#BlogBlitz Willow Weeps by Louise Worthington

It's my turn on the BlogBlitz Willow Weeps by Louise Worthington.

About the Author

Born in Cheshire, England, Louise studied literature at the University of Essex. As a teenager she read until the small hours, enjoying the darker worlds conjured by Stephen King and Daphne du Maurier.

Louise is the author of the bestseller, Rachel's Garden, another psychological thriller and Distorted Days which Kirkus Review described as 'a formidable work.'  Her chilling blend of the lyrical and the dark is the most gripping in her thrillers and horror.

Follow @louiseworthing9 on Twitter, on Facebook, on Amazon, on Goodreads, Visit louiseworthington.co.uk, 

About the book

A secret is a lie in the making. A charming divorcee and his young daughter. The promise of a new life – together as a family, in an apartment in a historic building.  A fresh start – or the key to a nightmare?Who will Willow believe – a young offender, or the love of her life?

Page-turning and emotional, Willow Weeps is the gripping new thriller from the author of Rachel’s Garden and The Entrepreneur. 

Review

Willow seems to have a life on the brink of being almost perfect until she decides to move in with her boyfriend. Then her life is filled with messages, warnings from behind the veil - from her sister. Her dead sister. 

It's very much a story told by an unreliable narrator. There are many times when both the reader and Willow isn't aware how much she is actually experiencing and how much of it is imagined or a result of her internal narrative. 

Clearly I've been doing life wrong if being a mature woman, and being able to notice said maturity in myself, is equal to being a bit of a sociopath. Willow really isn't your average kind of character, although if you asked her she would be the first to deny any fault of hers, but secretly she would admire herself for being such a successful psycho.

This was a bit of a too many cooks in the kitchen kind of thing. Too many threads, many superfluous, and not enough of them coming together in a way that made sense from a story perspective. At times there seemed to be too many sub-plots and not enough focus on a main thread.

At the same time I wonder if perhaps Willow is a character the reader may misinterpret or rather interpret depending on how they read her. For me she was someone who was the danger, as opposed to her sensing some external danger courtesy of her dead sister. That's perhaps what was missing though, the conviction of writing a flawed main character and accepting she isn't just the protagonist, but also the antagonist of the story.

Buy Willow Weeps at Amazon Uk or go to Goodreads for any other retailer. Publisher : Red Escape Publishing pub date March 31, 2021. Buy at Amazon com.

#BlogTour Distorted Days by Louise Worthington

Today it's my turn on the BlogTour Distorted Days by Louise Worthington.

About the Author
Louise is the author of ‘Distorted Days’ and ‘Rachel’s Garden of Rooms.’ ‘The Entrepreneur’ will be available later in 2020. ‘The Thief’, a short story published by Park Publications, is available to download Louise Worthington's website.
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Before writing full time, Louise worked mainly as an English teacher after getting a degree in Literature and later, studying business and psychology at Masters level. Louise grew up in Cheshire and now resides in Shropshire.

Follow @louiseworthing9 on Twitter, on Facebook, on Amazon, on Goodreads,  Visit louiseworthington.co.uk, Buy Distorted Days

About the book
If she could speak to them, she would say they have exploded her heart, released firecrackers through her senses. She wishes she could call the police, the ambulance, the fire brigade, to arrest and anaesthetise and waterboard the bastards.

So what happens when your husband runs off with your best friend? When you discover the dead body of an old man halfway through your delivery round? When your house is burgled and you get beaten up? Doris, Andy and Colleen are about to find out. They’re also about to discover that you can find friendship and support in the oddest of places…

Heart-rending, humorous and above all authentic, Distorted Days is an exquisitely written account of the ways in which life can knock you off our feet – and how you can pick yourself up again. If you’ve experienced the fickleness of fortune, this is a book that you’ll never forget.

Review
The first few chapters seem a little confusing and disjointed, but stick with it, it appears to be more of a style choice. This story is about the way our lives become intertwined, especially when we need a helping hand or just someone who takes a moment of their day to show a little kindness.

Doris is comfortable in her life and her marriage until one day her hubby walks out the door to live with her best friend. Life as she knows it crumbles and so does she. She falls into a deep depression and stays there until a neighbour shows her some kindness.

Andy sees loneliness and neglect on a daily basis, as a delivery man he is often the only contact some of these lonely people have with the world. He has the best intentions, but that isn't always enough in this cruel society.

Colleen finds her life disrupted by a brutal event that makes her withdraw into a shell. The kind of shell that becomes a trap of her own making. In a strange way Andy and Doris both help Colleen to step back into life, despite their own setbacks.

It's a contemporary read about self-discovery and self-preservation. Worthington reminds us that there are three sides to every story. In this case the story of Doris takes up the majority of the book, but her husband John owns his version of their marriage and of course then there is the third version, which is somewhere in between.

It gives the whole narrative a completely different slant. The reader is so invested in protecting the betrayed woman and the person who has to rebuild her life entirely after her husband walks out, that it's easy to forget her voice isn't the only one.

Kudos to the author for the excellent description of Doris and her personal demon. The mantra that she recites or the author puts into play is a riveting way to show the pull, the excuses and repetitive draw when the crap hits the fan. You don't notice it at first, but eventually you realise what Worthington is doing.

At the heart of this story is the kindness that can be used to reach out and make connections. The kind of connections that can save the people who are one step away from giving up.

Buy Distorted Days at Amazon Uk or go to Goodreads for any other retailer. Publisher Paperback: Lulu.com pub date 29 Nov. 2019. Publisher eBook: PublishNation. Buy at Amazon com. Buy at Lulu.