Just from the flimsy book synopsis alone, I should have realized there wasn’t much meat to this thriller. But I casually flipped through the book at the library, and this paragraph stood out and influenced my decision to borrow Second Life.
I realize with sudden clarity that we’re wearing masks, all of us, all the time. We’re presenting a face, a version of ourselves, to the world, to each other. We show a different face depending on who we’re with and what they expect of us. Even when we’re alone, it’s just another mask, the version of ourselves we’d prefer to be.
About Second Life
She loves her husband. She’s obsessed with a stranger. She’s a devoted mother. She’s prepared to lose everything. She knows what she’s doing. She’s out of control. She’s innocent. She’s guilty as sin. She’s living two lives.
She might lose both.
Synopsis from goodreads
My Review
The story starts with a woman, Julia, living a respectable life in London with her husband and son. She starts spiraling when she gets news of her sister’s murder in Paris.
When the local police seem at a standstill, Julia wades in looking for clues. Very soon, we come to know that her sister Kate was on shady online dating sites, and so, of course, Julia also goes online to track down the man who could have been meeting her on the night of the murder.
So far, so good, but Julia is such a naive idiot. She is a recovering alcoholic, and soon, she starts to get obsessed with the man who might have met her sister. She starts stalking him, meeting him, and soon puts herself in dangerous situations that no one with even half a brain would think a good idea.
And the sex, OMG, all the sex, there was just too much of it, not well written, and honestly, I felt so dirty reading all those parts. She embarks on an affair with her sister’s (likely) murderer and then comes home and is so distant with her husband and son. This book is what watching a train wreck in slow motion must look like.
Anyway, a massive middle portion of the book is devoted to the affair and the second life she is starting to lead. In places, it feels like she’s almost forgotten what her original intent was – finding her sister’s murderer.
The ending was unpredictable, which was good, but also lacklustre, and it felt like it came out of nowhere.
Altogether disappointing. Overly long for the story it tells, repetitive, and a protagonist so dim it’s impossible to empathize with. Do not recommend.
