Lexie Elliott

I Know What You Did Last Summer meets the French countryside in this exhilarating psychological suspense novel about a woman trapped by the bonds of friendship—perfect for fans of The Widow and The Woman in Cabin 10. One of RealSimple's and Cosmopolitan's Best Books of the Month Everyone has a secret... They were six university students from Oxford—friends and sometimes more than friends—spending an idyllic week together in a French farmhouse. It was supposed to be the perfect summer getaway...until they met Severine, the girl next door. But after a huge altercation on the last night of the holiday, Kate Channing knew nothing would ever be the same. There are some things you can't forgive. And there are some people you can't forget...like Severine, who was never seen again. A decade later, the case is reopened when Severine's body is found behind the farmhouse. Questioned along with her friends, Kate stands to lose everything she's worked so hard to achieve as suspicion mounts all around her. Desperate to resolve her unreliable memories and fearful she will be forever bound to the memory of the woman who still haunts her, Kate finds herself entangled within layers of deception with no one to set her free....

The French Girl

"Memories from her trip to France still haunt Kate Channing almost a decade after the fateful vacation. The image of her French neighbor, Severine, is as clear as if she had seen her yesterday--despite the fact that Severine went missing just as the vacation ended. And when the case is reopened, bringing with it resurfaced secrets, rekindled affections, and dangerous enemies, Kate wonders if she will ever be able to rid herself of the ghost of the haunting and silent young woman. As the investigation speeds forward and alliances can no longer be trusted, she begins to understand that the stakes of this game are her own survival"--

Ipek

Interesting premise that somewhat falls flat on execution.

I keep an eye out for books that might be similar to Donna Tartt's The Secret History, and more often than not they end up underwhelming me, to the point that I've started to think that if I were to reread The Secret History, I might not like it so much this time around. That's not how The French Girl was advertised, to be clear - rather, it seems that the publishers wanted to jump on the "X-Girl/Girl with the x" bandwagon that became massively popular following Gone Girl's success. 

However, the premise is definitely reminiscent of TSH - very bright young person from a lower socioeconomic background becomes part of a well-to-do group of friends, for a while things seem to go well, but then The Event happens and everything is changed. Off the top of my head, from among the books I've read in the past 3-4 years: Erin Kelly's The Poison Tree, Benjamin Wood's The Bellwether Revivals, Lucie Whitehouse's The House at Midnight and most recently, Tara Isabella Burton's Social Creature. (By the way, I keep calling these TSH-like novels but in all likelihood, there's probably a more prototypical work hiding from my sight somewhere back there. Still, TSH is old and famous enough.)

You can see how, in a novel constructed on this premise, more than a little depends on the believable and realistic depictions of interactions and relationships between human beings, not to mention the motivations characters have in themselves. It's not that The French Girl belongs to the "who the fuck does that, who the fuck is even like that" school of subpar characterization in novels. Broadly speaking, people think, feel and act in a people-like way in this book; one does not feel as if there is something fundamentally awry about the way the author perceives and processes the world. Having said that, there were a lot of instances where the characters acted in a particular way, with all contextual evidence suggesting such behaviour could only correspond to a certain set of motivations, and then it turned out that no, in fact the reason why was something else altogether. I am not talking about red herrings or misdirection here; I am talking more about what would have been foreshadowing(s) but for the haphazard constructions. (view spoiler)[ My biggest gripe would be Tom’s secret infatuation with Kate, and the way it develops, just so normally – with all the signs indicating that something else might be boiling below the surface, that something about Tom might just reveal itself as the final twist of the plot… No, they end up happily ever after, with twin boys. Mazel tov,  (hide spoiler)] but that makes for a disjointed reading experience. A lot of guns hanging on walls, with none of them going off in the second or the third act – Modan’s antsy behavior, Seb getting all weird re: and around Caro; I mean, misdirection in a crime novel should not mean “all this strange stuff happening thrown around here and there”. 

Whatever, it could be a lot tighter. And the murder, the central event around which the plot is constructed, could be a little more interesting. As it was, the mental image of Severine that I am left with is a piece of leather left to dry out in the sun, perhaps with some thin wisps of smoke rising from it. 

 (view spoiler)[While I am at it, the apparition, or Severine's "ghost" which appears to Kate from time to time...  (hide spoiler)] I guess this is one of those things which, if experienced in real life, feel unspeakably profound and meaningful and symbolic whereas found in the pages of a book, or at least of a contemporary psychological thriller, turn stale and unimpressive. 

So, to conclude - I had a good time in the process of reading the book, perhaps up until the %90-95 mark, despite the quibbles I had, because (a) the story had momentum, which didn't let me focus on those quibbles and (b) the book was written in a very serviceable language, generally speaking nobody spoke out of character, no awkward metaphors that particularly stood out, etc etc.. However. In the last 5 percent of the novel, I realized that no last-minute twist or explanation was on its way to either work out the kinks or make the underwhelming sequence of events interesting in any way. And now that I’m finished with the book and its immediate effect is worn off, all I can think of is the things I’ve recounted in the paragraph above. So if you read fast and then don’t look back, this might be the book for you.

Leonie

Jessica 

Blog | Twitter | Instagram | As a note, an e-galley of this novel was sent to me via Edelweiss by the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not effect my opinions in any way.

Review also found here. 

Just a quick question before I start reviewing the book it-self: Is anyone else flinching at the complaints of the title? Oh-My-God, it has the word "Girl" in it! Gone Girl! Girl on the Train! The Good Girl! The French Girl! It's almost like it's a mystery novel about a--gasp--young woman. However will we survive the use of a word that is entirely relevant to the plot!? Are we going to lift our noses at the use of the word 
  The
, next? No? Double gasp. I didn't think so.

All in good fun, kids! My sarcasm is all in good fun! I do wish they had used the original/working title of The French Girl--The Mademoiselle Next Door, it was very catchy. For the most part, I just cannot wrap my head around people just latching negative attention on the use of one word in the title. That's just me. The book in question would have been phenomenal with any title. It was bleak. It was a dreary mystery. There's this charge to the book that will electrify thriller lovers because of its dishy-but-subtle prose. I adored the entire premise and the manner in which the main mystery unfolded.

I love an old fashioned whodunnit. I love a story of friendships and secrets and one massive event that lingers in the background. I love conflict and most of all, I love how the past doesn't always stay buried.

Literally.

So, it should come as no shock that The French Girl is one of my favourite fictional releases this year. Although the genre is quite well crowded, and some tropes and twists used in this specific book can be viewed as predictable, Lexie Elliott brings to life characters such as Kate, Tom, Caro, Lara, Seb, Alina and Alain. You get to know them in a way that is strangely intimate but still rather... from afar. I rather like that when it comes to mysteries. You feel like you know someone but at the same time you don't.

Perfect for fans of (you guessed it) Gillian Flynn, Megan Abbott, Paula Hawkins and Mary Kubica, The French Girl follows the secretive nature of one group of friends' trip to France--ten years later, as a case reopens and the body of one long-since missing girl is found. Suddenly, the past is colliding with the present and everyone is a suspect in the death of the young girl.

I appreciated the dynamics of the central characters and how their pasts had tangled up. It's always an interesting story to see old friends coming back together for two different reasons. It's even more fun to see old relationships develop or be closed off and for new ones to take form. And even though the novel had its flickers of romance between characters in the past and present, the biggest focus was the case at hand.

I really just appreciated the way everything unfolded. Of the two suspects I had throughout the novel, I can't say I was altogether shocked at who was the killer. I was, however, surprised at how the rest of it unfolded and what almost happened. It was very fast paced and intelligent; there was a serious chill and bite to the reveal and the aftermath. Lexie Elliott knows how to tell a story.

Although a lot of the central questions were answered--I had a lot more that I truly wanted to know.

 How--exactly--did Severine die? Why did she seem to be haunting Kate, of all the others? Was she truly a figment of her imagination, despite being (spoiler) innocent in Severine's death? And why is she still with her, even after the killer is revealed? Why did we learn so little about Theo, even if he was dead before the novel began, when he seemed to be such a huge part of the past? Why did Caro approach Kate at the end of the novel--and what was it she wanted to to say? 


At the same time, I'm rather appreciative of the lingering questions because it really got the wheels in my head turning with possibilities. The French Girl lulled me into a tense sort of comfort when it came to the conclusion and I do fancy that. Elliott crafted a story that will surely hum at the back of my mind for months after I finished it and for some reason, I'm quite okay with this.

In short, The French Girl really was a fun thriller to dive into. I can definitely see it getting the big-or-small-screen treatment in the future because the overall image that Elliott provides in her prose is a good mix of vivid and complex; you can see it come to life from its pages and it would make for a perfect adaptation in the future.

The French Girl

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