Review: The Child Next Door

The Child Next Door by Shalini Boland
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

My rating: 3.5 / 5

The child next door is a psychological thriller. And yes – you can be assured that there are twists, especially some good ones towards the end of the book.

Kirstie Rawlings hears some sounds on her baby monitor of two people talking of taking a baby and going away. She has a daughter who is near 6 months old, and she is terrified. She has had a daughter after a couple of miscarriages, and is extremely emotional at the thought of any danger to her. She rushes to check and finds that her child is safe however – so what is going on? While it seems like the voices she heard are from some other place, she does not know of any other baby in the vicinity. She remains tense for days after that, worried that either her daughter or some other baby is in danger.

In the absence of clear evidence, her husband Dom has his doubts if there is any real danger to their daughter. Kirstie’s friends and many others start feeling that she is losing control of herself.

The story and the writing is very good. The pace though is a letdown in parts. Though it starts very briskly, there is a section of the book in the middle where nothing much seems to be happening, and the book drags along with small incidents. While it serves the purpose of providing a deeper insight into the personalities of the principal characters, you would expect a thriller novel to move faster. It does pick up again towards the later part of the book, and the ending is interesting as well.

I hope to read more of her books shortly.


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