And Then She Ran By Karen Clarke

‘And Then She Ran’ is the latest book by Karen Clarke.

Grace bundled her eight-week-old daughter into her carry cot, opened the door and ran. Her life in New York faded into the background – she needed to keep her baby safe. She needed to get as far away from Patrick as possible. Now, staying in a remote cottage in Wales, Grace is trying to start again. But she can’t shake the uneasy feeling that she’s been followed.
And then she finds a note. Left on her bed. A tiny scrap of paper with scrawl in bright red pen. Keep her close. Anything could happen. She’s been found. Patrick wants his baby back. But Grace will do everything to stop him.

This book is the perfect book to get absorbed in, a story of a cat and mouse chase, this suspenseful story with filled with twists.

The story is seen solely through the narrative of Grace who’s ran away from New York for a small rural town in Wales where only her aunt knows her. She has ran from her power driven lover Patrick with her baby Lily and is determined to set up a new life for herself. But as she settles into the slower pace of life and adjusts to being a mother, she meets a Declan, a handsome and charismatic Irish man, who refuses to take no for an answer. Tentatively, Grace gets to know Declan, but as she gets closer, strange things and scary things start to happen, things go missing, phone lines are cut and Grace begins to fear that Patrick has sent Declan after her and Lily.

Grace is an interesting character, who’s had a complex life. Her parents relationship was turbulent as her father was prone to physical outbursts and her mother bore the brought of them. Grace was an only child and had no one to turn to and faced a lot of it alone. After her father died, Grace’s relationship with her mother became strained and she lost contact and she finds herself turning to aunt Morag for support. I really liked Morag, who initially was a gruff character who lived a simple life without a television or internet for distraction but as Grace and Lily stay with her, she becomes a softer and more approachable character, and this truly made for heartwarming reading at times.

This story travels at a good pace that keeps the reader engaged with regular twists and reveals that kept my attention hooked. Initially the story seems quite straight forward but as it progresses, we see new unexpected developments and more me, that’s the sign of a great thriller.

Set against the atmospheric, rural countryside of Wales, ‘And Then She Ran’ is a thrilling psychological story, filled with drama, suspense and the power of a mother’s love, this book will hook you from the first sentence.

You can buy ‘And Then She Ran’ from Amazon and will be available to buy from good bookshops.