Review ~ Four by Andy Jones

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Happy Publication  Day

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Hodder&Stoughton
26 July 2018

My thanks to the publishers for my copy of this book

What's it about ..

One weekend towards the end of summer, charged on drink and lust and love and disappointment, two couples exchange partners for a single night. But the repercussions will last a great deal longer. Told from the perspectives of all four characters, FOUR is a book about love, secrets, friendship and fidelity.

Two Couples

One Reckless Night

My Thoughts about it...

This is one of those stories which begins in such a way that you can't help but think it's not going to work out well. Sally and Al have been married for seven years and when they go away for a weekend in Brighton with their shared friend, Mike and his new girlfriend, Faye, all is set for a drink and drug fuelled weekend. When lust for each other's partners rears its ugly head, there is so much to lose and it seems, not much to be gained from swapping bed partners for a night.

Four felt like a very modern story, peopled with characters who work in high stress occupations and who like to relax at the weekend, however, this foursome are about to find out, to their cost, that for any action, however superficial it may seem in the cold light of day, or drink and drug fuelled night, there are always going to be consequences.

At the beginning I wasn't too sure about any of the characters, in fact, I didn't like any of them very much but after a while, as they started to become more familiar, I began to care about what happened to them and hoped that everything would work out in the way they wanted it to do.

Four is a thought provoking novel which beautifully observes the vagaries of people. It’s about the struggle to maintain a failing relationship when couples seem to want different things, and it’s also about the lure of a tantalising temptation, which at first seems like a gift that can't be turned down, but which, on reflection, could so easily herald a downfall.

About the Author

In one form or another Andy has always been a writer. At school he passed notes in class and scribbled rude words on lamp pots. At university he wrote a PhD in biochemistry and forged tickets to various balls, and as an advertising copy writer, he has written adverts for everything from baby food to booze. But it wasn't until he was well into his thirties that Andy started writing fiction, if he could write a letter to his younger self, it would urge him to stop messing around and get on with it. Four is his fourth novel, but it should probably be his tenth.

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