Like Mother, Like Daughter by Kimberly McCreight

Like Mother, Like Daughter by Kimberly McCreight

Published by Knopf on July 30, 2024

Genres:  Thriller, Mystery, Suspense, Contemporary Fiction

Pages:  320

Format:  Hardcover

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★★★.5

A daughter races to uncover her mother's secret life in the wake of her disappearance in this thriller.

When Cleo, a student at NYU, arrives late for dinner at her childhood home in Brooklyn, she finds food burning in the oven and no sign of her mother, Kat. Then Cleo discovers her mom’s bloody shoe under the sofa. Something terrible has happened.

But what? The polar opposite of Cleo, whose “out of control” emotions and “unsafe” behavior have created a seemingly unbridgeable rift between mother and daughter, Kat is the essence of Park Slope perfection: a happily married, successful corporate lawyer. Or so Cleo thinks.

Kat has been lying. She’s not just a lawyer; she’s her firm’s fixer. She’s damn good at it, too. Growing up in a dangerous group home taught her how to think fast, stay calm under pressure, and recognize a real threat when she sees one. And in the days leading up her disappearance, Kat has become aware of multiple threats: demands for money from her unfaithful soon-to-be ex-husband; evidence that Cleo has slipped back into a relationship that’s far riskier than she understands; and menacing anonymous messages from her past—all of which she’s kept hidden from Cleo . . .

Like Mother, Like Daughter is a thrilling novel of emotional suspense that questions the damaging fictions we cling to and the hard truths we avoid. Above all, it’s a love story between a mother and a daughter, each determined to save the other before it’s too late.

Cleo has a complicated relationship with her mother, Kat - but then she shows up for dinner and finds her mother's shoe in a pool of blood and her mother is gone. Cleo starts an investigation of her own and finds out more family secrets than she anticipated and gets herself into trouble...

I absolutely loved how McCreight showcased a complicated relationship between a mother and her daughter. I feel like most mothers/daughters will be able to relate to this in some way and it adds so much more depth to the story.

There were so many twists and turns along with family secrets I did and didn't see coming. We get multiple POVs between Cleo (current time) and Kat (in the days before she disappeared). The secrets that kept coming out had me hooked and I read this one pretty quickly.

There are A LOT of characters and it took me a second to figure out who was who. We are also thrown back and forth in time - which I actually love in a thriller, while some do not. McCreight seemlessly wound us through this tale with stories from the past and transcripts that added to the plot.

The plot itself was sorta meh for me. I guessed so many of the plot twists and had a feeling about where the story was going to go the entire time - and I ended up guessing the whole plot twist along with several of the smaller ones.

The ending was also kind of lackluster to me. I wished for a more thrilling ending - but it was solid. The writing is what drew me to keep reading and I did enjoy it overall. I do wish we would of got more of an ending for some of the side plots instead they were left a little open ended. The character arc both mother and daughter were so well done and I enjoyed that aspect of it.

3.5-stars rounded up to 4. I would recommend this to readers who love a good twisty, relationship fueled thriller that will keep you invested until the end.