I loved Maley’s writing and her ability create characters that you either empathise with or despise (sometimes both at once in the case of the main character.) Suzy is a journalist and single mum of one who wrote an expose about a wellness blogger who ended up suiciding. Suzy is also trying to get over the demise of her marriage by sleeping with people she shouldn’t and worrying about providing a future for her daughter. The last thing she expected was to be asked by the mother of the wellness blogger to write the real truth about her daughter. This leads to more chaos and heartbreak for Suzy. This was a great story, well written and I loved it.

This was such an enjoyable take on the life of a journalist who publishes a story based on the information she gathered, but finding out later that there was a deeper well of information that she didn’t have access to. But is she to blame for the outcome of her reporting. The combination of single life, mummyhood, balancing a career in a cuthroat world and being a grown up.

Thank you for the opportunity to read this one.

We can never own our own image, it belongs to the world, just as the things that happen to us don’t really belong to us either.

Okay wow! Thank you to HarperCollins Publishers Australia for my first 5 🌟 NetGalley read. All opinions are my own and I have given my honest feedback for this copy of the book.

Jacqueline Maley poetically describes the Sydney landscape beautifully. You can imagine walking the Jacaranda-laced, harbor-facing streets with our main character Suzy. Suzy is the mother to rambunctious Maddy and busy juggling her motherhood with a full-time career as an award-winning, expose journalist. One morning she discovers that the previous focus of her written piece, Tracey has died and this foreshadows a series of events.

Maley engineers likable characters and builds realistic relationships that portray the Australian way of being. With the right amount of twists and turns that allow the reader to sink into Suzy’s story. I cried at the end of the book (please note, I am not usually a crier unless it was THAT episode from Packed to the Rafters, if you know, you know). I rarely feel an attachment to characters and particularly the development of children in books, however, Maley wrote Maddy’s character authentically.

There are many trigger warnings that are needed to be given to the readers of this book including suicide, domestic violence, and alcoholism. In my opinion, Maley encounters these issues with respect.

I dare say with my generation (the cusp between Gen Y and Z), there is an online trend with cancel culture. This is an interesting look from the perspective of someone who delivers the cancellation and who ultimately receives it in return.

Please take the time to read this book by this wonderful Australian author. I look forward to Maley’s future works.

With thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a digital arc of this book, all opinions expressed here are my own.

The Truth About Her by Jacqueline Maley is the author’s first novel. It is beautifully descriptive with well developed characters.

This is a story about life and death. This is a story about mothers. A working single mother. A mother with a grown up daughter and a granddaughter. A mother with a dead daughter. The setting is summer in Australia written in a way you can feel the heat and humidity.

While this story was well written it was unfortunately not for me. I found the pace slow and felt like nothing much really happened. It was simply a story about life. A three star read for me.

I found The Truth About Her by Jacqueline Marley to be a marvellous debut novel. Through the main character, Suzy Hamilton, a single mother and journalist, the story explores ‘motherhood’ and the complexities that entails as well as the guilt of not being a full time mother while having to earn an income to support herself and her daughter Maddy. The story is told from Suzy’s view and her inner thoughts and feelings are laid bare as she struggles with her life, her friends, her family, her colleagues and her relationships with men.
This is a sensitive and honest look at relationships and how perspectives are not necessarily wrong but different. Suzy’s journey is difficult and we are taken along with her on this journey.
I really enjoyed reading this novel and it certainly gave a lot of food for thought.
Recommended read.

Thank you to Netgalley and HarperCollins Publishers Australia for a copy to read and review.

The narrator of this book, Suze Hamilton is a journalist. A piece she wrote that exposed a popular “wellness” blogger as a fraud has lead to that young woman taking her life. Social media goes crazy and while everyone she knows tells her it’s not her fault, Suzy of course feels guilty. Then objects belonging to the girl are sent to her... seems like the beginning of a thriller but that’s not what this book is at all. I found it extremely readable although i don’t have much in common with the main characters it still seemed very relevant to modern life. Single motherhood, in fact all types of motherhood are explored. Suze’s young daughter Maddy is a delight. Suze makes extremely poor decisions when it comes to sex and relationships. There’s other topics covered , alcoholism, ageing and death, art, guilt, forgiveness and atonement.
Definitely an entertaining read.

Suzy is a single mother and journalist, and is told one morning that the subject of one of her articles, a "wellness blogger", has killed herself. Suzy starts receiving odd packages in the mail of some of Tracey's belongings, and then Tracey's mother tracks her down. That description sounds a bit thriller-like, but that's not what this book is. It's an excellent novel, about the way we tell stories about other people, about grief, about motherhood, filed with beautifully realised characters. Tracey's mother is magnificent in her complicated grief, and Suzy is wonderful, making you fondly wince as she makes another reckless decision. I couldn't put it down.

The premise of The Truth About Her is what drew me in, and it would have kept me captivated had the novel not been so long. While I’m all for a character-driven plot, this one in particular dragged past the point where I could stay interested.

I appreciated the contrast between the mother who had lost her daughter and the mother raising a young girl. I liked the depth of the characters, and how intricately the story was woven with minute details that helped to build the story. There is no doubt that the author has a talent for constructing detail.

The issue for me was the way that the storyline didn’t progress quickly enough. The characters seemed to be going around in circles without experiencing growth and the story could have been told in half the number of pages.

I’d recommend this book to people who enjoy character-driven plots and depth of detail. To those who don’t: proceed with caution (unless you have hours to spare!).

A compelling read about a journalist and the inherent fallout from a story she publishes. Through this, and some other bad decisions, she is at a crossroad in her life and must come to grips with some difficult issues. I like the perspective of the book from a journalists point of view, we can assume which was influenced by an incident which appeared in the newspapers some years ago.