Review: I'M THE GIRL by Courtney Summers

 

I'm the Girl by Courtney Summers
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The new groundbreaking queer thriller from New York Times bestselling and Edgar-award Winning author Courtney Summers.

When sixteen-year-old Georgia Avis discovers the dead body of thirteen-year-old Ashley James, she teams up with Ashley's older sister, Nora, to find and bring the killer to justice before he strikes again. But their investigation throws Georgia into a world of unimaginable privilege and wealth, without conscience or consequence, and as Ashley’s killer closes in, Georgia will discover when money, power and beauty rule, it might not be a matter of who is guilty—but who is guiltiest.

A spiritual successor to the 2018 breakout hit, Sadie, I'm the Girl is a masterfully written, bold, and unflinching account of how one young woman feels in her body as she struggles to navigate a deadly and predatory power structure while asking readers one question: if this is the way the world is, do you accept it?

---

I am a massive fan of Courtney Summers, and this book is one I am also now a massive fan of.

It's dark, this one. And uncomfortable. Disturbing. Everything I 'like' from a dark contemporary YA read. But this one also hit differently. I'm normally fine reading disturbing content, but I was not fine after reading this. And that's how real this all felt.

Georgia's a great character. She's lost. She's angry. She's trying to work out why things are the way that they are. And she's looking for a mother figure as her mother recently passed away. And so when Cleo steps in, she wants to get close to her. Cleo and her husband run Aspera, and Georgia wants to be an 'Aspera girl'--a beautiful girl who works there--precisely because her mother said she wouldn't be one. Georgia is vain too, in an entirely normal teen girl way. Before the book begins she's had some nude photos taken by a 'professional' (who later turns out not to be a professional.)

And this is a story about grooming and child sexual abuse. We watch as Georgia becomes a victim of this, first being employed in small roles at Aspera, then seeing it turn more into what it actually is. There's graphic sexual content between Georgia (a sixteen-year-old) and Cleo's middle-aged husband Matthew. Cleo appears to be on board with this. And this all happens even though Georgia tells them she's a lesbian. She has in fact got a crush on Nora, who's the sister of Ashley--and the book starts with Georgia finding 13-year-old Ashley's body, so there is a lot packed in this.

It starts off as a murder mystery, but the actual murder mystery doesn't really control much of the plot. It's very much secondary to Georgia trying to become an Aspera girl.

One of the things I really liked was Georgia's relationship with Tyler, her brother. He's always looking out for her, and this, alongside Nora's relationship with Georgia, helped balance this book so it didn't feel like it was being devoured by all the slime. Because that's how I felt while reading a lot of this--slimy.

The language is also beautiful in this. So, so lyrical.

This is an important book to read. It's about beauty and appearance, privilege and wealth and poverty, truth and lies, policing and the cover-up of crimes by those with money.

Content warnings for: rape, child abuse, child sexual abuse, grooming, murder, implied incest (though I don't think that actually happened and was just set up to look like it had, by one of the characters, to set someone else up for murder).

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Review: THE COUPLE NEXT DOOR by Shari Lapena

 

The Couple Next Door by Shari Lapena
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

It all started at a dinner party. . .

A domestic suspense debut about a young couple and their apparently friendly neighbors--a twisty, rollercoaster ride of lies, betrayal, and the secrets between husbands and wives. . .

Anne and Marco Conti seem to have it all--a loving relationship, a wonderful home, and their beautiful baby, Cora. But one night when they are at a dinner party next door, a terrible crime is committed. Suspicion immediately focuses on the parents. But the truth is a much more complicated story.

Inside the curtained house, an unsettling account of what actually happened unfolds. Detective Rasbach knows that the panicked couple is hiding something. Both Anne and Marco soon discover that the other is keeping secrets, secrets they've kept for years.

What follows is the nerve-racking unraveling of a family--a chilling tale of deception, duplicity, and unfaithfulness that will keep you breathless until the final shocking twist.

---

This is the first Shari Lapena novel I've read, and it was an easy read. I was having intensive medical treatment for 6 weeks in hospital and I had a pile of books that I'd got from a secondhand book shop. This was one of them, and yeah, it kept me entertained. But I found the first half of the story was much better.

The set-up is good in terms of execution and tension and pacing--there's a missing baby and suspicion is cast from one character to another--but I also found the set-up not that plausible. Would parents really leave their six-month-old daughter at home on her own? Would they assume that she really would be fine? Because as soon as we had this set-up, I knew what was going to happen. It was kind of obvious and so, so predictable. And it also really annoyed me and made me not like the parents too.

What wasn't obvious though were developments in the second half--yes, I love when a story does this, but it didn't quite feel organic enough to the story for me. There were also so many twists being piled on top of each other by the end, and it almost felt that the author was just trying to make the reader more and more surprised. So by the time I was finishing the book, my disbelief was no longer suspended. I wasn't as on-page in the story as I had been before. I felt like I was reading the ending of a book, rather than learning what was actually going on. It was a bit infuriating really to be pulled out of the story, when on a craft level, this book had started so well in terms of set-up.

However, there was an issue with the writing that bothered me, and this was the dialogue tags. Just so many of them... I kept thinking, why not just use 'said'? But I haven't deducted a star from the review though as this book did what I wanted it to: it kept me entertained and distracted from my medical treatment, and there's no doubt that it's compulsive and a page-turner. I will be picking up more books by this author in the future.

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Review: TWITCH by M. G. Leonard

 

Twitch by M.G. Leonard
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Can a birdwatcher outwit an escaped convict?

Twitch has three pet chickens, four pigeons, swallows nesting in his bedroom and a passion for birdwatching. On the first day of the summer holidays, he arrives at his secret hide to find police everywhere: a convicted robber has broken out of prison and is hiding in Aves Wood. Can Twitch use his talents for birdwatching to hunt for the dangerous prisoner and find the missing loot?

---

Okay, so this has to be one of my favourite middle grade stories. I've been reading more of these recently as I've been writing MG too, and this is one of the books I used to for research--seeing how it's plotted, the level of 'threat' that a child MC can face, etc.

 
And I loved this story. The plot was impressively put together, tightly constructed, and entertaining to me as an adult. I could not work out who the 'bad guy' of the story was, and the twists were great. Characterisation was also superb.

This story also examines bullying and friendship, and I think it would be a good gift for a child who is experiencing trouble at school in these respects, or a child who thinks they don't quite fit in with everyone else.

 
There's also an impressive amount of bird knowledge in this book, and I learnt so much and could really feel Twitch's enthusiasm for birds.

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Review: NEVER SAW ME COMING by Vera Kurian

 

Never Saw Me Coming by Vera Kurian
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Meet Chloe Sevre. She’s a freshman honor student, a leggings-wearing hot girl next door, who also happens to be a psychopath. Her hobbies include yogalates, frat parties, and plotting to kill Will Bachman, a childhood friend who grievously wronged her.

Chloe is one of seven students at her DC-based college who are part of an unusual clinical study for psychopaths—students like herself who lack empathy and can’t comprehend emotions like fear or guilt. The study, led by a renowned psychologist, requires them to wear smart watches that track their moods and movements.

When one of the students in the study is found murdered in the psychology building, a dangerous game of cat and mouse begins, and Chloe goes from hunter to prey. As she races to identify the killer and put her own plan into action, she’ll be forced to decide if she can trust any of her fellow psychopaths—and everybody knows you should never trust a psychopath.

Never Saw Me Coming is a compulsive, voice-driven thriller by an exciting new voice in fiction, that will keep you pinned to the page and rooting for a would-be killer.

---

Ah, how I wish I reviewed this book as soon as I finished it and not nearly a year later! Because I remember this book was good. Dark secrets, psychopaths (actual, clinically-diagnosed psychopaths, too), unreliable narrators and characters, violence, murder, sexual assault. There's a lot in this book.

Before reading this, I'll confess, I didn't know that much about the clinical diagnosis of psychopathy and what it means to have this diagnosis. I think often the figure of the psychopath is dramatized and over-villainised in popular culture and media, and this was a really interesting read, when two of our narrators were psychopaths involved in a clinical university study into their condition, and a third one was pretending to be a psychopath (I found it interesting how he'd fooled the scientists running the study, but at least one of the others in the study could see right through him).

A lot of the story focuses on Chloe wanting revenge on Will. Her reasons are justified and I found myself routing for her--her lack of guilt or empathy made it a lot easier to route for her, too. I think if this had been a character who wasn't diagnosed as a psychopath, then the lack of guilt may have changed how I viewed her slightly. But Will was an abusive and awful character, and I really felt like Chloe was justified.

Charles is probably the most memorable of the characters, though. He's more thoughtful and contemplative than Chloe, and a lot of the time he's trying to steer his life in a different direction and overcome the social stigma of his diagnosis.

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Review: THE LAST GIRL by Goldy Moldavsky

The Last Girl by Goldy Moldavsky
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

New girl Rachel Chavez is eager to make a fresh start at Manchester Prep. But as one of the few scholarship kids, Rachel struggles to fit in, and when she gets caught up in a prank gone awry, she ends up with more enemies than friends.

To her surprise, however, the prank attracts the attention of the Mary Shelley Club, a secret club of students with one objective: come up with the scariest prank to orchestrate real fear. But as the pranks escalate, the competition turns cutthroat and takes on a life of its own.

When the tables are turned and someone targets the club itself, Rachel must track down the real-life monster in their midst . . . even if it means finally confronting the dark secrets from her past.

—-

Engaging and Clever

This is the first book by Goldy Moldavsky that I’ve read, and I have to say, I really enjoyed it. I’m a sucker for anything related to Mary Shelley and Frankenstein, and the premise of this book is great. So engaging.

All the characters are well written and believable. The narrative style is engaging, and Rachel’s a great MC. She’s vulnerable but active and strong, and she’s haunted by her past.

This is a solid read, but I found the pacing a little slow in the second half, so it took me a little longer to read it as I didn’t really feel that sense of urgency to pick it up until the ending. But the end is amazing—masterfully plotted, though I did wonder if the ending was a little too neatly tied up.

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Review: FAMILY OF LIARS by e. lockhart

 

Family of Liars by E. Lockhart
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The prequel to We Were Liars takes readers back to the story of another summer, another generation, and the secrets that will haunt them for decades to come.

A windswept private island off the coast of Massachusetts. 
A hungry ocean, churning with secrets and sorrow.
A fiery, addicted heiress. An irresistible, unpredictable boy. 
A summer of unforgivable betrayal and terrible mistakes.

Welcome back to the Sinclair family. 
They were always liars

— 

Beautiful lyrical prose, as is expected of E. Lockhart, and a wonderful prequel to WE WERE LIARS. Always interesting learning about the previous generation, and the characterisation was masterful. The twists were phenomenal. Complete shockers that I did not see coming. Unreliable narrators (like mother like daughter!), delightful imagery, and a book that speaks so many truths, particularly for the #MeToo movement.

Although this review is short (I’m currently not that well!) this book is an instant favourite.

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Review: THE GIRLS ARE ALL SO NICE HERE by Laurie Elizabeth Flynn

 

The Girls Are All So Nice Here by Laurie Elizabeth Flynn
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

A USA TODAY Best Book of 2021

Two former best friends return to their college reunion to find that they’re being circled by someone who wants revenge for what they did ten years before—and will stop at nothing to get it—in this “propulsive” (Megan Miranda, bestselling author of The Girl from Widow Hills) psychological thriller.

A lot has changed in years since Ambrosia Wellington graduated from college, and she’s worked hard to create a new life for herself. But then an invitation to her ten-year reunion arrives in the mail, along with an anonymous note that reads, “We need to talk about what we did that night.”

It seems that the secrets of Ambrosia’s past—and the people she thought she’d left there—aren’t as buried as she believed. Amb can’t stop fixating on what she did or who she did it with: larger-than-life Sloane “Sully” Sullivan, Amb’s former best friend, who could make anyone do anything.

At the reunion, Amb and Sully receive increasingly menacing messages, and it becomes clear that they’re being pursued by someone who wants more than just the truth of what happened that first semester. This person wants revenge for what they did and the damage they caused—the extent of which Amb is only now fully understanding. And it was all because of the game they played to get a boy who belonged to someone else and the girl who paid the price.

Alternating between the reunion and Amb’s freshman year, The Girls Are All So Nice Here is a “chilling and twisty thriller” (Book Riot) about the brutal lengths girls can go to get what they think they’re owed, and what happens when the games we play in college become matters of life and death. 

— 

Dark, toxic female friendships. A stunning debut adult thriller. I’ve loved L.E. Flynn’s YA thrillers, and her first adult novel did not disappoint. 

Ambrosia Wellington is one hell of a character. Complex, hurting, haunted, and trying to forget her past and her involvement in her roommate’s death.

The twists here were shocking, the voice compelling, and I couldn’t listen to this audiobook fast enough. The storyline deftly weaves between past and present, showing how the effects of toxic female friendship are never really over. This is exactly the type of adult thriller I love.

I wasn’t entirely sure about one of the narrators at first, but she turned out being the perfect choice.

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Review: THE AGATHAS by Kathleen Glasgow and Liz Lawson

 

The Agathas by Kathleen Glasgow
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Last summer, Alice Ogilve’s basketball-star boyfriend Steve dumped her. Then she disappeared for five days. Where she went and what happened to her is the biggest mystery in Castle Cove, because she’s not talking. Or it was, at least. But now, another one of Steve’s girlfriends has vanished: Brooke Donovan, Alice’s ex–best friend. And it doesn’t look like Brooke will be coming back. . .

Enter Iris Adams, Alice’s tutor. Iris has her own reasons for wanting to disappear, though unlike Alice, she doesn’t have the money or the means. That could be changed by the hefty reward Brooke’s grandmother is offering to anyone who can share information about her granddaughter’s whereabouts. The police are convinced Steve is the culprit, but Alice isn’t so sure, and with Iris on her side, she just might be able to prove her theory.

In order to get the reward and prove Steve’s innocence, they need to figure out who killed Brooke Donovan. And luckily Alice has exactly what they need—the complete works of Agatha Christie. If there’s anyone that can teach the girls how to solve a mystery it’s the master herself. But the town of Castle Cove holds many secrets, and Alice and Iris have no idea how much danger they're about to walk into.

—

You know what? The Agathas is possibly my favourite co-written book (along with All of Us Villains). It’s phenomenal. A compelling and wonderfully plotted YA murder mystery/thriller with plenty of heart and emotion. Two narrators that I absolutely adored, dark topics, and twists that impressed. Did not see the ending coming! 

One thing I loved about this book was how different the two narrators are. Alice is rich and used to be popular. Iris has little money and is the victim of domestic abuse. And this rich/poor divide is explored really well, even showing how money and power corrupt. An innocent suspect is paid by a rich family to plead guilty, and we even see how the police are corrupt in this sense too (though they are sort of redeemed at the end as the bribery isn’t as big as it seems.) 

I loved how Alice is a massive Agatha Christie fan and I loved the mystery surrounding Alice’s own disappearance before this book begins, and how details of that even weave into the mystery surrounding Brooke’s death. 

Highly recommended.  

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Review: THIS IS WHY WE LIE by Gabriella Lepore

 

This Is Why We Lie by Gabriella Lepore
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Everyone in Gardiners Bay has a secret.

When Jenna Dallas and Adam Cole find Colleen O'Dell's body floating off the shore of their coastal town, the community of Gardiners Bay is shaken. But even more shocking is the fact that her drowning was no accident.

Once Jenna's best friend becomes a key suspect, Jenna starts to look for answers on her own. As she uncovers scandals inside Preston Prep School leading back to Rookwood reform school, she knows she needs Adam on her side.

As a student at Rookwood, Adam is used to getting judgmental looks, but now his friends are being investigated by the police. Adam will do whatever he can to keep them safe, even if that means trusting Jenna.

As lies unravel, the truth starts to blur. Only one thing is certain: somebody must take the fall. 

—-

I listened to the audiobook for this one, and the narration and story are great. Right away, I was hooked and for about 60% I had no idea who the killer was because we kept getting hit with more developments that changed what I was thinking constantly. And then I worked it out, and it was so satisfying putting all the precise together—and before the narrator does too.

So, we have Jenna and Adam who discover Colleen’s body. She’s drowned…except this is a YA thriller so of course she didn’t drown. It was murder! Jenna lives with her aunt (her mother’s glamorous lifestyle isn’t compatible with being a parent) and her aunt is one of the cops investigating the case. Jenna’s and Adam’s best friends are both implicated for the murder, and we see each protecting them while trying to find out the truth. Adam also becomes a suspect.

We get flashback scenes that show us what Colleen was like as a person, and honestly, her characterisation is strong. Actually, every character’s characterisation is so strong. Really well done.

Jenna goes to Preston Prep school for Girls and Adam is at Rookwood, a school for troubled boys (and ones who often have criminal records). I loved this as it immediately meant all the boys had dark pasts and theoretically could definitely be capable of murder. But we also see how the girls are capable too, even though they’re not looked down on or judged by the rest of the town. We also have secret parties and meet-ups at Rookwood.

The final showdown, between Jenna and the killer was a bit of a let down for me, if I’m honest. Jenna fell for the trap, and I was screaming at her not to go there. Then she did. But then, by coincidence, Adam was at the right place at the right time. I know the book even has him acknowledge this as a coincidence, but it felt a bit too convenient for me. I was willing to overlook it though, expecting to get a couple more chapters afterward, but the next scenes were set farther ahead in time and sort of just provided a summary, looking back.

Spoiler: I loved that we have a female killer.

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Review: Never Tell A Lie by Gail Schimmel

 

Never Tell A Lie by Gail Schimmel
My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars

This is my first book by Gail Schimmel and I will definitely be reading more. Never Tell a Lie is a rather tame domestic suspense novel, but it’s engaging and I couldn’t read it fast enough. I love stories about complex friendships and complex female characters. A school reunion has main character Mary becoming best friends with old schoolmate April—even if Mary can’t actually remember April from them.

There are so many secrets wrapped up inside this novel. April has a dark past linking to an event at school; April and Leo’s marriage is abusive but the big question for a long time is who is the abuser; and Mary discovers her long dead mother isn’t actually dead.

But the big plot centres around April—Mary believes her husband is abusing her, as all the signs are there, but Leo spins a convincing tale as he tries to persuade Mary that he’s the one being abused. Given we know April has done bad things in the past, this is plausible too, and the plot evolves into this twisty narrative where we and Mary are trying to work out who is telling the truth.

Spoilers ahead: So, April’s character was so well written and developed for a long time. Leo’s character had less page-time, and so when he managed to persuade Mary to help get April sectioned in a psychiatric unit, I was surprised by how quickly that happened. And then we end up with time-jumps
Suddenly weeks have passed and Mary is on her third date with Leo—where she discovers the truth, that April was telling the truth all along. And while I like that this is a great #MeToo story showing how men can hide their abusive actions and appear charming to others, I really felt like this ending was just too rushed. It felt like it all happened too quickly, like the pacing was off. This is my only complaint about the book, and so it’s a 4.5 star read for me.

All the characters were all so well written, especially Mary’s son Django and her new boyfriend Joshua and her old friend Stacey. Even Mary’s parents felt real.

The writing is well done and sophisticated.

While I usually gravitate toward suspense novels with more action, this one still had me gripped. 

Thank you to NetGalley for the arc. 

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Review: THE MAID by Nita Prose

 

The Maid by Nita Prose
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is a phenomenal book.

The writing is so, so strong, and Molly’s voice is fantastic. Molly Gray is twenty-five, a maid, and she sees the world differently to most people. She struggles with social interactions, taking everything at face value and interpreting things literally. She’s not a good judge of character as she’s way too trusting. And that becomes her downfall when others use this against her to set her up for the murder of a pm important client at the hotel she works for.

Molly discovers wealthy client Mr Black is dead when she goes to clean his room, and because she doesn’t act as others expect her to, she quickly becomes a suspect in the police investigation. The real murderers realise this and use it to their advantage, framing her more and more.

I couldn’t get over how amazingly well written Molly is. It’s first-person narrative and we’re in her head, seeing her thought processes and how she reacts differently. Yet it also very much clear to readers who the bad characters are from the start, despite us only ever seeing them through Molly!s eyes where she believes they are good and trustworthy. This is simply a masterful piece of craft.

All the characters are so well written, and every time I felt like I knew Molly, there was a surprise or a twist in store. This book is tense, and I read the whole thing in a couple of days. Really, really recommend it to everyone who likes stories of neurodivergence, thrillers, suspense, and strong characters. 

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.   

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Review: Chloe Cates is Missing by Mandy McHugh

 

Chloe Cates is Missing by Mandy McHugh
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

AThe disappearance of a young internet celebrity ignites a firestorm of speculation on social media, and to find her a detective will have to extinguish the blaze. 

Chloe Cates is missing. The 13-year-old star of the hit YouTube series, “CC and Me,” has disappeared, and nobody knows where she’s gone — least of all ruthless momager Jennifer Scarborough, who has spent much of her daughter’s young life crafting a child celebrity persona that is finally beginning to pay off. And in Chloe’s absence, the faux-fairytale world that supported that persona begins to fracture, revealing secrets capable of reducing the highly-dysfunctional Scarborough family to rubble. 

Anxious to find her daughter and preserve the life she’s worked so hard to build, Jennifer turns to social media for help, but the hearsay, false claims, and salacious suspicions only multiply. As the search becomes as sensational as Chloe’s series, Missing Persons detective Emilina Stone steps in, only to realize she has a connection to this case herself. Will she be able to stay objective and cut through the rumors to find the truth before it’s too late?

Told from multiple points of view including Jennifer, Emilina, and pages from Chloe’s lost diary, Chloe Cates Is Missing is a suspenseful novel of a child pushed to the brink, and of the troubled family that desperately needs her back.

—-

Chloe Cates is missing is a phenomenal debut. Seriously. It’s SO good.

I started it late evening yesterday and read until the early hours, and then picked it up again as soon as I could today. Within twenty-four hours of starting this book, I’d finished it. I simply couldn’t read it fast enough. Chloe Cates is Missing is a twisty, complicated story that spirals around Jennifer, the mother of Abigail who is more publicly known as Chloe. Jennifer began a ‘mommy blog’ when Abby was little, and ‘Chloe’ is its main character. While Jennifer’s son is allowed a normal life, Abby isn’t. She’s not allowed to go to school, have friends, or make any of her own choices. She has to constantly perform as Chloe, and we see the horrific things that this leads to. And the story begins when Jennifer finds that her precious daughter is missing…

Jennifer is such a fascinating character. She’s dark and twisty. She sees her daughter only in terms of what Chloe can provide her. She treats her like a doll, wanting to control every aspect of her life. And she’ll do anything to make sure she gets her own way. And she lies. She lies a lot, and I was never quite sure when she was telling the truth. This made the tension so, so high. I couldn’t stop reading. She’d engineered an entire fake life for her daughter for her followers to watch. Chloe’s ‘friends’ were photoshopped models. Any time Abby really did start making friends of her own, Jennifer put a stop to it. She wanted her daughter isolated and dependent, and Jackson, Jennifer’s husband and Chloe’s father just lets it happen.

Jennifer is also a murderer. Part of the narrative is from the perspective of Emilina, the former best friend of Jennifer and the now detective investigating Chloe’s disappearance. Emilina knows exactly what kind of person Jennifer is, as Jennifer forced her to cover up the murder when they were kids. 

And that’s not the only murder in the book. We’ve also got the murder of Missy, a girl the same age as Chloe and who looks pretty similar to her. And it soon becomes clear the murder of Missy and the disappearance of Chloe are intrinsically connected.

Chloe/Abby is a fascinating character. I really felt for her, could feel her desperation through her journal entries as she tried to fight her controlling mother. Indeed, the journal was quite horrifying to read when it became apparent just how far Jennifer would go to make sure her daughter was doing what she wanted. There was a fantastic twist about the boy whom Abby was secretly getting to know. And we really see the effect of all this emotional abuse on Abby and learn how her mother’s behaviour has shaped her. Nothing is as it seems!

There are so many twists in this book. The pacing is spot-on, and I simply had to read it as quickly as possible to find out who was the evil mastermind—because no matter how hard I tried to work it out, I just couldn’t. Every time I thought I had a handle on one of the suspects, a new curveball was thrown into the mix.

We’ve got a lot of first person narrators—Jennifer, Emilina, Abby, and Jackson (Jennifer’s husband)—but it didn’t feel like too many and I was able to separate the narratives quite easily.

All in all, this is a highly recommended read. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC.

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Review: STILLHOUSE LAKE by Rachel Caine

Stillhouse Lake by Rachel Caine
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Gina Royal is the definition of average—a shy Midwestern housewife with a happy marriage and two adorable children. But when a car accident reveals her husband’s secret life as a serial killer, she must remake herself as Gwen Proctor—the ultimate warrior mom.

With her ex now in prison, Gwen has finally found refuge in a new home on remote Stillhouse Lake. Though still the target of stalkers and Internet trolls who think she had something to do with her husband’s crimes, Gwen dares to think her kids can finally grow up in peace.

But just when she’s starting to feel at ease in her new identity, a body turns up in the lake—and threatening letters start arriving from an all-too-familiar address. Gwen Proctor must keep friends close and enemies at bay to avoid being exposed—or watch her kids fall victim to a killer who takes pleasure in tormenting her. One thing is certain: she’s learned how to fight evil. And she’ll never stop.

--- 
I listened to the audiobook shortly after Rachel Caine passed away, and it definitely was poignant listening to this as she was such a great writer. I'd had the ebook of this for a while, but when I joined audible and saw this was there too, I thought I'd try it out that way as I'd been having problems with my vision.

I ended up listening to this in quite intense chunks--several hours at a time--as it was when we had the really hot weather and I needed to sit outside with my guinea pigs to make sure they weren't getting too hot. They always like the sound of the radio and so on, so I put the audio on out loud for them all to hear--and we all enjoyed it.

In Stillhouse Lake, Caine proved once again that she is a master of writing. This is the first of her adult books I've read--and the first thriller from her, given I was obsessed with her YA fantasy Morganville series and was a bit scared to try something new from her for so long due to being afraid of being disappointed. But I wasn't disappointed at all.

From the moment I started listening to this book, I was drawn in. The characters are just so, so real, and the emotion in the writing is incredible.

I'll admit, I found the first half of the book a tiny bit slow at times--but this is just nitpicking really, because it really is amazing. And that ending! Wow. Just wow.

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Review: HER LAST HOLIDAY by C. L. Taylor

 

Her Last Holiday by C.L. Taylor
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

You come to the retreat to be healed. You don’t expect to die.

Two years ago, Fran’s sister Jenna disappeared on a wellness retreat in Gozo that went terribly wrong.

Tom Wade, the now infamous man behind Soul Shrink Retreats, has just been released from prison after serving his sentence for the deaths of two people. But he has never let on what happened to the third victim: Jenna.

Determined to find out the truth, Fran books herself onto his upcoming retreat – the first since his release – and finds herself face to face with the man who might hold the key to her sister’s disappearance. The only question is, will she escape the retreat alive? Or does someone out there want Jenna’s secrets to stay hidden?

The master of suspense is back. Prepare yourself for the latest heart-in-mouth rollercoaster ride from the Sunday Times bestseller.

--

I have to admit, this book didn't blow me away like I'd hoped it would. I'm a massive fan of C.L. Taylor's other works, but this one just fell a bit short me. I don't know if it was because I had such high expectations, or if it's because I loved her first-person narrators so much (and this is third person and three narrators), but it just felt a bit...flat. I didn't really think the tension was there, and a few of the twists I managed to guess. 

And the ending--well, I just didn't think it was 'enough'. The whole story seemed to have been leading one way, and then well, it didn't. It just stopped, taking us a new direction as we discover the truth--and I just found that it all wrapped up too nicely. It felt like it was just too convenient. Too perfect an ending for such a dark novel. 

Having said that, the characterisation is solid and the setting was really well written. I do love stories set in retreats as you get this locked-room mystery vibe, and we do have two timelines here too, both with retreats. 

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Review: SWEET LITTLE LIES by Caz Frear

 

Sweet Little Lies by Caz Frear
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

In this gripping debut procedural, a young London policewoman must probe dark secrets buried deep in her own family's past to solve a murder and a long-ago disappearance.

Your father is a liar. But is he a killer?
Even liars tell the truth... sometimes.

Twenty-six-year-old Cat Kinsella overcame a troubled childhood to become a Detective Constable with the Metropolitan Police Force, but she's never been able to banish these ghosts. When she's called to the scene of a murder in Islington, not far from the pub her estranged father still runs, she discovers that Alice Lapaine, a young housewife who didn't get out much, has been found strangled.

Cat and her team immediately suspect Alice's husband, until she receives a mysterious phone call that links the victim to Maryanne Doyle, a teenage girl who went missing in Ireland eighteen years earlier. The call raises uneasy memories for Cat--her family met Maryanne while on holiday, right before she vanished. Though she was only a child, Cat knew that her charming but dissolute father wasn't telling the truth when he denied knowing anything about Maryanne or her disappearance. Did her father do something to the teenage girl all those years ago? Could he have harmed Alice now? And how can you trust a liar even if he might be telling the truth?

Determined to close the two cases, Cat rushes headlong into the investigation, crossing ethical lines and trampling professional codes. But in looking into the past, she might not like what she finds... 

--

I've had this book on my shelf for a while, and I don't know why I didn't pick it up for so long--because the moment I started it, I could not stop reading. Seriously, I've been in a bit of a reading slump lately and I finished off this book in just over two days. It's just amazing.

Right away, Frear introduces us to main character Cat and the dark secret she's hiding about her father. When she was a child, a girl went missing and she knows her father lied to the police. Now, an adult, Cat is a police detective. She's suffering with fragile mental health--PTSD following a gruelling murder case--and the new case she's on has links to the past, and her father.

This is just such a complex book. And it covers so much. Secrets and lies and betrayal. You've got complicated familial relationships, an examination of grief and one's desire to protect themselves.

The story is told across two timelines, and the inclusion of the flashbacks was particularly well done. Seriously, really good. They may have been short snippets but they not only fleshed out the past mystery but were placed wonderfully to spur on the present-day storyline too.

And the characterisation! So, this has to be my favourite thing about this book. Frear is masterful at creating believable characters. Every single one of them just leapt off the page. The dialogue for each was spot-on. I especially loved Steele, Cat's boss, but all of them were just so real and authentic.

And the twists! There's a huge twist around who the latest murder victim is, and that left me speechless. Well, I mean, there are many twists in the book, and I found myself really looking forward to the ends of chapters as nearly every one delivered some sort of twist or charged moment.

And the ending--so I hadn't been able to work out who the 'bad guy' was for so long. Every time I thought I knew, Frear was one step ahead. But learning the truth was so satisfying. It really worked. 

There's some dark content in this book: murder, child abuse, sex trafficking, grooming, baby factories, mental illness, and death. 

I'll definitely be looking out for the next book in this series.

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Review: FRIEND REQUEST by Laura Marshall

 

Friend Request by Laura Marshall
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

1989. When Louise first notices the new girl who has mysteriously transferred late into their senior year, Maria seems to be everything the girls Louise hangs out with aren't. Authentic. Funny. Brash. Within just a few days, Maria and Louise are on their way to becoming fast friends.

2016. Louise receives a heart-stopping email: Maria Weston wants to be friends on Facebook. Long-buried memories quickly rise to the surface: those first days of their budding friendship; cruel decisions made and dark secrets kept; the night that would change all their lives forever.

Louise has always known that if the truth ever came out, she could stand to lose everything. Her job. Her son. Her freedom. Maria's sudden reappearance threatens it all, and forces Louise to reconnect with everyone she'd severed ties with to escape the past. But as she tries to piece together exactly what happened that night, Louise discovers there's more to the story than she ever knew. To keep her secret, Louise must first uncover the whole truth, before what's known to Maria--or whoever's pretending to be her--is known to all.

--

Oh, this book! So, when I first started reading it, I found the opening a bit slow. It was a take-it-or-leave-it book for me for a while, but then the pacing suddenly picked up and I couldn't read it quickly enough.

Louise has a secret. She was involved in the murder of her former friend Maria, at high school. Now she's an adult and a mother, and suddenly she's receiving messages from someone who's supposedly Maria. Louise panics and goes to see Sophie, the ring-leader of the bullies at school (the one who made Louise bully Maria). As an adult, Sophie is calmer and seems less mean and insecure--she was a classic bully at school--and Sophie has also been receiving messages from 'Maria'. And when they both go to a high school reunion, things get out of hand.

The story alternates between the present day and the characters' school years. The teenage girls in this are written so very well--the bullying seems so real and authentic, and the author really captures just how mean teen girls can be.

There are twists throughout this book, and barring the beginning, the pacing is good. This was one of those books where I could not work out who the real murderer was... every time I thought I knew, I was thrown off a little. And when we had the reveal at the end, I just couldn't read fast enough.

The identity of the person behind 'Maria' was a little bit of a let-down if I'm honest as that character didn't really have much page-time earlier in the book. But the reveal of the murderer was so good. Really gripping writing. 

Trigger warning for rape.  

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Review: ALL YOUR TWISTED SECRETS by Diana Urban

 

All Your Twisted Secrets by Diana Urban
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This thrilling debut, reminiscent of new fan favorites like One of Us Is Lying and the beloved classics by Agatha Christie, will leave readers guessing until the explosive ending.

Welcome to dinner, and again, congratulations on being selected. Now you must do the selecting.

What do the queen bee, star athlete, valedictorian, stoner, loner, and music geek all have in common? They were all invited to a scholarship dinner, only to discover it’s a trap. Someone has locked them into a room with a bomb, a syringe filled with poison, and a note saying they have an hour to pick someone to kill … or else everyone dies.

Amber Prescott is determined to get her classmates and herself out of the room alive, but that might be easier said than done. No one knows how they’re all connected or who would want them dead. As they retrace the events over the past year that might have triggered their captor’s ultimatum, it becomes clear that everyone is hiding something. And with the clock ticking down, confusion turns into fear, and fear morphs into panic as they race to answer the biggest question: Who will they choose to die?

------

I already know this is going to be one of my top reads of 2021. It's PHENOMENAL.

I love locked room mysteries. And I love escape room mysteries. I love stories about friendships--especially when those friendships turn bad. I love unlikeable female characters. I love unreliable narrators. And I love alternating timelines. This book has it all. I mean, I was almost afraid that it wouldn't live up to my expectations, but this book is phenomenal. Truly spectacular.

The book starts with Amber invited to a restaurant to meet the mayor, as she's got a scholarship. Also invited are her boyfriend Robbie, her former best friend Priya, her current friend Sasha, the school drug-dealer Scott, and Diego, who is the boy Amber now likes. When the six get to the restaurant, they're trapped. The door locks, and they can't get out. Then Amber discovers a bomb with a one-hour countdown and a syringe. Instructions tell them that the syringe contains poison and they must choose one person to die before the hour's up, else the bomb will kill them all. Cue: panic.

But how amazing is this set up? So, the narrative alternates between them in this one-hour countdown as they panic and try to think of ways out, and scenes from the last year or so. We get to know the characters, and gradually the past scenes reveal huge secrets--secrets that are then brought up in the current timeline as the characters turn on each other, as they try to work out who to die.

And this is where we see that all these characters are complex. They've all got secrets, all got flaws--it's amazing writing.

The next part of my review contains spoilers, so be warned!

Amber is our main character. She's hugely talented with music and she's also still grieving over her older sister's death. Maggie took her own life after being bullied for about a year by an unknown girl.

Sasha is the queen bee of the school. We see her befriend Amber, and readers can immediately tell that Sasha is using Amber. But Amber can't see this at the time, and it was infuriating! We could see exactly what was going on. But in the present timeline, Amber's very aware of who Sasha really is--but she doesn't expect for more secrets to be revealed in the bomb's countdown, namely that Sasha is the girl who bullied Maggie, causing Maggie to commit suicide.

Priya is Amber's former best friend. She was also initiated into Sasha's popular group when Sasha befriended Amber, but Sasha bullied Priya too in the same way she'd already bullied Maggie (and she knew what happened to Maggie, too). The bullying in this storyline culminates in Priya having her front teeth knocked out and Sasha sharing a video of it to the whole school. Priya then drops Sasha as a friend, and also Amber.

Next we have Robbie. He's Sasha's best friend and becomes Amber's boyfriend. He's a nice enough guy--until he believes that his dreams and ambitions are more important than Amber's. Then he becomes a bit of dick.

Diego is Amber's friend from when she was a child. The two fell out after Diego invented a colour-changing sponge and Diego's father resigned from Amber's father's business, causing it to fold. Diego is also extremely intelligent, and we see how Sasha is in direct competition with him for getting into Harvard. Sasha does her best to sabotage Diego at every opportunity, no matter the consequence.

And last is Scott. He's the stoner of the school, and he at first seems out of place being invited to the restaurant--it's believable to Amber that all the others have been invited there to celebrate their scholarships, but not Scott.

So, this is the set-up. (And even more spoilers ahead now). As the hour passes, the characters turn on each other and several get injured. When trying to break the windows to escape, Scott falls and breaks his ankle. Priya is hypoglycemic and passes out at one point, but Diego revives her.

The writing is so good that I kept working out what I'd do if I was in this situation. Faking a death seemed like an obvious thing to do, but it took the characters a long time to decide to do this.

And as the time is running out and they're all convinced they have to kill someone, Amber manages to turn everyone against Sasha so she is the one who gets injected with the syringe of poison.

At which point, they discover that the poison isn't real! I mean, to be honest, I was thinking that would have to happen. But Sasha, still alive, turns on the others. She attacks Amber, and she tries to kill her. Amber is saved by Priya, who stabs Sasha with a shard of glass from the window in self-defense. And Sasha dies.

And at this point, my eyes were so wide as I was reading (well, listening, as I had the audiobook, which has fantastic narration!). They'd literally killed one of the group. And still the bomb was counting down.

When the time runs out, and they're all alive, it's so tense. They hear footsteps and this was the part where I really had no idea who had orchestrated all this--which, I must admit, is unusual. I read a lot of YA thrillers and usually have some sort of idea. But I was flummoxed. And it's a delivery driver who lets them out. He's been instructed to deliver a cake to the room with a message telling them that they now know who each other are.

This writing--it's just so amazing. Tense. I was on the edge of my seat. (I actually had to stop listening at this point, as I had to get off the bus, and I was desperate to keep listening!).

And then we have the timeline going to four hours ago--and we get the huge reveal. Amber set all this up!!!! So, I didn't see it coming--even though one of the past scenes ends with Amber wanting to get revenge on Sasha. But I trusted Amber as she's our first person narrator. I believed her when she said she didn't know what was going on.

But then the pieces started to slot into place. Amber was the one who found the bomb in the room. All the people in the room were connected most strongly to Amber. And this is a story of revenge. It's a story of Amber wanting to teach Sasha a lesson--it wasn't supposed to end up with murder, but it did. It's Priya getting revenge on Sasha for the bullying--though Priya only stabs Sasha to stop her killing Amber. It's just...wow. That reveal--that Amber was behind it all--changed my whole view on her. I didn't know what to think anymore. I was totally blown away. Absolutely blown away. And it made Amber unlikeable. She was going to get away what was basically murder--even if she'd not intended to kill. But then Amber feels guilt. She goes to turn herself in, and is stopped by Priya and Diego.

It really is a story about the power of friendship and how toxic teenagers can be. It's a story of cold, calculated revenge. A story of secrets being revealed and the lengths that people will go to in order to keep them.

Highly recommended.

There are lot of trigger warnings for this book: suicide, drugs, bullying, abuse, implied school shooting at one point, potential for eating disorder survivors to be triggered by some of the bullying language used toward Priya.

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Review: CONCRETE ROSE by Angie Thomas

 

Concrete Rose by Angie Thomas
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

International phenomenon Angie Thomas revisits Garden Heights seventeen years before the events of The Hate U Give in this searing and poignant exploration of Black boyhood and manhood.

If there’s one thing seventeen-year-old Maverick Carter knows, it’s that a real man takes care of his family. As the son of a former gang legend, Mav does that the only way he knows how: dealing for the King Lords. With this money he can help his mom, who works two jobs while his dad’s in prison.

Life’s not perfect, but with a fly girlfriend and a cousin who always has his back, Mav’s got everything under control.

Until, that is, Maverick finds out he’s a father.

Suddenly he has a baby, Seven, who depends on him for everything. But it’s not so easy to sling dope, finish school, and raise a child. So when he’s offered the chance to go straight, he takes it. In a world where he’s expected to amount to nothing, maybe Mav can prove he’s different.

When King Lord blood runs through your veins, though, you can't just walk away. Loyalty, revenge, and responsibility threaten to tear Mav apart, especially after the brutal murder of a loved one. He’ll have to figure out for himself what it really means to be a man.

----

This book--just wow!!!! I loved THE HATE U GIVE, and so the moment I heard that CONCRETE ROSE was set in the same world of Garden Heights, I just had to drop everything and read it immediately. And I'm sooooo glad I did.

Angie Thomas's writing is just amazing, and this story is so, so real. It's authentic and compelling. And it really helps to remove stigma too.

Maverick is such a great character. He is a Black man who is in a gang. He deals drugs, and there's drug-related violence, and drug-related murders and deaths affecting those close to him. But he is so much more than this--he's a doting father, even as a teenager. He's only selling drugs as he needs to support his mother, and especially when he finds out he's got a child. (And then discovers his girlfriend is also pregnant--two children. He is desperate to provide for his family.) He's fiercely protective of his family and friends. He's kind. He's genuine. We see him make mistakes--and we see him learn from mistakes.

Mav's father is in prison for the entirety of the book, and we learn that this is because the only way out of the King Lords' gang is to be go to prison, often taking the fall for someone else in the gang, or to end up dead. Mav says countless times how he was encouraged by his father to join the gang for his protection--and we can really see this in the book too. King and the other King Lords do protect him from the GDs, the warring gang. And we can see how this almost creates a vicious cycle of these men ending up in prison. Something Mav is desperate to avoid as he wants to be there for his children, especially when he knows what it's like to grow up with a father in prison.

But then Mav's cousin is murdered and he's expected to kill the murderer. We see his desperation to do this, and it's heartbreaking because we've already been shown what could happen.

And, you know what? I desperately wanted things to work out for Maverick--perhaps more than any other protagonist I'd read. And I was so worried that it was going to end with him in big trouble in prison (like, I was sure that was happening). Thankfully, it didn't--though having read THUG we get a hint of what Maverick does have to do to get out of the gang.

But, yes, I couldn't read this book fast enough. (I also LOVED the reference to Justyce in Nic Stone's Dear Martin too!)

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Review: LIES LIKE POISON by Chelsea Pitcher

 

Lies Like Poison by Chelsea Pitcher
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Poppy, Lily, and Belladonna would do anything to protect their best friend, Raven. So when they discovered he was suffering abuse at the hands of his stepmother, they came up with a lethal plan: petals of poppy, belladonna, and lily in her evening tea so she’d never be able to hurt Raven again. But someone got cold feet, the plot faded to a secret of the past, and the group fell apart.

Three years later, on the eve of Raven’s seventeenth birthday, his stepmother turns up dead. But it’s only belladonna found in her tea, and it’s only Belladonna who’s carted off to jail. Desperate for help, Belle reaches out to her estranged friends to prove her innocence. They answer the call, but no one is prepared for what comes next.

Now, everyone has something to lose and something equally dangerous to hide. And when the tangled web of secrets and betrayal is finally unwound, what lies at its heart will change the group forever

--

So, when I was first getting into audiobooks, I was browsing YA thrillers on audible and I came across this one--instantly, I was hooked. I downloaded it immediately--along with a few others--and then I had technology problems and couldn't access my audiobooks! Oh no! Eventually, I sorted it out, but I'd forgotten which book this one was. All I remembered was the main characters shared names with flowers and there was murder, and I was desperately trying to work out which book it was.

So, a few months later, when I'd finished my most recent listen and clicked randomly onto this title (my audible app doesn't show book descriptions), I was delighted to realise IT WAS THIS BOOK! And this book is incredible.

Complex female characters? Yes. Complex male characters? Yes. Complex transitioning characters? Yes. LGBT relationships? Strong character voices and narrative writing? Yes. Beautiful imagery? Yes. And a plot that just grabs you right away? Yes.

THIS BOOK WAS AMAZING! It's haunting and breathtaking and I could not stop listening to it. Chelsea Pitcher is now one of my favourite YA writers ever. And I must give a shoutout to the narrators too: Emmett Grosland, Emily Ellet, Amanda Dolan, and Kevin Free.

The book is told via multiple narrators and across multiple timelines. When the characters were little, Poppy, Belladonna, and Lily planned to poison Raven's evil step-mother--shortly after the murder of Raven's mother. They didn't do it. Now, the characters are 17, and Raven's just returned from the boarding school is father sent him to, to find out his step mother actually has been murdered and Belladonna's been arrested. The 'recipe' for murder that they came up with as children as apparently now been followed. Jack (previously named Poppy--and the book follows his transition) is desperate to clear Belladonna's name and ropes in Lily and Raven to help.

And this book is just so delicious. All the characters are so 3D. Lily's dark and sinister, suffering an eating disorder due to her mother's abuse. Belladonna is obsessed with fairytales--dark tales--having been adopted by a man who locked her up at night after his biological daughter was abducted. Jack has secrets of his own--from the clothes he burned on the night of Raven's step-mother's murder to his preference to be called 'Jack' and using him/his pronouns. And Raven--well, Raven is the character that haunted me the most. There's something eerie about him, namely stemming from the scene we're shown early on where as children all the characters were playing at fairy tales and he was lying 'dead' in a coffin.

So who did the murder?

Well, I must confess that I did realise who the murderer of the step-mother was quite early on. Not because all clues pointed to that person, but through process of deduction I realised it couldn't be anyone else. What I didn't expect was to find out the identity of the murderer of Raven's real mother too. That was edge-of-your-seat-stuff.

The only thing that bugged me a bit about this book was how when we're halfway through, we suddenly are introduced to narration by Raven as well. Up until that point, the narration had been told by Jack, Lily, and Belladonna only--so I did find it a little jarring.

But this is an amazing YA thriller! It's just so atmospheric and haunting and I loved it so much.

Content warnings for: abuse, eating disorders, suicidal talk.



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Review: THE COUSINS by Karen M. McManus

 

The Cousins by Karen M. McManus
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Milly, Aubrey and Jonah Story are cousins, but they barely know each another, and they’ve never even met their grandmother. Rich and reclusive, she disinherited their parents before they were born. So when they each receive a letter inviting them to work at her island resort for the summer, they’re surprised…and curious.

Their parents are all clear on one point—not going is not an option. This could be the opportunity to get back into Grandmother’s good graces. But when the cousins arrive on the island, it’s immediately clear that she has different plans for them. And the longer they stay, the more they realize how mysterious—and dark—their family’s past is.

The entire Story family has secrets. Whatever pulled them apart years ago isn’t over—and this summer, the cousins will learn everything. 

--- 


Like with all of Karen M. McManus's books, I had this one on preorder the moment it was available to preorder and I was counting down the days until it appeared on my kindle. I loved the sound of this book--I mean, I love stories about complicated families, generations-old mysteries, and cousins. Not to mention this is set on an island. Having previously lived on an island, I love island stories--especially if they're the locked-room variety.

This book tells the story of three cousins who don't really know each other: Aubrey, Milly, and Jonah. Each of them is the child of one of the Story siblings--Adam, Allison, Archer, and Anders--and these siblings were mysteriously disinherited by their mother, Mildred when they were 18-ish. None of the A siblings knows why this happened--but they received a note the following day saying that 'they know what they did'. And this book starts when Aubrey, Milly, and Jonah are invited to Mildred's island. There, they're determined to find out what exactly went on when their parents last set foot on the island.

I'll admit, I was expecting there to be more of a present-day mystery and more present-day danger going on--instead, the book is very much just about what happened to the A siblings. And we have even got a few chapters told from Alison's POV which take place twenty years ago (the rest of it is told from the cousins' perspectives in the present day). But I was just waiting for there to be some sort of present day thrilling event that puts the cousins in danger--and it doesn't really happen until the end. The climax itself is great--we do get the sense that Aubrey is in great danger, and it delivers some HUGE twists. I didn't see those twists coming, so that made this read a 4 star rather than 3.5, which I had been veering toward until that point.

Having said that, while we don't get much sense of Aubrey, Jonah, and Milly being in danger for most of the book--which I found odd given it's a thriller--there is a huge twist with Jonah pretty early on. Again, I didn't see that coming. While it's not a point of danger for any of the cousins, it does create a lot of tension and intrigue.

As always, characterisation is solid--though I did get Anders, Archer, and Adam mixed up quite a bit because their names all begin with A.

All in all, I'd recommend this book. My first finished read of 2021.

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