Title: The Safe Place
Author: Anna Downes
Genre: Thriller
Rating: 3 out of 5
Emily is a mess.
Emily Proudman just lost her acting agent, her job, and her apartment in one miserable day.
Emily is desperate.
Scott Denny, a successful and charismatic CEO, has a problem that neither his business acumen nor vast wealth can fix. Until he meets Emily.
Emily is perfect.
Scott offers Emily a summer job as a housekeeper on his remote, beautiful French estate. Enchanted by his lovely wife Nina, and his eccentric young daughter, Aurelia, Emily falls headlong into this oasis of wine-soaked days by the pool. But soon Emily realizes that Scott and Nina are hiding dangerous secrets, and if she doesn’t play along, the consequences could be deadly.
It’s very difficult for me to read books when I don’t like any of the characters. And…I didn’t like any of these. Emily is selfish and naïve to point of being stupid, and I just can’t deal with that. Her loss of her job and her apartment was due to her own incompetence and willful denial of reality, so I didn’t feel sorry for her at all. Then she started crushing on her married boss, was absolutely awful to her mother, and I lost any remaining shred of liking I had for her.
Also: these people are crazy. Not a fan of the characters, so not a fan of the book, although the writing was solid.
Anna Downes was born and raised in the UK but now lives in Australia. The Safe Place is her debut novel.
(Galley courtesy of St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review.)
Tomorrow Is Another Day 