Two Can Keep A Secret – Book Review

Two Can Keep A Secret is just as brilliant and terrifying as McManus’s previous novel, One of Us Is Lying.

The plot centres on twins Ellery and Ezra, who move to the sleepy town of Echo Ridge. Ellery and Ezra’s maternal aunt was murdered in Echo Ridge in 1995. Five years ago, the town’s homecoming queen was also murdered. Now the killer claims to be back.

I’d loved One of Us is Lying when I read it in 2017, so naturally I was both excited and a little apprehensive when I heard that a new book was coming out from McManus. I was concerned that the two books may be too similar to one another, however they actually have little in common outside of being murder mysteries.

In any mystery story, I’m usually obsessed with the build-up. I love the secrecy and the flakiness of the characters and the constant tension permeating the plot. Yet being enamoured with build-up can also mean that I’m inevitably disappointed with the eventual pay-off. However (without wanting to spoil anything), I actually liked the pay-off in Two Can Keep A Secret. What’s more, I thought the very last line of the book was so chilling that I had to sleep with the lights on that evening…like a big, wussy baby!

I really liked the characters of Ellery, Ezra, Mia and Malcolm; their little friendship group was believable and Ellery and Malcom’s blossoming romance was downright adorable.

The ‘small, provincial town’ of Echo Ridge was delightfully creepy, made even more so by the Fright Farm Halloween Park (formerly ‘Murderland’).

As with any good mystery, many of the characters were suspicious and unreliable, so there were ample opportunities for McManus to throw in some red herrings.

I’ll hold my hands up and be the first to admit that I don’t read a lot of murder mysteries; as such, I’m not sure how Two Can Keep A Secret holds up alongside other examples of the genre, but I loved it all the same.