I Invited Her In by Adele Parks

I don’t read a lot of books that aren’t young adult, but when I come across one that sounds amazing, I can’t not pick it up. That was the case for me with I Invited Her In by Adele Parks. I’m honestly not even sure when I bought this book, but when I was going through my Kindle the one day, looking for something to read, I came across it, and I decided I was in the mood for a suspense/psychological thriller.

This one took me a few days to read, but it isn’t because I didn’t have interest in the story. Work was taking up quite a bit of time so I didn’t have as much time to devote to this book like I would have loved to. So it took me a little bit longer than usual.

Still, this was an interesting read. Although it’s supposedly suspense, I wouldn’t say it was all that suspenseful.

Melanie, one of the main characters in the book, gets a random e-mail from Abi, a woman that she was friends with in college. The two of them were kind of close, but they drifted apart and honestly never spoke again since. Melanie was happy living near London, settled in with her husband and children, while Melanie lived in the United States with her famous husband, while she herself became famous, too. So the e-mail had, of course, taken Melanie off guard.

“We all want to be better. None of us can really forgive ourselves for being human.”

So Melanie offers to let Abi come and stay with her for a while, until her messy divorce is finalized and she gets herself a place to stay. Abi takes her up on the offer, of course, and Melanie works hard to ensure that her life looks presentable – including her children and her marriage.

But Abi has other things in mind – at first, she is all to thrilled to be spending time with Melanie. But then, of course – she starts some flirting with Melanie’s husband, and when that doesn’t go anywhere, begins a relationship with Melanie’s teenage son.

While Melanie is in the dark about this for some time, she keeps trying to ensure that Abi is happy in her home. Melanie’s husband tries to encourage her to find her own place, but Abi is having none of it.

“I have a secret buried, like a stone in my shoe, not visible to the eye but always causing me discomfort.”

When Abi’s secret is comes to light – the relationship she is currently engaged in with Melanie’s son – Melanie feels as though she will go to great lengths to rectify the situation. However, Melanie has her own secret – one she doesn’t think that anyone but her could ever know. But what Melanie doesn’t realize is that Abi has a motivation behind her actions, and she is about to find out just what that motivation is.

I Invited Her In is a thrilling novel of suspense that focuses on friendship and what can happen when one friend is betrayed – and the secrets from the past that come to light because of that betrayal.

While I really was drawn into the story in this book, it wasn’t quite as suspenseful or thrilling as I had hoped it would be. To be honest, it was quite a bit more tame than I expected, which was a bit of a bummer, but still, I enjoyed the book.

There were a lot of parts of the book that kind of felt like they dragged on more than necessary – for example, the amount of time Melanie spends cleaning to make sure that the place looks great for Abi.

The characters were pretty well written and fleshed out – I enjoyed getting to know the two main characters – Abi and Melanie had such great personalities – of course Abi wasn’t exactly nice, and Melanie had secrets, so it was great to be able to see the stories unfold.

Speaking of characters, the book changed its point of view many times throughout the book – Melanie narrated some chapters, and some chapters were more about Abi. Every noe and again, Melanie’s husband would have chapters that were told from his point of view, as well. I found myself truly enjoying the way this really brought the story to life instead of just leaving it to the narration of a single character. It added something extra to the book.

I liked the whole plot of the book, although I guess I wish there had been some more twists and turns than there actually were. I feel like while a lot was happening in the book, not enough surprising events actually occurred to make this a thriller. That being said, it was a good book regardless, and that ending was different than I had expected.

I think I would definitely pick up more books by this author, to be honest. I mean, her writing style in I Invited Her In was good, and it kept my interested, that’s for sure – I just wish there were more twists and turns that weren’t really predictable.