I’m beginning to lose count of the number of thrillers I’ve read this year. I can guarantee this number is more than the number of thrillers I’ve read in my lifetime. For 23 years I didn’t read thrillers because they were, in my opinion, too scary and true-to-life. Now I can’t get enough of them. Skin Deep by Liz Nugent was my second read by this author and I was super excited to get into it.

Before I even opened the book, the title caught my attention. Skin Deep. What does this even mean? Is there some ambiguity there? Venturing into the book and my attention was caught from the first scene. A woman. A dead body. We’re starting with a death – Murder? Accidental? “How glamour and horror intersect” – Marian Keyes summarises the story perfectly.

Anyone who follows me on Instagram will know that I like to take the occasional trip away – most recently a weekend in Madrid. Skin Deep brings the reader to many parts of the world – Ireland, England, France. If you’re good at visualisation, you’ll thoroughly enjoy being brought to these contrasting locations to meet a variety of characters. Speaking of which, Nugent‘s creations of the characters in Skin Deep is amazing. I felt each and every one of them was real and now, a month on, I can still clearly picture them in my head and remember there uniqueness. Funny enough, one of the characters really reminded me of Eleanor Oliphant – the lead female in Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine.

My one criticism of the book relates to the author telling tales of Irish mythology. While I understand why she felt they fitted in with the story, I found these sections of the books somewhat boring, and a times disturbing, to read. Maybe that was the point?

This book was the eighth book I read in 2019 – the year in which I have committed to reading 25 books. You can keep up-to-date with my “to-read” list and book reviews here. Having now read two books by Liz Nugent, I am eager to read Unravelling Oliver, a book which has been recommended to me a few times now.