Title: The Babysitter

Author: Emma Curtis

Genre: Psychological Thriller

Publisher: Corvus

Publication Date: 12th October 2023

Rating: 4/5

Cover:

Book Summary:

Three women. Three secrets.

Claudia’s life imploded ten years ago when she was convicted of the murder of her child. Now she has done the unthinkable and confessed to manslaughter in order to be granted parole – her only hope of finding out what really happened to Tilly.

Sara is married to Joe, Claudia’s ex-husband, and they have a young child together. She finally has everything she ever wanted, but Claudia’s release threatens the perfect life she has created.

Anna was the babysitter who let Claudia and Joe down on day their daughter disappeared. Married with a child of her own, Claudia’s reappearance in her quiet cul-de-sac is an unwelcome surprise.

These three women are tied together in more ways than they realize. But only one of them is capable of killing.

Review:

A lost or missing child is a fairly common theme for a thriller, likely because it’s a situation that is, I imagine, almost impossible to bear. It is used in The Babysitter to great effect and I was desperate to find out what really happened to little Tilly Hartman. The story is told from the perspective of three women: Claudia, the mother jailed for her baby daughter’s murder, Sara, Claudia’s ex husband’s new wife and Anna, the woman who was supposed to be babysitting Tilly on the day she was snatched. As we uncover more about the secrets these women are hiding, a twisty and shocking picture of the events of Tilly’s abduction start to become more clear.

I was gripped by The Babysitter pretty much from the start. My sympathy was very much with Claudia from the beginning. She is released from prison, determined to find out the truth of her daughter’s disappearance but she is very much a broken shell of a woman – desperate and suffering immensely under the hatred thrown at her as a supposed child-killer. The story is paced well and had me thrown off by red herrings more than once. I found it totally addictive and scarily plausible. The Babysitter is tension-filled, unnerving, smart and sometimes heartbreaking. Highly recommend to any thriller fans – I’ll definitely be looking out for Emma Curtis’s next book!

Thank you so much to Anne Cater of Random Things Blog Tours for inviting me on this tour and organising it. I kindly received a copy of the book from the publisher. My review is entirely my own honest opinion.

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