Book Review of ‘The Girl Upstairs’ by Georgina Lees

Description

How well do you know your neighbour?Would you trust them with your life?

I heard Emily before I saw her. The harsh smack of heels against cheap wooden floorboards. The loud phone calls. The incessant music.

I knew Emily before I met her. Discarded receipts in our communal hallway. Sticky leftovers in the shared food waste bin. Wine shop vouchers in the letterbox.

Now she’s gone missing, and I’m the only one who can find her. The only one who can save her.

Because I know her best, and I heard everything.

<a href="http://<a target="_blank" href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08WPQJTZJ/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=B08WPQJTZJ&linkCode=as2&tag=wordywitterin-21&linkId=de4e3ad9131743eec387687bd21c40b3">The Girl Upstairs: An absolutely gripping psychological thriller and debut novel with a jaw-dropping twist from a stunning new voice in crime fictionThe Girl Upstairs is a spine-tingling psychological thriller of grief and obsession that explores how lonely London can be and how sometimes it’s our neighbours who see us most, who know us best…

A must-read for fans of Lisa Jewell and Sarah Pinborough.

---

This book has received some really high praise from early reviewers, and quite rightly so!

Suzie’s world is small. For reasons which are slowly revealed, she exists alone in her one-bedroomed flat in London – an isolated woman in one of the world’s busiest cities. It’s because she spends so much time in her flat that she is so in-tune with her upstairs neighbour, Emily. Suzie knows which room Emily is in, who her guests are, and what she eats for dinner each night. But when Emily goes missing, does Suzie know enough to be able to track her down?

I really wasn’t sure whether I was going to engage with the characters when I started reading this. Suzie is nosey and sometimes unreasonable. She expects people to show her courtesy, and complains when they don’t. My teenage son would refer to her as ‘Karen’. But there’s a backstory here, and she quickly gained my sympathy. Then there’s Emily – noisy, inconsiderate, messy Emily – who stomps around without a thought for Suzie, seemingly unaware that the world doesn’t revolve around her. But again, there’s much more to her, and Lees completely won me over within the first fifty pages by showing us the flipside of both women’s lives.

Whilst following many of the tropes of the modern thriller, it ditches just as many, and leads up to a exhilarating ending. ‘The Girl Upstairs’ is written in a very conversational style, which makes it very accessible and a real page-turner. It would be a great book to recommend to anyone who’s struggling to get back into reading after a break, or for fans of romances who are looking for something with a little more meat on the bone.

<a href="http://<a target="_blank" href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08WPQJTZJ/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=B08WPQJTZJ&linkCode=as2&tag=wordywitterin-21&linkId=de4e3ad9131743eec387687bd21c40b3">The Girl Upstairs: An absolutely gripping psychological thriller and debut novel with a jaw-dropping twist from a stunning new voice in crime fiction‘The Girl Upstairs’ is to be published on 9th December 2021.

Thank you to NetGalley UK, Harper Collins UK and Georgina Lees for an ARC of this book in return for my honest review.