Last summer, everyone was reading The Couple Next Door by Canadian author, Shari Lapena. I am all about Canadian authors, so, obviously, I jumped on the bandwagon. I was not incredibly impressed with the debut, but when I found out that Lapena’s sophomore novel had been released, I rushed to the library and put a hold on it. I was intrigued to see what her follow up would be like.
Now, because I am a dingbat, I ended up accidentally putting a hold on the audiobook version of this book. I don’t read (well, I suppose listen?) to a lot of audiobooks but I do find the idea of them intriguing. So, I signed out the audiobook, slid into my car and started listening.
This, I believe, was my first mistake in regards to this book. The audiobook was not a good format for this title.
To start, the voices were driving me crazy. I couldn’t handle the back and forth between the different characters and how the reader continuously tried to change or disguise her voice for different characters. I also felt consistently confused, probably because I had to start and stop this one every time I got in and out of my car. I didn’t feel any of the tension or build up that I was supposed to feel because I had to take myself out of the moment to go into work or into my house. This made me feel like there were a lot of inconsistencies in the text and I wasn’t sure if the characters were unreliable on purpose or if Lapena couldn’t keep her story straight.
After trying for a few weeks, I ended up returning the audiobook, however, I still wanted to know how the novel would end so I ended up purchasing the physical copy.
Overall, it just ended up being okay for me, but I am not sure if it was because of the actual story or because of the mess I created while trying to read it. Is it worth the read? Sure. Would I run out and purchase this book today? No.