Little Disasters: the compelling and thought-provoking new novel from the author of the Sunday Times bestseller Anatomy of a Scandal

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There is much suspicion and speculation regarding what really happened on the day the toddler was injured. Seeing the characters of one novel – Anatomy of a Scandal – develop in a TV series has been incredible. As with many books that try to be thrillers or quasi-thrillers nowadays, I felt like this book had one twist too many.

The way she handled the material made me appreciate this more as a straight fiction read rather than one in the mystery or thriller genre. Overall, I think Little Disasters is an intriguing, character-driven mystery that’s also thought-provoking and timely. My instant international bestseller, Anatomy of a Scandal, heralded a shift in genre: part courtroom drama, part portrait of a marriage, part psychological thriller, it draws on my experience as a political correspondent, court reporter, and student at Oxford to explore power, privilege, and consent.

I regret to say that this book was just not for me through no fault of the author’s literary abilities. Reputation, published in March 2022 in the UK, and in the US and elsewhere later this year, has been optioned for TV by the team behind Anatomy. Do she and her husband have ill-fated relationship affected the way they treated to their own children?

For some postnatal mothers, OCD takes the form of intrusive thinking about harming their baby,” she explains. When Jess Curtis brings her crying baby girl to the emergency room, she’s confident everything will be alright. Liz doesn’t want to be part of the team that reports this to Britain’s equivalent of social services because she knows what a conscientious, if high-strung, mother Jess was with her older two children. But what happens when these women have gone back to work, have lives outside the home, and you are at home with a colicky, unsettled, unhappy baby and all your coping mechanisms are failing?Special thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a free, electronic ARC of this novel received in exchange for an honest review. In mainstream media expecting parents are given the impression that welcoming a new child is a joyous occasion, you will be filled with a tremendous sense of love from the moment you meet them. And when I think back to the “baby years” with my two boys, I smile with love and fondness at the memories. Fans of Anatomy may miss the courtroom tension, but the psychological portraiture in this absorbing study of motherhood is just as rich.

Thank you to NetGalley, Sarah Vaughan and Atria, for this free digital ARC in exchange for my honest opinion! Jess is a perfectionist and is troubled by dark dreams and visions of tragedy and hurt for her new daughter who is fussy, crying all the time, and making demands on Jess that she feels incapable of delivering. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and have no hesitation in recommending it to anyone who is looking for their next read. It captures the moments when even the best of parents can find themselves trapped in an endless cycle and it can be overwhelming without support.

Almost from the beginning, the plot is obvious - there are so many clues along the way that you can't help but catch on. It turns out baby Betsey has a fractured skull, and Jess's only explanation is that Betsey was trying to pull herself up on the refrigerator and fell. It forces Liz in particular to focus on suppressed memories from her own childhood and on several terrible events and the difficult relationship with her mother. Liz deals with too many questions and also worries about her mother’s mentally unbalanced state who suffers from terminal disease and for making things for worse she drinks herself to death. While she may stay buttoned up outside of the home, amongst her friends and at the children's activities, inside the home, things are far from perfect.