Follow Me Down By Tanya Byrne

[amazon_link id=”0755393082″ target=”_blank” ][/amazon_link]’Follow Me Down’ is the second book by British author, Tanya Byrne.

When Adamma Okomma has to leave her glossy life behind in New York for a dusty English boarding school, she thinks it’s the end of her world, Then she meets quick-witted Scarlett Chiltern who introduces her to Crofton College’s darkest corners and Adamma realises that there is much more to her new school than tartan skirts and hockey sticks. She and Scarlett become inseparable, but when they both fall for the same guy, the battle lines are firmly drawn. Adamma gets the guy, but loses her best friend. Then when Scarlett runs away, Adamma finds herself caught up in something a lot more sinister than a messy love triangle. Adamma always knew that Scarlett had her secrets but some secrets are too big to keep and this one will change their lives forever.

In ‘Follow Me Down’ Tanya has created a character that plays both the hero and the victim of the story perfectly. Adamma is plucked from her life in New York, long gone are nights out with friends and instead she has to make do with living in a boarding school in a small village where nothing much happens. It is there that she meets self-obsessed, selfish tear-away Scarlett who likes to run away at the drop of a hat, hoping to finally fulfil her dream of a life on stage. Scarlett takes Adamma underneath her wing and introduces her to sexy rogue and photographer Dominic, where they all embark on a heated friendship that seems to thrive mostly on jealousy and betrayal. As the two lead characters of the book, I enjoyed them both immensely. I liked Adamma for her quiet nurturing quality as she looked out for her friends and her curiosity of the school, as a reporter for the school’s newspaper, she was always seeking out a story especially when a number of attacks had taken place in the forest beside school, she turns investigative reporter looking for clues and suspects. Scarlett was the friend that we all encountered at some point in our lives, beautifully spiteful and gloriously jealous, she made for entertaining reading when the spotlight was on her.

The story is told solely from Adamma’s perspective and starts on the day that Scarlett, first disappears, the story then takes a wonderful twist as alternative chapters are set both in the past and the present. Throughout there is intriguing undertone of tension which makes the story even more compelling and creepy as suddenly everyone becomes a suspect. In the true style of ‘Heart Shaped Bruise’ Tanya has once again achieved a thrilling story that I was unable to put down. Filled with angst, illicit affairs and jealousy, this is an addictive book that had me reading late into to night, with her fresh voice, gritty narrative and dialogue, Tanya Byrne is not only the voice for the Young Adult genre, she is the voice for the Adult generation.

You can buy [amazon_link id=”0755393082″ target=”_blank” ]Follow Me Down on Amazon [/amazon_link] and is available to buy from good bookshops.