The Family Remains: the gripping Sunday Times No. 1 bestseller (The Family Upstairs, 2)

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I really enjoyed the police investigation sections and thought those new characters were a fantastic addition. And Michael Raimes found murdered brutally at his house in France , the very same man was married with Lucy Lamb: one of the victims who has been raped and abused at the mad house! I try not to DNF books out of respect for the author’s hard work, but this book really tried my patience.

What are the similarities and differences in the ways Henry and Lucy Lamb deal with their past traumas? Several decades after the three adult bodies were found dead on the kitchen floor of the home at 16 Cheyne Walk, a bag of bones was discovered on the shores on The Thames River. The first storyline follows Henry Lamb aka Phineas Thomson as he attempts to find the real Phineas Thomsen for unspecified reasons in Chicago. It pains me to rate a Lisa Jewell novel this low but there is absolutely nothing about this book I feel good about. Jewell weaves her magic with her disturbed and unsettling storytelling, in which there are mysteries and surprising connections are made.She worked for the fashion chain Warehouse for three years as a PR assistant and then for Thomas Pink, the Jermyn Street shirt company for four years as a receptionist and PA. It’s been three years since “The Family Upstairs”, and it all came back to me as soon as I began reading “Remains”. Through Lucy’s narrative (and through Rachel’s, too), we get the picture of just how bleak an existence Lucy lived in France and how finally she is able to afford a house for her and Marco and Stella, her younger children. I'm obviously an outlier (what's new) but really this book just fell a part in the last 25% and I couldn't in good conscience give it anything higher than a one.

Q: You must have felt you knew the characters pretty well when you started writing this follow-up, but as you wrote, did they develop in any ways that surprised you? But to be honest, I think living with those questions would have been more satisfying than having to endure The Family Remains. So, DCI Owusu starts trying to put the pieces together of what happened all those years ago when people died and people disappeared from 16 Cheyne Walk. The characters are complex, as we expect them to be; the plot twisty and compelling; the denouement just perfect.I read Book 1 in this series a few years ago so some details weren’t as fresh in my mind as I would have liked, however, Lisa Jewell had me hooked and hanging on every word regardless. We become reacquainted with the Lamb family, Lucy, with her two children, Marco and Stella, her brother, Henry, and Libby, haunted by the trauma of their past. To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. If you’ve not yet read THE FAMILY UPSTAIRS, choose it for your next book club pick and discuss as a group how the story both functions as a sequel and stand-alone novel.

The 103 third parties who use cookies on this service do so for their purposes of displaying and measuring personalized ads, generating audience insights, and developing and improving products. A Police Inspector gets involved when a barrel of bones, connected to the house that Libby inherited.We get bird's eye views on the family's next steps and their dark turns as they continue to navigate their lives post-trauma during their teenage years. Rachel Gold makes stunning jewelry and is trying to get her business off the ground, with her father providing both moral and financial support when needed. For many years, Henry blaming himself for making Phin sick with a love potion, but when the two men reunite, Phin tells Henry, “I wasn’t ill from your love potion, Henry. When Phin goes missing, Lucy reaches out to his sister, Clemency, who brings up Phin and Henry’s complicated relationship. BUT book one has a good story and since this will completely spoil the first book I think it's better to read that first.