The likeness

Cassie Maddox is sucked back into undercover work by the freakish coincidence of a murder victim that looks just like her. Most of the book is Cassie impersonating the victim to her housemates. There is lots of interesting characterization of Cassie, the housemates, and the victim.

While "Into the woods" kindof sucker-punched me with the ending, this was less traumatic. The ending of this book is a bit more conventional (even using some police procedural trope, slightly twisted).

You should definitely read "Into the woods first", this book references it quite often. It does switch points of view a bit startlingly compared to the previous book.

As an identical twin I found the premise hilarious but if you ignore that basic issue it's a good whodunnit and beautifully written

Tana French outdoes herself here. In The Woods was excellently written, but had a few narrative flaws that marred the gem. The basic premise of The Likeness may require a slight suspension of disbelief, but once you're past that it unfolds as a careful, patient, and exquisite mystery as only Strong can tell it.

Not as good as the first by quite a ways.

Good (murder mysteries/cop procedurals are still not my cup of tea), but not as good as In The Woods. I think it's because In The Woods had an eerie/supernatural undercurrent to it because of Ryan's missing friends. This seemed, from the description, to have the same sense of something-isn't-right that keeps the reader off balance, but Tana French squashed that in the beginning. The rest, while still good, didn't have that off-putting charge to it and was just a police story.

Still, will probably read her next book, Faithful Place.