Solid popcorn read--some good twists, but graded down because there were some threads that went nowhere and I don't like unresolved things.

Lillian is an obituary writer married to Mike, they have a teenage son Jacob. Lillian finds some evidence that maybe Mike is having an affair. She meets David in a coffee shop and decides to do some flirting herself, which turns into more. Then some shocking events occur--we know from the beginning that there is a death but not who or why --and the reader is left to wonder who is responsible. The book is told mostly from Lillian and Mike's alternating points of view with a few random others scattered throughout.

I didn't care for really any of the characters (maybe the cemetery caretaker) and that made me struggle to care what happened to any of them. They were all slimy in their own ways. And as I mentioned above, there was one storyline that was completely unresolved, we have no idea what was going on there. And the way the author dealt with Lillian's mental health issues was just icky too.

Overall, this is a popcorn thriller with some wild twists that kept me compulsively reading even if it wasn't as good as it could have been.

I’ve started to really look forward to A.R. Torre books and I was definitely intrigued by A Familiar Stranger. I will say that the synopsis doesn’t really seem to fit the actual story that unfolds, but that ended up being ok for me.

The story starts off pretty slowly and is told mostly from Lillian’s point of view. She’s feeling dissatisfied with her boring life and her boring job and her boring husband. I thought this part of the story did drag at times, as Lillian’s thoughts were kind of repetitive and tedious. My favorite parts were her husband’s, Mike’s, POVs that were peppered in throughout. There is definitely more to him than meets the eye and I really wanted to find out what he was hiding.

The timeline of the story includes a countdown until a death occurs and once that happened, I felt the pace really started to pick up. A lot more secrets were revealed and while I did guess a lot of them, there were still a couple that surprised me. There was a twist, as well, that I wasn’t really sure I could get on board with, but I tried to keep an open mind about it and it eventually stopped bothering me. We also got several more POVs and I thought they all added something. I also liked how short the chapters were, which kept me wanting to turn the page, even when I thought things were going a little slow.

Overall, I enjoyed A Familiar Stranger. I liked the short chapters, the multiple POVs, and the characters I loved to hate. One of my complaints with some of the other books I’ve read by this author has been that the endings tend to be a little anti-climactic, but I thought this one did a better job with that. However, I still thought there were several things I wanted a little more explanation or closure on. I also have to mention that my reading experience was definitely enhanced because I was reading this at the same time as one of my favorite bloggers, Deanna, and we messaged each other throughout the whole book with reactions and theories. That extra enjoyment is what is tipping my rating up from 3.5 to 4 stars.

A Familiar Stranger by A.R. Torre (aka the amazing Alessandra Torre) kept me at the edge of the seat from start to finish. We know something is coming right from the start. Get ready for a story full of surprises, twists, and suspense. In this domestic thriller, Lillian is not happy with her life right now. She lost the job she loved, she is non-existent to her husband and son. Then she meets David and everything changes. She becomes a new person, literally. But what happens when truths come out and things are not always what they seem? How will it all end? I could not put this book down.

Happy reading!

EXCERPT: As I added cream and sugar, a familiar code came across the scanner.

A dead body, found. Setting down the Garfield cup, I turned the radio up, then grabbed my pen and my work notebook. Writing down the details, I glanced at the sunshine clock above the family organisation board that hung by the pantry. I pulled out my travel mug and poured my coffee into the stainless-steel vessel and screwed the lid onto the top.

I try not to be excited by a death, but this moment, before I find out the details, before I know all the answers - it's like a shot of adrenaline. I love it.

ABOUT 'A FAMILIAR STRANGER': Such a quiet and ordinary wife and mother. Who will even notice what she’s done?

Lillian Smith leads an unexceptional life, writing obituaries and killing time with her inattentive husband and disconnected son. Then she meets David, a handsome stranger, in a coffee shop. Lured into an affair, she invents a new persona, one without strings, deadlines, or brooding husbands.

Lillian has never felt so reckless, unpredictable, or wanted. But as her affair with David intensifies, she withdraws from everything that’s real, even her closest friend. When evidence of her life as a secret lover finds its way onto her son’s social media, she risks ruining much more than her marriage or reputation.

As lies beget lies, Lillian’s two worlds spiral dangerously out of control. And betrayals run deeper than she imagines. Because Lillian isn’t the only one leading a double life.

MY THOUGHTS: I'm definitely classing A Familiar Stranger as a guilty pleasure read! It has many elements that I love - crime, manipulative characters, family and relationship dramas, mystery, and just a smidgen of romance. It's twisty and unpredictable.

The characters are all multi-layered, though it certainly doesn't seem that way at first. It's like peeling an onion, the way the author slowly reveals their secrets, their lies, and their true natures.

Sam is Lillian's best friend and supporter. He's gay, a man who thinks things through to the nth degree, a compulsive listener of podcasts, and always looks like he has stepped straight out of the pages of GQ. Her other best friend is Lenny, an alcoholic groundsman at a local cemetery. There's an extremely touching story behind this friendship. I loved the scene where Lillian meets Marcella, Lenny's daughter, for the first time. It's both poignant and funny.

Torres writing is seductive. I was pulled into the story from the beginning and it just never let go of me. I read the whole book with a dirty, great grin on my face, and that ending? Just perfect!

This whole read played out like a movie in my head as I was reading. In fact, this would make a great movie.

A twisty and fun read filled with secrets, suspense, drama and danger!

⭐⭐⭐⭐.3

#AFamiliarStranger #NetGalley

I: @alessandratorre4 @thomasmerceruk

T: @ReadAlessandra @AmazonPub

#contemporaryfiction #crime #domesticdrama #friendship #mystery

THE AUTHOR: A.R. Torre is a pseudonym of Alessandra Torre and is her dark alter ego. While Alessandra writes spicy romances, A.R. focuses on twisted stories filled with secrets, suspense, drama, and danger.

DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Thomas & Mercer via Netgalley for providing a digital ARC of A Familiar Stranger by A.R. Torre for review. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own personal opinions.

For an explanation of my rating system please refer to my Goodreads.com profile page or the about page on sandysbookaday.wordpress.com

This review is also published on Twitter, Amazon, Instagram and my webpage

Twisty, turny, quirky suspense. This was a good read with intriguing characters, all holding their own mystery and showing the complexity of human relationships. Characters you will love to hate.

4.5 stars!

Lillian is an obituary writer living with her teenage son and husband. When she discovers her husband is having an affair, she decides it's her turn to have some fun. When she meets David, she creates a new persona, spicing up her life. But when footage of David and Lillian is splashed onto social media, it is not just her secret that will be revealed....it seems everyone else is hiding something too. ⁣⁣

Wow, this book was absolutely wild!! It has the making of everything I love in a psychological thriller - multiple POV's, short gripping chapters and so many twists and turns that will leave you shocked to your core. Highly recommend this unputdownable thriller!

I have been such a huge fan of Torre!

What another crazy, wild, and unputdownable ride.

I thought this may have been another domestic suspense but damn Torre pulls those twists out of her pocket so nicely and she keeps you on the edge of your seat.

I have to say this isn't my favorite by her but it's another one that sucks you in and a fun edge of your seat book that will k eep you entertained.

Thank you so much to Amazon publishing for the arc in exchange for an honest review.

3.5/5 stars

I enjoyed this one. It wasn't my favorite story by this author but it read quickly and easily and kept me engaged the whole way through.

This had many aspects similar to my favorite thrillers; unreliable narrator, deceit, cheating spouse, and misdirection galore. The writing is fairly simplistic in it's style and it has multiple narrators though the primary narrator is Lillian, the female MC.

I'm trying to put my finger on what left me slightly unsatisfied at the finale and I think it's because I felt like someone who didn't deserve an okay ending got one and that tugs at me a bit. There is also a paranormal aspect that I didn't care for mostly because I felt like it didn't add anything to the story line other than to serve as an additional narrator when the story didn't need it at that point (also this particular element is all of a sudden popping up in multiple books I've read recently so I'm tired of it personally, but I think it's just a coincidence in the books I've been selecting lately.)

Overall, I enjoy books by this author and will continue to seek them out.

Torre always guarantees her readers sit-on-the-edge-of-your-seat suspense, and she doesn’t disappoint with A Familiar Stranger. What I like about her storytelling is she keeps you guessing. And ooh boy, did she get me with this one! From the beginning to the end, mystery abounds, and the thrill of this unconventional story is how I saw her heroine’s state of affairs and interpreted it. But Torre ensures that what one sees or believes is far from cut and dry.

Lillian Smith’s reality isn’t the norm. In a rut of sorts, her job writing obituaries and not such fabulous home life, I found surprisingly fascinating. I have a suspicion that she wouldn't think the same as me. Entertaining her followers by writing speculatively fun if not morbid Tweets is only the tip of the iceberg. Her quirky humour dampened when things backfire; I couldn’t have understood her frustration more.

Lillian slips easily into a habit that troubled me. Escapism at its worse, could she control it because I had certainly had my doubts. Doubts that led to the never expected blew my mind away. While this was going on, she trusted the circumstance. To me, it felt like watching a train wreck about to happen, and she had no blinking idea. However, I observed a happier woman who became more comfortable with herself, and I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed the new sassy Lillian. Therefore I can’t help but raise my glass to her, and whatever conscious actions she’d chosen to do were fine by me.

Did her husband notice that change in his wife, who he’d been neglecting? Even bigger question. What was he hiding? And her best friend? Torre fooled me into believing the goodie was a baddie and vice versa. Well, there was one person I loved to bits. Whether they were a drinking partner or confidant, even someone to pass the time and let off steam, I was so grateful that Torre developed such a marvellous character.

Not only does Torre grab your attention from the word go, but she also challenges her readers. What was coming, I never envisaged for a minute, and that frustrated me as I like to think I can work out who the wrongdoer is. Her spectacular narrative makes for a psychological thriller that keeps you in a state of uncertainty, waiting for more. The finale! Quite brilliant. Simply bravo, Torre!

ARC gratefully received from Thomas & Mercer and NetGalley for an honest review

Omg this book was perfect for buddyreading, Lily and Farah thank you for reading this together.

I enjoyed this mystery so much. The writing was so good, i felt on my skin every word. Past and present were perfectly mixed. And as well points of views. The only thing that I was not glad was a paranormal thing but I did not mind so much this time. Maybe it is a fave for someone.

I loved I was wrong about everything and wanted to be different with all my heart but as I said it was so great done I love it so much even was not perfect for my taste.

A story about a marriage with secrets and a lot of jelaosy around, missed chances, chances taken, in bad and worse, romance and thriller mixed in one.

A familiar stranger was a rollercoaster ride!

Right from the first chapter, I got so invested that I couldn’t put it down until the last page.

And while it was slow in the middle, I think it actually was worth the slow pace because it showed more of the characters’ traits and what they actually thought after her death.

I felt like the author intentionally made you want to like her and cheer her up in finding whatever her husband is hiding just so you get slapped in the face by the “stranger” situation.

I think this book will stay with me for a while because it is really unexpected and the twists and turns just kept coming with a new chapter.

I also think that with this book you either love it or hate it. And for me it is love it. So I’ll recommend it to any domestic thrillers lovers.

🆓📖Very grateful to the publisher for my review copy

2.5
Meet Lillian, a mother and wife with the career as an obituary writer-how unique! Especially when there is a death looming in this book!

I have really enjoyed previous Torre books and was hoping for the same from this one, but it felt very disjointed at about the half way point.

We meet all the main characters, learn about their quirks, faults and affairs....I was on track and curious about where we were going. There was a moment where Lillian straight up didn't remember anything from a specific day....interesting....then we get to a point where it wasn't all that valuable or even needed as part of the plot in the book. Once the "death" happens a bunch of crazy stuff goes down, with little to no development surrounding or supporting the reasons. It just wasn't set up well enough for me as the reader to be convinced by it.

I hung onto it to the very end hoping for some better answers but ended up disappointed and underwhelmed. It felt manufactured and unrealistic by the end. This said, I will read her next book! A. R. Torre does a great job of making reading easy!

Thank you to NetGalley and Thomas & Mercer for the advance e-copy in return for my honest review.

I enjoy A. R. Torre's originality. She always manages to create unusual plots that have clever twists to keep her readers guessing. She did not disappoint in A Familiar Stranger.

In this book, Lillian has marital issues, job problems and complicated relationships. There don't seem to be any areas of her life that she doesn't seem to be struggling. To make things even worse, there are things going on that aren't as they seem and Lillian hasn't even scratched the surface yet.

This book takes you down one path and then takes a hard right down another one. Buckle up and enjoy the ride.

Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC. I voluntarily chose to read and review it and the opinions contained within are my own.

3.5 stars!

A Familiar Stranger was a super quick and bingeable read. A typical domestic thriller with a twist 👀 I loved the short chapters and multiple POVs. This book is filled with drama, deceit, secrets and affairs.

I enjoyed the easy flow of this book thanks to the short chapters. And I definitely did not see the big twist coming, I don’t think anyone would 🫢

While I thought this was a great, quick read, the execution did not knock me off my feet nor wow me. This turned out to be a middle-of-the-road type of book and I just wished there was a bit more thrill and maybe complexity to it.

A Familiar Stranger by A.R. Torre is about Lillian Smith, a former celebrity obituary writer for the Times; she writes obituaries for everyday people and runs a murder-who did it blog on Twitter; she might have an obsession with death. Lillian is also suffering from depression-bipolar, and alcoholism. Her marriage to Mike is in tatters, and her teenage son, Jacob, ignores them. Lillian has a best friend, Sam Knight, who is a realtor and her confidant, so when she suspects her husband of infidelity, she confides in Sam. When Lillian addresses her suspensions to Mike about his affair, Mike admits it and says he will stop; it was just sex, not love. A few days later, Lillian finds herself in a cafe writing and staring at a handsome man David Laurent, deciding to take on a different persona and start an affair of her own. She's reckless and unpredictable; her lies mount up as she pulls away from her old life and into this new affair. Lillian is spinning out of control, and betrayal runs deeper than ever imagined; she's not the only person living a double life.

A Familiar Stranger is an enthralling, captivating, mindblowing read!

Lillian Smith is a writer, mother, and wife. She feels like she’s failing at life. In addition to being demoted at work, her distant husband is likely cheating, and her son is disconnected from the family. She wants more excitement from her boring life. So she borrows someone else’s life. But what if she isn’t the only one with a double life?

I was very pleasantly surprised by A Familiar Stranger! With its clever plot, multiple POVs, unexpected twists, and an extra helping of messiness, A Familiar Stranger kept me intrigued and turning the pages. While I figured out parts of the mystery, I enjoyed the overall unpredictability of this story, with surprises until the end.

Go in blind to best enjoy this thriller filled with scandal, deception, and lies!

Thank you to NetGalley and Thomas & Mercer for an early copy of this book. All opinions are my own.

I devoured this one. I simply couldn’t stop reading this and ignored all my other books for it.

I’m extremely picky about domestic thrillers. I haven’t had much success in finding titles that really, really work for me. This one almost completely worked for me - I didn’t need the dreaded suspension of disbelief that too many novels suffer from, and I didn’t guess the twist within a few chapters.

Regarding my "almost completely" comment, after reading this, I was still left with certain questions from two incidents in the book that didn’t seem to be addressed again or wrapped up. This didn’t affect my overall enjoyment of the story, however.

Questions aside, I fully enjoyed this and plan on absolutely reading more of this author (this was my first book by Ms. Torre) 🙂

An interesting read with some twists and turns that has a few different points of views of the same events. Lillian has been feeling detached from her marriage and her life for some time, though the latter was not always obvious to her, so when her husbands activities come to light she makes some changes. Changes that may just become the beginning of the end. A good read that kept me interested and invested.

Thank you to the publishers for sending me this ARC through NetGalley in exchange for my honest review!

The synopsis of this book does not match up to the emphasis of the plot in the actual novel. That is to say, the points that are focused on in the synopsis are not particularly the main points focused on throughout the novel. The main faults to this story are the plot twists near the end. I did not like the turns that this book took. I believe there could have been a much better and more plausible way to end this story.

I strongly enjoyed the main character, Lillian. She had an intriguing thought process that led her to making many questionable decisions. Overall, I would mainly recommend this book to those who like morally gray/messed up characters, though I could not guarantee that anyone would enjoy the plot twists.

I went into this with high expectations since I really enjoy her books. This one started off really slow, and going into this book blind I didn’t know where this was going. Was it a “find yourself again trope” or what. The story didn’t pick up until 60% and after that I could not put it down.