The Marriage Trap by Sheryl Browne #bookreview #TheMarriageTrap @SherylBrowne @Bookouture #NetGalley

My husband has been keeping secrets for a long time. He thinks I don’t know what he does outside of this house. But I know everything… 
Karla watches silently as Jason hurriedly packs his belongings into a suitcase. She knows that her stillness is unnerving him as she watches his every move from the doorway of their bedroom. 
Clothes are screwed up and packed into the case, along with a watch she bought him for his last birthday and his precious laptop. He takes everything from his bedside table. Everything except the framed wedding photo, which now stands alone. Karla strains to see the smiling faces in the photo. If only she knew then what she knows now. 
‘I’ve fallen in love with someone else,’ he’d said to her, just moments earlier. The brutality of those words hit Karla hard and she struggled to breathe as she took in each word in turn. 
You may think you know what Karla will do next. But you’ll be wrong. Because Karla isn’t who you think she is. Only she knows what’s about to happen. And you will never see it coming. 

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The Marriage Trap is a bit of a slow-burner at first, more of a drama than a thriller, it starts with Jason telling his wife Karla that he’s going away and then we go back in time a few months to find out what happened to make Jason want to leave his wife. And let me tell you right now, whatever it is you’re thinking, it’s not that! Holy cow, what an impeccable and original execution of a rather ordinary premise! Because let’s face it, a man leaving his wife, marital warts and all that, it’s been done before, but the journey Sheryl Browne takes us on, ending in this unbelievable knot of twists, hasn’t!

The Marriage Trap alternates between Karla’s and Jason’s POV, and it’s really quite tragic how people who love each other so much can drift apart, and how little it takes to fuel the flames. I felt for them, but most of all, I felt for their children, easily my favourite characters, even though they only have supporting roles. Scratch that, my favourite character may very well be the one I hated the most: Karla’s father Robert, your typical misogynistic pig, the rich and successful business man who thinks he’s allowed to do whatever he wants, even coming on to girls half his age right under his wife’s and daughter’s nose. A despicable man, but what can I say, I have a thing for loathsome characters. I love to root for the lovely people but I’m perhaps a tad more gleeful when I can root for a character’s downfall. The Marriage Trap allowed me to do both,  I kept rooting for Karla and Jason to unravel all the secrets and save their marriage AND I kept wishing for all of Robert’s secrets to come out and bite him on the arse! Secrets? Yeah quite a lot of them and most of them I never even suspected, they never even crossed my mind.

If you’re looking for a suspenseful, twisty psychological thriller with some family drama and loads of secrets to unravel, look no further and pick up The Marriage Trap!

Many thanks to Bookouture and NetGalley for the free eARC! All opinions are my own and I was not paid to give them.

The Marriage Trap is out on 30 July, pre-order here!