The Widow by Fiona Barton

Author : Fiona Barton
Title : The Widow
Published : 01/09/2016
Pages: 416
Genre : Mystery Thriller
Publisher : Transworld

     Staring from the front page of every newspaper, accused of a terrible crime. But what about her: the woman who grips his arm on the courtroom stairs - the wife who stands by him? Jean Taylor's life was blissfully ordinary. Nice house, nice husband. Glen was all she'd ever wanted: her Prince Charming. Until he became that man accused, that monster on the front page. Jean was married to a man everyone thought capable of unimaginable evil. But now Glen is dead and she's alone for the first time, free to tell her story on her own terms. Jean Taylor is going to tell us what she knows.'

     I'm always on the lookout for the next great mystery or psychological thriller, and I had seen this book on the shelves of the bookstore more than once. So the last time I was there I decided to take a look and see if this could be the next one to grab me and keep me there till the last page. As you can tell from the blurb the author decides to take a different approach when it comes to this book. Many times in books and in t.v we have seen the desperate search for a killer or for that matter the latest trial of the century as our killer face justice for what they have done. It is not too often we see the story of there family's. The people that everyone likes to vilify along with whoever actually committed the crime. How could they not know what there loved ones where up to? 

     Despite the title of the book, throughout the story, we get to delve into the viewpoint of several different people involved in the disappearance of a young girl. From the widow her self to the reporter desperate to get to the real truth of what took place, we get an intimate look at how a crime can spread out like cracks in a window pane and effect so many more people. With an amazingly real touch, the author brings home the true mental effects and torture such events can take on the human soul. When it comes to those we love and hold dear are we in fact too often wearing blinks to there true nature. Jean personifies this question she does her best to be everything to her husband, choosing not to see the worst in him, how when someone tries's to control you there motives could never be pure.

     This for me this held within its pages everything I look for in a psychological thriller. The author manages to give you so much within these pages to work with. The widow her self is someone I felt was never quite giving away everything she knew. And within each visit with her, you have to make a choice as to how much you have to take what she says with a grain of salt. It goes to show what a great writer can do to manipulate their readers to just the point of tipping there hand. Adding in the point of view of the journalist also helps with our own questions of who this woman really is. It makes the reader feel not so alone in our doubts as to how much a person can know. I felt that she managed to tackle a lot of questions that we have all wondered about when these sort of stories come up on the news. They are those nagging thoughts when you read the detail about how a man, as it is so often is the cases, Has committed a crime of this nature and the woman who has spent her life with them. Switching perspective and time periods helps to move the plot along and build the tension. It also allows us accesses to parts of the story that a single narrative would others wise not allow us to know. 

     Overall this book lived up to everything I hoped it would. It dealt me a good solid look into the untold world of the family's who are left behind. It adds layer on layer to a plot that kept me ever chasing that last page and the answer to a question I had since I started the first page. Who is Jean and how much did she really know?