Keep Them Close by Sophie Flynn
She trusted a stranger with her secrets. Now she's paying the price.
Emily loves her four-year-old twin daughters. Like any frazzled mum, she spends her time wiping up spills, cooking their favourite meals and putting plasters on scraped knees, trying her best to be the perfect mum as well as keep her sanity.
Internet forum MumsOnline proves to be a lifeline in her darkest days, an anonymous place where she can voice the problems that she would never say in real life.
She finds a connection with fellow mum-of-twins, TwoIsTrouble, and soon, the internet friends are chatting daily. But when Emily tries to pull back, realising she has shared too much about the darkness in her past, she finds herself being stalked.
As Emily's history is exposed, it's clear that someone is using her secrets against her...and they will threaten everything Emily loves to destroy her perfect life.
A gripping domestic suspense thriller that asks if we really know who we are talking to online, with a twist ending that will make you gasp. Fans of T.M. Logan, Lisa Jewell and Gillian McAllister will love this unputdownable read.
About the author
Sophie is a Cotswolds based psychological thriller author with an MA in Creative Writing from Oxford Brookes. Her debut novel ALL MY LIES will be published by Simon & Schuster in April 2021.
Alongside writing, Sophie is the Head of Marketing at Jericho Writers. After being awarded a place at Swanwick Writers’ Summer School on the TopWrite scheme for young writers in 2017, Sophie began writing short fiction. She has since had many stories published and placed in competitions with organisations such as Writing Magazine and The Cheltenham Literature Festival.
When not writing, Sophie can be mostly found on muddy walks with her husband and rescue dog or disappearing to Cornwall whenever possible.
She is represented by Kate Nash of Kate Nash Literary Agency.
Sophie tweets from @sophielflynn.
Review
‘Keep Them Close’ is the story of Emily, a mum of twins under stress as her internet history has come back to haunt her. She turned to the mums forum for support after the birth of the twins and ended up befriending one woman and opened herself up to her, telling her secrets she hasn't even told her husband. Emily decides to deactivate her profile but now ‘Twois Trouble’ has found her on other social media and is determined to make her life hell!
I really enjoyed ‘Keep Them Close’ even though I couldn't relate to a lot of the problems as I don't have kids! I value my sleep too much 🤣 but Sophie managed to make all the topics relatable and authentic. It is an area that does need more publicity and it was clear that Sophie has done a lot of research on the topic. As someone who does suffer from anxiety and depression, I could emphasise with the main character and thought that aspect was done extremely well!
I loved the pacing of this one as it was broken up with Emily’s internet posts and this means the different branches of the narrative layered up very nicely indeed. I could see that the pacing and my speed of reading got more intense as Emily’s struggled more with her mental health. I flew through this book in one day and found it very engaging and engrossing. There are twists and turns aplenty and it will definitely keep you entertained!
Let me know if you pick it up!
