An unmissable thriller from the Sunday Times number one bestselling author of One Last Secret and Both Of You.
Lost. Missing. Murdered? And both her husbands are suspects…
Kylie Gillingham’s disappearance has gripped the nation: the woman with a shocking secret – she was a bigamist, married to two men at the same time – is missing, presumed dead. And both her husbands are suspects.
DC Clements knows the dark side of human nature and that love can make people do treacherous things; you can’t presume anything when it comes to crimes of the heart. While Kylie’s two husbands remain prime suspects, her sons won’t accept that she is dead. Until a body is found, this scandalous and sad case remains wide open.
Stacie Jones lives a quiet life in a small village, nursed by her father as she recovers from illness, shielded from any disquieting news of the outside world. But their reclusive life is about to be shattered.
How are these families linked, and can any of them ever rebuild their lives in the wake of tragedy?
Just Between Us had me absolutely gripped from the first page. This explosive thriller from million-copy bestseller Adele Parks examines what it is to be a family, and the dangerous lengths that people will go to for those they love.
With an impressive 22 novels under her belt, Parks knows how to tell a seriously compelling story. She takes us under her wing to weave effortlessly in and out of multiple perspectives. We see the novel’s disastrous events unfold through the eyes of Kylie’s two bereaved husbands, her confused stepsons, her pragmatic best friend Fiona, investigating DC Clements, and the mysterious Stacie Jones and her father. This would make for dizzying reading if not for Parks’ extremely careful, skillful plotting. Instead, the effect is a satisfyingly unrelenting impetus that leaves us scrambling to piece together clues in its wake.
Another standout feature for me was the novel’s pandemic setting. Most of the action happens under peak lockdown conditions in 2020, and Parks perfectly captures the strangeness and uncertainty of this time. Sinister and slightly surreal, yet always utterly believable, it forms the ideal backdrop for this thriller.
Just Between Us is a page-turner, but it’s also a thought-provoking exploration of social values – particularly the standards to which we hold women. Kylie well and truly transgresses the boundaries of what society expects from a ‘good’ wife and mother – but does she deserve her punishment? Parks leaves plenty of room for us to decide.
Just Between Us is technically a sequel to Both of You, continuing its characters’ trials where they were left off. However, Parks’ ingenious plotting makes this book just as fantastic as a standalone read. I came to it fresh and was not disappointed, although I can see how readers of Both of You would be rewarded. Whichever order you approach these, I expect you’ll need to make room on your TBR stack for Parks’ backlist.
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