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Review
'French's second foray into the dark world of psychological crime more than proves she's the real deal'**** (Daily Mirror 20080611)
'Begin reading this and you won't want to stop' (Choice 20080928)
'A literary crime stonker.' (Lottie Moggach, thelondonpaper 20080908)
'Creepily melding elements of Donna Tartt's The Secret History and undercover police procedural, The Likeness seduces from the start . . . A nifty tale of desire for belonging, as well as a cool thriller' (Time Out 20081018)
'Claustrophobic, conversational, clever and beautifully written' (Literary Review 20081018)
'riveting... hugely satisfying' (Irish Independent )
'An intricate and edgy top-notch psychological thriller.' (Woman and Home )
'Paints a vivid, gritty picture' ( Psychologies )
'Police procedures, psychological thrills and gothic romance beautifully woven into one stunning story' (Kirkus )
'The Likeness isn't just a good page-turner, but a skilfully written modern novel . . . French has a brilliant ear for dialogue . . . Also in the best tradition of classic crime writers, such as P D James and Ruth Rendell, her characters are fully-rounded people and she is able to layer plots and storylines with a mastery that belies the fact that it is only her second book.' (Anne Marie Scanlon, Sunday Independent,Dublin )
'A truly creepy mystery thriller... so gripping you'll want to finish it in one sitting, no matter how many coffees it takes! ******" ( Now Magazine )
'Dense and filled with wonderful characters and atmosphere, The Likeness is riveting.' (Globe and Mail, Toronto )
'French's writing is lush, intense and gorgeous. She possesses an enviable ability to portray scenes so clearly that you feel you're there and can reach out and touch things or join in the conversation. Snap shots remain imprinted on your mind once the book is put aside.' (Sharon Wheeler,reviewingtheevidence )
'Begin reading this and you won't want to stop' (Choice 20080928)
'A literary crime stonker.' (Lottie Moggach, thelondonpaper 20080908)
'Creepily melding elements of Donna Tartt's The Secret History and undercover police procedural, The Likeness seduces from the start . . . A nifty tale of desire for belonging, as well as a cool thriller' (Time Out 20081018)
'Claustrophobic, conversational, clever and beautifully written' (Literary Review 20081018)
'riveting... hugely satisfying' (Irish Independent )
'An intricate and edgy top-notch psychological thriller.' (Woman and Home )
'Paints a vivid, gritty picture' ( Psychologies )
'Police procedures, psychological thrills and gothic romance beautifully woven into one stunning story' (Kirkus )
'The Likeness isn't just a good page-turner, but a skilfully written modern novel . . . French has a brilliant ear for dialogue . . . Also in the best tradition of classic crime writers, such as P D James and Ruth Rendell, her characters are fully-rounded people and she is able to layer plots and storylines with a mastery that belies the fact that it is only her second book.' (Anne Marie Scanlon, Sunday Independent,Dublin )
'A truly creepy mystery thriller... so gripping you'll want to finish it in one sitting, no matter how many coffees it takes! ******" ( Now Magazine )
'Dense and filled with wonderful characters and atmosphere, The Likeness is riveting.' (Globe and Mail, Toronto )
'French's writing is lush, intense and gorgeous. She possesses an enviable ability to portray scenes so clearly that you feel you're there and can reach out and touch things or join in the conversation. Snap shots remain imprinted on your mind once the book is put aside.' (Sharon Wheeler,reviewingtheevidence )
Review
'French's second foray into the dark world of psychological crime more than proves she's the real deal'**** -- Daily Mirror 'Begin reading this and you won't want to stop' -- Choice 'A literary crime stonker.' -- Lottie Moggach, thelondonpaper 20080819 'Creepily melding elements of Donna Tartt's The Secret History and undercover police procedural, The Likeness seduces from the start ... A nifty tale of desire for belonging, as well as a cool thriller' -- Time Out 20080819 'Claustrophobic, conversational, clever and beautifully written' -- Literary Review 20080801 'riveting... hugely satisfying' -- Irish Independent 20080803 'An intricate and edgy top-notch psychological thriller.' -- Woman and Home 20080801 'Paints a vivid, gritty picture' -- Psychologies 20080801 'Police procedures, psychological thrills and gothic romance beautifully woven into one stunning story' -- Kirkus 20080611 'The Likeness isn't just a good page-turner, but a skilfully written modern novel ... French has a brilliant ear for dialogue ... Also in the best tradition of classic crime writers, such as P D James and Ruth Rendell, her characters are fully-rounded people and she is able to layer plots and storylines with a mastery that belies the fact that it is only her second book.' -- Anne Marie Scanlon, Sunday Independent,Dublin 20080928 'A truly creepy mystery thriller... so gripping you'll want to finish it in one sitting, no matter how many coffees it takes! ******" -- Now Magazine 20080908 'Dense and filled with wonderful characters and atmosphere, The Likeness is riveting.' -- Globe and Mail, Toronto 20081018 'French's writing is lush, intense and gorgeous. She possesses an enviable ability to portray scenes so clearly that you feel you're there and can reach out and touch things or join in the conversation. Snap shots remain imprinted on your mind once the book is put aside.' -- Sharon Wheeler,reviewingtheevidence 20081018
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
When several people whom I know and like and have similar taste in books to me start raving about a book, it is never long before I make it my mission to get my paws on a copy and that's exactly what happened with The Likeness. Once I had my squeeky new copy at home, I thought I'd just have a flick through the first few pages and before I knew it I had read all 700 pages in 3 days. It is one of my favourite reads this year!
The story is narrated by Cassie Maddox, a Detective in Dublin's Domestic Violence Unit. She is called out to the scene of a crime in a derelict cottage in the countryside early one morning where a young lady has been stabbed to death. It doesn't take Cassie long to work out why she, personally, has been summoned - the dead girl is the spitting image of herself. Not only that, but the girl is ID'd as one Lexie Maddison which is the invented name that Cassie had been given several years ago on an undercover job. The girl, by the looks of all the evidence that is presented to the team, has been living as Lexie Maddison for the last 3 years in Dublin and nobody knows where she came from or who she really is.
Lexie had been living in an old manor house in the village where she was found for just 6 months with 4 of her student friends (one of whom had inherited the house from his deceased uncle). After considerable prersuasion Casssie agrees to become part of a plan to infiltrate the manor house and out the killer. By telling the 4 house-mates that Lexie didn't die that night, Cassie then spends the next week preparing for her new role by watching videos of the 5 housemates together, learning all about Lexie's life, mannerisms, and her friends and then she is ready to step into her new life.......
I was on the edge of my seat wondering if Cassie could pull it off and if one of the housemates had anything to do with her death or whether it is someone from Lexie's unknown past come back to find her, or even someone thinking that they had murdered the original Lexie (from Cassie's undercover role). One thing is for sure though: the housemates are hiding something.
I just loved this book, I found that I couldn't and put it down, nor did I want to. Despite the size of the book, I never once felt like it was too long; on the contrary I could have gone on reading for several hundred more. I became like Cassie - so engrossed in Lexie's life that I felt like I knew the housemates and was living there with them. I love a god thriller, but this felt like more than that to me - it is a pyschoogical thriller and even had shades of The Secret History by Donna Tartt (which is one of my all-time favourite books) or Red Leaves by Paulina Simons (another great college thriller).
The characters in this book are brilliantly drawn: Detective Frank Mackey (Cassie's undercover boss) is perfect for his role (and I have heard that French's next book Faithful Place will be narrated by him which I am excited about) as are the characters of the housemates (posh, lying around listening to classical music and reading 18th century poets for relaxation).
This book has turned out to be one of my absolute favourites of the year so far and I intend to dive into In The Woods (the first book) and Faithful Place very soon. If Tana French grabs my attention in these books as much as she has done in The Likeness then she is on her way to becoming one of my favourite authors!
The story is narrated by Cassie Maddox, a Detective in Dublin's Domestic Violence Unit. She is called out to the scene of a crime in a derelict cottage in the countryside early one morning where a young lady has been stabbed to death. It doesn't take Cassie long to work out why she, personally, has been summoned - the dead girl is the spitting image of herself. Not only that, but the girl is ID'd as one Lexie Maddison which is the invented name that Cassie had been given several years ago on an undercover job. The girl, by the looks of all the evidence that is presented to the team, has been living as Lexie Maddison for the last 3 years in Dublin and nobody knows where she came from or who she really is.
Lexie had been living in an old manor house in the village where she was found for just 6 months with 4 of her student friends (one of whom had inherited the house from his deceased uncle). After considerable prersuasion Casssie agrees to become part of a plan to infiltrate the manor house and out the killer. By telling the 4 house-mates that Lexie didn't die that night, Cassie then spends the next week preparing for her new role by watching videos of the 5 housemates together, learning all about Lexie's life, mannerisms, and her friends and then she is ready to step into her new life.......
I was on the edge of my seat wondering if Cassie could pull it off and if one of the housemates had anything to do with her death or whether it is someone from Lexie's unknown past come back to find her, or even someone thinking that they had murdered the original Lexie (from Cassie's undercover role). One thing is for sure though: the housemates are hiding something.
I just loved this book, I found that I couldn't and put it down, nor did I want to. Despite the size of the book, I never once felt like it was too long; on the contrary I could have gone on reading for several hundred more. I became like Cassie - so engrossed in Lexie's life that I felt like I knew the housemates and was living there with them. I love a god thriller, but this felt like more than that to me - it is a pyschoogical thriller and even had shades of The Secret History by Donna Tartt (which is one of my all-time favourite books) or Red Leaves by Paulina Simons (another great college thriller).
The characters in this book are brilliantly drawn: Detective Frank Mackey (Cassie's undercover boss) is perfect for his role (and I have heard that French's next book Faithful Place will be narrated by him which I am excited about) as are the characters of the housemates (posh, lying around listening to classical music and reading 18th century poets for relaxation).
This book has turned out to be one of my absolute favourites of the year so far and I intend to dive into In The Woods (the first book) and Faithful Place very soon. If Tana French grabs my attention in these books as much as she has done in The Likeness then she is on her way to becoming one of my favourite authors!
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I won't recount the plot as that's already been done here, but have to say that while I loved French's In the Woods, I felt this didn't quite live up to the high expectations that book engendered. Which isn't to say that it's a bad book as it patently isn't: French is a really interesting writer who takes some fascinating scenarios and squeezes the utmost out of them.
Here Cassie Maddox from In the Woods goes back to working undercover when a dead girl is found who looks so exactly like her that Cassie is able to seamlessly slip into her life. This does take a major suspension of disbelief (I could accept the main premise but where is fell down for me was in the small details e.g. Cassie, who dropped out of her undergraduate degree in Psychology, doesn't just pass herself off as an English PhD student to her peers, but also manages to teach for a month with no-one `outing' her...) however not more than many Elizabethan and Jacobean plays (which the text self-consciously alludes to) and, of course, Shakespearean comedy.
And she finds a disturbing liberation in being someone else: in fact, the sub-text is precisely about the extent to which our personas are a performance, a self-fashioning in which we all collude. For the small family of students into which she infiltrates herself are also acting out a life, one in which the mantra is `no pasts' and Cassie finds herself torn between submerging herself in their life, and remaining enough of an outsider to find out who murdered her alter ego.
While I really enjoyed this book I didn't find it as haunting as In the Woods, perhaps because Cassie, for me, is far less intriguing as a character than Rob/Adam Ryan. I also felt that in such a long book (c.700 pages) French suddenly hit us with lots of revelations towards the end that felt tacked on instead of being organically embedded in the text (the relationship between Justin and Rafe, for example).
But these are small quibbles. Overall this is an assured and well-written book, which explores some dark fascinating ideas while masquerading as a murder mystery. Highly recommended and I can't wait for French's next book.
Here Cassie Maddox from In the Woods goes back to working undercover when a dead girl is found who looks so exactly like her that Cassie is able to seamlessly slip into her life. This does take a major suspension of disbelief (I could accept the main premise but where is fell down for me was in the small details e.g. Cassie, who dropped out of her undergraduate degree in Psychology, doesn't just pass herself off as an English PhD student to her peers, but also manages to teach for a month with no-one `outing' her...) however not more than many Elizabethan and Jacobean plays (which the text self-consciously alludes to) and, of course, Shakespearean comedy.
And she finds a disturbing liberation in being someone else: in fact, the sub-text is precisely about the extent to which our personas are a performance, a self-fashioning in which we all collude. For the small family of students into which she infiltrates herself are also acting out a life, one in which the mantra is `no pasts' and Cassie finds herself torn between submerging herself in their life, and remaining enough of an outsider to find out who murdered her alter ego.
While I really enjoyed this book I didn't find it as haunting as In the Woods, perhaps because Cassie, for me, is far less intriguing as a character than Rob/Adam Ryan. I also felt that in such a long book (c.700 pages) French suddenly hit us with lots of revelations towards the end that felt tacked on instead of being organically embedded in the text (the relationship between Justin and Rafe, for example).
But these are small quibbles. Overall this is an assured and well-written book, which explores some dark fascinating ideas while masquerading as a murder mystery. Highly recommended and I can't wait for French's next book.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Dublin Detective Cassie Maddox is called to a murder where the victim is more or less an identical twin. And not only that but the victim has also adopted a name which Cassie herself had used when she undertook an under-cover investigation a few years earlier. This sets the scene for what could be a very intriguing story.
It is just about credible that Cassie could have taken on the victim's persona and return to live with her circle of friends in order to discover what has happened. If this can be accepted, the story rolls itself out in a fairly low key, matter of fact way. While this enhances the credibility of the story, it sacrifices the potential for twists and turns that the opening offered. This leads to a tense novel rather than an heart thumping page turner.
All in all an enjoyable story, if a bit on the long side. Certainly enough there to try another Tana French story.
It is just about credible that Cassie could have taken on the victim's persona and return to live with her circle of friends in order to discover what has happened. If this can be accepted, the story rolls itself out in a fairly low key, matter of fact way. While this enhances the credibility of the story, it sacrifices the potential for twists and turns that the opening offered. This leads to a tense novel rather than an heart thumping page turner.
All in all an enjoyable story, if a bit on the long side. Certainly enough there to try another Tana French story.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
LOVED IT! MISS THE CHARACTERS ONCE I FINISHED
After I found the first book In the woods on Mexican beach while on holiday and read it in one go, sometimes stopping breathing how I got into the story I deciced to read The... Read more
Published 2 months ago by blanka
Brilliant!
"The Likeness" caught me from the first page, and my fascination with it lasted until the very end. I've read "In The Woods" and liked it very much but this one is much, much... Read more
Published 3 months ago by H. Ulla
Great plot and long read
I am not usually an avid reader of modern detective stories but due to bedrest after an operation I have been consuming more Kindle books than usual and thought to give this book a... Read more
Published 3 months ago by Jude Smith
It's that difficult second book thing ...
I loved the first book, I liked the second book. All of the criticism here is right, the central premise requires a massive suspension of disbelief. Read more
Published 4 months ago by Happyface
Oh, dear!
Frankly, this half-baked tale illustrates virtually everything that's wrong with modern publishers. At almost seven hundred pages it is way too long to sustain interest. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Geoff Wallis
devoncharlie
Great read! I read also the first one (In the Woods) and it's very poetically written - grabs you from the first page in, great characters and the intrigue keeps going until the... Read more
Published 7 months ago by devoncharlie
Couldn't put it down
I picked this book up at 10am this morning and finished it at 5pm, I had a day off and had lots to do but couldn't put it down, that says a lot. Read more
Published 8 months ago by Deborah Dudgeon
fantastic!
this is the first Tana French novel I have read and it inspired me to go searching for more!
I loved this book and would recommend it to anyone who loves a good mystery. Read more
I loved this book and would recommend it to anyone who loves a good mystery. Read more
Published 11 months ago by doglover
I Loved It!
I loved this book, I enjoyed every moment, I couldn't wait to finish it but at the same time I dreaded losing the grip of the characters on my life! Read more
Published 13 months ago by Linda
An excellent read
What a relief to have finished this, the tension was getting to me. I loved it, more than the In the Woods, which I also loved. Read more
Published 15 months ago by Beverly
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