In-Laws and Outlaws by Kate Fulford
Rating: 4.5 of 5 stars
Book Summary:
She knows what’s best for her son, and it’s not you.
Eve has an idiosyncratic relationship with the truth, is a borderline psychopath (according to her psychologist friend Claire), and has a rather colourful past. But her heart is in the right place. Having recently met Gideon everything seems, at last, to be working out rather well for her. Then he introduces her to his mother. Marjorie clearly believes that she knows what’s best for her son, and it’s definitely not Eve.
Over the next few months Eve struggles as Marjorie seems hell-bent on undermining her relationship with Gideon at every opportunity. Then, a chance meeting with someone very close to Marjorie confirms Eve’s worst fears – there are literally no lengths to which Marjorie will not go to get Eve out of her son’s life. Using her own ingenuity, and with help from some very unexpected quarters, Eve finds herself caught up in a very high stakes game indeed, in which there can be only one winner.
Book Review:
Lovely. Absolutely lovely. This is a book that drew me in from page one, and not too many books do, specially if I don’t already know and love the author.
From the outset I was feeling very positive about this book. I needed to know where exactly the story was going so I used to sneak even 5 minutes of free time into this book! I’m sure you guys must have felt like that about certain books too. It’s wonderful when that happens.
Eve is a strong, kind, beautiful woman. And she has borderline psychopathic tendencies. Her prospective mother-in-law Marjorie is a conniving, overbearing woman who is very attached to her son Gideon — Eve’s boyfriend. Gideon is absolutely oblivious to everything.
Small instances of Marjorie’s attempts to undermine Eve have left Eve very confused. Eve’s friend Claire thinks that Eve is projecting. For a long time, Eve herself is unsure about whether Marjorie is actually horrible, or if she’s reading too much into a series of unfortunate coincidences.
The story proceeds in a fairly fast paced fashion, with the reader always wanting more and wanting to know what’s next. Everything seems to be wrapping up neatly, but near the end, I was very eager to know how it would play out. Surely there was something to be said for the fact that we were going towards an impossible situation! There was no way for this to have a non-messy end.
But there was. It was beautifully wrapped up. It was amazing.
I am in love. And I want a sequel. Kate Fulford, are you listening?
*A review copy was provided to Oh Just Books by the publisher in exchange for an honest review*
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So delighted you loved the book!
Your commentary on the resolution is well observed – it’s very important to me that plots are well constructed and I spend a lot of time to get it right so it feels & works well for readers and characters alike.
There’s another in the works and, although not a sequel, if you like my style of writing, I promise you won’t be disappointed.
/ Kate
That's awesome, Kate! I'm glad you liked my review.
Even if its not a sequel, I'm sure a book you write will be very well constructed. I'd be more than happy to review your next book too 🙂