Between The Lines was a slow burning thriller that kept me on the edge and wondering until almost the very end. Unfortunately, since I've been reading so many psychological thrillers, I've gotten pretty good at guessing the culprit, and I did guess it correctly in this one too, though not until very late in the book.
Chloe's story was chilling and unbelievably cruel. Losing her memory was one thing, but what was she supposed to do when everyone in her family was hell bent on not telling her the truth about her life? About who she'd been before the accident?
I loved the storyline, and the characters. I appreciated how determined Chloe was to find out the truth, even when she knew it wasn't going to something she'd like.
All in all, Between The Lies was an enjoyable thriller and I had fun reading it.

4.5 stars
Wow! This was a really great psychological suspense thriller. I was so enthralled!
The action begins right away. There's been a car accident. Chloe Daniels wakes up in the hospital badly hurt with many injuries including a brain bleed. She has no memory of the accident or her family. When she goes home, it is to her parents' home to start her physical recuperation as well as her mental healing. Her parents, her father especially, seem to be hiding particular things from her past. As Chloe works to regain her memory, she has to learn who is telling the truth and what the entire truth really is. Sometimes the truth is better left alone.
This is one of those books that has you making predictions as you read. Sometimes you are spot-on, and sometimes not. I really enjoyed this second book by Michelle Adams. I'm off to find her first book that others think is equally wonderful!

Nothing anchored me to Chloe to keep me interested in finding out what really led to her car accident. She's a black slate both to herself and the reader in this book and that didnt work for me. There needed to be something to set her apart from and above the other characters.

Thriller about a woman's loss of memory. All the characters in the book lie to her. Twists were interesting though the plot was a little slow at times.

Thanks to netgalley and the publisher for the eARC

A car accident left Chloe badly injured, and when she awakens from a coma a month later, she can't remember anything about her life or the accident. Despite her family telling her they want to help her remember her life, Chloe can't shake the feeling that she's being lied to... but why?

When I opened this up on my Kindle, I only meant to peak at the first chapter. I was already reading three other books, and the last thing I needed was to start another one. It only took me a couple of minutes to decide to put the other books on hold, and devote my full attention to this book... and here I am, less than 24 hours later, writing this review. If that's not the definition of unputdownable, I don't know what is.

Chloe was a fascinating character. One minute, she was certain she'd recalled a memory, only to find herself doubting it was real in the next. Her uncertainty about her life was a constant throughout the story, and when she made discoveries that contradicted what she'd been told, I felt the same shock and/or confusion that she felt—and some of those discoveries were whoppers!

It didn't take long for me to decide that most of the characters were completely untrustworthy. I didn't believe anything they told Chloe, and kept trying to figure out why they were lying to her. I won't say whether I was right or wrong about all of them... but I did have one in particular pegged as a manipulative liar.It wasn't much of an accomplishment, however, as I was oblivious to the biggest liar of them all. I was stunned, because I thought they were truly trying to help Chloe figure out what happened on the night of the accident.

Simply put, I thought this story was absolutely fantastic. As promised by the blurb, it kept me guessing all the way to the end. And what an ending it was! Even after I knew who did what, and why, Adams whipped out one last twist that was perhaps the most satisfying of them all. Brava!

I highly recommend Between the Lies to all readers who love a twisty psychological thriller. I hope you'll love it as much as I did.

I can't wait to see Adams comes up with next!

I received an advance reading copy of this book courtesy of St. Martin's Griffin via Netgalley.

‘In those first few moments there is nothing. No pain, no fear.’

Chloe Daniels wakes up in a hospital bed. She has no idea who she is. She has no idea how she got there. She has no idea who the strangers are. But the strangers claim to be her family, and they take her home.
Chloe slowly recovers from severe injuries which her family tell he she sustained in a car accident that she cannot remember. Her parents and her sister seem reluctant to tell Chloe much about her life. Her father, a psychiatrist, is trying to help Chloe regain her memory. Slowly, fragments of memory seem to be returning but they don’t accord with what her family have been telling her.

The police want to talk to Chloe as well: there are certain aspects of the accident that don’t make sense. Was another car involved? And if it was, who was driving?

Chloe is determined to recover her past and to find out what happened. She uncovers a cruel lie and, fearful of more lies, sets out to find out who she was. But Chloe cannot do this on her own: who can she trust to help her?

‘The more I learn about my past, the less I know myself, the less I understand what happened.’

If I write more about the plot, I’m likely to spoil the story or, at least, the suspense in the telling of it. While I worked out certain key aspects before the end, this didn’t ruin my enjoyment. We experience events from Chloe’s perspective and at least initially it is difficult to differentiate fact from false memory.
I found this an enjoyable, page turning (albeit unsettling) read. This is Ms Adams’s second novel. I’ll have to search out her first. Recommended reading for those who enjoy psychological thrillers.

Note: My thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for providing me with a free electronic copy of this book for review purposes.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

***spoiler alert***
I received an ARC of this book from the publisher in exchange for my honest review. What a nail biter! If you like psychological thrillers this book is for you. 5 stars for sure! I read this book in 2 sittings because I just had to know how it ended! This psychological thriller will sink it's teeth into you!

The story of a young woman involved in an auto accident, resulting in a TBI with residual amnesia is bad enough, then you learn her family is intentionally working to prevent her from remembering her former life. As the story unfolds you will find yourself "solving the mystery", only to turn the page and learn your theory wasn't entirely correct.

This was at times a little fantastical and you really did have to suspend disbelief for large chunks of it but, you know what? This was great fun and I was happy to go along for the ride.

Chloe Daniels wakes up in hospital surrounded by strangers. But they aren’t strangers. They are her mother, her father and her sister. She has no memory of them. She has no memory or her name. She has no memory at all!

After a near fatal car accident and serious brain bleed, Chloe is taken by her family to their home to recuperate. Her father a renowned physiatrist will try and help her regain her memory.
She feels a stranger in her own home. Her family are very vague with details when she asks about the accident and her past life and she finds it hard to warm to them or even trust them.

Her father feeds her medication as he continues his sessions with her and refuses to let her outside the house, saying she is not well enough and needs more time to recover.

As she starts to slowly get some faint memories back she realizes that her family are not being truthful about the accident and her past. What are they trying to hide and why are they lying to her?

This is told from Chloe’s perspective and this works really well as a tool for telling the mostly enjoyable story. Everything about her family home, from the house itself to her family is a little bit creepy. We struggle to figure out with her if things are really a little bit sinister or is her paranoia creating a false past.

This zipped along nicely and was one of those ones where I had to read “one more chapter”. The ending I found a little weak but that didn’t take away from my overall enjoyment of the book.
While not really in any way original it was still a very enjoyable read overall.

Many thanks to Netgalley, St Martins Press and Michelle Adams for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Between the Lies is the perfect thriller with twists and turns you won't see coming! I haven't had the chance to read the authors previous novels but if they are anything like this one you can bet I will be purchasing more in the future! This is a tense and exceptional read and I was anxiously waiting to find out all the dark secrets! Wow. I really enjoyed it!

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the eARC in exchange for an honest review!

I was looking for a good psychological thriller and got super lucky with this one. In Between the Lies, Chloe is in a car accident and wakes up weeks later with amnesia after suffering a brain bleed. She gets the feeling that her family is lying about a lot of things, and the first creep that we meet is her psychologist father.

Most of the premise is totally plausible, which helps, and there were just enough potential bad guys that I had guessed the wrong one...twice. The book definitely kept me hooked.

The other good thing is that there is (unlike in some thrillers) just enough growth and characterization that I wanted to root for Chloe and her mother as the truth started coming out.

100% recommend for fans of psychological thrillers and suspense!

I will come back and paste in the blog link when it is a few weeks out!

Chloe is in an automobile accident and ends up in a coma from a brain bleed. When she wakes up from the coma, she has no memory of her past at all. She goes from the Hospital to her parents’ home and that is where the lies start. I won’t go into the plot because of spoilers, but I will tell you that Chloe was truly victimized by almost everyone with whom she had contact. When she begins to remember bits and pieces of her past she starts searching for it and learns a lot. This was very well done and kept me reading long after I intended to stop. Thanks to Net Galley and St. Martin’s Griffin for an e-Galley for an honest review.

What would you do if you woke up and didn't know who you were?

Within the first few pages of this thriller you just know it's going to be good!

Chloe Daniels wakes up in a hospital bed having no idea how she got there, who she is or who these people calling themselves family are. Very scary.

Back in her parents home she struggles to remember what happened to her and as she snatches glimpses of her past she begins to believe her family are telling some pretty bad lies. What was she running from that night her car crashed? Even the police seem suspicious of the circumstances.

When she discovers one of the cruelest lies she has been told, she sets out to find the truth about who she was and who she can trust.

I felt so horrible for Chloe. She honestly had no one in her corner. And what a psychological thriller it was. I had no idea that ending was coming! 

Another job well done!

Netgalley/St.Martin's Griffin  March 05, 2019

Special thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for a free, electronic ARC of this novel received in exchange for an honest review.

Chloe Daniels wakes up in the hospital after an accident, with a head wound and no memory of what happened. In fact, she has no memory of anything. Returning to the care of her parents, she tries to patch together pieces of her past life with the help of her father, a psychiatrist with a speciality in hypnosis and memory recovery. Her parents and younger sister, Jess, contribute to her memory recall by telling Chloe of the life she once had- the successful career as a lawyer and her beautiful seaside home, as well as details of the tragic car accident that took her memory. However, as Chloe’s memory start to return on their own, and they conflict with what she has been told by those closer to her, she begins to wonder if she should trust her own memories, or the people who supposedly matter the most to her?

Right from the beginning of “Between the Lies”, by Michelle Adams, the story pulls you in. Immediately, as a reader, I began to make assumptions, about who could be responsible and which parts of the stories Chloe was being told, were true. Although there were parts of the story that were predictable, right from the beginning, I had to continue reading, as “Lies” very quickly developed into a story I could not put down.

All of the characters in this story play an important role. There are no behind-the-scenes, appear-as-an-arbitrary-figure-in-the-background-and-then-it-is-revealed-he-was-the-main-suspect, kind of characters. This added to the story’s “whodunit” appeal, as each character could have been just as responsible as the next.

As Chloe’s memory returns slowly, Adams allows you to experience the confusion, and the emotions associated with it. Although this is not a unique storyline, Adams’ talent is evident as the novel still manages to be entertaining and suspenseful.

The ending is extremely satisfying, tying up loose ends and leaving no questions unanswered. For novels like this, I prefer this type of ending. The “guessing game” ending does not work in “whodunit” mystery novels, and I really appreciate Adams’ ability to tie up the plot in a neat bow.

Adams has only one other novel, My Sister, and I will definitely be checking it out. For a relatively new author, Adams writes as if she’s been on the scene for years, and I am thoroughly interested in checking out her other works.

This is a book that when it ends it leaves you with a book hangover. I’ll be thinking about this book for days. There are so many twists and turns. My heart broke for Cloe. There are so many levels to this book. I couldn’t stop reading. I had to know what was next. I received an advance review copy from NetGalley for an honest review.

What a read! This book sucked me in from page 1 and didn’t let up. When Chloe wakes from a coma after a car accident, she’s in her childhood home with her family. It seems that a lot of secrets are being kept from her and things are not as they seem. What happens next is an adventure of twists and turns that keep you guessing until the end.

This is a compelling book, you cannot imagine the twists in store. While the events are dark and disturbing, the premise is all too real. What happens when your parents have your best interests at heart? At least what they believe to be your best interests. What happens if you are totally helpless and can rely only on your immediate family? This tale unwinds maybe the most frightening outcome of your inability to care for yourself. The characters are so rich you feel like you know them. Chloe is a very complex character, you may not agree with her, but you cannot ignore her spirit. A stunning psychological thriller.

Thank you to Netgalley, the author and the publisher for this ARC.

What a beautifully, poetic, Gothic thriller. It was so crisp and descriptive, I could envision the scenes and imagine the tangible fear of not remembering a thing. A tragic story that is beautifully written, a twist that is not altogether completely surprising but so well laid out that it couldn't have been more perfect. Definitely recommend this one.

The truth lies somewhere between the lies. Chloe awakens from a month long coma and remembers nothing. No name or history or how she got where she is. Some people claiming to be her family say she was in a car accident and has amnesia. Chloe goes to her parents, allegedly, house to stay while she tries to remember who she is. Her family tells her about her life, but she questions them. Are these people who they claim to be? Are they being truthful about who she is? Something just doesn't feel right. It's a story of psychological suspense full of doubt and hope. So many twists and turns from beginning to end. The characters are untrustworthy and suspicious. It's a great read full of drama. Thanks to NetGalley for an arc in exchange for an honest review.

This is one of those fun, fast paced, thrillers that kind of lacks real depth but is still fun to read so I'd actually bump it to a 3.5 rather than a 3. Chloe wakes up from a coma and remembers absolutely nothing about her former life. Literally nothing. This, in and of itself is super rare, so begin your suspension of disbelief here and take it for a train ride throughout the rest of this whole entire book and you'll enjoy yourself. Her father, the almighty tool himself, is a psychiatrist of some sort, he has something to do with rewriting of memories and is giving Chloe some questionable drugs. Her sister and mom seem to be in on (not maliciously, but through omission of truth) the withholding of details of her former life, and she finds out through flashbacks and police visits (because, ya know, life still happens,) that her husband and child are dead, and that she may (?) have had something to do with it. Buckle your seatbelt YA'LL, because (SPOILER), except not really, her husband ain't dead. In the meantime, she's running around with her father's youngish hottish colleague trying to retrace her steps and figure out if the guy and his car who sideswiped her on the night of the terrible accident was even present to begin with (the guy, not the car, keep up here, I know it's confusing), and her flashbacks are getting more confusing. But are her flashbacks even to be trusted, remember, her dad can literally rewrite memories?

All in all, I found this book to be a bit of a back and forth switcheroo confusey mess sometimes, but overall it was a fun thriller and if you're willing to suspend all disbelief and just go along for the ride, it's a fun whodunit with a little bit of untrustworthy narrator thrown in for good measure.

**4 Stars**

Michelle Adams' Between the Lies starts with bang: a woman - Chloe - awakes from a coma, completely unaware of who she is, what has happened to her, and, most importantly, who she can trust. She knows little about her past - just that she was in a serious car accident that took the life of her son, a car accident still under investigation by the police. 

Her father, a psychiatrist studying memory, brings her home to their historic mansion, which is situated on sprawling acreage in the countryside. She is monitored closely by her father, her sister, and her mother, all of whom express concern and worry about her condition.

But something doesn't feel right, and Chloe must regain her health to figure it out.

Soon, Chloe begins to suspect her family are not telling the truth about her past. They are keeping secrets from her and she must find a way off of their fenced-in property to discover who she was and what has happened to her. She also believes her father may be using her as part of a medical experiment, deliberately withholding memories from her to help her avoid dealing with the trauma of what happened.

I don't want to say too much more about the plot in fear of revealing of it. I will say that Adams is a master at crafting characters with whom you instantly relate, people who you want to befriend even if they are damaged or made terrible albeit all so human choices. Chloe felt like a real, living, breathing human being, fully fleshed out to me as a reader. I look forward to reading more of Adams' books in the future. Thank you to Adams, NetGalley, and St. Martin's Press for the advanced reader copy of Between the Lies!