(I received a free copy of this book from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.)

Everyone has an idea of what their perfect life is. For Agatha, it's Meghan Shaughnessy's.
These two women from vastly different backgrounds have one thing in common - a dangerous secret that could destroy everything they hold dear.
Both will risk everything to hide the truth, but their worlds are about to collide in a shocking act that cannot be undone.

Not the most original of ideas but, in the hands of Michael Robotham, you are guaranteed a brilliant read...

Told from the POV of both Agatha and Meghan, we learn about the lives. Meghan and her husband, Jack, seem to have the perfect lives. They have two children with another on the way. Agatha, on the other hand, is pregnant and her boyfriend, away with the Royal Navy, doesn't seem too interested in the fact that she is pregnant. Agatha watches Meg, wanting to know her. Why is she so keen? What secrets is she carrying...?

From the outset, I just wanted to know about these two women. I admit I was far more interested in Agatha's story - where she had come from, what was happening in her life now - than I was about Meghan. I don't know - sometimes I feel like I know that the "perfect" couple are gonna have some issues but the poorer, harder-done-by characters always seems to have the "twist" in these stories, so I was keen on seeing how that would play out.

As the story unfolds, and the secrets and lies keep unfolding, we are treated to one of the best psychological thrillers I have read for a while. But the best part of it is that it sneaks up on you - not necessarily a slow-burner, but I got so invested into the lives of the two women, that the twists and turns took me by surprise. And I like that in a novel.

So, why not 5-stars? I think it was a bit heavy in baby-details which slowed it a little for me and, as I said previously, it wasn't exactly new territory in "domestic thrillers", if that is the term...

Having said that, this is a cracker of a novel and one worth every minute (and dollar) you invest in it.


Paul
ARH

This book kept me up all night reading it. The twists and turns keep you guessing. It is a perfect psychological thriller.

Book blurb...
The life she wanted wasn't hers . . . The compelling new psychological thriller that will break your heart into tiny pieces, from world-renowned author Michael Robotham.
Everyone has an idea of what their perfect life is. For Agatha, it's Meghan Shaughnessy's.
These two women from vastly different backgrounds have one thing in common - a dangerous secret that could destroy everything they hold dear.
Both will risk everything to hide the truth, but their worlds are about to collide in a shocking act that cannot be undone.

My thoughts…
Michael Robotham has written a compelling psychological thriller that will have you reading into the small hours of the morning. This story was full of tension and I devoured it, desperate to know where it was going.
I loved the two points of view and I was drawn into each character's life. Both Agatha and Meghan have secrets and for Meghan it’s a question of what direction her life will take after Agatha enters the picture.
An intriguing plot that weaves the lives of these two women together and has you wondering if good or evil will prevail.
The Secrets She Keeps is highly recommended but is devastatingly close to real life.

The Secrets She Keeps is a standalone psychological thriller.
Meg is married to Jack and has two small children. Agatha is unmarried and a grocery store clerk. Both ladies are pregnant and the story is told in 2 narrators Meghan and Agatha.
Both narrators had major secrets
I would recommend this novel to anyone who is looking for a captivating and compelling mystery/suspense I have read all this Authors books and loved all of them....

Thanks to Netgalley the Author and Publisher for a chance to read this book.

Agatha and Meghan become friends when they discover they are both pregnant and due to give birth within days of each other. Agatha is a troubled person with a past that continues to influence her present. Meghan appears to have it all with two gorgeous children already and a loving husband but she has a big secret. The story is told alternately by Agatha and Meghan which allows the reader to get a sense of each individual as well as weaving the plot together. Based on true events this is quite a creepy tale. I would have rated it higher except for three issues that Robotham raises which shows he hasn't done his homework. Firstly he states that suicide is the ultimate act of selfishness. Anyone who works in the area of mental health would dispute this and it shows a complete lack of understanding of the complex motivations involved in this area. Secondly, he describes DNA testing as you would see in an episode of a TV drama and having done two of these recently I can assure readers it's not like that. And lastly, he seems to think that love is all you need for a non-biological child. While it's certainly the most important ingredient, genetic inheritances can make for a very complex situation in which a loving home is not enough. These glib cliches that Robotham uses for these issues really irritated me thus my rating of 3 stars.

If I had been given this book with no authors name attached, I never would have picked it was by Michael Robotham. Told from the pov of 2 different females and told very well I might add, I would have thought the writer was a woman.
Meg is pregnant with her third "unplanned" child. She meets Agatha at the grocery store where Agatha works. She is also pregnant and due the same time as Meg. What Meg doesn't know is that Agatha is fixated with her, has been spying on her at home and following her to her Mummy mornings and yoga classes, because Agatha isn't really pregnant and she plans on taking Megs baby. Meg is everything Agatha wants to be and wants to have in life, but what she doesn't see is Megs own secrets.
Wonderfully drawn characters, a real page turner, lots of twists and I, for one, felt a lot of apathy for Agatha whose outcome in all of this looks grim.

Two women pregnant and expecting about the same time. But no ones life is the same from behind closed doors. One works at the local supermarket where she sees the other having lunches with the girls. A well written book that kept me turning pages furiously! I love this author and this book did not disappoint!

With the saturation of psychological/domestic noir thrillers in recent years, I am very selective in which ones I choose to read. Most are average, some terrible, and some fantastic. This is definitely one of the fantastic ones. This was everything I was wanting when I read The Girl On The Train, but never got. This is the first Michael Robotham novel that I have read, and I am very keen to read more! He definitely knows his characters inside and out, and understands the psychology behind people's motivations. he had me empathising with both the 'good' characters and the 'bad' characters. Excellent book that I would highly recommend!

Two pregnant women are counting down the days until their babies are born. They may be of similar age, but their lives could not be more different. Meghan, already a mother of two small children, seems to have it all: a successful husband, a big house, a comfortable life as stay-at-home mum and regular latte’ dates with her equally privileged friends. This pregnancy is their “oops” baby, the one they never planned on having. Then there is Agatha, who has a lowly paid job in a supermarket, and whose childhood trauma and failed marriage are still overshadowing her joy of finally becoming a mother. This pregnancy is her salvation, the answer to all her prayers, the baby she has longed for forever and the one she never thought she would be able to have. When these two women’s worlds collide, their lives will change in ways neither of them could have predicted ...

I first discovered Michael Robotham through his Joe O’Loughlin series, and he soon made his way onto my favourite author’s list. I have since learned to look out for new books by the author, knowing that they would guarantee a cracking good read! I admit I did a happy dance around the house when I heard that I had been granted an ARC of his latest book, The Secrets She Keeps.

I am happy to say that The Secrets She Keeps is every bit as good as all the other books by the author. Before reading it, I may have thought that featuring two pregnant woman protagonists is a strange choice for a male author, but I need not have worried, because Robotham always knows how to get into the hearts and heads of his characters and reveal their deepest, darkest thoughts and feelings. When your heart aches even for the “bad guy” in the story, you know the author has done a great job in forging a connection between his characters and the reader. It truly is a rare art to be able to make the reader empathise with each and every character of the story, which is the one thing I loved most about this wonderful read. Now there is a REAL psychological thriller – character driven, disturbing and intense. Told in alternating viewpoints by Meghan and Agatha, the story unfolds in all its creepy, chilling and nail-biting glory, laying both of these women’s souls bare for everyone to see.

This may be a very brief review, as I do not want to give anything away about the story, or the characters. The Secrets She Keeps is one book you should go into blindly, let the story highjack your heart and your brain and take you on its journey. Do not despair if you think you have figured out the “secret” early on, because this is not what drives this book – it’s about what follows, how it ends, and how it gets there. And what a journey it was! I could not put the book down until I had reached its inevitable finale. Emerging somewhat stunned and bleary-eyed from a late night read-a-thon I know I will have a massive book hangover today!

The Secrets She Keeps is a tense, chilling and disturbing psychological thriller about secrets, obsession and the longing for the “perfect life” from a master of the genre. Very highly recommended!

I am an unabashed Michael Robotham fan. There are no absolutes in his novels, and maybe that's why I like them so much - there is a clear right and wrong, but the circumstances and personalities that give each work a dilemma to wrestle with have their own shades of gray, and chains of action and reaction that lead to catastrophe. No one is perfect. The story unfolds from two viewpoints, from two erstwhile pregnant mums: Meghan, a yummy mummy expecting her third child who writes a popular parenting blog and seems to have it all, and Agatha, a woman who does it tough as a mini-mart employee and scrapes a living on her own as she prepares to welcome her baby.

The novel is in two parts - the first unfolds the life stories of these two women to the point of the arrival of their babies. Not all is as it at first seems - Meg gradually reveals her uncertainties and discontentedness with her situation, and her own infidelities and mistakes that have brought her to the life she now lives. And Agatha gradually fills in details of her own life as well, unsettling and unlovely as it is, full of lies, deceit and betrayal. Their lives eventually intersect, for a short season, as they await the arrival of their children, at the supermarket, and again at a yoga class. The second half of the novel is the post natal unravelling, of a preposterous plan and a vulnerable marriage. Through this half we meet a new psychologist - not Joe O'Loughlin, with whom Robotham fans have agonised and struggled through so many investigations and relationship issues, but Cyrus, a profession with issues of his own, but who helps the police prepare a profile of a baby-snatcher, and solve the careful disappearance of a surprise baby, and then attempt to repair the damage of a damaged personality after the resolution.

It is a really well crafted story, and while it is not difficult to pick the direction it will take, it is intriguing to follow the clues and watch it unfold. The crime is not really the centre of the story in a way : the story is the unpicking of personalities and social constructs, of how damaged people can become as a result of the actions of others. Of how much is hidden behind individual personas. Of responsibility. Of faith. A tremendous exploration of social issues and the drives that make us who we are, as much as the horror of the truths that result in the tale's central crime.

The Secrets She Keeps is a departure from the traditional psychological crime novels Michael Robotham is better known for (the Joseph O’Loughlin series). There’s no real investigative angle into a crime as such – this book is all about the characters (not to say his other books aren’t by the way but there seems to be a considerable effort here to make the main characters shine); two in particular; Meg, a soon to be mother of three expecting her ‘oops baby’ and Agatha, a 30-something single who works at a supermarket.

Meg and Agatha are from different walks of life, seemingly worlds apart; Meg is well-off, has a happy family with all the trimmings, Agatha is lonesome and just making ends meet. While the distance between the two is easily distinguishable, there's a layer of grime beneath the glossy veneer which inevitably brings the two women together.

The pacing is deliberately slow, steadily drip feeding the reader subtle and at times not so subtle hints that something isn't quite right in the Meg and Agatha dynamic, before too long there's a twist or two and that's when things really start to get interesting.

The Secrets She Keeps is a great read that that me hooked all the way through. By the end of the book I really felt like I knew these characters and felt for their respective situations. Michael Robotham also does a fantastic job at writing from the female perspective - that mother-child bond is omnipresent throughout the novel and highlighted by some terrific writing.

My rating: 5 / 5 stars - I can't recommend this book enough.