Grace is appalled when a body, dragged from the Thames, is identified as Catherine Smith, who has lodged with Grace and her family for the last eight years before suddenly disappearing. Please note: I have read the ARC copy. However, all the opinions and views are my own as any other review I make. The book just tries to do too much and falls flat in its premise/execution! The one thing it does well is show Grace’s grief following World War 1 and the aftermath effects of how it affected the country as a whole. Honestly the book would have been much better as a historical romance or general historical novel that focuses on characters’ grief and trying to move on following the war. All in all very well written, and if the mystery would have been more appealing and a little less romance, it would have made a a perfect read. I didn't get the romance at all. The characters didn't spend enough time together and I didn't feel the chemistry. I saw that some readers enjoyed it, so maybe it just me. The finale scene was a bit cliché

The Lodger | Helen Scarlett | 9781529407594 | NetGalley The Lodger | Helen Scarlett | 9781529407594 | NetGalley

Grace Armstrong believes that she has come to terms with her own loss, the death of her dazzling fiancé who was declared Missing in Action. But soon he starts to reappear both in her waking life and dreams. Flat characters-there’s no development or character arcs. It’s always the same things and we don’t learn anything new to add to the characterization of the MC or side characters. The main mystery also disappears for awhile and becomes more of a side plot to the romance and character relationships. The Lodger by Helen Scarlett is a detective taking place in the aftermath of WWI in London. It's full of brooding and grief but also new beginnings and stories of healing.Grace is appalled when a body, dragged from the Thames, is identified as Elizabeth Smith, who has lodged with Grace and her family for the last eight years before suddenly disappearing. The Lodger is a historical mystery novel set in post-World War I London. We follow Grace, an aspiring reporter in her early 20s as she works to discern the truth of the death of her dear family friend and long-time lodger, Elizabeth. It’s 1919 and Grace Armstrong, like many other young women, is mourning the loss of her fiancé and brother in the Great War. She has done her best to move on – having served as a VAD nurse during the war, she is now pursuing a career as a journalist with the London periodical Nursing World – but she is still haunted by the thought that her fiancé Robert, reported Missing in Action at the Somme, could still be alive. Meanwhile her mother, struggling to cope with the death of Grace’s brother Edward, is under sedation in a nursing home. It’s a difficult time for the Armstrong family – and is about to get worse when their lodger, Elizabeth Smith, is found drowned in the River Thames. The Lodger by Helen Scarlett is a gripping and haunting gothic tale set in post-World War I London. When the body of Elizabeth Smith, a lodger who had become a dear friend to Grace, is found in the Thames after disappearing suddenly, Grace is drawn into the dangerous underbelly of London to uncover what happened to Elizabeth.

The Lodger - Helen Scarlett - Google Books The Lodger - Helen Scarlett - Google Books

I really enjoyed this historical novel set in 1919 London. A mystery is set up from the prologue when the body of a woman in a blue coat is found near London bridge. Grace Armstrong is a young woman who lost both her brother and fiancé in the war. She lives with her father at the family home Ryedale Villa, her mother is in a hospital with depression after the death of her son. After seeing the report in the newspaper about the body, it’s feared that it may be their former lodger, Elizabeth Smith who had moved out only two weeks before after living there for eight years. Grace starts looking into Elizabeth’s life (she can’t believe it was suicide) and there’s much more than she expected. With the help of her mother’s unconventional friend Lady Bunty and the mysterious and troubled Tom Monaghan, Grace delves into society scandals and London’s murky underworld, risking her safety to expose the truth. Side characters. I appreciate the time the author took to research the recovery of people and wounds that will never heal. I liked the themes she discussed with the stories of side characters. But for me, there were too many sub-plots, we didn't have enough time to explore them. In my opinion, it could be better if we had just one or two side characters, but we could feel their story Soon Grace finds herself under threat, and the only person prepared to listen is the brooding Tom Monaghan. Elizabeth was much more than a lodger, she had become a dear friend to Grace, and these memories spur Grace on to uncover the true circumstances as to what led her friend to meet such a tragic fate.

Summary

Despite my usual aversion to novels set during wartime, I was thoroughly engrossed in this book. The author did a fantastic job of capturing the atmosphere and era with vivid descriptions, and the mystery itself was well-crafted and kept me intrigued until the end. Helen Scarlett] has a gift for pulling readers into the twists and turns of her story' SUNDAY TIMES A ghostly, immersive mystery threaded with twists and turns as evocative as the 20th-century London in which it is set . . . A devastating reveal and a tangled web I won't forget * Amanda Geard, author of THE MIDNIGHT HOUSE * It’s a slow unravelling of the mystery, but steady, so that I didn’t feel it dragged at any point. The pace allows for plenty of space to explore different reactions to the cataclysm of the war, from those men directly affected trying to deal with mental and physical injuries, to those who had endured a long wait ending perhaps with the awfulness of the telegram telling them their son or brother or lover would not be coming home. Scarlett reminds us that for many the verdict was missing, presumed dead, leaving a tiny glimmer of hope that cruelly drags out the process of acceptance. She shows us how this feeds into the rise of spiritualism, as people desperately seek some kind of closure – the possibility at least of saying goodbye, when there isn’t even a grave to visit. We see how society is divided into those who find comfort in the belief that the fallen had died gloriously for a great cause and those who feel it had all been an unforgivable waste, and how each side of that divide unintentionally adds to the hurt of the other. And yet through all this, Scarlett avoids mawkishness and over-sentimentality.