The Perfect Stranger

Our Review

Initially I was too busy to read more than a few pages of this book a day so it took me a while to get into it. Once I had time to read more than a few pages it became the kind of book you don’t want to put down.

Leah is trying to make a new life for herself in rural Pennsylvania with her old friend Emmy. She is having some trouble adjusting to the quiet nature of life outside of the city.

“Other sounds, more familiar now: the creak of the old mattress, crickets, a howl as the wind funnelled through the valley I lived in, a whisper in the night. You are her.”

Emmy returned to Leah’s life at exactly the right time. Leah was being threatened with a potential lawsuit over a newspaper article she had written and she had been ‘advised’ to quit her job.

Then someone who looks like Leah, Bethany Jarvis, is found badly beaten by a lake near their home and Leah realises she hasn’t heard from Emmy for days.

Leah and Emmy have differing approaches to how they live their lives. Emmy is clearly impulsive, transient and gets bored easily. Leah, on the other hand, prefers to make plans and weigh up a situation and other people.

Leah has a full- time job as a teacher at a local school and Emma works nights as a cleaner at a motel so they don’t tend to see a lot of each other. Sometimes Leah only knows Emmy is about because she can hear her with her boyfriend Jim. Their infrequent contact with each other is why it takes Leah so long to realize Emmy is missing.

Leah is on her way to work when Bethany Jarvis is found badly beaten and then later find out that Davis Cobbs, the school coach, has been arrested.

“Davis Cobb was the reason I’d begun leaving my phone on silent at night. I ignored his calls every time they came through – always after eleven P.M, always after I assumed he’d been down at the bar and was walking back home. Always the same thing…

He’d offered a drink at the nearest bar – he had a ring on his finger, it was the middle of the day, you can follow me in your car. It seemed like a friendly welcome-to-town-offer. He seemed like a lot of things – until he showed up at my door one night.”

Then he began emailing her and leaving her voicemails all the time which she always deleted.

Leah is questioned by the police about the incidents between her and the coach and shortly afterwards she tells them about Emmy being missing. But who is Emmy? Leah is sure she is a victim but the police aren’t so sure, in fact they aren’t sure she exists at all.

And why does Leah get the feeling she is being stalked?

This was definitely worth reading. The characters were well thought out, the story was full of suspense, and I was kept guessing right until the very end.

 

Our Final Rating...

Mon, 27th February 2017