The Mother-in-Law; Sally Hepworth

TITLE: The Mother-in-Law
AUTHOR:  Sally Hepworth

PUBLISHER:  St. Martin's Press - Macmillan Audio

PUB. YEAR: 2019

SETTING: Australia
FORMAT:  - audio (9+ hours)

RATING - 4/5

Diana Goodwin is the "mother-in-law" in this domestic thriller. She's rich, strong, confident, cold-hearted and aloof.  When she dies shortly after her husband, suicide is initially suspected but, the coroner's report indicates that foul play might have been involved.  Did Diana take her own life or was someone else involved?

Lucy had always longed for a special relationship with her mother-in-law. Her own mother died when she was very young.  Unfortunately, her 10 year relationship with Diana has been a struggle to say the least ever since she married Diana's son, Ollie.

Ollie loves his wife and his mother and realizes his mother can be difficult. Even his sister, Nettie and her husband Patrick have had their share of run-ins with Diana.

True, Diana just wasn't a warm and fuzzy individual and, yes, there were plenty of instances where one might want revenge, but, there is more to Diana than meets the eye. The story began with the police at Ollie and Lucy's door telling them Diana has died and that they think it might have been a suicide. She did have cancer but they were not expecting her to pass so quickly. I thought the story moved along at a nice pace and it wasn't at all predictable.  I like complex family dramas and this one made me wonder who really may have wanted Diana out the picture the most.  A well-crafted characters and story. I was happy I tried this one and will try other books by this author in the future. The audio was very good as well.