Book review: Apple Tree Yard by Louise Doughty

Yvonne is in her early 50s and is a successful geneticist. One day, at the Houses of Parliament, she meets a man and – within minutes – finds herself embarking on an affair with him. However we know – as the opening chapter is set after the affair and in a courtroom – that things will soon go wrong for Yvonne and her lover…

Yvonne narrates this book as if she is talking to her lover, so we get her version of events throughout. She is married with two grown-up children, and as the novel progresses we find out a bit more about her relationships with her family members, which at times seem less than perfect. I found her to be quite an unlikeable character – she seems to feel no guilt about her affair, which itself seemed to me a bit implausible and too out of character.

I also found the story really plodded along at times and took ages to really go anywhere – and then when it did it would slow right down again. I was expecting more drama from the courtroom scenes at the end but instead I found that potentially interesting developments were glossed over, with much more attention given to more boring details.  I found myself skipping sections (there was one particular paragraph that covered over two ‘pages’ of my e-reader), and yet I didn’t feel that I missed out on anything. I think that thrillers like this need to have a few good twists and turns – but this one really fell flat for me.

I know this book has had a lot of good reviews, so maybe I’m a bit too cynical, but it really didn’t work for me and I won’t be reading any more of Doughty’s novels.

My rating: 4 out of 10

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