The Secretary by Renee Knight blog tour #bookreview @TransworldBooks @alisonbarrow

I’m thrilled to be joining the blog tour for The Secretary by Renee Knight on my blog today.

BLURB

Look around you. Who holds the most power in the room? Is it the one who speaks loudest, who looks the part, who has the most money, who commands the most respect?

Or perhaps it’s someone like Christine Butcher: a meek, overlooked figure, who silently bears witness as information is shared and secrets are whispered. Someone who quietly, perhaps even unwittingly, gathers together knowledge of the people she’s there to serve – the ones who don’t notice her, the ones who consider themselves to be important.

There’s a fine line between loyalty and obsession. And when someone like Christine Butcher is pushed to her limit, she might just become the most dangerous person in the room . . .

MY THOUGHTS

The Secretary is a tense psychological drama with a shocking conclusion that had me sitting up in my seat as I realised what was happening on the page. I haven’t read Renee Knight’s first novel Disclaimer, but now that I have read her latest one I will be bumping it up my TBR pile. If you’re thinking of hiring a personal assistant any time soon, this book may make you want to reconsider.

We meet Christine Butcher who becomes the secretary of Mina Appleton, a successful celebrity businesswoman who is very well respected in the public eye and in government as well. Mina soon takes over the family business from her father, who is also a member of the House of Lords. But Mina doesn’t quite share the same qualities and the values on which he built the business on, fairness and equality. As Christine is drawn into Mina’s luxurious world, she realises that she will do anything for her boss, including putting her work first before the needs of her own family and lying for her in court as well.

You really do get a sense of Christine’s obsession for her job and for making sure that everything is perfect for her boss. From the opening pages, I was kept on my toes as I tried to work out what was going to happen between Christine and Mina. There is a dark sense of foreboding throughout the book, and there is a real sense of imminent danger for both characters which kept me engrossed in the plot as I waited to find out what was going to happen.

Renee Knights writing quickly drew me into the story, and it does make for an addictive read. There is a slow build up to the main events which take place, but once the court case gets going and the true colours of Mina and Christine begin to come to the surface, the tension is turned up a notch. I loved the way how Renee Knight rounded everything up at the end of the novel, and it was very chilling.

This is a book with a small cast of characters, but both Mina and Christine make the plot so addictive. I just had this horrible feeling when I started that something was going to go very wrong for them both and this is what Renee gets you thinking about right from the first page.

Thank you to Anne Cater at Random Things Tours for inviting me to take part in the blog tour and to the publisher for sending me an advance review copy.

Publisher: Transworld

Publication date: 21st February 2019

Print length: 297 pages

If you would like to purchase The Secretary, you can do so by clicking on one of the following links below. 

Amazon UK  Kobo  Waterstones

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