Pieces of Her by Karin Slaughter

5th August 2018 Uncategorised

THE BLURB

What if the person you thought you knew best turns out to be someone you never knew at all?

Andrea Cooper knows everything about her mother Laura. She knows she’s spent her whole life in the small town of Gullaway Island; she knows she’s never had any more ambition than to live a quiet life as a pillar of the community; she knows she’s never kept a secret in her life.

But one day, a trip to the mall explodes into violence and Andrea suddenly sees a completely different side to Laura.

Twenty-four hours later, Laura is in hospital, shot by an intruder who’s spent thirty years trying to track her down. Now, Andrea must go on a desperate journey to follow the breadcrumbs of her mother’s past. If she can’t uncover the secrets hidden there, there may be no future for either of them…

PIECES OF HER – MY THOUGHTS

I loved the premise of the story and think that is it wonderfully written. The way that Slaughter effortless weaves between the past and present is fabulously done. At no point is the story confusing and every single element of it works to draw you in explain that nothing within Pieces of Her is black and white.

I loved Laura as a character. She starts off as interesting as her actions at the mall makes you wonder how this suburban mother can react in such a manner. However, it doesn’t stop there. As Laura’s story unfolds in the past, you realise the extent of the journey she has been on and realise that for her the line between right and wrong is blurred. It was Laura and her story that kept me turning the page.

Back in the present though, unfortunately I did not feel the same way about Andy. For me, she let the book down as I found her to be whiney and annoying. Her tepidness and hesitancy were frustrating to say the least, and I found her journey and development as a character to be far less believable than Laura’s.

As a result, I spent the first half of the book convincing myself not to give up and to keep going. I almost put it down for good so many times, but I am so glad that I didn’t as suddenly I was hooked and was up until 2am reading ‘just one more chapter’. Therefore, if you are like me you will need to persevere with this one, but you will be glad that you did.

Overall, I have to admit that I didn’t 100% love this one as I felt the second half was so much better than the first. That being said, it was a good solid summer read and once things kicked off in the past for Laura, I just couldn’t put it down as I had to know how it all ended.

Pieces of Her is currently available to buy on Amazon for £7.99 (affiliate link).