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Andrea Barton

Kirsten is a master of creating atmosphere

Reviewed in Australia on 24 February 2020

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

Have you ever made a decision you later regretted? Riptides by Kirsten Alexander takes this concept and runs amok.
After a car accident leaves a pregnant woman dead, Abby and her brother Charlie flee the scene. This lapse of judgment sets into motion a series of lies, cover-ups and emotional wreckage that tears the characters apart. Against a setting of Queensland in 1974, police corruption, natural disasters and political instability further create further problems.
Told in alternating points of view between Abby and Charlie, they reveals the cracks in their relationships with each other, their friends and family. Loyalties are tested as drugs, infidelity and children at risk tests their courage and morality.
Kirsten is a master of creating atmosphere and by the time you reach the final pages, you will be wishing it never ends.
Highly recommended.

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bustaf

An absolute must read

Reviewed in Australia on 4 February 2020

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

This book is one of my favourites of the past 12 months. It’s one of those novels that is like a time machine, picking you up and dumping you into 1970s Queensland. It pulls in lots of rich historical detail from that period that gives you a sense of both the major events of the time (cataclysmic weather, political upheaval) but also the small things you would notice, I imagine, if you walked in a home at the time. The author uses these details to colour in a dramatic family story told from a the perspective of brother and sister, Abby and Charlie, and then Riptides pulls you in and doesn’t let you go.

From the first explosive couple of chapters it yet manages to build to a riveting pace, constantly challenged the reader to answer tough questions - what would you do? I found myself second-guessing my own responses as the complex layers of the story and it’s characters’ lives became more and more entangled. While some points in the story will have you reaching into the pages wanting to give Charlie or Mark a good shake, you won’t doubt their motivations or decisions as the author has made incredibly well-rounded participants.

I’ve been recommending this to people who like richly-drawn family dramas, a dose of period culture and the kinds of twists and turns you’d normally find in an edge of the seat thriller film. Tense and addictive. Loved it.

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It has it all and once you start it you won't want to put it down.

Reviewed in Australia on 5 February 2020

Format: Paperback

Riptides is such a multi layered story and I loved every minute of it. Kirsten Alexander is a new Australian writer for me and this is her second book. I feel that she has a hit on her hands with this one. There is so much going on in this fantastic book and I can't recommend it enough. There were moments that made me laugh, and moments that made me cry. It has it all and once you start it you won't want to put it down.

It is 1974 in Queensland, Australia. Charlie and her sister Abby are heading home to their fathers farm. It is raining heavily and dark and it is a small, narrow dirt road. Then both of their lives change forever. They force a car off the road, killing the pregnant driver instantly. Scared they drag the woman from the car but leave her on the side of the road in the rain, dead. When they arrive at the farm they are horrified to find out that the woman was Skye, their fathers fiancé .

The siblings decide to keep what happened to themselves, a decision that tears them up - and apart. The more they lie and avoid the police the more they change as people. Their friendships and relationships suffer. It is a story of family and what it means to different people. It is the 70's and there is corruption and abuse of power. It was a different time, an easier time in some ways.

Alexander reels you in with her descriptions of 1970's Australia, I felt as if I was there and watching it all unfold. The characters are so real and you feel for them and the situations they get themselves into.

Thanks to Better Reading and Penguin Random House for my advanced copy of this book to read. All opinions are my own and are in no way biased.