They All Fall Down by Cat Hogan

Length: 322 pages

Please note that the cover image leads to a universal Amazon buy link for the book

What they say: Ring-a-ring o’ rosie . . .
… Someone wants to play.
… Who’s not playing the game?
… Now Someone must pay.

Jen Harper likes to play it safe. She is settling into life on the outskirts of a sleepy fishing village with her little boy, Danny. Life by the sea – just how she wanted it.

When she meets Andy, she feels the time has come to put her baggage and the scars of the past behind her. Then she is introduced to Scott, Andy’s best friend, and is stung by his obvious disdain for her. Why is Scott so protective of his best friend? What is the dark secret that threatens all of them?

In her attempt to find answers, Jen must confront her demons and push her relationships to their limits. By digging up the past, she puts Danny and herself in danger. Will she succeed in uncovering the truth before they all fall down?

Raw and energetic, They All Fall Down is a fast-paced and addictive novel exploring the depths of flawed human nature, the thin line between love and obsession and the destructive nature of addiction.

The Review: Having met the lovely Cat Hogan a number of times before, I was very excited to get to this, which so many top author’s have lauded and recommended.

As you can see above the book is set in a fishing village and, actually before I go on I have to highly commend the author for an astoundingly vivid and stark setting, that had me daydreaming of the majesty of waves lashing against rocks. This was further punctuated on reading of Cat Hogan’s fabulous bio, which showed her love and affinity for the sea. From the start of the book I was happy out, with a read that at times turns away from the thriller genre I’d put it in, leaning more towards an irishy fiction one instead.  I’m not always a fan of books that are so irish in terms of the nuances and language (yes I do know where I’m from), and for a while struggled to connect with the villagers (some of them were very unlikable) but then the thriller part, the meeting of the baddie of the story, via one heck of a backstory, soon put time to that.

Jen moves into a new house with her gorgeous son Danny, who I adored. A prerequisite is that they move in with Andy, a friend of her Aunty Pat, who is recently deceased. Andy is a lovely character but unfortunately brings some baggage with him in the form of his extremely jealous best friend Scott, a rich playboy who thinks the world owes him something. Here we get some insight into an evil that is about, as he uses wealth and power to destroy all around him and I couldn’t wait to see where it all went. The climax was excellent and I was very excited to see that there was actually a sequel There was a Crooked Man (which is now on my Kindle!) All in all a book I really enjoyed.

Rating: 4/5

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