The Couple Next Door by Shari Lapena

*There are spoilers!*

Really good book! Really awful characters! I hated almost everyone in this book except poor Cora. Everyone else was despicable. To be fair, Anne wasn't necessarily despicable, she was just very blah. She was very unhappy and angry and hurt at everything, but she never fought for what she wanted, and that annoys me. If you're unhappy and have the power to change something that's adding to that unhappiness, change it! She just let it rot and fester, and that's not cool. Anne just let things roll over her and crush her to the point where she wasn't really anything any more. While I didn't dislike her as much as the other characters, I really disliked reading about her. Maybe that's the point?

I get that technically, Marco "isn't" the bad guy in the end, but obviously he's still very much the bad guy. Sure he was "set-up," but he still agreed to kidnap his own daughter instead of talking things out with his wife, sharing things with her, and working out problems with her. No, he'd rather risk his baby daughter by making a deal with a stranger he knew for about an hour. I honestly don't understand how any person could do that. I think this too is part of the appeal of this book: someone so horrible and despicable who is unlike anything you can imagine of yourself is kind of fun to read about. When you encounter such a character, you have to step outside of your own self and try to imagine the life and perspective of someone so different from you. That's an important aspect to any good story, challenging the reader to take on a different persona in order to fully understand and enjoy a new character.

I was impressed with Anne's mother's actions in the end of the novel. I didn't think she had it in her to stand up to her husband. She seemed very weak and a push-over, but she showed me up, again, adding to the appeal because it was another twist that I didn't see coming. It's always a pleasant surprise when you think you have a character figured out, and he takes you by surprise in the end, causing you to rethink your previous profile.

As you might have guessed, one of the things I enjoyed about this book was the amount of shockers I was given. Each chapter seemed to have a new twist. Several times, I gasped out loud and had to explain to my husband why I was shocked. Because of these twists, I couldn't put the book down, making it a fun and addicting adventure. I couldn't wait to find out about the next secret.

The ending though? Whoa. I had thoughts throughout the book, like, oh man, this is the perfect set up for Cynthia's murder, but I didn't think it would actually happen, especially as the truth of Cora came out, but I suppose Anne's mental condition had to come into play at some point, and that was a great way to bring in her blackouts. It's a funny thing when an author can make something so obvious, too obvious for you to believe that's what will happen, and just as you've convinced yourself that it would be too easy, that's the path the author takes. You'd think it would be disappointing, but in reality, it makes me feel accomplished to have "known all along" that it would end that way.

All in all, it was a good read. While I didn't like any of the characters, I was very invested in the story because kidnapping is such a horrible thing, so stories about that can usually keep me in its clutches.  This was a quick read, too, which was nice over my vacation. A couple hours by the pool, and I read through this book.