In Justin’s suicide note, he says that Henry had “Such a strong sense of right and wrong. More than anyone else in that house Henry knew where the moral high ground should be and was constantly begging the grown-ups to try to find it” (407). Do you agree with Justin’s evaluation of Henry? Do you think Henry skirts the moral line so well because he understands where the moral high ground should be? Or do you think Justin is exaggerating here to help clear Henry’s name? I'm definitely an outlier here, many people have loved this one. I've been a fan of Jewell's for a long time, but her last two books just haven't been all that great for me. Hopefully I'll like the next one better. Do you think Rachel and Lucy will continue to be friends, or do you think their bond in common is too painful for them to maintain a relationship? I get that it's fiction, but some of the shit that occurred in this book would've been better suited for a cozy mystery. It was just TOO fictional if you know what I mean. I'm not a fan of an author aiming for some kind of mind-bending, literary masterpiece that can't execute a simple Google search to verify some basic information. If this book had a pic of a cat eating lasagna with a baddie standing in the window holding a vial of posion and was titled 2 Hot 2 Handle then I'd be like ight, this drama is kinda fun or whatever.

A terrific and engrossing continuation of this fascinatingly creepy, mysterious and oddly entertaining family saga. Q: Why did you decide to have the Lambs leave London? What intrigued you about showing them away from home? Other authors are at a ten out of ten, for me, and Lisa is a solid hundred.” —Gillian McAllister, The Sunday Times (London) bestselling author of Wrong Place Wrong Time Well, turns out Jewell had quite a bit left to say about the now-grown occupants of 16 Cheyne Walk. During her police interview, Lucy tells Detective Owusu that she “should have killed [Birdie]. If I had killed her, I would have been proud” (367). Does this change your perception of Lucy as a character?This sequel started with a dead body, as these thrillers often do, and the opening of a twenty year old mystery. But what this leads into is more and more family drama, multiple twisting subplots that eventually, over the course of time, wind together and paint a bigger picture.

First things first, I did not read book #1. However, I did read a super long spoiler review of it to get a grasp on wassup because I was mad confused at first. My rating does not reflect the fact I didn't read #1... so pls refrain from the "YoU nEeD tO rEaD tHe FiRsT oNe" comments, respectfully. A: They certainly did! Especially Phin. I really had no handle on Phin at all. He was an absolutely enigma in the first book. In particular, I had no set idea about his sexuality. I had always sort of assumed that he was gay, but it wasn’t until I started to write the scenes in Chicago that I found my way to who he really was, and by the end he had surprised me. I think he needed to be less ambiguous than Henry, to balance out that slipperiness of his nemesis. He needed to be solid and absolutely at one with himself. I was excited to get to the last scene which I knew I would write from his point of view, and to be inside his head for the first and only time. I liked him very much, more than I expected to. Henry surprised me too, by not being as malevolent as I’d imagined he was going to be. But as I say, there's still potential for him to go darker! Lisa Jewell has written a spellbinding conclusion to her family drama that is surprisingly tense in places, leaving me holding my breath, heart pounding. The characters are complex, as we expect them to be; the plot twisty and compelling; the denouement just perfect.

And as I told, the bones of a young woman found in Thames and another murder case in France may be linked to the Lamb siblings!

There are multiple timelines that are well defined and I felt such dread with the earlier timelines. As with the other book, there is physical, mental, and emotional abuse that is very distressing to read/hear. It was once we got away from the character of Henry that I really got into this story. I care so much for Lucy and her two clever kids. Marco is just the smartest thing and I loved his scenes. There are also new characters in this story that made an impression on me. At some point, I had to know what was going to happen despite all the disturbing things going on. This story won't appeal to everyone, just like the first book didn't appeal to everyone. But I enjoyed it and wouldn't mind seeing some of these characters again except that I know one of them remains as creepy and disturbing as ever. When Detective Owusu lets Henry go, Henry has a desire to be reunited with his family and go home. Were you surprised by Henry’s reaction here? What did you think Henry was going to do in this situation? I remembered the first book mostly although the details eluded me until this book reminded me, very well, of what exactly had happened in the first book. Because this book does such a good job of going over past events, I can see how someone could read this book and understand what is going on, more or less. But I think that the story has more meaning if you do read the first book before you read this one. It's not a pretty story, bad things happened in the past and they are happening in this book, too. I definitely recommend giving this a read if you’ve read The Family Upstairs. You might get a better feel for the characters that way.A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy. In this sequel to The Family Upstairs (2019), two siblings continue to deal with the fallout of their traumatic childhoods. From the #1 New York Times bestselling author Lisa Jewell comes an intricate and affecting novel about twisted marriages, fractured families, and deadly obsessions in this standalone sequel to the “brilliantly chilling” (Ruth Ware, New York Times bestselling author) The Family Upstairs . Do you think Henry will ever be able to live as his true self, without adopting anybody else’s personality traits? Why or why not?

There are several POVs and many mysteries to resolve, including the detective trying to solve the case, Rachel; a recently married jewelry designer, Lucy Lamb; who fled London 30 years ago; and her creepy brother, Henry, who, to put it mildly, has some issues. I found the mystery behind the remains intriguing, but the storyline that interested me the most was that of Rachel and her husband, Michael. Celebrating her forty-fifth birthday at her local pub, popular podcaster Alix Summer crosses paths with an unassuming woman called Josie Fair. Josie, it turns out, is also celebrating her forty-fifth birthday. They are, in fact, birthday twins. Josie’s life appears to be strange and complicated, and although Alix finds her unsettling, she can’t quite resist the temptation to keep making the podcast. Slowly she starts to realize that Josie has been hiding some very dark secrets, and before she knows it, Josie has inveigled her way into Alix’s life—and into her home.

This is slated as a standalone sequel, but if I hadn’t read The Family Upstairs before this, I’m not sure I would have been as invested in the plot or its characters.