Lies by T.M. Logan #tmlogan #stmartinspress #psycologicalthriller @absltmom

“What’s done cannot be undone.” It is often said that one can’t ever trust a liar. For Joe Lynch his life is about to turn as he finds the “truth” of that quote.   One day driving home his son spots his wife entering a hotel. Joe’s son convinces him that they need to surprise mommy and so they follow her with shocking results. For he finds her with Ben, a casual friend of theirs, having a full blown out argument. Joe doesn’t know what to do and later confronts Ben, thinking of course that his wife is having an affair. Angry words are exchanged in the hotel parking lot. Words lead to aggression and Ben is pushed, hits his head and is knocked out. Joe leaves the scene figuring someone will find Ben or that he will wake up, but then his conscience clicks in and he feels he needs to return to the scene and check up on Ben. When he arrives he finds Ben is gone and then Ben just seems to vanish.

Where is Ben and why is he intervening in Joe’s social media account? In the altercation, Joe has lost both his phone and a treasured bracelet. Now, it would seem that Joe has information from the phone that he will use to attack and bait Joe.

The police are alerted first declaring Ben a missing person and then as things start to rack up against Joe, they start to think that there has been foul play.  Meanwhile, Joe is being harassed by Ben on social media as well as text messages. These messages are cryptic as well as threatening. The men schedule to meet on a number of occasions, and Joe swears he knows that Ben is somewhere alive taunting him. What is going on? Is Ben his wife’s paramour? Is she lying to him about their involvement? Who can he trust? Things escalate and Joe becomes a suspect in the possible murder of Ben.  Will he ever be able to clear himself? Joe seems to be caught in a never ending spiral of lies, deceit, and distortions.

This was a fast paced interesting book that had a cast of characters who were deceptive, carrying out a subterfuge that had no end in sight. There were many twists and turns as the characters seemed to carry out their many distortions and fabrications right up to the end of the book where there was a major “wow” moment……didn’t see that one coming for sure happening….

All in all, it was a well done thriller although Joe was a bit too gullible and forgiving for my tastes. He was so desperate to make things right that he stumbled from one lie into the next and didn’t even seem to blink an eye. “The truth of the battle is whatever the victor deems it to be’ – Sun Tzu.” What ultimately is the truth is the shocker ending which to this reader saved what might have been a mediocre book making it into something that was definitely a cut above.

Bestselling author TM Logan was a national newspaper journalist before turning to novel-writing full time. His debut thriller LIES (2017) was one of Amazon UK’s biggest ebooks of 2017, selling 330,000 copies and gathering more than 1,300 5-star reviews so far. It is now being published in ten other countries worldwide. His next thriller, 29 SECONDS, will be published in the USA in summer 2019. Tim lives in Nottinghamshire, UK, with his wife and two children.