The Downstairs Neighbor

November 23, 2020
At the outset of Cooper’s heart-pounding debut, 17-year-old Freya Harlow fails to return home to her parents’ Kingston, England, apartment. When the police ask Freya’s parents, Paul and Steph, if they have any enemies who might want to harm Freya, each has a secret unbeknownst to the other, and each believes theirs holds the key to their daughter’s disappearance. While Paul unearths painful memories of his past undercover police work, Steph often travels to a nearby town, and begs their downstairs neighbor, Emma Brighton, not to tell anyone about her whereabouts. Meanwhile, Emma’s apartment is vandalized, and the police repeatedly question Freya’s driving instructor, who lives below Emma, since he was the last person to see Freya. A second plot, set 25 years earlier, involves a teenage girl who suspects her mother’s boyfriend is abusive and dangerous. Readers will enjoy trying to figure out how the two story lines are connected. Even avid suspense readers won’t be able to predict all the twists. Cooper is off to a strong start. Agent: Hellie Ogden, Janklow & Nesbit (U.K.).

Starred review from December 1, 2020

DEBUT In a London apartment building, all the residents harbor secrets. Paul, a retired policeman, and Steph Harlow live with their 17-year-old daughter, Freya, on the third floor. Their downstairs neighbor Emma has kept the secret of her son Zeb's father, Robin Lyle, from him. Chris Watson, a driving instructor, and his wife, Vicky, live in the basement flat, and Chris struggles to protect Vicky from the consequences of her secret. When Freya disappears, all the secrets, as well as others arising from interconnected events 25 years earlier, come to light. Chris was the last person to see Freya, but Paul is certain that something in his past is the reason for his daughter's disappearance despite finding photos of Zeb and Freya taken at the park. VERDICT Fans of British mysteries will love this debut. The setup of the characters is leisurely, but once the story gets rolling, it is difficult to put down. This is one that readers may not figure out fully, if at all, in advance of the denouement, but the author ties all the secrets together in a most satisfying reveal.--Vicki Gregory, Sch. of Information, Univ. of South Florida, Tampa

Copyright 2020 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 1, 2021
In suburban London, three apartments in a subdivided house are inhabited by tenants with a fleeting familiarity with one another. After Freya, the teenage girl in the topmost flat, vanishes, her parents, along with Emma on the first floor and Chris in the basement, find their lives intertwined in ways they could never have imagined. Each of them has some involvement, in varying degrees, in this disappearance and in a similar one 25 years earlier, and the three also have connections to a shocking murder. Vintage-clothier Emma has overheard much from her upstairs neighbors but nothing untoward, and Chris, a driving instructor who was giving Freya lessons, did little worthy of Emma's attention. Freya had been receiving telephone threats for some reason, but now that the threats become more visceral, it almost seems as though Freya's mother is the target. Cooper skillfully builds a house of cards, demolishes it, reshuffles the deck, and deals an even stronger hand, while keeping a few cards up her sleeve. An emotionally charged domestic-suspense debut, perfect for fans of Lucy Foley and Ruth Ware.

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