up around 30%-40%.
Please, do not give up on this book just because I didn't like it, we all are different so please, make up your mind and join others who enjoyed this book!

Thank you NetGalley and Bonnier UK Audio for this copy. I am hoping other readers will love this book!

I enjoyed this book, it was vastly different to what I expected. It started with a young woman and her grief for her recently deceased brother, and I thought it was going to be a sad book about his death. I was wrong! Much better than that. It was a gripping run of her psychopathy and her reckless reign of revenge. Good narration, five stars.

I kept trying hard with this title - but the narration was just monotonous. What should have been highly descriptive passages just fell flat. I found myself drifting off many times whilst listening which is unusual for me. I really wanted to like this title, but the narration ruined it for me I’m afraid.

I had a really hard time understanding everything this narrator was saying. I think I got the jist of it though. This description sounded really good, but the book fell flat to me. It may have been the narrator, but it just didn't grab me at all. Really long for a book that isn't cutting it. Interesting twist at the end though.