Helen Fitzgerald – Keep Her Sweet @RandomTTours @OrendaBooks @FitzHelen #KeepHerSweet #RandomThingsTours #SharonBTB

Today I bring everyone my late blog post for Keep Her Sweet by Helen Fitzgerald. I do this review with my biggest apologies to Anne Cater and Orenda Books. Thanks to you both for my copy of the book to actually take part. These are my own honest opinions.

Desperate to enjoy their empty nest, Penny and Andeep downsize to the countryside, to forage, upcycle and fall in love again, only to be joined by their two twenty-something daughters, Asha and Camille.

Living on top of each other in a tiny house, with no way to make money, tensions simmer, and as Penny and Andeep focus increasingly on themselves, the girls become isolated, argumentative and violent.

When Asha injures Camille, a family therapist is called in, but she shrugs off the escalating violence between the sisters as a classic case of sibling rivalry … and the stress of the family move.

But this is not sibling rivalry. The sisters are in far too deep for that.

This is a murder, just waiting to happen…

Chilling, vicious and darkly funny, Keep Her Sweet is not just a tense, sinister psychological thriller, but a startling look at sister relationships and they bonds they share … or shatter.

Another Orenda published book by Helen Fitzgerald this time. I have read her other books and have enjoyed them all. Keep Her Sweet is her latest release, which I was so looking forward to read.

We are introduced to the Moloney-Singh family. Parents, Penny and Andeep planned to enjoy their new ’empty nest’. They downsized after their daughters left home. What they didn’t prepare for was both of them to fly back home…to a smaller nest than ever. With less room, tempers begin to rise and the tensions are increasing. Then the escalating violence spills over. A therapist is hired, Joy, a woman who has no idea just how fractured this family is. She finds herself caught up in the fires that the family consistently set that is racing to an outcome that noone ever wants to see.

Told from multiple perspectives, which serve to accelerate the suspense of the story which does crank up as the plot unfolds before your eyes. Keep Her Sweet is a book that I thought I had already knew how it would all go. Then I started reading and let me tell you, no, it’s not what I thought. This story is more shocking and so much more sinister than anything I expected. Alongside this there is such dark humour too. Which I appreciated and it made the book even more addictive to me.

The family are not all likeable people, in fact, I would go so far as to say only Camille is the closest to being normal. Asha, her sister is another story. A manipulative and vicious woman who uses Camille as a whipping board quite frequently. She is such a great hateful character.

Helen Fitzgerald has created such a dysfunctional family. The vile emotions are almost palpable as the rage, bitterness and fear pour of the pages. I was constantly changing my mind about them all. One minute I didn’t have a clue about the way their heads worked and the next I got it all.

Such skilful writing made this almost a hypnotic and compelling read. At times I almost felt that it was akin to a horror movie. The ones you have a cushion in front of your face but you know you need to keep watching. If only to see the terrible consequences that you feel in your gut will happen.

With themes of obsession, betrayal and addiction. This is one unique story of a family who is rapidly spiraling downhill. An intense, claustrophobic and addictive psychologal thriller that is so well written that you can’t stop reading…even though you know it’s going to end in some sort of tragedy!

Author Bio

Helen FitzGerald is the bestselling author of ten adult and young adult thrillers, including The Donor (2011) and The Cry (2013), which was longlisted for the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year, and adapted for a major BBC drama. Her 2019 dark-comedy thriller Worst Case Scenario was a Book of the Year in the Literary Review, Herald Scotland, Guardian and Daily Telegraph, shortlisted for the Theakston’s Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year, and won the CrimeFest Last Laugh Award. Her latest title Ash Mountain was published in 2020. Helen worked as a criminal justice social worker for over fifteen years. She grew up in Victoria, Australia, and now lives in Glasgow with her husband. Follow Helen on Twitter @FitzHelen