Finished this last week and it's still on mind - an absolute belter ... if you haven't read it yet you need to! Valentina is a fabulously self assured debut - beautifully written, well structured and perfectly paced with great characters. S. E. Lynes has a real understanding about relationships and the changes in a woman's outlook and needs and dependencies when she has a baby, she knows what makes her characters tick, and how and why they connect. The tension was skilfully built and the story of complex emotions, relationships and betrayals was totally captivating. Really can't wait to read more from this author 4.5 stars Highly recommended

Valentina is a fantastic read, a brilliantly written novel. Loved it. Can't wait for more from this newly published author. Thanks for keeping me entertained.

This is an exceptional novel. There is something truly wonderful and special about it. It’s fair to say I loved this book. It sent chills down my spine and I couldn’t put it down. This is S E Lynes debut and I am so excited to see what else she has in store for us. Shona and Mikey are madly in love and expecting their first little bundle of joy. Being a responsible father-to-be Mikey finds himself a job working on the oil rigs off the coast of Scotland. Shona begrudgingly packs up her old life and her job, says goodbye to her friends and family and follows Mikey to deepest, darkest Aberdeenshire. It’s OK though, she has the most beautiful house to spend her days in. Mikey’s work rota means that he’s away two weeks out of four so it’s not long before loneliness starts to creep in. She has Isla, her baby daughter, but babies aren’t all that good at conversation! Thankfully she meets spirited Valentina. She’s full of life, charismatic and Shona’s saviour. But how well does Shona really know Valentina? Is she the answer to her prayers, or the epitome of her nightmares….? I love how Shona is written. A few chapters into the book and I felt I was sat in the pub chatting to a friend. That’s how well S E Lynes has written her, she became real to me. As I progressed through the book I wanted everything to turn out well for Shona. Does it? Well, you’ll have to read Valentina and find out for yourself. The plot is so very clever and quite intricate. It was a joy to read this book and I struggled to focus on anything else as it had my full attention. When I wasn’t reading, I was thinking about the characters and wondering what was going to happen next. I even explained the plot to my husband (I don’t think he could work out why I was explaining it to him) but it was because I wanted to talk about the book with someone! It really gets under your skin. This is a dark story about loneliness and what we accept to be the truth, whether it is or not. The one thing I will say, I was a touch disappointed by the closing chapters. I wanted a little more ‘omph’ but I still loved the story and the authors style. Would I recommend this book? Most definitely. A very deserving five out of five stars from me. It’s dark, totally compelling and full of shady characters. There’s a sense of foreboding you get from the very beginning which stays with you until the very end. Completely enticing, once you start reading you will struggle to stop. I loved it! As I said earlier, if this is the first offering from S E Lynes, I cannot wait to see what she has in store for us next. Many thanks to Rosalie Love at Blackbird Digital Books for providing me with a copy of Valentina: A Hauntingly Intelligent Psychological Thriller by S E Lynes in exchange for an honest review.

I absolutely loved this brilliant debut novel from S. E. Lynes. I was totally absorbed in the story, and found the whole thing to be one of the most beautifully written books I have ever read. Shona and Mikey are the married couple who appear to have it all. A fantastic cottage in a remote area of Scotland, a beautiful new born daughter, Isla, a great new job for Mikey and the prospect of making new friends and an exciting new life for Shona, a former journalist. Valentina is a young, carefree and exciting acquaintance of Shona's, who she meets by chance one day at Isla's nursery. A friendship blossoms, and the story begins. The use of 1st person narration which tells the tale from the perspectives of Shona and Valentina, really drew me in to their characters and I quickly felt as though I knew them both well. There were times throughout the book that I loved and loathed them both in equal measure, and when the ending finally exploded, I was left wanting more. A must read, and a very easy five stars.

Valentina by S.E. Lynes Narrated by Helen McAlpine, Tamsin Kennard When we meet city girl Shona she has been living with Mikey and their just months old baby girl in a very remote cabin, far away from her old job, friends, and family. Little did she know that as soon as they moved to this remote location that Mikey would be working two weeks on, two weeks off at an offshore location. But even when Mikey is on shore he's busy working and Shona is alone with her baby girl and her loneliness is going to overwhelm her. It it by chance, the first time Shona leaves her baby at a nursery for a few hours, that Shona meets wild and crazy, hippy-ish Valentina, who has a son the same age as Shona's baby girl. Valentina is the friend that Shona needed...or at least she first appears to be what Shona needed. But Valentina isn't very reliable, she's quick to take advantage of Shona's time and friendship, and she's very evasive at the oddest of times. Friendship with Valentina seems like a very bad idea to me and I felt sorry for her little baby. He seemed more like an accessory than someone Valentina loved which is probably why Valentina was so prone to foisting him off on Shona. But then I don't think much of Shona's decision making skills. After all, Mikey turned my stomach from the first time I met him while Shona is madly in love with the guy and all ready to jump him every time he came home from anywhere. So from all these bad decisions, plus exhaustion from caring for a baby (or two) all on her own most of the time, and missing all that she left behind when she met Mikey, Shona isn't in the best frame of mind. Guess what Shona, life is going to get a whole lot worse, take my word for it. The narration by both narrators is good and you can always count on a horribly bad time for the characters when Tamsin Kennard is narrating. Prepare for wild and crazy times and this time it's not in a suburb. Thank you to Bookouture Audio and NetGalley for this ARC.