The First Wife: A moving psychological thriller with a twist Paperback – 15 Sept. 2011

I have read all of Barr's novels and enjoyed this one as much as any of the others. I love her themes of disturbed childhoods, and problematic mother/parenthood. She manages them well, with pragmatism and without sentimentality. There is real pathos but it's not a lugubrious novel at all.The plot is pleasantly twisty, as you would expect from Barr; the characters real enough to accept, including the fallible central character, a young woman with very painful 'parenting' behind her. This is another dual narrative, and, again as you would expect from Barr, the details of place, food, clothes and just 'life' are what makes the novel so easy, and satisfying, to read.Make sure you have guaranteed peace for an hour or two about 50 pages from the end, so that you have an outside chance of finishing it without being disturbed......

Started off a little slow, but once it picked up it was addictive! Exciting and different, could be open to a follow up book!

This book started well, with enough intrigue suggested to keep me reading. The middle section dragged somewhat. Descriptions of two people who are blissfully happy together are unfortunately not riveting, or not to me anyway! It is a reasonably good read for the beach, or some other time and location when a not too demanding, instantly forgettable novel is called for. I have enjoyed other Emily Barr novels much more, partly because they have given a good sense of their locations. I did not get much of a 'feel' of being in Cornwall or of Barcelona. Somehow the tone of the writing was childish, but perhaps that was deliberate on the author's part, seeing as the protagonist was young and unworldly. The subplot concerning Jack held my interest more than the main plot, but then he became almost a cipher during the denouement.

If you've never read an Emily Barr novel perhaps you ought to begin with this. She writes wittily, intelligently and with pace. There are some true nuggets among her paragraphs - when you stumble upon them you will know.This psychological thriller is a real page turner and keeps you guessing .It arrived exactly as described and came promptly through the post

I really liked the first half of the book but as soon as the main character got to Barcelona everything kicked off really fast. The man you thought was good turned out to be really evil but there were very few warning signs before she went away so it seemed like the author had rushed the story to make it suddenly exciting which I thought was a bit of a let down. Also I'm not really sure why the character Jack was mentioned at all in this book - when you are first introduced to his story you expect it to link with Lily's story quite quickly, but he actually doesn't meet her until quite near the end. The same plot and storyline could have happened without him so his relevance did confuse me. Otherwise I really enjoyed it

I really enjoyed this book and couldn't put it down. One of Emily Barr's best novels by far. The characters were well written, with just the right amount of twists and suspense. I really felt for the character of Lily, she stood off the page from the first chapter and I had to finish the book in 2 days I was so absorbed! Another good read by Emily Barr.

I really did enjoy this book. Some of it was predictable but equally some of it wasn't. At one point, I couldn't stop reading it on my kindle. It was an unputdownable page turner for me!

A good easy read with a twist towards the end. Really enjoyable

I've spent this last week reading Emily Barr books after thinking one sounded interesting, now I'm hooked.I really enjoyed this book, yes, it's unbelievable which I don't usually like, but also fast paced and interesting. Again, many un-predictable twists and turns made for a fantastic read.Ultimate chick lit with some thrills thrown in!

Emily Barr exploite sans fin le thème de la disparition volontaire, avec une variante dans ce cas puisque la disparue n'est pas la narratrice. Elle a fait beaucoup mieux avec ce titre qu'avec les derniers qui étaient vraiment répétitifs, et barbants.Ca se lit facilement, c'est déjà ça. La fin est un peu irritante, je n'en dis pas plus pour ne pas casser le mystère pour les futurs lecteurs.

Emily Barr's books are a sure bet and she hasn't failed so far. The plot takes you in and before you know it you're reading the last page.

Agréable à lire, comme d'habitude. Pour moi depuis Backpack et son deuxième livre elle n'a plus atteint le même niveau. Je continue quand-même à collectionner ses livres.

It took me about 3 chapters to really get hooked on this storyline, but once hooked...you are hooked! I read from 1a.m. to 5a.m to finish the twists ......going to work was tough haha but well worth the deprivation.