As an avid thriller fan, it can be hard for me to read a book that catches me by surprise, but this one managed to shock me multiple times.

56 days follows the lives of Oliver and Ciara. Who’s relationship is ramped up by the pandemic. However, 56 days after they first meet, Detectives Lee and Karl and called in after a body has been found.

This book kept me on my toes more than I expected it to. Usually with thrillers I get a sense of whether there may be plot-twists. Strangely, I didn’t think there would be any twists in this book, which made the numerous ones that appeared even more exciting! Howard used language perfectly to hint that ‘reality’ was a particular way, only to later reveal a twist that shone a light on the truth. The novel flipped between the present day and time points from the last three months as well as following three different character points of view. At first I struggled a little to understand what was going on but by the end I absolutely loved this.

I enjoyed the unique use of the pandemic to create an interesting thriller storyline. I also love books with multiple characters points of view. My main issue with this novel was that things did get repetitive because of this. If more extra information had been added when repeating scenes from other characters views, I would have loved it. But the repetition of the same conversations with very little added was a bit tiring. That being said, overall I really enjoyed this novel and still feel like I am reeling from all the twists that were thrown in.

I would recommend this book to any thriller fan! I want to thank Readers First, Corvus publishers and Catherine Ryan Howard for allowing me to read this book and give my personal thoughts.