Tag: Thriller

Kate’s Review: “You Will Never Be Me”

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Book: “You Will Never Be Me” by Jesse Q. Sutanto

Publishing Info: Berkley, August 2024

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an eARC from NetGalley.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: When cracks start forming in an influencer’s curated life, she finds out that jealousy is just as viral as a video in this riveting suspense novel by bestselling author Jesse Q. Sutanto.

Influencer Meredith Lee didn’t teach Aspen Palmer how to blossom on social media just to be ditched as soon as Aspen became big. So can anyone really blame Mer for doing a little stalking? Nothing serious, more like Stalking Lite.

Then Mer gets lucky; she finds one of Aspen’s kids’ iPads and swipes it. Now she has access to the family calendar and Aspen’s social media accounts. Would anyone else be able to resist tweaking things a little here and there, showing up in Aspen’s place for meetings with potential sponsors? Mer’s only taking back what she deserves—what should have been hers. 

Meanwhile, Aspen doesn’t understand why her perfectly filtered life is falling apart. Sponsors are dropping her, fellow influencers are ghosting her, and even her own husband seems to find her repulsive. If she doesn’t find out who’s behind everything, she might just lose it all. But what everyone seems to forget is that Aspen didn’t become one of TikTok’s biggest momfluencers by being naive.

When Meredith suddenly goes missing, Aspen’s world is upended and mysterious threats begin to arrive—but she won’t let anything get in the way of her perfect life again.

Review: Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an eARC of this novel!

I’m really happy to see that more and more family influencers are getting called out, or at the very least more scrutinized, as of late. I think that the very public fall of Ruby Franke helped with this shift, but it’s been a long time coming. It’s probably not too shocking that as more of this has been in the public eye, more books involving family vloggers and family influencers have been cropping up. And I’ve been reaping the benefits, as this kind of plot is catnip for me. So I was obviously very interested in reading “You Will Never Be Me” by Jesse Q. Sutanto, which involves two mommy influencer frenemies named Mer and Aspen, who used to be tight but had a huge falling out that leads to Mer trying to wreck Aspen’s very curated public image. It all sounds great on paper. Sadly, in execution it didn’t get to the level I was hoping for.

You all know that I always start with the good when it comes to a book that I didn’t really connect with, and this time is no different. And the good is REALLY good and something that I don’t get to say too often: THERE IS A FANTASTIC TWIST THAT I DIDN’T SEE COMING IN THIS BOOK! I feel like so much of the time when I take on a thriller of a certain kind I have to complain about a twist that is either unearned, or thrown in at the last moment for shock value, or was easy to spot a mile away. None of these things happen in the big twist in “You Will Never Be Me”. In fact the moment it was revealed I said to myself ‘wait…. HOLD UP!?’, and jumped back to the beginning of the chapter to make sure I hadn’t missed anything. I’m not going to say anything here details wise, but Sutanto so expertly dropped it in in such an unexpected place and moment with such a subtle set up that I set my Kindle down for a moment just to process what I had just read. And it’s a bit of a one two punch as well, with a couple dimensions to the twist that made it all the more satisfying. This is how it’s done!

But unfortunately, well executed twist or not, there were a number of aspects to this book that didn’t work for me. For one, Mommy Blog and Influencer satire is starting to be seen more in books, with more and more scandals coming out about these kinds of accounts and more people starting to question what this kind of exposure and exploitation does to the children involved. Always pertinent points, and it can be really well done satire as well as social commentary on something that is becoming more and more talked about. But the problem here is that the examples in this are very heavy handed, even if I don’t necessarily disagree with them. One such example that sticks out is Meredith at one point admitting that she had her child via a sperm donor because she knew that the engagement would go up if she shifted from her initial platform into a mommy influencer like Aspen was. Again, I don’t doubt that on some level family influencers do view their children as content and the more content you have the more engagement you have (I think about the family that adopted an autistic boy from China to use it as a story their followers could keep up with, and then ‘rehomed’ him because he was too difficult and burst their perfect family ideal as presented to their followers). But I had a hard time believing that Mer would be so up front and flippant about it, and it just felt like it was just another way to show how awful she was. Which segues into my other gripe fairly well; both Mer and Aspen, the characters whose POVs we follow, are just really unsympathetic characters with not much depth, which makes it very hard to follow them. I am one hundred percent down for having unlikable characters as protagonists, especially in thrillers and ESPECIALLY if they are women (lord knows male characters get more passes in this way). But I want them to be at least interesting and rounded in their villainy. In this book they felt more like caricatures. Aspen had a little more depth as she feels the need to carry the financial burden in her home, especially since one of her children is diabetic, but we only barely scratched the surface with her. Mer felt like a full cartoon villain at times. I think that had there been a bit more exploration and complexity I could have swallowed it better, but as it was, it just didn’t ever click.

“You Will Never Be Me” didn’t quite live up to the high hopes I had for it. It was refreshing having such a stellar twist, but that wasn’t enough to save it.

Rating 5: A fantastic twist that came earlier than anticipated was well done, but it can’t save the facts that all of the characters are terrible and in a fun way and the satire doesn’t have much bite.

Reader’s Advisory:

“You Will Never Be Me” is included on the Goodreads list “Thrillers You Must Read!”.

Kate’s Review: “House of Bone and Rain”

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Book: “House of Bone and Rain” by Gabino Iglesias

Publishing Info: Mulholland Books, August 2024

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC from the publisher.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: In the latest from Shirley Jackson and Bram Stoker Award-winning author of THE DEVIL TAKES YOU HOME, a group of five teenage boys, living in Puerto Rico, seek vengeance after one of their mothers is murdered; a doomed tale of devotion and the afterlife of violence.

For childhood friends Gabe, Xavier, Tavo, Paul, and Bimbo, death has always been close. Hurricanes. Car accidents. Gang violence. Suicide. Estamos rodeados de fantasmas was Gabe’s grandmother’s refrain. We are surrounded by ghosts. But this time is different. Bimbo’s mom has been shot dead. We’re gonna kill the guys who killed her Bimbo swears. And they all agree.

Feral with grief, Bimbo has become unrecognizable, taking no prisoners in his search for names. Soon, they learn Maria was gunned down by guys working for the drug kingpin of Puerto Rico. No one has ever gone up against him and survived. As the boys strategize, a storm gathers far from the coast. Hurricanes are known to carry evil spirits in their currents and bring them ashore, spirits which impose their own order.

Blurring the boundaries between myth, mysticism, and the grim realities of our world, House of Bone and Rain is a harrowing coming of age story; a doomed tale of devotion, the afterlife of violence, and what rolls in on the tide.

Review: Thank you to Mulholland Books and Hachette for sending me an ARC of this novel! Special thanks even, as they were super kind to send me an ARC after I had missed out on getting one at ALA, and took down my information once I told the reps at the booth how much I was looking forward to this book. It was a very kind gesture and it was a lovely book mail arrival!

I know by now that if I am going to read a book by Gabino Iglesias, it’s going to be a rough go with lots of visceral violence, dark themes, and yet a gorgeous lyrical journey to boot. It stands to reason, then, that “House of Bone and Rain” was a tip top priority on my list, even if it was going to no doubt really kick me in the teeth, emotionally. But I have really enjoyed everything I’ve read by Iglesias, and because of that I knew that his newest horror novel needed to be a priority, even if it was a bit unclear what the horror components, at least the supernatural ones were going to be. But ultimately, I shouldn’t have been surprised that while the supernatural ones were grand and well done, it was the real life ones that would REALLY cut to the bone.

I don’t really want to spoil the horror aspects of this book, as there is a reason it is kept a bit close to the vest in the description. Iglesias packs a wallop of a punch with the reveal, and it made me go ‘wait…. what?!’, but in the best way possible. I will say that some of the ins and outs of it felt a bit Cosmic-y, with an impending storm surge churning up something otherworldly, and while it’s not full on Cthulhu or Old Gods in its execution, the largeness and inevitability of it was really heavy throughout the narrative. Which is a lovely theme in tandem to a monster storm that is about to bear down on an island like Maria did. Some of the descriptions of the big reveal were very creepy, and I loved how it was presented and how it fit in with both the hurricane as well as the threats that Gabe, Bimbo, Xavier, Tavo, and Paul are all dealing with in the wake of Bimbo’s mother’s murder. The violence is supernatural and all too real, and it makes the horror beats feel all the more unnerving as the story goes on.

But horror elements aside, this book reads just as well as a drug kingpin thriller with real world tragedies and horrors at the heart. Gabe, Bimbo, Xavier, Tavo, and Paul are best friends brought together by their shared experience of living a difficult life in Puerto Rico, where the ghosts of colonialism have led to lots of corruption, wealth disparities, and lots of experiences with violence, even before Bimbo’s mother’s death. As Bimbo and his friends are driven by vengeance, and as Hurricane Maria is about to barrel down on the island and cause mass devastation on top of that, our characters are pulling together in the face of terrible odds, and for a sense of a need for justice that they won’t be able to achieve due to their circumstances and the systemic disparities they are living within. I was on the edge of my seat watching them all make these decisions, because while I KNEW that these were sometimes TERRIBLE decisions, I felt like Iglesias perfectly captured why they were doing these things because I understood the realities they they were living, and how it shapes each of them. Bimbo is especially a complicated and intriguing character, because while his mission to take out a VIOLENT DRUG KINGPIN with no real plan, and putting his friends in severe danger (and not being super forthcoming in some ways but that is all I will say) was absolutely CRAZY to me… but I also know that the grief and the loss meant that he had nothing to lose, and I couldn’t really fault him to a point. Iglesias is the kind of author who shows a huge picture of complex characters and dire circumstances, and you generally know that happy endings in his tales are hard to come by, but they are still great reads because he pulls out such emotion and poignancy with the bleakness. The repeated phrase in this book, ‘all stories are ghost stories’, is especially moving as we see their reality laid out bare.

“House of Bone and Rain” didn’t disappoint! Gabino Iglesias has created another unrelenting horror thriller that got under my skin, and surprised me in a lot of ways.

Rating 8: A merciless, creepy, and devastating story about friendship, revenge, desperation, and loss, with sprinkles of Cosmic-ish horror to go with the real world ones.

Reader’s Advisory:

“House of Bone and Rain” is included on the Goodreads lists “Horror to Look Forward to in 2024”, and “2024 Adult Fantasy/Sci-Fi/Speculative Releases by BIPOC Authors”.

Kate’s Review: “49 Miles Alone”

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Book: “49 Miles Alone” by Natalie D. Richards

Publishing Info: Sourcebooks Fire, July 2024

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC from the publisher.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: Four days alone in the desert. Except they’re not as alone as they think.

A year ago, Katie and her cousin Aster survived a night that left their world and easy friendship fractured. Desperate to heal and leave the past behind them, they tackle four days of hiking in the Utah backcountry. But the desert they’ve loved for years has tricks up its sleeve. An illness, an injury, and a freak storm leave them short on confidence and supplies. When they come across a young couple with extra supplies on the trail, they’re grateful and relieved―at first. Riley exudes friendliness, but everything about her boyfriend Finn spells trouble.

That night, after some chilling admissions about Finn from Riley, Katie and Aster wake to hear the couple fighting. Helpless and trapped in the darkness, they witness Riley’s desperate race into the night, with Finn chasing after. In the morning, they find the couple’s camp, but Riley and Finn? Vanished. Katie is sure Riley is in trouble. And with help a two-day hike away, they know they are the only ones who can save her before something terrible happens. The clock is ticking and their supplies are dwindling, but Katie and Aster know they have to find Riley before Finn―or the desert―gets to her first.

Review: Thank you to Sourcebooks Fire for sending me an ARC of this novel!

I truly think that Summer, while not a favorite season of mine, has a book vibe that I really like to adhere to. Much like Fall feeling like the perfect ambiance for a horror story or a cozy fantasy, for me Summer feels like the best time to tap into various kinds of thrillers. One of those sub-genres is survival thrillers, especially if they are set in the wilderness. So I was very excited to read “49 Miles Alone” by Natalie D. Richards, which follows cousins Katie and Aster on a wilderness hike that goes pretty sour and they are suddenly in the web of a killer. This is my FAVORITE kind of wilderness survival tale, and I hopped on in ready for a wild ride!

I’ve mentioned before that I’m not an outdoorsy kinda person outside of the occasional hike through a state or national park, or for some landscape photography excursions. Certainly not multiple days of camping or hardcore hiking and off trail backpacking. But I do love seeing that premise used in a survival/wilderness thriller, and “49 Miles Alone” does a great job of highlighting the real dangers of the wilderness even without having a killer in the vicinity. As Katie and Aster start their journey, it’s already tense due to an incident in the near past that left Aster wracked with guilt and Katie traumatized, and things just keep going wrong and make the tension build all the more. Whether it’s weirdos on the trail, or a storm that manifested out of nowhere and makes the trail that much more unpredictable and dangerous, or Aster suddenly falling ill, many small things keep piling up to turn into one big troublesome and dangerous situation. I’ve known people who do this kind of hiking and camping who have BEEN in these sudden life or death situations where you have to make quick decisions that could end very badly, and watching Katie and Aster have to contend with these things on top of Katie’s trauma and Aster’s guilt made for a lot of really well done suspenseful beats.

But the main point of suspension, when Aster and Katie meet a couple on the trail and Katie suspects the man, Finn, to be dangerous, didn’t hit as hard as i had hoped it would. I normally really like this trope of wilderness savvy people meeting dangerous psychos and having to navigate the wilderness with them, as when it’s done well (like in “The River Wild” or “Desolation”, two films I really like) it can be SO nerve wracking. But I think that in this one it gets a little tripped up, partially due to the timing of meeting Finn and his hiking partner/girlfriend Riley, and partially due to not really getting much insight into the two of them outside of some interactions from Aster’s and Katie’s POVs. To make things worse, by the time we do get to the main driving conflict of potentially being hunted down, it felt a bit more rushed as opposed to the slow build of the earlier parts of the book. I also kind of called one of the big twists pretty quickly, which always kind of pulls the wind out of the sails of a thriller.

So it was a bit of a mixed bag. But that said, “49 Miles Alone” has some really good bits of realistic wilderness survival thrills. It’s a good summer read to be sure!

Rating 7: I loved the tense build up of the perils of an unpredictable hike between tension filled cousins, and I wish it had stayed more in that realm as the dangerous killer on the trail was a little underwhelming.

Reader’s Advisory:

“49 Miles Alone” is included on the Goodreads list “YA Novels of 2024”.

Kate’s Review: “Ladykiller”

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “Ladykiller” by Katherine Wood

Publishing Info: Bantam, July 2024

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an eARC from NetGalley.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: When an heiress goes missing, her best friend races to unravel the secrets behind her disappearance using clues left behind in an explosive manuscript…

Gia and Abby have been best friends since they were girls, forever bonded by the tragedy that unfolded in Greece when they were eighteen. In the aftermath, bookish Abby threw herself into her studies while heiress Gia chronicled the events of that fateful summer in a salacious memoir.

Twelve years later, Gia is back in Greece for the summer with her shiny new husband and a motley crew of glamorous guests, preparing to sell the family estate in the wake of her father’s death. When Abby receives an invitation from Gia to celebrate her birthday in September beneath the Northern Lights, she’s thrilled to be granted the time off from her high-pressure job. But the day of her flight, she receives a mysterious, threatening email in her inbox, and when she and Gia’s brother Benny arrive at the Swedish resort, Gia isn’t there. After days of cryptic messages and unanswered calls, Abby and Benny are worried enough to fly to Greece to check on her.

Only, when they arrive, they find Gia’s beachfront estate eerily deserted, the sole clue to her whereabouts a manuscript she wrote detailing the events leading up to her disappearance. The pages reveal the dark truth about Gia’s provocative new marriage and the dirty secrets of the guests they entertained with fizzy champagne under the hot Mediterranean sun. As tensions rise, Gia feels less and less safe in her own home. But the pages end abruptly, leaving Abby and Benny with more questions than answers.

Where is Gia now? And, more importantly, will they find her before it’s too late?

Review: Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an eARC of this novel!

We are now smack dab in the middle of summer now, and I don’t know about you, dear readers, but I have a LOT of pool time coming up as the temps go up and the family wants to cool off. While I spend a fair amount of time at the pool keeping an eye on my kid, if the husband is there too we split the time, which means I get to read when I’m not on swim duty. Which in turn means that I’m looking for good poolside reads that keep me entertained and keep my interest, the more scandalous the better. “Ladykiller” by Katherine Wood was one such book. You have a missing woman, a Grecian backdrop, a potentially shady new husband, and some long hidden secrets. All of this is the perfect mix for the kind of thriller I want poolside! And while it definitely scratched some itches, overall, unfortunately, I found this one to be a bit hit or miss.

The story structure of this novel is told from two different perspectives, one from the perspective of Abby and the other from Gia. Abby is Gia’s long time friend, who has worked incredibly hard to become an attorney and who had a falling out with the heiress newlywed Gia due to her not approving of the whirlwind romance and fast marriage. Abby and Gia’s brother Benny are supposed to meet Gia for her birthday, but find her missing and not answering her phone. The other perspective is the manuscript from Gia’s newest memoir, which is a record of what was happening on her estate in Greece with her husband Garrett, two strangers they befriended, and the slow realization that Garrett is perhaps not what he seems. Both perspectives round out the mystery, with the reader being able to follow along and to learn things that perhaps one woman may not know of the other, which I always enjoy. It’s also interesting getting their varying perspectives on some of their shared secrets, as Abby has some guilt for past actions, and Gia’s memoir starts to veer into ‘is this unreliable’ territory. I greatly enjoyed these aspects of this book.

All that said, I think that while it’s entertaining in structure, I wasn’t super invested in any of the characters, and wasn’t terribly surprised by many of the twists and reveals as the mystery went on. It follows a pretty well explored formula, and it doesn’t really go outside the expected norms. I found it entertaining as it was going, and I was interested to see how things were going to shake out, but I wasn’t terribly invested in many of the characters and what their outcomes were going to be. I also found some of the choices made by the characters, Abby in particular, to be a bit galling. It just had a lot of potential to really bowl me over as the recipe for that is there. But it never quite came together. But hey, I did find it to be entertaining for the most part, and one I could easily pick up and put down as needed.

“Ladykiller” is a poolside read through and through and one I would recommend to those who are looking for such a thing. There’s still lots of summer left! Add it to your pile you keep in the swim bag.

Rating 6: It’s entertaining for the most part, but the twists and turns were pretty obvious and I wasn’t interested in many of the characters.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Ladykiller” is included on the Goodreads list “Mystery and Thriller 2024”.

Kate’s Review: “Such a Bad Influence”

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “Such a Bad Influence” by Olivia Muenter

Publishing Info: Quirk Books, June 2024

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an eARC from NetGalley.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: For fans of Ashley Winstead, a razor-sharp debut about what happens when one of the first child stars of the social media age grows up . . . and goes missing.

Hazel Davis is drifting: she’s stalled in her career, living in a city she hates, and less successful than her younger sister @evelyn, a lifestyle influencer. Evie came of age on the family YouTube channel after a viral video when she was five. Ten years older and spotlight-averse, Hazel managed to dodge the family business—so although she can barely afford her apartment, at least she made her own way.

Evie is eighteen now, with a multimillion-dollar career, but Hazel is still protective of her little sister and skeptical of the way everyone seems to want a piece of her: Evie’s followers, her YouTuber boyfriend and influencer frenemies, and their opportunistic mother. So when Evie disappears one day during an unsettling live stream that cuts out midsentence, Hazel is horrified to have her worst instincts proven right.

As theories about Evie’s disappearance tear through the internet, inspiring hashtags, Reddit threads, and podcast episodes, Hazel throws herself into the darkest parts of her sister’s world to untangle the truth. After all, Hazel knows Evie better than anyone else . . . doesn’t she?

Review: Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with and eARC of this novel!

Back at the end of last summer a particularly disturbing crime story dropped, in which Youtube Mommy Blogger Ruby Franke and her business associate Jodi Hildebrandt were arrested for six counts of aggravated child abuse against Franke’s two youngest children. Franke and her family rose to fame through her now defunct 8 Passengers YouTube channel, where she would document and monetize family life and wholesome conservative/Mormon values. So it was a shock to many when she was arrested for starving, beating, maiming, and abusing two of the kids that had once been on the channel and in so many people’s lives through a computer screen. It wasn’t a shock for me, though, having been tuned in to the whole swamp that is child influencers on social media for awhile. So it’s no surprise that “Such a Bad Influence” by Oliva Muenter caught my attention, as it’s a thriller that has that very idea as a hook. I had such high expectations for this book, and was very excited to read it. So it’s not too dramatic to say that after riding a high on it for a good three fourths of the novel, the last fourth knocked me back to Earth in a frustrating way.

Firstly though I’m going to talk about the things that I did like about this book, because for the great majority of it I was very, very pleased with what I was reading. For one, I am a huge sucker for missing person books, and “Such a Bad Influence” has a great hook of a very popular influencer named Evie Davis going radio silent mid livestream, and as her silence continues people start speculating she’s actually missing. This is already a winning aspect for me, and you add in a protagonist in the form of her older sister Hazel, who has shunned the spotlight and has worried over Evie even before this moment in time. Hazel’s motivation is totally believable, and while she’s prickly and difficult in some ways I liked her tenacity and her drive to find the younger sister she feels she has failed in many ways. I also really, really liked the themes of the ethics of children being shown online for profit, usually by their parents, and using them as money makers by exploiting their time, image, and very existence when they can’t REALLY consent. And along with that come the strangers who seek out these accounts of underage children who have disgusting ulterior motives, and how the full access to these accounts can enable predation. This is all through the role of Evie and Hazel’s mother Erin, who once posted a tragic video that went viral and rocketed Evie to fame, and with that came her ambitions to become a momager to her now incredibly popular daughter. And all the shady choices that come with a fortune from business ventures, sponsorships, and clicks constant content churning. I’ve been tapped into this ethical debate for almost two years now, when the podcast “Someplace Under Neith” did a whole series on exploitation of children on social media vis a vis influencer accounts, but it has come more to the forefront in society’s eyes due to the aforementioned Ruby Franke/Jodi Hildebrandt case and a long investigative article by the New York Times (which my husband was texting me about the day it dropped, in full horror, and I was like ‘yep, I know all this, why do you think all my social media accounts where I have images of our kid are private/highly vetted?’). There were also some good points about how true crime exploits people as well, but I won’t go into that as much because eh, that’s pretty well worn territory these days as it seems EVERYONE needs to be pointing that out in any story that involves a true crime community angle. We get it, we’re creeps. But I did like the way this story addressed it as it wasn’t as hamfisted as it could have been. All of this was fantastic, and I was really loving this book and the issues that Muenter was touching upon.

BUT. ONCE AGAIN, a really fun and engaging thriller/mystery was, for me, completely derailed by a wholly unnecessary twist ending.

THIS JUST KEEPS HAPPENING LATELY. (source)

Okay, look. I’m not so naive to believe that these kinds of rug yanked out from under you twists aren’t popular with the thriller fanbase. I would probably even be willing to concede that for a lot of people the big surprising twist is a good part of the fun of a thriller, to see how creative an author can be and how their misdirection can surprise a reader. But I am getting sick of it. Nay, I’ve BEEN sick of it. It always feels like it negates everything that came before, especially when there was an already in place solid first ending that was upended with a few paragraphs after a time jump of all things, which just felt like a yadda yadda yadda of a significant plot point. And honestly I didn’t really like that one so much either because it wasn’t super fleshed out to begin with, but at least it felt earned and like everything was building up to it. This damn twist had a couple of hints towards it too I suppose, but it still felt like a cheap final ‘gotcha’ that I really didn’t have the patience for this time around. That’s probably not the fault of the book, but man, I’m just so over this kind of device.

I was bummed that “Such a Bad Influence” had a thud of an ending after a solid and enjoyable rise before the fall. If you like shocking final act game changers by all means check it out for yourself. Far be it from me to ruin that kind of fun for those who enjoy it.

Rating 6: What started as a twisted and entertaining thriller eventually ended with a clunk and an unnecessary twist.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Such a Bad Influence” is included in the Goodreads article/list “Readers’ 54 Most Anticipated Summer Mysteries & Thrillers”.

Kate’s Review: “Middle of the Night”

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “Middle of the Night” by Riley Sager

Publishing Info: Dutton, June 2024

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an eARC from NetGalley.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: In the latest jaw-dropping thriller from New York Times bestselling author Riley Sager, a man must contend with the long-ago disappearance of his childhood best friend—and the dark secrets lurking just beyond the safe confines of his picture-perfect neighborhood.

The worst thing to ever happen on Hemlock Circle occurred in Ethan Marsh’s backyard. One July night, ten-year-old Ethan and his best friend and neighbor, Billy, fell asleep in a tent set up on a manicured lawn in a quiet, quaint New Jersey cul de sac. In the morning, Ethan woke up alone. During the night, someone had sliced the tent open with a knife and taken Billy. He was never seen again.

Thirty years later, Ethan has reluctantly returned to his childhood home. Plagued by bad dreams and insomnia, he begins to notice strange things happening in the middle of the night. Someone seems to be roaming the cul de sac at odd hours, and signs of Billy’s presence keep appearing in Ethan’s backyard. Is someone playing a cruel prank? Or has Billy, long thought to be dead, somehow returned to Hemlock Circle?

The mysterious occurrences prompt Ethan to investigate what really happened that night, a quest that reunites him with former friends and neighbors and leads him into the woods that surround Hemlock Circle. Woods where Billy claimed monsters roamed and where a mysterious institute does clandestine research on a crumbling estate.

The closer Ethan gets to the truth, the more he realizes that no place—be it quiet forest or suburban street—is completely safe. And that the past has a way of haunting the present.

Review: Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an eARC of this novel!

It’s fully summer now, and along with the promises of pool days, barbecuing, river tubing, and melting in the heat and therefore hiding in an air conditioned home as much as I can, I also have the promise of a new Riley Sager novel every year. And this year we have “Middle of the Night”, a new thriller about a long missing boy, the man who was the one left behind and facing survivor guilt, and a neighborhood that has had this case haunting them for decades… oh, and also a spectral person lurking in the neighborhood in the dead of night. Oh yes. This has potential for sure.

Like most of Sager’s books before it, I was entertained by the mystery and the twists and turns of “Middle of the Night”. The initial mystery is already a solid premise: thirty years ago, Ethan Marsh and his neighborhood best friend Billy were camping in his backyard on a sleepover, only for their tent to be cut into and Billy to go missing, with Ethan clueless as to what happened outside of shoddy flashes of memories that don’t make much sense. In the present Ethan has returned to the old neighborhood to sell his parents house after their retirement, and has started noticing weird things, like a mysterious shadow person creeping through the neighborhood at night, or signs of life that only Billy could have done back in the day. You already have me with the questions of what happened to Billy, and who (or what) is now sending Ethan messages thirty years later, but then Sager adds MORE to it by bringing in a mysterious local institution with connections to the Ivy League that may or may not have been doing some odd things they hoped to keep hidden. The weirdness and the slow reveals of how THAT plays into the story, as well as more evidence, motives, suspects, and, yes, red herrings, makes for a suspenseful read as we jump from Ethan’s perspective in the present to other people’s perspectives in the past, and even though it could have been a lot of narrative shifting, it worked well for me. I was genuinely surprised by a lot of the reveals, and even those that weren’t as shocking to me still felt executed tightly and properly. I know that Sager can be polarizing to thriller fans, but I always buy into his books because it’s just fun to experience the ride.

Sager is usually a good bet if you want an entertaining read for the fun summer months, and “Middle of the Night” once again delivers on that. But what I also liked about this book is how Sager explores the themes of survivor guilt and collective trauma for those who live in a tight knit community when a person, especially a young person, goes missing. My mind kept wandering back to a notorious and long lingering Minnesota case, that of Jacob Wetterling, who was kidnapped by a masked man in 1989 and was missing for decades until they got a confession and found his body in 2016. Ethan has come back to the place where his best friend vanished, and has to face how that has shaped his life up until now, and how that has reverberated through his relationships, actions, and experiences, usually with tragic elements as he hasn’t fully reconciled all of his guilt and fear and heartbreak. I found Ethan to be a very easy to follow main character, and I thought that Sager really dug into his psyche. It’s also a change to have a male protagonist in a Sager book (I suppose “Survive the Night” had a dual POV with a male protagonist, but it was split), so that was a breath of fresh air. And hell, we even get a little bit into the minds of all the people in the neighborhood around the time Billy disappears, which gave more complicated layers to a supposedly perfect suburban setting. I always enjoy a dressing down of the facade of a perfect Americana community, and “Middle of the Night” peels back some layers and exposes the cracks that were there even before Billy disappeared. It makes for some added pathos to an already emotional premise.

Ultimately I found “Middle of the Night” to be another serviceable thriller, and one perfect for summer vacations. It’s speedy and fun and I continue to hold Riley Sager in high regard when it comes to genuinely enjoyable thrillers.

Rating 8: Tense and at times incredibly sad, “Middle of the Night” is about going home in the face of unresolved trauma, and a neighborhood haunted (perhaps literally) by a long lost child.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Middle of the Night” is included on the Goodreads list “Best Dark Fiction of 2024”.

Kate’s Review: “What Fire Brings”

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Book: “What Fire Brings” by Rachel Howzell Hall

Publishing Info: Thomas & Mercer, June 2024

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC from the publicist.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: A writer’s search for her missing friend becomes a real-life thriller in a twisting novel of suspense by the New York Times bestselling author of These Toxic Things.

Bailey Meadows has just moved into the remote Topanga Canyon home of thriller author Jack Beckham. As his writer-in-residence, she’s supposed to help him once again reach the bestseller list. But she’s not there to write a thriller—she’s there to find Sam Morris, a community leader dedicated to finding missing people, who has disappeared in the canyon surrounding Beckham’s property.

The missing woman was last seen in the drought-stricken forest known for wildfires and mountain lions. Each new day, Bailey learns just how dangerous these canyons are—for the other women who have also gone missing here…and for her. Could these missing women be linked to strange events that occurred decades ago at the Beckham estate?

As fire season in the canyons approaches, Bailey must race to unravel the truth from fiction before she becomes the next woman lost in the forest.

Review: Thank you to Sparkpoint Studio for sending me an ARC of this novel!

We’ve actually had a pretty wet Spring going into Summer here in Minnesota, which means that in my part of the state we have no drought conditions and no threats of fires spreading dangerously (for now. We’ll see what Summer brings). Wildfire season hasn’t been a big thing for my state outside of the fact smoke has been making its way here for the past few years, but I know that it’s a huge problem out west. “What Fire Brings” by Rachel Howzell Hall takes that very real threat and throws a mystery of a missing woman, an intrepid detective, and a charming author in for good measure, and that kind of combination is super intriguing to someone like me. I was pretty hopeful going in, and my hopes were pretty well met, I’d say.

The mystery here is pretty unique and has a lot of interesting layers. We have Bailey, an aspiring private detective from L.A. who has taken on a case involving a missing woman Sam, who disappeared in the Topanga Canyon wilderness near the sprawling estate of famed author Jack Beckham. Bailey has snagged an undercover position as Jack’s writer in residence, and is using that to investigate, and while investigating starts to realize that Sam isn’t the only woman who has gone missing in the area over the years. It’s a great hook, and it has a built in suspense factor of whether or not Bailey will be discovered by Jack and his staff on top of the weird things she’s finding during her investigation. It makes for all of her moves to have added weight and potential consequence, as she is playing a part, being deceptive, and starts to realize that there may be bigger problems at hand for her outside of the investigation at hand. Bailey herself is a bit unreliable, as it slowly comes out that she has been having some problems and instabilities of her own, whether it’s a mysterious wound we aren’t privy to the origin of from the get go, an implied problem with fugue states here and there, and weird phone calls that are rattling her. It really added some dread to the ongoing investigation, which has its own twists and turns that I found surprising and enjoyable.

One thing that dinged it a bit was the pacing feeling pretty lackadaisical for a lot of the story, in spite of the fact the dread was built pretty well otherwise. It didn’t exactly meander or feel like it was stalling, but I remember there was a moment in my reading that I thought to myself ‘hm, there’s a lot of book left here’. I wasn’t bored or anything like that, but when I’m reading a thriller, even thrillers that ultimately don’t work for me (this one doesn’t fall into that category, I want to emphasize), I can at least give credit for a fast paced read that feels like it flies by. This one didn’t really have that, and by the time we did eventually get to the start of the climax it felt like it had been a long wait to get there. Once it got going it was breakneck, however. I think it’s sometimes a hard balance to get a solid slow burn for suspense while also doing a good job of keeping things moving smoothly. It’s certainly not a dealbreaker.

“What Fire Brings” is a sizzling thriller perfect for the summer months. Rachel Howzell Hall is making a name in the genre to be sure.

Rating 7: I enjoyed the mystery and the way there is already built in suspense with the private eye angle, though the pacing was sometimes a little slower than I would have liked.

Reader’s Advisory:

“What Fire Brings” is included on the Goodreads list “2024 Books by Black Authors”.

Kate’s Review: “Anna Bright Is Hiding Something”

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Book: “Anna Bright Is Hiding Something” by Susie Orman Schnall

Publishing Info: SparkPress, June 2024

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC from the publisher.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: What some women will do for success…

A fast-paced and ripped-from-the-headlines story set in the glossy offices of Silicon Valley startups and New York City new media, Anna Bright Is Hiding Something explores our culture’s fascination with businesswomen who are breaking barriers—and sometimes behaving badly in the process.

Anna Bright is committing fraud. But nobody knows it yet. Not the board of her multibillion-dollar company, BrightLife; not her investors; not the media; not the public breathlessly anticipating the imminent launch of BrightSpot.

Jamie Roman, a hardworking journalist for BusinessBerry, is, no surprise, in awe of her company’s billion-dollar valuation, her polished confidence, and her hustle. But when Jamie learns about Anna’s misconduct, she embarks on a bicoastal journey to expose the crimes in the hope of making a name for herself as a journalist. It’s not long before Anna learns what the young reporter is up to, however—and she’ll do anything to stop Jamie, especially now that BrightLife’s IPO is days away.

With news of the deceit about to break, each woman will risk everything for her version of the truth . . . and only one will emerge unscathed.

Review: Thank you to SparkPress for sending me an ARC of this novel!

Back in 2019 I read the book “Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup” by John Carreyou, which was about the rise and fall of Theranos and it’s lying founder and CEO Elizabeth Holmes, who defrauded many many people for a lot of money by promising her tech could do something it absolutely could not do. Then a few years later the Hulu miniseries “The Dropout” came out, which is about the same thing with Amanda Seyfried as Holmes, and my husband (who had been following the Theranos scandal in real time) watched it and really enjoyed it. So when I found an offer to read “Anna Bright Is Hiding Something” by Susie Orman Schnall in my inbox, the story alone caught my attention, as it definitely sounded inspired by Elizabeth Holmes and her shenanigans. And given that I love a scandal and a mess, I obviously had to read it.

For people familiar with the Theranos/Elizabeth Holmes scandal, this will follow some similar beats, but that isn’t to say that it just lifts that story completely and makes it fiction. In part we follow Jamie, an intrepid and ambitious reporter who starts to investigate Anna Bright, the CEO of BrightLife whose upcoming ocular implant is boasted to change the way we see and gather information. Jamie starts to hear rumors of unrest at BrightLife after initially being in awe of the CEO, and when she smells a story that could define her career, she jumps on it. I liked Jamie’s character, as it’s always refreshing to see a flawed but easy to root for character take the reins in a story like this, and Jamie is all that and more. She has every reason to strive to prove herself, whether it’s because she’s a woman in an environment that can be sexist in a lot of ways, or because of being worried about being the shadow of her journalism giant father (and with whom she has.a tricky relationship). And I liked seeing her get the scoop, and enjoyed the suspense of wondering just what she was going to find, and what consequences there could be should she REALLY cross Anna and her own ambitions.

And then there is the choice to follow Anna, a choice that could have been a bit dicey as having our primary antagonist a perspective is a risk that can, in general, go really well, or really poorly. In this instance I thought that it was effective, as we not only get to see what kind of manipulative sociopath that Anna is, and not only do we get to see how she’s buying time and shutting all naysayers down, but we also get to see her start to realize that Jamie is on to her, and what lengths she will go to to stop the story, and the truth, from coming out. Schnall walks a really fine line, as she never makes excuses nor sympathizes for Anna’s unethical and downright dangerous lies and fraudulence, but she also isn’t painted as a cartoony villain. It’s very fun to watch these two women play a game of cat and mouse, while also watching the narrative critique some of the aspects of the scandal as it unfolds that could apply to real life (misogyny towards women in tech, the way that BIPOC women are especially targeted, the way that men who do similar things don’t receive the same level of scrutiny, and so forth). I also appreciated that while this is more of a contemporary novel, the suspense and thriller elements are still well done with the intrigue and as these two women set out to take each other down.

If you are looking for a page turner this summer and enjoy a good tech company scandal, “Anna Bright Is Hiding Something” ought to be put on your book pile. It’s very enjoyable.

Rating 8: Gripping, timely, and a little bit soapy (in a good way), “Anna Bright Is Hiding Something” is an entertaining page turner and a grand cat and mouse story.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Anna Bright Is Hiding Something” isn’t on any Goodreads lists as of yet, but if you want the real life parallels I would recommend “Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup” by John Carreyou.

Kate’s Review: “Follow Her Down”

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Book: “Follow Her Down” by Victoria Helen Stone

Publishing Info: Lake Union Publishing, June 2024

Where Did I Get This Book: I received a print copy from the publicist.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: Decades of doubt, fear, and suspicion won’t let a woman overcome her trauma in a riveting novel of suspense by the Amazon Charts bestselling author of Jane Doe and The Hook.

The murder of Elise Rockwood’s sister shattered her family. Their mother’s anxiety kept her housebound. Elise’s paranoid brother, Kyle, saw conspiracies everywhere. Elise numbed her grief in an aimless lifestyle that left her emotionally broken. All of them victims. A local boy eventually confessed, but the damage was already done.

Years later, Elise is reinventing herself. She’s bought a mountain lodge to be close to home again and to find stability. Not even an email from her ex tempts her into revisiting the past. But Kyle won’t let it go. He still believes there’s more to their sister’s murder—and the confession—than meets the eye. When Elise’s ex is found dead in the same forest where her sister went missing decades before, Elise is finally willing to listen.

The traumas of the past are reemerging. So is the truth. Elise’s greatest fear now is who will survive it.

Review: Thank you to Lake Union Press and Kaye Publicity for sending me an print copy of this novel!

I feel like after having a fair amount of focus on horror for awhile I’m finally getting back into throwing in thrillers to balance it out. And there have been some pretty good ones that have come my way without me seeking them out. One of which is “Follow Her Down” by Victoria Helen Stone. I hadn’t read anything by Stone before, but the premise of a woman still reeling from her sister’s unsolved murder years before caught my attention pretty handily. I had no idea what to expect, but I was very pleased with this one.

The mystery is solid and entertaining. We follow our protagonist Elise, a standoffish woman who owns a campground whose older sister Robin disappeared decades ago, and whose death basically destroyed her family. When her ex-lover Christian reaches out after radio silence, and Elise rejects seeing him again, his body is found in the wilderness near her campground, which also happens to be in the same area Robin disappeared years earlier. It’s a good set up, and it was interesting seeing how Christian’s murder may or may nto be connected to Robin’s, especially as Elise’s obsessive brother Kyle starts to hyper-focus on the possibility. I liked Elise as a protagonist as she tries to steer focus away from herself by law enforcement, while also trying to convince herself that Kyle is just doing his usual conspiracy theory nonsense, even as more and more strange clues pop up that could be convincing. Elise is flawed and damaged, which always has the potential to be a little cloying in the genre, but Stone does her justice, mostly because she herself is the skeptic as opposed to the loose cannon.

But what I liked the most about this book was that there was such a focus on the way that the trauma of a missing person can have shattering effects on the people in their lives. For Elise it’s the way that she has shut herself off from most people in her life, focusing on her campground and trying to not think about what happened to Robin all those years ago, unable to connect with many people. For Kyle, he dives into conspiracies and dodgy theories of cover ups, hyperfixating on improbable things because at least with the improbable things there is some kind of explanation. For their mother, she rarely leaves the house, her anxiety too much to bear. While there are plenty of thrillers with the theme of a lost family member that touch on the fallout, I thought that this one really nailed the way that a family can be torn apart due to unresolved trauma, resentment, and survivor guilt. The relationship between Elise and Kyle in particular could turn on a dime, so much so that it would be deeply uncomfortable and at times completely heart wrenching. I do wish that the book had kept this theme the focal point more, and hadn’t succumbed to more well worn tropes to the genre.

At the end of the day, “Follow Her Down” is a suspenseful and at times deeply upsetting thriller that doesn’t hold back in a lot of ways. I had hoped it stuck more to the more unique aspects to the story, but it was an enjoyable read overall.

Rating 7: An emotional mystery that examines unresolved trauma and the havoc it can cause, “Follow Her Down” is raw and at times devastating.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Follow Her Down” isn’t on any Goodreads lists as of now, but it would fit in on the Goodreads Shelf “Missing Women Books”.

Kate’s Review: “Together in a Broken World”

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “Together in a Broken World” by Paul Michael Winters

Publishing Info: Ninestar Press, L.L.C., May 2024

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC from the publisher vis a vis Pacific and Court.

Where You Can Get This Book: Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: Two boys fall in love in a deadly world, but it’s the secrets they keep that might kill them.

Seventeen-year-old Zach was visiting his uncle in a small Montana town when a mysterious illness ripped through the world. Most died, but those who survived the Infection became mindless killers, spreading the disease with a single scratch. Now, a year later, civilization lies in ruins, and Zach is the town’s sole survivor. Desperately lonely, he longs to return to his family in Seattle, but his fears hold him captive.

Eighteen-year-old Aiden is on a critical mission for the covert Scientific Collective, delivering vials whose contents could cure the Infection. Tortured by his boyfriend’s death, he welcomes the risks of the perilous journey. When a militia attacks Aiden, he flees to Zach’s town.

The boys escape together and soon form a bond as they comfort each other in this desolate and broken world. The farther they travel, the more their affection grows, as do the forces pulling them apart. But their greatest threats are the secrets they keep. Zach hides details of his uncle’s death, and Aiden conceals the vials’ sinister origins. In order to survive, they’ll have to confront the truths that could tear their love apart.

Review: Thank you to Pacific & Court for sending me an ARC of this novel!

It’s been a bit since I’ve covered a straight up post-apocalyptic story here on the blog, and now that we are finally past the more acute stages of the waning pandemic I’m feeling less of an anxiety spike when I read these kinds of stories as of late. So when “Together in a Broken World” by Paul Michael Winters ended up in my hands, I was eager to give it a go! You already had me at a post-apocalyptic setting, but then you add in a romance between two flawed but good hearted characters struggling to survive, and I am even more on board! And “Together in a Broken World” really met my expectations!

Given that Pride month starts in a few days, I will first talk about what a lovely queer romance it is as the beating heart of this story. Zach and Aiden are two strangers trying to survive in a world that has been ravaged by an infection that turns people into, essentially, zombies, and have been left adrift in different ways. For Zach it’s being the last person left in the small town he had been visiting right before things went to hell. For Aiden it’s working as a courier for a group that is trying to find a cure, which has made him a target of those who are in direct conflict with that for whatever reason that may be. It makes their lives very lonely, so seeing them meet and forge a connection with each other makes for a great set up for a really sweet romance. I love a slow burn, and this one is definitely that given that they are both understandably standoffish at first. But I really enjoyed watching them get to know each other, and to connect after they have been so alone and so haunted by their loneliness and regrets and fears. It feels like “Heartstopper” meets the episode “Long, Long Time” from “The Last of Us”, and Winters really captures the soaring love as well as the deep heartache and sadness of their circumstances, and the traumas they have faced which can lead to some bad decision making. I was rooting for them from the jump.

And since this is a post-apocalyptic tale, it’s only natural to talk about the world building on how the world has gotten to this point of the collapse of civilization. Winters has a pretty well thought out end of the world scenario, that combines natural disaster with fast spreading novel pathogen to create a wasteland of infected people and those who are uninfected, but left to total chaos and a “Mad Max” like reality of nomadic and isolated lives trying to hide from violent opportunists. Any good zombie story will make it clear that it’s actually the humans who are the true threat, and I thought that “Together in a Broken World” achieved that with a unique and suspenseful premise, particularly as Aiden is trying to bring a potential cure through hundreds of miles of dangerous wasteland with threats from all sides. I especially enjoyed the tidbits about Aiden running from an extremist militia that doesn’t trust the Scientific Collective, the group that is trying to find a cure, and wants to hinder him at all costs because of their conspiracy theorist nonsense and delusions, as it adds a whole other layer to an already fraught survival tale. It fits right in with other end of the world thrillers, and as an aficionado of the genre I was a fan.

I definitely recommend “Together in a Broken World” for not only young adults who enjoy end of days thrillers, but anyone who likes the sub genre. And hey, as I said, Pride Month is right around the corner, so if you are looking for LGBTQIA+ rep in your reading, add it to the list!

Rating 8: A suspenseful thriller and also a lovely romance, “Together in a Broken World” is about queer joy in the face of great adversity, as well as some pretty cool end of the world mythos.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Together in a Broken World” is included on the Goodreads list “2024 Queer YA Books”.