'Verity' - Colleen Hoover

This is a fast-paced book with a one- or two-day reading time. For me, the end or something similar to it was clear from quite early on, yet so many reviews I have read talk of how clever and unpredictable it was. The other reviewers cannot be familiar with the, just as you thought that the story is over a big bombshell will land type of story. When I first suspected the final plot twist, I was reminded of the excellent 80’s film ‘Jagged Edge’ which it proved was a good comparison.

The storyline itself has enormous potential throughout, our heroes Jeremy and Lowen (Low) are bought to live together while Low becomes the ghostwriter to the title character Verity who lives upstairs supposedly in a coma and has two books to complete. The sexual attraction between Jeremy and Low grows and grows but equally so do the strange sightings of Verity within the house with Jeremy's son Crew telling us that he had talked to mummy and waved to her, Low is convinced that she had felt Verity looking at her, which the medical people would say was impossible.

All the good in the book and it is good, what cannot be left unsaid is how sexually explicit it is, think ‘Fifty Shades’ but even more descriptive. The title character writes obsessively that great sex equals love and the thing that holds love together. We then read many times blow by blow what great sex is suggested to be with no filter. This is quite clever on the author's part as she is putting some distance between herself and the words as they are all Verity's words, she then adds distance again by saying these are not even Verity's words but those of Verity in character. For those who like shock and awe, you may well like this book. Ms. Hoover has decided she is going to author a very sexy book with the idea that the explicitness is a vital part of the plot and fits the narrative. It could be argued that a more subtle approach would have also fit the narrative and could have made the book sexier with the idea sometimes less is more and the imagination is more of a tease than just writing like your work is going to be in some top-shelf magazine placed next to some bare all pictures.

I understand why it is a bestseller but to deliver the story it did it could, should the author had wanted been done so much better and even sexier. She went for the money.

Mark out of ten - 7