Review: After the Lie by Kerry Fisher

An addictive and gripping read about love, life and living a lie.
One little lie can make one big difference …
Lydia has the ‘right’ kind of friends, her children are at the ‘right’ kind of school and she’s married to the ‘right’ sort of man – kind, steady, reliable Mark. Her wedding business is flourishing and even though she is at loggerheads with her mother, she couldn’t ask for anything more from life.
But the truth is that Lydia has been lucky. She has been living a lie for years and Mark has no idea who he is really married to. But nothing lasts forever and the past has a funny way of catching up with the present. When the person who knows all of Lydia’s dark little secrets turns up at the school gates, his presence threatens to blow Lydia’s life apart.
What is Lydia’s terrible truth? Once the secret is out, you can’t put it back …

Shona's review 5 of 5 stars

For almost all of Lydia's life she has had this secret. A secret that isnt only hers to tell, and one that she has been forced to keep from everyone she has ever met, including her husband. But worse than that she has had to live with the guilt of how that secret has affected the live of her family. So when someone who knows her secret shows up in her life, her life begins to unravel.

Its easy to see how Lydia's secret has affected her life. The fact that she has spent so long trying to keep this secret from being discovered, but it has meant she has never really allowed anyone to get close to her. And unfortunately that means her husband too. I think if it had just been her secret to tell, she would have told Mark many years ago. But because she has lived with the guilt of what it has done to her parents too she is forced into this constant state of guilt and shame and she cant quite break free. In trying to distance herself and her family from Sean, without telling them why she certainly comes across as a tad crazy and whilst I may not agree with her choices, its easy to see how events could spiral they way they do. 

I spent half of the book feeling incredibly sorry for Lydia and the other half wanting to gently shake her. And almost all of the book I wanted to shake her mother, whilst i could understand wanting to protect a young Lydia and pushing to keep the secret, the manner in which it was hushed up and forever locked away just made the situation worse.

This is the first time I have read anything by Fisher so I had no idea what to expect of her writing, but I found it utterly gripping, I quite simply could not put this down. I will definitely be reading more of her work in the future.