Random House Books for Young Readers The Couple Next Door

One of the worst, if the worst book I have ever read. I am at a loss how this book has received any five star reviews. I wouldn’t give it any if I could. It’s written in a very immature way. In fact my 16 year old could do better.I read the first two chapters and was struck by the repetitive mention of the characters names and the poor storyline. I decided to read the reviews on Amazon to see if it was just me. It’s not of course. However I thought I’d give it another go. More annoying now is the characters are suddenly being referred to as “the mother” “the father” “the parents”. It feels as though the author is in the room watching: “Marco sits down on the sofa” “Anne looks up” “Marco appears at the bedroom door” “Anne sits immobile” I hate the style of the story telling, the immaturity to the extent that I’m not wasting any more of my precious time reading it! It’s going straight in the bin: I can’t bear to see it on my bookcase!

One of the worst books it has been my misfortune to read. A Book Group choice so I persevered but it was indeed a struggle.A jumble of every possible theme, no cliche was left unused, no turn of phrase too banal to be employed.Life is truly too short to waste time on a book like this.

Bought this for my daughter as it was recommended to her, so I thought I would give it a go. Wish I hadn't bothered.The writing is simplistic, and whilst I occasionally like an easy read, this was just annoying in its lack of real description. Considering a baby has just gone missing, the book never once made me feel the horror or distress of this. All the characters were unlikeable stereotypes; the uber bitch; the evil step father etc.The plot twists just felt stale and highly implausible and the ending was just awful. May as well have just had them waking up in the shower and realising it had all just been a dream.... I do not recommend; even if you want an easy read to devour in one sitting, there are much better books out there.

I hate to complain about books but my god, I don’t know if it’s because I’ve read like every crime fiction novel under the sun and this was new but I don’t know why it’s a best seller! 5 or so chapters in and still on the bloody same scene from the beginning, it is slow and the reading age is very low and writing is boring. Hate to say it but was a painful read until the end. Anddd was very predictable, you can see it coming from a mile away long before being anywhere near the end.

I had high hopes for this book but that’s all they were I don’t know how it got so many stars. I didn’t warn to any of the characters the father was selfish throughout the mother was Dippy with no backbone the detective was repetitive (didn’t meant that to rhyme lol ) but yes all in all very poorly written.I read books all the time and I saw the twist coming a few chapters in so I wasn’t shocked and I honestly just wanted to get to the end and not in a good way.I feel duped by the good reviews as I found it boring and written poorly.