“A searing, chilling sliver of perfection . . . May well turn out to be the year’s best thriller.” –Charles Finch, The New York Times Book Review “This is simply one of the nastiest and most disturbing thrillers I’ve read in years. I loved it, right down to the utterly chilling final line.” –Gillian Flynn “A perfect nightmare of a novel–as merciless a thriller as I’ve ever read. Astonishingly … nightmare of a novel–as merciless a thriller as I’ve ever read. Astonishingly dark and sensationally accomplished.” –A. J. Finn, author of The Woman in the Window
A spellbinding, darkly twisted novel about desire and obsession, and the complicated lines between truth and perception, Our Kind of Cruelty introduces Araminta Hall, a chilling new voice in psychological suspense.
This is a love story. Mike’s love story.
Mike Hayes fought his way out of a brutal childhood and into a quiet, if lonely, life before he met Verity Metcalf. V taught him about love, and in return, Mike has dedicated his life to making her happy. He’s found the perfect home, the perfect job; he’s sculpted himself into the physical ideal V has always wanted. He knows they’ll be blissfully happy together.
It doesn’t matter that she hasn’t been returning his e-mails or phone calls.
It doesn’t matter that she says she’s marrying Angus.
It’s all just part of the secret game they used to play. If Mike watches V closely, he’ll see the signs. If he keeps track of her every move, he’ll know just when to come to her rescue . . .
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This is simply one of the nastiest and most disturbing thrillers I’ve read in years. I loved it, right down to the utterly chilling final line.
I am really struggling with this review and rating. I read Our Kind of Cruelty at a break neck pace and up until the last 15-20%, I was on track to give this a 4 star review. I couldn’t get enough. I know some people complained about the “slowness” of part 1, but I was completely captivated from the start.
I read this book with a couple of my besties, and we were constantly texting our theories and ideas to each other. Having discussions after each Part. I didn’t mind being inside the mind of Mike, I actually found it quite fascinating. And I really wanted to know more about Crave and was dying to know more about Verity and what role she was playing in all of this.
Although what I am about to write in this next paragraph isn’t really a spoiler, I am going to go ahead and put the spoiler tag on it anyway, just in case.
[And then, suddenly, I realized how the whole thing was going to end and I was just so disappointed. I know that I am in the minority with my low rating, but I just couldn’t believe that this was all there was to it. I mean, this book had it all. Delusional psycho, stalking, sex games, Crave. And the set up. OMG, the set up. It was there for the taking. There were so many paths for Hall to take us on, so many ways for her to blow our minds. And yet, mind not blown. I kept waiting for that one moment when everything that you think you know is blown to bits. And you are reading the story with a fresh pair of eyes. But sadly, that never happened for me here. (hide spoiler)]
I am going to go ahead and recommend this book anyway because I am in the clear minority here. I did read this at a record pace and was so completely and utterly hooked. But in the end (quite literally) it just all fell flat for me
What a f##ked up read,but really good! Mike lives in a very disillusional world were everything is perfect between him and verity,even though they aren’t together he still thinks it’s just a game, and all he has to do is make her crave him again,and verity doesn’t help the situation at all by not telling her husband to be the truth. This is a tale of love,sex and obsession and the lengths that Mike is willing to go for the crave!! It’s a creepy chilling read with twist’s and turns. Very good writing and a great ride to the end,but is it really the end, Mike doesn’t think so!!! I won this book from @shhmomsreading TY !
Well written and engaging but for me, it’s lacking more of an actual plot. This book could have been developed into something a lot more.
Original idea, easy to read and hard to put down, but Infelt it kind of fizzled out in the end.
Hooked me with beginning quote: One can be too ingenious in trying to search out the truth. Sometimes one must simply respect its veiled face. Of course this is a love story in a way.
A great novel of psychological suspense with all the abnormal behavior you could imagine but still maintaining the doubt of who’s doing what to whom which is the way life works but not always fiction. I appreciated that the author didn’t make it easy.
did not care for this book. I never really got into it. Thought it was a bit over dramatic and the main character bordered on a bit stalkerish.
I wanted to love this novel. A lot has been said about the ending. So I read really fast hoping for a great ending only to find it’s a meh ending. Predictable. It is well written, fast paced, and creepy. Just not as original as I’d hoped.
This was between and 2 and 3 for me. I was interested to know what happened and I sort of liked the perspective of the writing, but the writing itself didn’t do it for me and I felt like there were some holes in it. It was still sort of entertaining (albeit dark!) and since I did want to know the outcome … so 3 Stars from me.
This book was a page-turner, and very hard to predict what would happen next. It is a tale of obsession and dependence. It is twisty and dark, but at the same time very real. Beautifully written and second book I have read by this author, who doesn’t disappoint.
Amazing! Leaves your mind with many many questions!
Relationships can be complicated.. controlling… or other???
wow wow wow
Shocking
This was really good. Mostly told by Mike the main character of his undying, unhealthy love for Verity. This goes way over the edge and I didn’t see the most shocking part coming, nor the ending. I am totally shocked. Poor Verity she tried to get away and ended up in it for the long nasty end. I had something like this happen to me and sometimes no matter how far you run they find you. It wasn’t anything like this though but some parts were. Should I feel like a jerk for liking this book though? Perhaps yes, perhaps no. I’m glad it’s behind me. So you can’t say this is a far-fetched story cause it does happen. Probably more than we know. I like how this book did that. It bought the real to a novel and the courtroom part to the finale is the best.
I do recommend this book if you can deal with this kind of content.
On to the next book if I can get this one out of my mind.
Thank you Net Gallery for this great read and the opportunity to review a second book on behalf of you, the publisher, and of course the Author.
I enjoyed this book, especially the ending.
This was one creepy and disturbing book and I loved it! Not sure what that says about me but I thought it was fantastic. In the very beginning, the book really bothered me and I almost put it down but I kept reading and was glad that I did.
Mike and Verity (who he refers to as V) met in college and appear to be deeply in love. Mike is obsessive about V and wants to do whatever he can to make her happy. When he returns from work in America, they break up and she invites him to her wedding (WHY??) to another man. He still thinks that they are playing a game with each other and she is just trying to punish him but really plans to end up with him. The question you keep asking yourself – is Mike really crazy or is this really all a game?
This is a dark and twisted novel but one you won’t soon forget.
Thanks to goodreads for a copy of this book to read and review. All opinions are my own.
Expertly written and brilliantly executed, Araminta Hall has written what is sure to be one of the most buzzed-about novels of 2018. A tale of toxic love from a wholly unreliable narrator, OUR KIND OF CRUELTY brings us an anti-hero that you’ll love to hate.
But…he is unreliable if he truly believes everything he’s relaying to the reader? Mike Hayes will get into your head like few characters can. His POV is both unsettling and fascinating. The reader cannot help but to feel sympathetic towards him, while at the same time feeling distrustful of him.
Araminta Hall has left me wondering, even after days spent in Mike’s head, exactly what it was that happened here. Her storytelling is smart and devious, leaving me questioning everything I believed throughout this novel. Is Mike really deluded? Or are there other machinations at work here?
While at times, the story did drag a bit for me, I couldn’t stop turning pages, trying to figure out which way was up, finding myself craving the delicious confusion and needing to know more, more, more.
After finishing this book, I was infuriated, I was confused, I was even a little sad. The climax of this book will leave you reeling. Questions will linger and you’ll find yourself doubting, never quite sure of what kind of cruelty you just witnessed.
“but,my darling, our kind of cruelty is love by another name.”
A dark and twisted love story gone wrong. Mike and Verity are in love. They play this game called the CRAVE in which she stands alone by the bar waiting for a man to hit on her while Mike watches, once the man chats her up she gives a signal (when enough is enough) to Mike by tugging on a eagle necklace she always wear so he can swoop in and rescue her. This turns them both on but to what expense?
This story is mainly told in Mike’s perspective so you get a sense of what a warped sense of reality he is in and how interprets his love with Verity. Sometimes you think hes absolutely a nut job then the author does a perfect job of making you wonder is Verity just that conniving. This book kept me on my toes with wondering how this would play out in the end. Is Mike really that far off from reality or is Verity an evil women playing into Mike’s game this whole time? GOSH, i LOVED this book soooo much!!