One Step Too Far

By: Tina Seskis
Published Year: US-2015 UK-2013
Publisher: William Morrow
Pages: 304

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Summary (Provided by Goodreads): An apparently happy marriage. A beautiful son. A lovely home. So what makes Emily Coleman get up one morning and walk right out of her life to start all over again? Has she had a breakdown? Was it to escape her dysfunctional family - especially her flawed twin sister Caroline who always seemed to hate her? And what is the date that looms, threatening to force her to confront her past? No-one has ever guessed her secret. Will you?




                                                                    First Impressions

The cover caught my eye and the summary intrigued me even more. I think I found this on a list of books to read if you enjoyed Gone Girl (which I loved), so I was excited about it! I was a little skeptical about the fact that it emphasized a twist so much, but I was still really excited.

                                                             What I thought

Le sigh. This book was so blah to me. And the fact that the front cover says “No one has ever guessed Emily’s secret. Will You?” just super irritated me. I was able to figure out half of her secret pretty early on in the book. The other half that I didn’t figure out wasn’t part of the secret, but a purposeful misinformation through the writing of the author. It is something that no one would ever be able to guess because the author writes her words in a way that is meant to trick you. It was honestly really frustrating.

One Step Too Far is Seskis’s debut novel. I think that it’s a little obvious in the way that the story plays out and some of the writing. A lot of the characters are underdeveloped and it seemed like she had a lot of ideas and just tried to get them all put into one book.

This story is about Emily, who experiences a traumatic event and decides to run away and start a new life as Cat (her full name is Catherine Emily). Miraculously, she never changed her name on her passport, even though she’s been married at least 3 years, so she is able to use her maiden name to start her new life. The story follows Emily/Cat as she starts her new life, but also checks in with her family. One Step Too Far is told in alternating points of view. The first point of view is Emily/Cat and is in the first person. The alternating chapters are told from the point of either past Emily, her husband Ben, her mom, her dad, her twin, or her friends. It’s all a little bit confusing. The other thing is that there are definitely some of these chapters that are totally unnecessary. Her new friend’s backstory? Did not need an entire chapter. Mom’s trip to climb a mountain? Useless.

The beginning of this story definitely caught my attention, and I also enjoyed the end, but the middle did not keep my interest. This book moved so slowly and I really wanted to know the “twist”. I have definitely decided that I do not like books that sell themselves with their twist. I end up reading the whole book thinking “is that the twist? Maybe it’s this?” It really takes me out of the book and starts making me wish it was moving quicker. I actually got so frustrated halfway through that I peeked and read the big twist. There was a smaller (unnecessary) twist that I didn’t peek at, but it honestly wasn’t a big deal.

The ending was nice, because everything was wrapped up in the end. You found out about each of the many characters that you were introduced to, so that was nice. But other than that, I can’t find many positives about this story.
 

If you see this book, I would say pass. It’s nothing like Gone Girl, and the twist is definitely predictable. The characters are blah and also irritating and the writing is nothing special. I would not re-read, recommend, or purchase this book.