The Epilogue is based in France where we discover is how the story ends and we have to read Clare's account of the events which leads to the disturbing scene of girls dancing and force feeding some guy until he chokes and has convulsions. So, it starts on a dark note preparing you for a twisted tale of unreliable characters with secrets and devious minds.

Clare was sent to live with her grandmother by her parents before she eventually moves on to the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. Her plan is to reinvent herself including her dark past. She wants nothing more than to blend in with the college experience studying art history. She needs to make money and finds a job at bar where she befriends her boss, Finn. It seems fortuitous that Clare should encounter a group of obvious "popular" wealthy students while working at the bar. She recognizes Tabitha from her art history class and is delighted when she is welcomed to spend time with her friends Samuel, Ava and Imogen. Eventually, what felt like a privilege being accepted into the group, it doesn't come without a cost as she discovers her initiation has a connection to the sordid past she thought she buried. The story is filled with suspense and foreboding as you wait for the story to unfold revealing sinister obsessions and alluring toxic characters.

Unfortunately, this story resonated as a familiar story for me which held my interest but felt like the characters needed more dimension. I'm rounding my review up to help balance the many 3 star reviews as it has potential.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Bantam Random House for providing access to this digital review copy. This review contains my personal, honest and unbiased opinions. ( )

Friends Forever


This book is a must-read for avid thriller fans who enjoy being swept away in a fast-paced story. Although I'm a bit late to the reviewing party, I thoroughly enjoyed it and would highly recommend it to fans of Lisa Jewel's work.

The story starts with a shocking event that sets the tone for the rest of the novel. Clare, who uses an alias, enrolls in a university in Edinburgh hoping to make new friends and start afresh. However, it's not as easy as she thought, and the people who want to befriend her are not the type she's interested in. That is, until she meets Tabitha, a charismatic girl, and her wealthy, carefree group of friends. They invite Clare to join their clique, but she soon realizes their motives are not entirely pure and are linked to her past.

As the story progresses, the author, Heather Darwent, skillfully keeps readers guessing with every revelation and event. Although Clare is initially quiet and seems to blend into her new group of friends, she's far from passive and has no idea what plans they're making behind her back. Every few pages present a new event that throws the previous ones into question, and while there is foreshadowing throughout the book, it's difficult to predict how the story will end. Darwent's writing is subtle, dropping hints and creating a cast of complex, unlikely-but-believable characters.

Overall, this book is a wild ride that's worth reading, even if it doesn't hold up under close scrutiny. I'm a new fan of Darwent's writing and would like to thank NetGalley and all those involved in granting me an advanced copy of this book. ( )

An interesting premise but the pace is slow and the characters, while interesting in a despicable way, seem a bit too cardboardy. Instead of the page-turning breathlessness usually found in a thriller, this one goes flat for pages on end and then there's a shocker followed by more flat. I would definitely read another book by the same author because I think she has talent, but this novel needs a few more rewrites. ( )

2.5⭐

The Things We Do to Our Friends by Heather Darwent tells the story of our protagonist Clare from when she was a newly enrolled student in the University of Edinburgh History of Art degree embarking on a new life away from Hull where she lived with her grandmother. Viewing her move to Edinburgh as an opportunity to become a new person she promptly moves into a new flat with two other students, finds a job working in a bar befriending her boss, Finn and strikes an unlikely friendship with the charismatic Tabitha and Tabitha’s group of friends (a group of people Clare privately compares with a shiver of sharks, “The Shiver” for short) whom she is drawn to, curious about and eager to fit in with.

As the story progresses we see Clare being drawn into The Shiver and groomed to participate in an ambitious venture that will push them in a direction that spells nothing but trouble. Clare, for her part, has a past that she intends to keep hidden but apparently, her new friend(s) are privy to some disturbing information which they do not fail to leverage in persuading her to join them in their project. Can Clare withstand the pressures exerted by her new “friends”? How far will Clare go to fit in? How far is too far before she breaks?

The story is narrated in the first person by Clare (a complicated and unreliable narrator) in the present day. As she shares her experiences with The Shivers during her University days with snippets from her present life, we are given a window into her psyche and it is not a pleasant picture. She is by no means as unassuming or clueless as she initially projects and we see the workings of a twisted mind as she navigates through toxic (to put it mildly!) friendships and manipulation. As she shares episodes from her past, it is evident that it is only a matter of time before she shows her true colors leading to an ending that is somewhat predictable and inevitable.

The prose is elegant and the author does an impressive job in developing the main characters (each unlikable in her/his own way) but the narrative is relatively slow-paced and somewhat disjointed, slightly repetitive and rather long-drawn. It took a while for me to engage with the characters and the story, losing interest a little after the halfway mark. I did not find the story as compelling as I had hoped. I usually enjoy character-driven stories but in this case, I did not find the character interesting enough despite her psychopathic tendencies and there really wasn’t much mystery or thrill to keep me hooked to the story. Dark and atmospheric, The Things We Do to Our Friends by Heather Darwent has a lot of promise but falls short in its execution.

Many thanks to Random House Publishing Group-Ballantine and NetGalley for the digital review copy. All opinions expressed in this review are my own. ( )

I went into this book blind and it was so much darker than I expected…which is winning in my eyes!

Meeting new friends in college is exciting, however, sometimes it can be horrifying. A group of friends start a business by helping married women see if their husbands are participating in activities they should not be.

Filled with juicy scandal, debauchery, and the end twist I didn’t see coming. This one will have you second guessing if you really know who your friends are.

4.5 stars ( )