Felicity Lloyd – works as a glaciologist for the British Antarctic Survey. She is twenty-eight years old, beautiful, and is emotionally damaged by severe childhood trauma. Regularly based in Cambridge, England, she has accepted a two-year term position in the Antarctic to study glaciers and polar ice.  Her therapist, Joe Grant, does not think she should take this new position because her psyche is precarious and she often suffers from fugue blackouts, with no memory of the time she lost…

König Glacier

Joe Grant – a psychotherapist who has a tendency to become too close to his patients. In addition to his day job, Joe spends his nights watching out for the homeless people who reside in Cambridge. He befriends them and takes them food, etc.

Joe’s mother, Delilah, was quite an interesting character as well. She is overweight, has pink-dyed hair, and is a Detective Inspector with the Cambridge Police.

You always know that you are in for a thrilling ride when you read a book by Sharon Bolton. She is another one of those authors that I read automatically, without having to read the blurb first.

When it comes to settings, “The Split” delivered on two fronts. Firstly, one of the settings was one which I was completely unfamiliar with, so I learned a lot while reading. The inhospitable though coldly beautiful South Georgia Island locale added some unique atmosphere to the novel. The second setting, the university city of Cambridge, England, is one of my favourites. I’ve always wanted to visit and see it for myself.

Secondly, the protagonist, Felicity Lloyd, was an unreliable narrator. You know that if the protagonist is questioning their own actions that you’ll be doing double duty trying to figure out what is going on. I’m always up for a challenge.  I had great sympathy for Felicity as I was reading. She was afraid that she was going insane or suffering from early-onset dementia.  She had memory lapses, was sure that someone was in her house when she was at work who played tricks on her by moving her possessions about.  The character of Felicity’s therapist, Joe Grant, was also a sympathetic character, though he seemed weak at times.

As usual, the author has used short chapters which aids in the page-turning factor and moves the story along at a swift pace.

There was a twist in this book that came as an utter surprise to me, and I’m always delighted when that happens. As the ending neared, I found that there was one aspect of the plot that I found far-fetched which for me, detracted from the overall reading experience.  All in all, an absorbing thriller, but perhaps not my very favourite  by this author.  Recommended!This review was written voluntarily and my rating was in no way influenced by the fact that I received a complimentary digital copy of this novel from Minotaur Books (an imprint of St. Martin’s Press) via NetGalley.

Publication date: April 28, 2020    Publisher: Minotaur Books/St. Martin’s Press

ISBN: 9781250300058   ASIN: B07S6J6T4N     400 pages

Sharon (formerly S.J.) Bolton grew up in a cotton-mill town in Lancashire and had an eclectic early career which she is now rather embarrassed about. She gave it all up to become a mother and a writer. She is the author of the bestselling Lacey Flint series, as well as a number of stand-alone thrillers.

Her first novel, Sacrifice, was voted Best New Read by Amazon.uk, whilst her second, Awakening, won the 2010 Mary Higgins Clark award. In 2014, Lost, (UK title, Like This, For Ever) was named RT Magazine’s Best Contemporary Thriller in the US, and in France, Now You See Me won the Plume de Bronze. That same year, Sharon was awarded the CWA Dagger in the Library, for her entire body of work.

Follow Sharon Bolton on Twitter.