I love Sheryl Browne books and this one lived up to the hype! Compelling, twisty and kind of creepy! This book made me feel like I was on an rollercoaster. 5 stars!!

I did really enjoy reading this. I felt quite sad for the main character and was intrigued as to how it was going to unfold.

However, I am a little disappointed in the ending. I didn't really get a satisfactory answer and I'm still left hanging which I don't really like.

This is the second by this author and while I do like them, I'm not sure the titles really match the stories.

Thank you to Netgalley for allowing me to read this book in return for an honest review. Wow! An absolutely fantastic rollercoaster of a psychological thriller. This book had so many twists and turns I could hardly keep up. Just when I thought I had figured it out I was blown away by the twist. A real edge of your seat page turner that I found impossible to put down. Highly recommended 5 stars.

This fast paced thriller was a really good read. Told in dual timeline this book told the story of family dramas and health issues and when history repeats itself who is to blame?

I really enjoyed the flawed characters in this book and with all the twists I just didn’t know who to believe. I was also very shocked by the ending. I’ve read a couple of books by this author and I’ll definitely read more - so well written. Definitely a book I would recommend.

I was smitten with this one! It has plenty of tension boiling beneath the surface. The characters are hiding secrets. It could be deadly!

When Eve's mother shows up to help with her new baby it brings up memories from the past and access which have been hidden. Lots of twists and secrets which have been hidden. Great for fans of historical fiction.

Dive into a world of hidden motives and danger with this gripping thriller, where every twist and turn deepens the intrigue and suspense. A must read for thriller lovers

Eve and her husband Dom are proud parents of Kai. Eve is overprotective and possessive, vowing to be a better mother to Kai than her mother was to her and her younger brother Jacob.

Eve had a horrid childhood. An abusive father and a heartless unloving mother. Eve's younger brother Jacob died and Eve was convinced her mother had something to do with this.

Eve's heartless mother turns up and things take a turn for the worse. She is reminded of the past and is fearful for her own son.

A great gripping and shocking read that kept me turning the pages late into the night.

Thank you to Netgalley for my copy in exchange for an honest review. .

A good read
This book is told by several characters
It will keep you guessing right till the end
Thanks NetGalley

Rating: 4.5 Stars

Sheryl Browne’s Her First Child is a chilling thriller that explores toxic family ties guaranteed to keep readers engrossed all through the night.

New mum Eve cannot believe how lucky she is. Not only is she married to a wonderful man, but baby Kai is absolutely gorgeous and she positively dotes on her beautiful child. Eve’s relationship with her own mother Lydia has always been fraught to say the least. Eve hadn’t had the best of childhoods and she vows to shower Kai with love and give him all the support and affection she never had as a child. When Lydia turns up at her house, Eve is immediately wary, however, she decides to heed her husband’s advice and give her mother a chance to bond with the baby.

Seeing Lydia with Kai makes Eve wonder whether she should let down the walls she had built around herself. However, no sooner has Eve decided to stop keeping Lydia at arm’s length that something terrible happens. A horrific tragedy turns Eve’s entire world upside down and she begins to rue the day she had let her mother anywhere near her precious baby. Was Eve wrong to trust Lydia? And could her mother possibly have harmed her baby?

Lydia pleads her innocence, but is she telling the truth? Has Eve been too quick to jump to conclusions? Or could there be far more to this story than meets the eye?

Sheryl Browne is so good at writing creepy, unsettling and complex thrillers that keep me guessing till the very end and she comes up trumps yet again with her latest novel, Her First Child. Brilliantly plotted and cleverly written, Her First Child is a dark, sinister and heart-stopping chiller about a mother’s love, the secrets we keep, dangerous deceptions and devastating lies that will keep readers on the edge of their seats.

Her First Child is the latest twisted, disturbing and compulsively readable thriller from best-selling author Sheryl Browne.

This book was full of suspense. The reason I have only give it a 3 was the ending was rushed. I still enjoyed it and will read her other books.

Another gripping psychological thriller from Sheryl Browne. The main characters are three women, Eve, her mother Lydia and Chloe, Eve’s best friend. Eve has a loving husband Tom and a baby son Kai. Chloe, who has been best friends with Eve since childhood, and her husband Steve live nearby. On returning home from work one day Eve finds an unexpected visitor in her house, Lydia. It becomes apparent that relationships between them are very strained. Eve has become estranged from her mother as she had a very traumatic childhood. Her father was a very controlling bully and she blamed he mother for not standing up to him and showing Eve very little love and affection. When Eve was nine years old her young brother died.. Eve and Chloe were there and blame Lydia for his death. Lydia decides she is staying the night but Kai suddenly falls ill in the night and has to go to hospital. Eve is suspicious as her mother was found in his bedroom. We soon realise that Eve, Lydia and Chloe are hikding a big secret. This is a great read full of suspense, intrigue, lies and plenty of twists and turns. A highly recommended read
Thanks to Netgalley and Bookouture for giving me the opportunity to read and review this book.

Sheryl Browne is an author who always delivers. This is a book which is completely addictive and unputdownable.

This is a completely gripping book which has captured my attention, held me captive and left me wanting more. Browne has written another masterpiece which is unforgettable.

This is a book I have devoured in just one sitting. Browne gives us multi perspectives and this really allows us to get to know the characters. This is is a brilliant and unpredictable read.

There are many twists and turns that fill the pages of this gem. It’s been a book which has had my pulse racing. It’s been completely unexpected and quite possibly my favourite by Browne yet.

“A perfect mother. A loving daughter. A secret that could destroy them both”

...

Okay! Will somebody please explain exactly what has just happened to me…

This book definitely needs to come with a health warning. I think I have read a psychological thriller, which has not only messed with my mind, but left me physically feeling as though I have been eaten alive, chewed up and spat out. And I’m still not really certain who did what to whom, how, where, why or even when… Answers on a postcard please!

But wait, I am getting a little ahead of myself now, so let’s backtrack a bit…

...

The story begins in 1997, with Eve, a nine-year-old, living with her parents and new baby brother. Hers is not a happy life however, as her father David, is a coercive and controlling bully, with a temper which seems to change direction with the wind and who was in no rush to have a second child underfoot; another mouth to feed and to add disruption to his strict regimes. Her mother Lydia, is always kept short of money and is expected to ensure that peace and quiet reigns in the house when her husband is at home. Suffering from what these days would undoubtedly be recognised as post natal depression, Lydia feels she has no other tools with which to keep calm in the home other than by ignoring Eve completely, as if by not speaking to, or acknowledging her presence, she will force Eve herself to maintain a silence which will be enough to pacify her father. Lydia, perhaps mistakenly, truly believes that she is protecting Eve, when actually her daughter is left feeling unloved and unwanted, unlike baby Jacob. Shunned by her classmates at school because she wears dirty and ill-fitting clothes and isn’t able to participate in any out of school activities, means that Eve lives a very lonely and solitary existence, with the exception of her one and only friend, Chloe, on whom she perhaps mistakenly, becomes totally dependent.

All is not well with Jacob’s health though and there seems to be a constant round of illnesses, hospital stays and near death experiences, before the poor mite finally succumbs and passes away. It is only during the spells when Jacob is very sick that David shows any compassion for his children and affection for Lydia, making these, despite the tragic circumstances which cause them, welcome respites for all. For Eve, the frequent visits to the hospital open up great new prospects for her future. She spends every moment of the lengthy wait times, chatting to one of the doctors about Jacob’s various ailments, which she then follows up by hours spent on the internet at Chloe’s house, doing her own research. Following Jacob’s death, David no longer lives at the family home, leaving Eve and Lydia to their own devices. Rather than bringing them closer together however, the wedge which Lydia had previously driven between them only becomes exacerbated and Lydia decides to seek psychiatric help for Eve, which only serves to see them become estranged completely.

Fast forward to the present day: Eve is now a qualified GP, married to Dominic the man of her dreams and new parents to baby Kai. With Chloe, her husband and two young children, living in the house right opposite, it seems as though Eve has the perfect life, until that fateful day when the phone rings and it is her mother calling… Things very quickly begin to unravel for Eve and cracks begin to show in the polished veneer she has built around herself. Although he knows that Eve had survived a troubled childhood, it soon becomes clear to Dom that he is only in possession of the most basic of facts about his wife’s past and when challenged, she is unwilling, or unable to trust him enough to open up to him completely, which leaves him feeling afraid for the wellbeing of baby Kai, fearful for the future of their relationship and very susceptible to the whisperings of someone whom both he and Eve had thought they could trust.

Lydia suffers a stroke and in another totally unexpected and rather strange turn up for the books, Eve decides to move in with and care for her mother. Is there a more deep and dark motive for her sudden change of heart? With tension between Chloe, her husband Steve, Dominic and Eve, almost at breaking point, Lydia and Chloe are both victims of separate attacks, clearly motivated by the hope that either one or both of them will die. Who has the most to lose from these complicated and surreal events? Will the wheels of justice stop at the right person, or will someone who is guilty be able to deflect the blame once again?

So many questions, I just hope you are up to the challenge of finding the correct answers!

...

This well structured, multi-layered storyline was powerful, highly textured and intense. Fast paced, the atmosphere for the most part was desperately tense, claustrophobic and totally immersive.

Short, well signposted chapters were narrated in the voices of Eve, Chloe and Lydia and were predominantly focussed on two timelines, 1997 when Eve and Chloe were nine and baby Jacob had just been born and the present day, although there were one or two diversions into the year 2000, when Lydia had decided that Eve should be seen by a psychiatrist.

That’s where anything uncomplicated about this story ended, as there were more and more clues drip-fed into the narrative little by little, nothing was quite as it seemed and the twists and turns just kept on coming – and I mean right to the very end, which I am still not sure I figured out correctly! Author Sheryl Browne just about threw in the kitchen sink when she was putting this plot together, including everything from bullying, coercive control, emotional and psychological abuse; to jealousy, cheating and illnesses both real and imagined including Munchausen syndrome by proxy. That’s without the tangled web of lies and secrets which overlaid everything, until I just didn’t know who to believe any more.

This story was definitely all about the characters and plot, with location being irrelevant and barely mentioned, so if you are a committed ‘armchair traveller’ then this probably isn’t going to be one for you. Although I’m certain you won’t be left feeling short-changed with all those love to hate characters Sheryl has filled this thriller with. Not a huge central cast, but what they lacked in numbers was more than compensated for by the sheer malevolence, deviousness and manipulative qualities they all displayed. I was never really sure just who I was meant to have sympathy for, or empathy with, so found myself sticking them all in one box marked ‘cheats, frauds and liars’. I genuinely wanted to believe in a couple of them, however they were such an emotional mess, that uncovering and exposing their true motives and feelings, or finding any authenticity about them, was almost impossible.

What always makes reading such a wonderful experience for me, is that with each and every new book, I am taken on a unique and individual journey, by authors who fire my imagination, stir my emotions and stimulate my senses. This story definitely scored heavily in just about all of those criteria, having the power to evoke so many feelings, that I’m sure I won’t have felt the same way about it as the last reader, nor indeed the next.

If anyone familiar with this book happens to read this slightly garbled review, then please put me out of my misery, as everyone seems divided about the outcome and I have been left an emotionally exhausted wreck, trying to get my head around it all!! But I loved the finished book and aim to try and work my way down Sheryl’s list of titles 🙂

What an amazing and gripping novel, it keeps you turning pages to find out what has happened.
Can history repeat itself?

A great thriller with lots of twists and turns! I have loved all of Sheryl Brownie’s books and this one was no exception. I’d really recommend it

Her First Child
This book had a good start and piqued my interest right off but then it slowed way down. I think it had a good storyline but seemed a bit repetitive especially with the cheating. (Chloe and husband and then Eve & Dom) Over all I’d give it a 2⭐️.

This thriller was a quick read and definitely kept me guessing! There were many unexpected twists and turns, along with unreliable narrators, and I'm still not sure I fully understand what happened!

Many thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the advanced copy of the book.

This book shines a light on the effects on an entire family after experiencing domestic abuse. A super sensitive subject but one I feel like the author handled very well. This could be a true story, all the characters are extremely relatable and you go through the whole rollercoaster of emotions with them throughout the book. My only negative was the lack of clarity surrounding some of the past events.

This is page-turner of a psychological suspense novel. It manages to be unputddownable while being filled with entirely unlikeable and bonkers characters. While I didn't like any of the characters and wanted to yell at them, I couldn't stop reading to figure out what was going on.