My biggest complaint with this book was that it takes so long before anything actually happens. Reading the back of the book I assumed the letter would be read in the beginning and the book would be the result of the letter. To my dismay the letter is not revealed until halfway through the book. The entire time I was reading the first half I was anxiously waiting to know what the letter was about and when it would come about. After reading the entire book I can see why she wrote it this way, but I wish it had been a bit more exciting to keep me interested.
I have to say that the ending of the book is why I gave it so many stars and I'm kind of disappointed that it ended so soon Just as I felt the story was really starting to take off it was suddenly over. ( )

Humour

This is a very well-written, cleverly plotted novel. It is something of a psychological thriller without being too tense; I certainly didn't see any of the twists or surprises coming. It raises some interesting ethical questions, as well as covering some quite traumatic incidents.

However I found the number of characters a bit overwhelming in the first few chapters. Then, even when I had managed to sort them out in my mind, none of them really got under my skin. Having said that, I did very much like the zany headmistress, and the middle, possibly autistic eight-year-old.

But the three main characters all feel too similar. One is obsessive about her house, one is rather immature and feels younger than she is; she's only just started seeing how much she has been living in the shadow of her cousin. The third main character is still suffering from a terrible, tragic loss twenty-seven years earlier, but I couldn't really grasp her as a person at all. Nor could I figure out how old she was meant to be - descriptions suggest that she's about eighty, but from the chronology she shouldn't have been more than mid-to-late sixties.

Still, it's a very readable book which I found hard to put down. So if you like women's fiction with a well-crafted plot and don't mind a large cast of somewhat indistinguishable characters, I would definitely recommend this.

Longer review: https://suesbookreviews.blogspot.com/2024/02/the-husbands-secret-by-liane-moriar... ( )

Interesting story. Good twists. No loose ends. ( )

The frazzled suburban housewives of Australia come to life perfectly here as they always do in Moriarty's hands. I find her books easy and fun to read and they seem realistic and outrageous at the same time. It's an amazing balance.

In my experience her books are page turners that are not taxing in the least but still satisfying. ( )