C. L. Taylor (1)

C.L. Taylor is one of my favourite authors and I always feel as though I'm in safe hands when I read one of her psychological thrillers. In Her Last Holiday we are transported to both Wales and Gozo as Fran tries to find out what happened to her sister, Jenna.

Jenna disappeared on a retreat in Gozo two years earlier. Was she murdered, did she commit suicide? It appears as though she disappeared into thin air. In a bid to find out what really happened and to try and shut up her unpleasant and show more overbearing mother, Fran books herself onto a retreat in Wales run by the same people, Tom and Kate.

First of all, I don't ever want to go on a retreat! Both of the ones in the book end up being quite dangerous places consisting of some rather dubious activities and some distinctly strange people. More than once I found myself grimacing at what was going on, and at the twists and turns taking place.

I loved Fran. She's one of those sorts of people who are quite blunt and who say exactly what they think but also she stands up for people and throws herself into all situations with a kind of gung-ho attitude. In fact, all of the author's characterisations are brilliant and I really feel she excels at nailing people's traits and foibles, pinning down exactly what makes them tick.

Her Last Holiday is another great read from Taylor. I was kept guessing and never knew which wellness retreat resident to trust. Fran meets some who were on the Gozo retreat. Do they know what happened to Jenna? I certainly couldn't work it out but I really enjoyed being along for the ride. Full of suspense and tension, with a compelling storyline and fascinating characters, I thought this was an excellent read. show less

I have always enjoyed C.L. Taylor's writing but I think Sleep is probably my favourite of her books so far. It's fair to say that this is not actually a sleep inducing story. In fact, I found myself staying awake that bit longer to read it.

The story begins with Anna Willis and her colleagues undertaking some training. On the way back there is a nasty accident and it obviously has a terrible effect on Anna. She finds herself struggling to sleep and struggling to adjust back to her life. To show more get away from it all she ends up taking a job on the Scottish island of Rum, working as a hotel receptionist/cleaner. A walking tour brings 7 guests to the island and what seemed like an idyllic escape becomes a nightmare for Anna as somebody seems to be determined to facilitate her death.

There are almost two separate stories here. I feel that Anna's time on Rum is quite separate to the events that went before and yet they are perfectly intertwined and kept me wondering how the past was connected to the present. I absolutely loved the setting. This is not a locked room mystery but a locked island mystery as a storm means that the guests, Anna and her boss, David, are trapped together with no way across the river and no means of communication. I have a bit of a thing about islands in fiction anyway, so that aspect worked really well for me.

Knowing that Anna was sleep deprived really made me wonder if she could be trusted. Was she unreliable or was someone really out to get her. And I obviously suspected all of the guests, just as Taylor wanted me to. The denouement, when it came, was unexpected and very clever.

I thought Sleep was a very absorbing story and a very twisty one. It's extremely atmospheric with the weather and the claustrophobia of the island being central to the plot. It's really a fabulous psychological thriller. show less

4.5 stars.

The Missing by C.L. Taylor is an incredibly fast-paced and suspenseful mystery about a missing fifteen year old and his mother's attempts to locate him.

Six months after their son Billy vanished without a trace, Claire Wilkinson and her husband Mark are making a another media appearance in hopes of uncovering new information. When their appeal is derailed by their nineteen year old Jake's drunken behavior, the family becomes even more fractured than before. Jake turns to drink to show more help him cope, his girlfriend, Kira Simmons, who lives with the family, loses herself in her college classes and Mark continues traveling for work. However, Claire begins experiencing inexplicable episodes of amnesia that while deeply troubling, do not distract her from her increasingly frantic efforts to locate Billy.

Written primarily from Claire's perspective, her anguish and worry are palpable as she remains convinced Billy will safely return home. In the aftermath of her first terrifying fugue state, she is of course very concerned about what happened to her, but she does not allow this to keep her doing everything possible to unearth new leads about Billy. Her desperation leads to some very questionable decisions that put her into potentially dangerous situations. Claire refuses to give up hope that Billy is alive and as she tries to find out the truth about what happened to her son, she gradually realizes that she does not know her loved ones as well as she thought.

The unfolding story is interspersed with message exchanges between two unknown people that take place during the months leading up to Billy's disappearance. While it is somewhat easy to surmise one of the authors of the messages is most likely Billy, the other person's identity remains shrouded in mystery. These messages offer a distressing snapshot of Billy's activities with this person and they also provide an intriguing peek into his strained relationships at home.

The Missing is an absolutely spellbinding mystery with a clever plot and a sympathetic yet increasingly unreliable narrator. C.L. Taylor brilliantly keeps readers guessing about whether or not Billy is alive and who might be responsible for his disappearance. The message exchanges are thought-provoking and provide fascinating insight into Billy's life in the months before he vanished. However, the truth about what happened to him is cunningly concealed until the very dramatic and positively stunning conclusion. I highly scintillating psychological thriller to fans of the genre. show less

A new C.L. Taylor book is always cause for celebration for me. I've never been disappointed. However, I think Strangers is quite possibly my favourite so far.

It's set around three characters: Alice, Gareth and Ursula. Alice is a divorced clothes shop manager and lives with her daughter, Emily, who encourages her to try dating again. However, events take a rather unusual turn when she meets up with a man. Gareth is a security guard at The Meads shopping centre. He lives with his mum who has show more dementia and doesn't have much of a life outside of his work and his home commitments. And Ursula is kind of adrift in her life after a terrible thing happened. Shoplifting makes her feel better somehow.

It's a testament to how good a writer Taylor is that she's taken three people with only the most tenuous of connections and written three individual stories about them which, for much of the book, don't cross over that much. And yet at the end of each character's chapter I didn't want to leave them behind, so engrossed was I in what was happening to them. It's particularly interesting when you consider how many strangers you come across in your day to day life and how random it all is.

I honestly didn't know how those three separate strands were going to come together and when they did it was a surprise. It was like being a fly on the wall of all of the lives contained within the pages, watching them as they go about their day to day business, dealing with all that life throws at them. Maybe it's my innate nosiness about what's going on behind closed doors that made this book so appealing.

I love the clever plotting that must have gone into this novel. It's a fast paced and exciting read with characters that I was thrilled by. I could have gone on reading about them but I realise the author needed to wind it up somewhere! Strangers is an absolutely brilliant read in every way and I loved it! show less