The story begins with the disappearance of 3 year old, Millie. Leslie receives a telephone call when she is out shopping from her stepdaughter, Shelby to say that Millie is gone. Leslie rushes home from her shopping excursion to find that Millie is gone without a trace. What emerges, is the realization that almost everyone is hiding something. There are three points of view coming through in this story, Leslie, Shelby, and Ruth’s. There are so many nuances to a blended family that are explored in this story. As the truth begins to come out, will it be in enough time to save the life of 3 year old Millie? This book was difficult to put down. It exemplified all of the necessary elements of a psychological thriller: unexpected plot twists, bad guy, and page turning tension. I would highly recommend this book and this author to anyone looking for an excellent read. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the advance review copy in exchange for my honest review.

Another fast paced, page turning read full of suspense to keep the reader guessing by author Nicole Trope!

After reading The Family Across the Street by this author, I was keen to read more of her and I am not left disappointed!

The Stepchild is a psychological thriller based on every parent’s nightmare, a missing child. Told in multiple POV’S with characters who have secrets and come across untrustworthy. It will draw you in and hold your attention!

No parent ever wants to hear their child has gone missing and Leslie was no different when she is told her three year old daughter Millie is missing. Leslie went out to the supermarket and left Millie with her twelve year old stepdaughter, Shelby. Returning home after being longer than she had said she would be, Millie is gone and Shelby insists she only left for a second to go upstairs to the bathroom.

But Millie is keeping secrets! Does she know more than she is letting on? Leslie has her own secrets too... Why was she at the supermarket for double the time she said she would be?

As the truth unfolds, will it be too late to find Millie and the biggest question... Will she still be alive?

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Leslie leaves her little girl with Shelby, her sister, hoping to get some errands done. She is gone longer than she expert be and when she returns home, her baby girl is missing. What happens from this point in the book can only be described as heartbreaking. The secret get out and we discover that many people have suffered at the hands of this terrible man. Then things get worse as a mother betrays her only child. Someone, unknown to the others, appears and refuses to let another victim be made. This book was excellent. I cannot wait to read this author’s other books. 5/5⭐️

Whilst Randall plays golf, Leslie goes to do some shopping leaving her twelve year old step-child, Shelby, babysitting three year old Millie. She is longer that she says she will be & as she arrives home a terror stricken Shelby tells her Millie is missing. Leslie is horrified & immediately calls her husband home from his golf & the police. Shelby is very upset & Leslie suspects that there is something she is hiding but before anyone can talk to her Bianca, her mother, sweeps in & demands that her daughter be left alone.

The story is told from three perspectives. Leslie, Shelby & Ruth. Ruth is somewhat of a recluse, obsessively hoarding & piling items to calm herself & it will be a long time before the reader realises where she fits in! If you have read any of Nicole Trope's books before you will know how good she is at leading you up blind alleys & makes you suspect you know the answers only to have you realise you haven't!! The characters were interesting. Bianca was a nightmare & although initially I thought the apple hadn't fallen far from the tree with Shelby I did change my impressions of her. This was a great read. Thanks to Netgalley & the publisher for letting me read & review this book.

This book got me from the very start, not a slow burner at all. A brilliant fast paced page turner. Fantastic style of writing told from different perspectives. Highly recommend

Leslie get's a call from her step Daughter Shelby.
Leslie's 3 year old Daughter Millie is missing. She
disappeared from home while Shelby is babysitting .
This story is told from several POV and the chapters are short. I love this style of writing as it keeps me turning the pages and before you know it you have finished the book.
Nicole Trope weaves a great story in and around the characters who are believable and relatable. As the story unfolds you slowly begin to learn how all the characters are entwined.
This book draws you in from the first page and takes you on a wild guessing game until the end when you finally find out what happened.

Thank you to Netgalley, Bookouture and the author for an advanced copy of this book for an honest
review.

My thoughts: Wow, I just finished this book and I can’t even process everything. But, like, in a good way. This book had me hooked right away and everyone seemed to know more than they were saying and every time you think you’re going to find out what happened, you just get a little bit more to the story which brings the suspense level to an all time high. This book had me in all the feels and I absolutely loved how the story unraveled. Plus, I don’t think you’ll be able to guess any of the plot twists, I know I wasn’t able to!

Nicole Trope has written such a knockout! Told from the points of view of three female characters, it’s fast paced and kept me on the edge of my seat up until the exciting end.

#nicoletropeauthor is now a must-read author for me. Be right back as I add all of her books to my TBR list!!!

A superb story of a mother’s plight to find her missing child, in the face of lies she is discovering about the members of her picture-perfect family.

This was a fast-paced, page turner right from the start which kept me guessing all the way through. This is my second book by the author and whilst I didn't enjoy it quite as much as the last one it is still absolutely worth a read.

Parts of the book felt a bit predictable and some parts reminded me too much of the previous book by the author that I also read.

I enjoyed the different perspectives and really empathised with the characters of Shelby and Ruth; also Leslie living every mother's worst nightmare but did felt her a bit selfish and self-centred at times.

At the time of the big reveal, I will say the way it was written had me really confused for the best part of five minutes and I had to keep flicking back and forth trying to work out what was going on; once I got it though it was good. I really enjoyed all the epilogues and how the story all tied up.

Definitely worth a read and if I hadn't read the previous book by the author I may have marked it higher.

*Thanks to NetGalley, Bookouture and Nicole Trope for the copy of this book. All views are my own.*

This book had me totally gripped from start to finish.

Leslie goes to the supermarket, leaving her stepdaughter minding her three year old daughter, but she has gone missing. Right from the start, it’s clear that almost everyone is keeping a secret and it’s very hard to know who to trust. Even Leslie is hiding something, and I was really unsure about Shelby, who in spite of her age, is clearly also keeping secrets.

This tightly plotted, atmospheric novel had me completely held under its spell from the first page to the last. There’s a very impactful prologue and it had me worried for Millie’s safety, and really builds the sense of urgency to find her.

The book is told from several points of view and it’s not clear at first what role everyone will play in Millie’s disappearance. There are many twists and turns along the way until it all begins to come together, and I thought the ending was particularly fitting.

A book to totally devour, this one will have you reading late into the night. Really superb.

Wow wow wow, this was a can’t put it down kind of read. Terrifying from page one. No one is who they seem to be and the plot winds more than a desolate mountain road. Full of gripping suspense that doesn’t ease up for a second until you hit that last page. Wonderful characters, an amazing plot, and a Jaw dropping finale.
Absolutely amazing .

Another great read by Nicole Trope! I was hooked right from the beginning and it just didn't let go, and all the characters were believable.
I highly recommend this book.
Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book

This a definite page turner and I'm already recommending to family and friends. Families are not all they same and when things seem to be going perfectly it quickly changes course and there's a missing child. The step child has you guessing from beginning to end with little twists to throw you off from time to time. Cracking read

TRIGGER WARNING: child abuse
Three year old Millie goes missing. Her mother Leslie was out shopping and Millie had been left in the care of her 12 year old half sister Shelby. Has Millie run away or been abducted...?
The Stepchild is a domestic drama and psychological thriller set in Australia.
OMG I could not put this down! A child going missing is every parent's worst nightmare and we are thrown straight into the action as Leslie arrives home to find Millie missing. Shelby is frantic but the fracture within the family is deep and compounded by secrets and lies.
The book is written from 3 third person viewpoints: Leslie, Shelby and Ruth. Leslie is Millie's mum who is married to Shelby's dad Randall. Shelby's mum has also remarried but the family struggles to stay amicable. Ruth is an outsider but she gradually reveals her tragic story which the author cleverly dripfeeds us so we eagerly await the connection.
The pacing of the plot as well as the regularity of the 3 perspectives worked really well to engage me with events and characters. The emotion of the plot is so well described and the tension is maintained throughout the whole book. I had suspicions about how the plot would twist and turn but loved how the author delivered the exploration of the characters and their choices.
The Stepchild was a totally gripping novel and I loved it!

I found this to be a great psychological thriller, pacey and very well written, with some very interesting and well thought out twists, it pulled me in from the first page and I didn't want to put it down,
I found the characters intriguing, not your run of the mill thriller characters at all! several are damaged by their pasts and it is harrowing and moving to see how they are effected by their horrible experiences.
I loved the strength that both Shelby and Leslie managed to find from somewhere and also how their relationship develops, I found Ruths' character arc the most interesting and I had my heart in my mouth right up to the last page of the epilogue!
Great read, I would love to read more from this excellent author.

This was my second book by Nicole Trope and once again I wasn’t disappointed.

Leslie and Randall have a blended family, they have 12-year-old Shelby who Randall shares with his ex-wife Bianca, and they also have a little girl of their own, Millie, who is 3. Shelby hasn’t seemed herself for a few months, but Leslie puts this down to Shelby soon entering the teenage years and also, it’s difficult having two sets of parents and two homes to contend with, despite this Leslie tries her best to be a good stepmother to Shelby. One afternoon Leslie leaves Shelby to babysit Millie while she pops to the shops however whilst there, she gets a panicked call from Shelby, Millie has disappeared, and Shelby can’t find her. Suddenly the family is in the midst of a media storm as the police and the media begin looking for Millie. Will they find out what has happened to Millie as the family seems to have so many secrets? And how is Ruth, the strange lady who loves to compulsively hoard everyday items, connected to the story? You’ll have to read this book to find out.

I really enjoyed this book, and I really thought it was so cleverly written. The whole story spanned only roughly 24 hours and I have never read a book in which only one day is covered but I very much enjoyed it. I don’t want to spoil anything, but I will say that the beginning of chapter 46 made me cry…. and this is a very rare occurrence for me (I can only think of one other book that has achieved this) so kudos to the author. I also absolutely loved the epilogue because we heard from all the main characters, and I felt this made the ending very neat.

This story definitely took me on an emotional roller-coaster, but I really enjoyed every second of it. I would highly recommend it to any fans of psychological thrillers, and I can’t wait to read more of Nicole Trope’s books.

Thank you to Netgalley, Nicole Trope and Bookouture for my advanced reading copy. Out now.

When three-year-old Millie Everleigh goes missing, everybody seems to be keeping secrets. Who is to blame? Her 12-year-old stepsister who was left in charge but is hiding what she knows? Her mother who was out much later than planned for a reason she won’t admit? The father who refuses to believe his daughter could be at fault?

This quick read kept me turning pages to see what secrets each person was keeping. Shorter chapters made this an easy-to-read binge reading that snapped me out of a month-long reading slump. The twists that were revealed over halfway through the story truly shocked me. It’s been a long time since I’ve been truly tricked into believing something that the author is trying to get you to think in order to make the twist more surprising. There was only a few parts that were a little underwhelming to me but otherwise I was obsessed from beginning to end. I appreciated the longer epilogue that allowed each character to wrap up their roles in the book.

Nicole Trope is beginning to become a favorite author of mine!

Wow! This book was engaging from cover to cover! The pacing, the characters, the story...all great! Although we have seen tropes like this, the author was very realistic in her portrayals. She also effortlessly weaved in social commentary about #metoo without being preachy. I really enjoyed this one and plan to read more of her books.

Emotional, thrilling and twists and turns. I enjoyed this latest Nicole Trope book and definitely recommend it. Thanks to NetGalley for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.