The Other Mother

Author: Carol Goodman

Publisher: William Morrow Books

Release Date: March 27, 2018

Rating: 5 Stars

Reviewer: Jessica Higgins

Just when you think you might have things figured out, this story takes a different turn you would never have seen coming.

Daphne Marist has had a difficult time since her daughter Chloe was born. She tried as hard as she could to be a good mother but Post-Partum depression hit her hard making the difficult even more trying.  When she joins a mother’s support group, she meets Laurel Hobbes and they quickly connect and find they have a lot in common, including both having little girls named Chloe.  The more time they spend together the more alike they become until the day things go dangerously wrong and Daphne is left fleeing everything she knows with Chloe and heads to a new job in secret.  She has found a position working with her favorite author in her mansion that happens to be next to a mental asylum.  With the world trying to tell her she is crazy and the mental asylum just outside her window, Daphne begins to wonder what is real and what the voices in her head are telling her are real.

It took me a while to realize I hadn’t read anything by Carol Goodman before this, the writing and story were so good I just figured I had been reading her books for years. While this story was mostly about Daphne, it did have a few other viewpoints that greatly added to the story. Along with the viewpoints, the reader is exposed to diary entries that give a behind the scene look at what is happening between these characters and what has led them to be in their current situations.  Goodman did a fantastic job of weaving together several different story lines and tying them all up by the end of the book. Several of which I wouldn’t have guessed tied in with each other until the end of the book, which opened the path to see how clues were sprinkled throughout to show the connections I had missed.  This is something that rarely happens for me when reading a novel. I am usually very good at seeing all connections and figuring things out before they happen.  I am pleased to say that Goodman worked it out so beautifully I didn’t see it until it was all right in front of my face and the story was laid out for me to connect the dots and make an amazing picture.  I really wasn’t sure what to expect with this book but wound up thoroughly enjoying the entire story.  I would highly recommend this to readers that love suspense and mystery and want to be guessing until the very last page.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher. The views and opinions expressed within are my own.