I've read other books by this author and liked them, and this new one definitely did not disappoint either. Alison just lost her baby and is trying to deal with the trauma. She decides to start her own photography business but things start to go wrong very quickly. Everything that happens is related to an event in her past that she was involved in. The book starts out a little slow but it takes off quickly after that. It keeps you guessing who the villain is until the very end and every time you think you know who it is, you're wrong. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the advanced reader copy.

Great plot to get yourself lost in. This book has everything. A real fast paced thriller. Will get your heart racing on more than one occasion. Very well written. Highly recommend this book To anyone looking for an exciting book to get into

Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this book for an honest review.

This book is about secrets and lies. This book is also about the loss of a baby girl. This book is also about a mother’s obsessive care and control of her other child a son to the point of paranoia and the mother thinks that there someone out there who is trying to steal him.

This book was a slow burn which only fitted together in the last few chapters. It was an interesting read however the story was filled with too many repetitive red herrings. 3 stars

This is a good story however it doest flow well which makes it harder to follow. Alison is trying to get through her grief of her baby and open up a studio. I didn't understand who I was following at certain times and what the narrative of the story was unfortunately.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this book. A very good read that keeps you excited to turn the pages. This is my first read by this author but I will look out for others by her. I would recommend reading this twisty book.

I really like the story itself, about a mother who has kept a big secret for years. But the unknown second narrator made it confusing for me. Also, there was too much blaming the wrong people going on throughout the book. I was satisfied though with the ending,,how it all wrapped up. It definitely keep me turning the pages to see how it all would turn out.

Awesome storyline. Thanks to Netgalley for allowing me to review this one. I'll be looking to read more from this author.

Great book it flowed nicely kept my interest through the whole book characters were great..Thanks netgalley for this ARC

This book was a low burn for me. It had good parts but I felt that it dragged in the middle. This book is about a woman who has suffered the loss of a child. She opens up a photography business and then strange things start to happen. The books was confusing to follow because of the different points of view

Thank you NetGalley and Ruth Harrow for an ARC copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

WHAT I LIKED:
This book was different and kept you in suspense.. I didn't realize that I was reading two different story lines for quite some time. I think that the way she instantly knew that someone was trying to sabotage her was perfectly instinctual and well written. You never knew who the person sabotaging was and was constantly misled.

WHAT I DIDN'T LIKE:
I think this book built up too much for the crescendo that we actually got. I was disappointed with the outcome even though it was what worked out best for both families in the end. There were also times where I feel as if the sabotaging went no where.. like her sons photo being cut out of the canvas (during an event - which blows my mind how that is possible..) and then just not seeing it or discovering it at all during the rest of the book. I think that if it had somehow ended up in her mailbox at home with a note written on it, it would have been convincingly more suspenseful.

OVERALL / RECOMMENDATION:
This is a good start of a suspense/thriller, a part of me just feels that maybe it wasn't thought out and built up how it should have been. There are too many loose ends that "just happened" and nothing is ever mentioned of them again. I will recommend this book to anyone who enjoys a light suspense thriller read, or more so for someone wanting to test the waters with a suspense novel.

Just One Lie by Ruth Harrow was an excellent read and Ruth is a new author to me as well. This psychological thriller had me on my toes all the way through, when I thought I worked it all out! Bang! I was back at the beginning again! Now thats what I call a great book!
Alison just loves being a mother and even though sometimes it can be hard to come to terms with the recent loss of her baby daughter. She still has her young son Adam whom she loves so much, but the grief is always there it will never go away.
When everyone sees Alison struggling and can not say anything to them and ask for help.
This is a secret that has to say with her forever! she can't even tell her husband and If anyone finds out all her family will disown her forever. It will destroy everyone around her. So this secret must Never re surfaces.

But, someone knows! How!?

Alison gets a disturbing message from them. She does not know who they are. Then, bad things start to happen around her, Her website is hacked, her business is sabotaged, then, there’s a fire in her home… OMG more threatening messages.

Who are you? Why are you doing this to me!?

WoW, This is one roller coaster of a ride! Excellent book from start to finish.

I highly recommend this book! Great read for your holiday.

Big thank you to NetGalley, inkubator Books and the author Ruth Harrow for my ARC of Just OneLie in exchange for an honest review.

Alison Burnham has decided to use her photography and open a shop for taking maternity and family portraits. She has hired a woman named Rebecca to help her. Alison’s husband, Dan, is a chef and they have a son Adam, age 8. Her baby daughter, Dorothy, was stillborn which caused her much sorrow and has taken her some time to come to grips with her loss.
The book switches back and forth from Alison to an unknown person. This is where it was confusing because you were unable to trust anyone and didnt understand who the unknown person was. I had to go back and look at it more closely. I enjoyed the story line but I sometimes felt lost who was talking.

I received a gifted copy of this book to read in exchange for an honest review as part of the book tour hosted by Zooloos Book Tours.

Just One Lie is a psychological thriller that has you guessing all the way through. Alison is very protective of her son Adam and is recovering from the loss of her baby daughter. Dan, her husband, seems worried that Alison is doing too much and taking on too much with starring her own photography business. After hiring a local lady to help her run the business strange things start happening - missing money, ominous messages, an attempted break in, a fire, sabotage to her business and being lead on a wild goose chase to name but a few. Alison is suddenly suspicious of everyone around her even her husband. Someone knows a secret she's been harbouring for ten years and will not stop at exposing her and bringing it to the surface. But can she discover who it is before it's too late and she loses her son forever?
I was glued to this book! Such a cleverly plotted story which had you jumping to conclusions and suspicious of anyone and everyone!

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a copy of Just One Lie by Ruth Harrow in exchange for my honest review and opinion. I enjoyed this book however I thought it was a tad slower paced than what I typically enjoy. I did enjoy the suspense and intrigue that this book has and would enjoy reading more by this author. I appreciated the opportunity to read it ahead of time and will for sure be telling my friends and family to read this the first opportunity they have.

*Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC in exchange for my honest review*

First book I've read by Ruth Harrow! I found the story very intriguing and I think this is a fantastic read. It kept me reading to the end and I would recommend it to anyone who likes a story that twists and turns.

★★★★ 4.5 stars

Everyone has a secret. But not like Alison’s. And it all started with a lie.

So many people have said that this was a slow paced book, so when I read that I thought "oh no" as I hate slow burns. But I was pleasantly surprised to discover that I didn't think it was slow paced at all. It does begin with a build up that does, admittedly, leave the reader a little confused at first. Especially with the alternating narratives changing every few chapters and BOTH are in the first person, so it is easy to mistake the second narrative as Alison's...until there is a few words that hint at it being an entirely different narrator. Some of the chapters are titled with "Before" making them easier to identify but some of the others are not which makes it confusing. I found this to be a confusing inconsistency.

The main narrator is Alison and is told predominantly from her perspective When the second one stealthily makes their way into the story in the second chapter, we stop to wonder who this could possibly be. We are drip-fed information to lead us thinking we know where the story is leading and who the mysterious narrator is...but we don't. I was left scratching my head cluelessly until a light bulb went on in my brain and it all became comparatively clearer. Didn't it? But like all good psychological thrillers, JUST ONE LIE has us chasing our tails and second guessing ourselves all the way through.

Beginning with an intriguing prologue another unnamed person is swimming with their child in the warm waters of somewhere quite obviously abroad until fate deals them a deadly blow. And the reader is left wanting to know who, what, why and when this all happened. But one thing we learn throughout the story is that time is relative.

Alison Burnham thought she had the perfect life. She thought she and Dan had the perfect marriage and they were incredibly happy together...until Adam was born. It was a difficult birth and for a time, Alison and her son were separated with him being in the neonatal unit shortly after his birth. But it wasn't long before they returned home together and the perfect life Alison thought they would be enjoying crumbled. She spiraled into a postpartum depression and found caring for a newborn incredibly trying as well as the changes to their family unit. It wasn't until a year or so had passed that Alison finally found her feet and a new appreciation for her beautiful baby son. But her's and Dan's relationship had taken a battering and they found it even harder to regain that equilibrium again.

Eight years later, and Alison is now mourning the loss of their stillborn daughter she had hoped would get her and Dan back on an even keel again. Now they couple barely speak and when they do she finds Dan patronising instead of understanding. Having lost her previous successful career in marketing after Adam's birth, Alison has been through a few failed ventures to help contribute financially to the household while Dan works as an undervalued chef at a local restaurant. Now Alison has begun a career as a photographer specialising in maternity and family photos, an idea that formed during her own recent pregnancy. She takes on an employee, Rebecca, who thrives in being at the forefront of organising bookings and the photo shoots, an ability Alison can only admire and envy in equal measure.

But then strange things begin to occur. Her studio is broken in. The electrics short-circuit having been filled with water. Strange phone calls where no one speaks. Anonymous messages sent to her Facebook account. And then her website is hacked. And she has this strange sense of being watched. Is it any wonder that Alison has trouble sleeping? That she barely eats? But is it the mysterious happenings occurring now or the deep dark secret she has carried for so long?

Her behaviour becomes so erratic Dan believes she is falling into a depression again and instead of showing her understanding, Alison finds every thing he does and every thing he says patronising. But when she returns home one day to find he has done the unthinkable without discussing it with her first, she is livid. And to be honest, I thought she had every right to be. What he did was cruel, even if he thought he was doing the right thing at the time. Just because it was right for him doesn't mean it was right for Alison. But to go behind her back without telling her...well, that was just cruel. As if she hasn't got enough to contend with.

And then she gets a phone call from the school...Adam has disappeared whilst on a school excursion. Has Alison's greatest fear come to fruition at last?

Pretty much WOW! Despite the ambiguity and confusion with the failure to clearly separate the two narratives in the beginning, JUST ONE LIE is just one wild ride! It wasn't slow paced at all. I found it began with a relatively steady pace that offered mystery and intrigue, picking up quickly as I raced to turn the pages long into the night. Just when I thought I knew who the unnamed narrator was, I discovered I'd been cleverly hoodwinked.

Alison is not an entirely likeable character and she is clearly unreliable as a narrator as well. Do we believe her perception? Or is it all in her mind? Is she suffering postpartum depression again only adding to her grief? Or is she right to be worried? Does someone know her secret?

I didn't particularly like Alison much but I liked Rebecca. Dan was not a very understanding husband particularly with some of his actions. But Alison was constantly second guessing herself and throughout the entire book she just figuratively threw her hands up and declared "That's it! I've failed as a wife! I've failed as a mother!" What mother hasn't thought that at times? But she just goes on about it every time something went wrong or threatened Adam's safety...which in Alison's was just about everything. Including a harmless birthday gift of walkie talkies, thus thinking someone could hack the frequency and lure her little boy away. Seriously? She just got on my goat a bit.

However, regardless of how annoying she could be, I thoroughly enjoyed JUST ONE LIE. It was fun, fast paced and entirely intriguing and entertaining. I had fun trying to work out who it could possibly be and I was able to work out the anonymous narrator long before their identity was revealed.

JUST ONE LIE is a brilliant, fun fast pace read with all the thrills and chills and clever twists along the way to keep you entertained throughout. I did find it ended a little abruptly though and found that a bit of a letdown considering everything else had concluded nicely, only for it to end...just like that.

Still an intriguing read that I recommend for fans of psychological thrillers with unreliable narrators.

I would like to thank #RuthHarrow, #Netgalley, #InkubatorBooks and #ZoolooTours for an ARC of #JustOneLie in exchange for an honest review.

This review appears on my blog at https://stinathebookaholic.blogspot.com/.

Alison loves being a mother but with the recent loss of her daughter she is finding it hard to cope.
Alison has a dark secret that she has never shared with anyone not even her husband. If it ever got out it would destroy her family.
But someone knows what she has done and they are wanting her to pay.
This was a very slow paced book that failed to hold my attention. I found the characters really unlikeable and could not relate to then.
The book was told from Alison's point if view and one unknown person, which you did not find out who it was until the last few chapters. This made the book super confusing. The angst also was on another level and it frustrated me way to much and had me eye rolling a lot.

Thank you, Netgalley, for the ARC!

I'll start by saying that the size of this book was intimidating, as someone who prefers shorter books, but I was intrigued and happy with the short chapters. However, a lot of it was filler, especially at the beginning. I didn't think a lot of the chapters were necessary and probably full of red herrings. The pace didn’t start picking up until halfway.

An indication of whose POV was which would’ve been helpful at the start but it all pieces together the more you read and I realized it kept the mystery going. I think a better indication of the past and present would've made the story more solid and less confusing.

A lot of the twists were trippy, and I needed to reread some parts because my instant reaction would be “wait, what?” I still think I’m confused by some that weren’t explained so well. I’m pretty sure all loose ends were tied by the end. This book certainly was better once I finished reading it since I dragged on completing it.

There wasn’t enough thriller for me given how it is marketed. This is a sad situation made worse with very poor decisions added in with a bit of enabling from others.

I found this quite hard to read but it is likely to be a great read for those who like domestic drama.

This book deals with a woman who is desperate to keep a part of her life secret, and the repercussions of her decision. In my opinion this book was just average. The story was predictable at times, and the characters were not particularly likable. Also, I found it to be a bit too long. Thank you to NetGalley for the copy!