The Other Mothers

I loved a lot about Katherine Faulkner’s newest release The Other Mothers. I loved that it kept me guessing up until the last chapter with a cast of characters that all felt suspicious yet grounded in reality.

The novel centers around Tash, a toddler mom and freelance journalist. As Tash begins to investigate the death of a local nanny, she befriends “the other mothers” in her son’s play group.

While the novel is a thriller, it also beautifully touches on the challenges of motherhood, marriage, and the desire to fit in. Additionally, Faulkner covers postpartum depression in this novel.

The book has dual POVs switching between Tash in the present and Sophie, the victim in the months leading up to her death. I loved the format but did occasionally wish for more from Sophie. There are some changes from Sophie towards the end that felt rushed and I was hoping would be explored more.

Overall, I think this is a wonderful and mature thriller!

Thanks to NetGalley for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.

Successfully got me out of my reading rut!

Not perfect, still have a few questions, but enough twists, turns, and suspicion to draw me into the story and make for an intense thriller!

(Rating 2.8/5) This book had so much potential. It was super slow burn though. I started reading and then had to switch to audio version because I wanted to see how it ended. Think of it like "mean girls" turn into adult "mean girls moms". Some parts of the book were unrealistic. The ending was a bit of a shocker. But because it was so slow throughout the book, overall I did not enjoy it. Ending made up for it though.

When I began reading The Other Mothers, I got a vibe of those tv shows/movies where the reader/watcher can already tell something is fishy and that was without the dual timelines. I don’t what it is, but I am rarely a fan of them, and it threw me while reading this book too. At the beginning there is Sophie and a woman named Tash. At first it doesn’t seem like there is anything that connects them, but the reader soon finds out that is not exactly true. Tash becomes friends with mothers in the playgroup her son attends, but it turns into something much bigger, and it becomes clear quite fast that Tash is in over her head. A death set the story in motion and a death ended the story, but in between was chaos. Quite frankly I wasn’t interested in the story, but so much. It was too much to keep up with and not much of it made sense. While I enjoyed reading the story, I found that I couldn’t concentrate well enough to piece things together. It was too messy for me. Too many characters with too many moving parts. I can do heavy storylines like this one, but only if the writer gives me enough to work with to follow along. I’m not sure what it is that made it seem like an appealing story, but the execution lacked. I’m honestly not sure how people could give this book 5 stars, but maybe they understand something I didn’t. In the end I cannot say I would recommend this book to any readers I know.

This new and deftly paced thriller about murder, class, and motherhood in an exclusive London community is written by the author of the critically acclaimed "twisty, fast-paced" (The Sunday Times, London) Greenwich Park. Over all, the book was worth it, and I really felt it, but I also tried to find it on other platforms too, but I didn't get it. I think this should get published on other online publishing platforms. so it will be easy for us to get the books.