I Let You Go: The Richard & Judy Bestseller
As seen:
By Clare Mackintosh
avg rating
1 review
Lose yourself in the sensational debut I Let You Go – the Sunday Times bestseller, No.1 ebook phenomenon and Richard & Judy Book Club pick.
A tragic accident. It all happened so quickly. She couldn’t have prevented it. Could she?
In a split second, Jenna Gray’s world descends into a nightmare. Her only hope of moving on is to walk away from everything she knows to start afresh. Desperate to escape, Jenna moves to a remote cottage on the Welsh coast, but she is haunted by her fears, her grief and her memories of a cruel November night that changed her life forever.
Slowly, Jenna begins to glimpse the potential for happiness in her future. But her past is about to catch up with her, and the consequences will be devastating . . .
If you can’t get I Let You Go out of your head, don’t miss Clare Mackintosh’s stunning new thrillers The Last Party, A Game of Lies and Other People’s Houses, featuring the unforgettable DC Ffion Morgan.
‘Compelling, with a killer twist’ Paula Hawkins
‘A masterclass in plotting . . . I could not put it down’ Jojo Moyes
‘Astonishingly good’ Lee Child
‘Chilling . . . I was hooked’ Rachel Abbott
‘Extraordinarily atmospheric’ Alex Marwood
TweetReviews
We all watched the YouTube video create by Clare specially for our book club where she answered some question that I'd sent her. We all enjoyed the video and found that it gave us a lot of extra background with regards the book and some of its elements.
Please be aware that there might be some spoilers in this review, do not continue to read this review unless you've either read the book or don't mind being spoilt!
The main element of this months discussion focused around how we mostly all fell for the big twist in the very middle of the book! We all loved how it was done, and even if we had slightly guessed at it we were still excited by it and wanted to know how Clare would work the rest of the book so that is kept our interest. We really should not have worried! There was so much more to come, and the real culprit of the crime isn't revealed until right at the end of the book.
The second half of the book was really creepy in contrast to the first half after we're introduced to Ian. We really enjoyed reading about how the relationship between Ian and his girlfriend/wife evolved. It really gave an excellent example of how an abuser can be so manipulative in order to keep their partner with them. The fact that we could see the relationship mature over a long time period made so much more realistic. It made everything that happened afterwards seem so completely believable and understandable in terms of how everyone reacted. Ian was so incredibly creepy as he isolated his wife from her friends and family. He even learnt from his mistakes in previous relationships in order to be a "better" abuser! We had a lot of discussion about how someone could have that amount of power over someone so easily.
We felt that the background Clare Mackintosh has as a police officer dealing with people like Ian and situations like a hit and run really came through in this book. It wasn't cold and factual but you could tell that the basis for the story was real. Having some chapters from the viewpoint of the police was interesting and just enough for us as lay people reading a thriller.
Our final thoughts were for the last part of the book and what that meant, thankfully Clare explained her reasoning in the video which settled our minds a great deal. We then wondered if Jenna would ever be happy given her past. We came to the conclusion that although the things that happened would always haunt her she would probably be happier now than she ever would have been before. We all liked Jenna as a character and felt that this ending was appropriate for her.
Overall we gave this book 9 out of 10.
