It Could Have Been Her, Lisa Jewell

It Could Have Been Her opening lines: I liked the girl. She had a nice smile. She was friendly. I could tell she liked us.

My blurb:

Jane did not have the best start in life. Her parents were alcoholics, and her brother died of a drug addiction. She marries into wealth, not once, but twice, and now finds herself in her fifties, with no job, and a house in dire need of repair. She too needs a bit of repairing, and it comes to her via the way of a lost dog Hugo, and the mystery she unravels when taking him home. Her new life is going to start with healing the old one, and realizing just how close she came to being killed.

It Could Have Been Her

It was the night she almost died.

Jane Trevally, newly divorced and feeling a little lost, agrees to accompany a man she doesn’t know to his house in the darkest corner of Hampstead Heath. She’s offered a drink, goes in, and then – a scream and the sound of something falling upstairs – Jane senses she’s in a bad place. She runs.

Twenty five years later, Jane finds herself outside the same house, this time to return a small white dog who’s been found near her home in the country; a dog whose owner has just been reported missing.

A fleeting glimpse of a haunted looking woman through the window sends Jane on a mission to uncover the house’s secrets – secrets more terrifying than she could have ever imagined, especially when she realises it could have been her. . .

My verdict:

Lisa Jewell has a great way of creating various threads in a book that come together neatly at the end. This is a story one could never imagine, and yet seemingly so plausible at the same time. I can highly recommend you add this to your TBR pile.

About the Author:

Lisa Jewell’s first novel, Ralph’s Party, was published in 1999 and was the best-selling debut novel of the year. Since then she has published another twenty-three novels, most lately a number of dark psychological thrillers, including Then She Was Gone, The Family Upstairs and None of This is True. Lisa is a number one New York Times and Sunday Times author who has sold over ten million books worldwide and been published in more than thirty languages. She lives in north London with her husband, two daughters, Daisy, a Romanian rescue dog, and a mad orange cat called Ivy.

Publishing information:

Penguin Random House South Africa sent me this novel to review.

See the links below for blog posts I published on July 19:

• 2025: Designing Small Spaces
• 2021: Zha Jiang Mian
• 2020: Firewatching
• 2019: Porchetta
• 2017: Travel Apps And Do You Use Them?
• 2013: Savory
• 2012: Venison Pie With A Buttermilk Pastry Topping
• 2011: Calamari Risotto
• 2010: Gurnards With Scallops

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