Tag: mystery book

Book Review: Not Like Other Girls by Meredith Adamo

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Rating: ★★★★☆
Audience: Mystery/Thriller
Length: 448 pages
Author: Meredith Adamo
Publisher: Bloomsbury YA
Release Date: April 30th, 2024
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

A girl risks everything to find her former best friend in this powerful debut mystery about trauma, girlhood, and what we deserve.

When Jo-Lynn Kirby’s former best friend—pretty, nice Maddie Price—comes to her claiming to be in trouble, Jo assumes it’s some kind of joke. After all, Jo has been an outcast ever since her nude photos were leaked—and since everyone decided she deserved it. There’s no way Maddie would actually come to her for help.

But then Maddie is gone.

Everyone is quick to write off Maddie as a runaway, but Jo can’t shake the feeling there’s more to the story. To find out the truth, Jo needs to get back in with the people who left her behind—and the only way back in is through Hudson Harper-Moore. An old fling of Jo’s with his own reasons for wanting to find Maddie, Hudson hatches a fake dating scheme to get Jo back into their clique. But being back on the inside means Jo must confront everything she’d rather forget: the boys who betrayed her, the whispers that she had it coming, and the secrets that tore her and Maddie apart. As Jo digs deeper into Maddie’s disappearance, she’s left to wonder who she’s really searching for: Maddie, or the girl she used to be.

Not Like Other Girls is a stunning debut that takes a hard look at how we treat young women and their trauma, through the lens of a missing girl and a girl trying to find herself again.

Thank you to LibroFM for the gifted audiobook.

WHAT A RIDE.

I honestly had no idea what I was getting when I picked this up. I didn’t read the synopsis and had seen a few friends love it so hey, why not? And it shocked me in so many ways. I feel a bit iffy on some of the writing/small plot moments but the big themes and story were incredibly hard hitting and made for an intense read.

This made me feel a range of emotions from the momma bear, I just want to hug this girl, to anger and devastation at how these situations occur and those who look the other way. Jo was hurting and struggling and I loved her story so much.

The pace was a little slow for me but I added that extra half star because I kept getting blindsided by the reveals towards the end. They were handled well and I was invested in needing to know how everything was going to come together.

Overall audience notes:

  • YA/NA Mystery with some romance
  • Language: moderate
  • Romance: vague open door/fade to black
  • Violence: moderate
  • Content Warnings: rap3 (alluded to multiple times), assault, kidnapping

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ALC Book Review: The Search Party by Hannah Richell

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Rating: ★★★
Audience: Mystery/Thriller
Length: 352 pages
Author: Hannah Richell
Publisher: Atria
Release Date: January 16th, 2024
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

A spellbinding locked-room mystery about a glamping trip gone horribly wrong when a powerful storm leaves the participants stranded and forced to confront long-held secrets and a shocking disappearance.

Max and Annie Kingsley have left the London rat race with their twelve-year-old son to set up a glamping site in the wilds of Cornwall. Eager for a dry run ahead of their opening, they invite three old university friends and their families for a long-needed reunion. But the festivities soon go awry as tensions arise between the children (and subsequently their parents), explosive secrets come to light, and a sudden storm moves in, cutting them off from help as one in the group disappears.

Moving between the police investigation, a hospital room, and the catastrophic weekend, The Search Party is a propulsive and twisty destination thriller about the tenuous bonds of friendship and the lengths parents will go to protect their children—perfect for fans of Ruth Ware and Lucy Foley.

Thank you Book Club Favorites for the physical copy and Simon and Schuster and LibroFM for the gifted audiobook.

THE SAME.

Either I’m picking the wrong thrillers or this is a continual theme I have found myself stuck in. I feel like every thriller I read is a big cast, 90% have done a bad thing, and there’s a murder to solve. Rinse and repeat. And this didn’t change that scenario much.

I did LOVE the audiobook. Audio was well done and that did make moving through this better. Highly recommend that route.

There were interesting tidbits throughout the story. It wasn’t a total lost cause. Having the multiple POV’s kept things going enough and I liked seeing each little side to the story. I was pulled in wrong directions a few times on the whodunnit and I appreciate that those mystery plot lines worked well.

While not quite a winner for me, it still might be a gem for you.

Overall audience notes:

  • Thriller/Mystery
  • Language: some strong
  • Romance: closed door/fade to black
  • Violence: high
  • Trigger/Content Warnings: murder, knife violence, infidelity, missing child, depression, non-consensual drugging, forced captivity, brief mentions of child abuse and suicide

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Book Review: Regrets Only by Kieran Scott

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Rating: ★★★★
Audience: Mystery/Thriller
Length: 336 pages
Author: Kieran Scott
Publisher: Gallery Books
Release Date: January 10th, 2023
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

In a fast-paced new novel in the vein of Big Little Lies, a single mom goes undercover to investigate a host of disturbing secrets held by the leaders of a local suburban parent-school association, including embezzlement, bribery, adultery, and murder—by the bestselling author of Wish You Were Gone.

Paige Lancaster, single mom and prodigal daughter, has returned to the East Coast from her prestigious, well-paid job in Los Angeles, writing for the smartest detective series on television. Something terrible happened to her back in Hollywood. Okay, two terrible things, one featuring a misplaced tire iron—and now she’s broke, homeless, and living with her widowed mother and eight-year-old daughter, Izzy, in her Connecticut hometown.

Paige needs to buckle down and find a new writing gig but first, she meets the movers and shakers of Izzy’s school’s Parent Booster Association, run by the intimidatingly gorgeous Ainsley Anderson, who just happens to be married to Paige’s old high school flame, John.

Then she shows up at the annual Parents and Pinot fundraiser, held at Ainsley and John’s dazzling mansion in the toniest part of town, where she’s caught in a compromising position with John, accidentally destroys the guest bathroom, overhears an incriminating conversation, and discovers that her purse has gone missing. And later that night, Ainsley turns up dead at the bottom of her own driveway.

Did she fall? Or was she pushed?

Paige may have only written about detectives, but she is convinced she can handle a little undercover sleuthing. After all, it’ll give her an excuse to spend more time with John. Still, she can’t help but wonder: could he be capable of murder? Or could one of the PBA members have planned a dastardly crime to reach the top? But the most important question of all: will Paige ever get her life back on track?

Thank you to Book Club Favorites and Simon & Schuster for the gifted copy.

BRING THE DRAMA.

You can sometimes easily know what you’re getting into from a book by the summary. In this case, I knew allllll the momma drama was coming my way and by leaning right into it, I enjoyed this one! It was a fantastic audiobook with multiple narrators that brought out another dimension to the story.

I liked the murder mystery the most. I honestly didn’t know who committed what and kept pointing my finger at the wrong person. It’s super fast paced and a compulsive kind of read that has a bit of an edge too.

Character wise, I didn’t love or hate anyone. I feel like they all played their roles well and each brought a little bit of something to the story. I like seeing things from multiple angles and Regrets Only brought that dynamic for me.

Not my usual genre, but definitely a nice switch up.

Overall audience notes:

  • Mystery/Thriller
  • Language: some strong
  • Romance: fade to black
  • Violence: murder, gun violence, physical altercations

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Book Review: The Siren by Katherine St. John

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Rating: ★★★
Audience: Thriller/Mystery
Length: 416 pages
Author: Katherine St. John
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Release Date: May 4th, 2021
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

From Katherine St. John, author of The Lion’s Den, comes another sublimely escapist thriller: When dangerously handsome megastar Cole Power hires his ex-wife, Stella Rivers, to act in his son’s film, he sparks a firestorm on an isolated island that will unearth long-buried secrets — and unravel years of lies.

In the midst of a sizzling hot summer, some of Hollywood’s most notorious faces are assembled on the idyllic Caribbean island of St. Genesius to film The Siren, starring dangerously handsome megastar Cole Power playing opposite his ex-wife, Stella Rivers. The surefire blockbuster promises to entice audiences with its sultry storyline and intimately connected cast.

Three very different women arrive on set, each with her own motive. Stella, an infamously unstable actress, is struggling to reclaim the career she lost in the wake of multiple, very public breakdowns. Taylor, a fledgling producer, is anxious to work on a film she hopes will turn her career around after her last job ended in scandal. And Felicity, Stella’s mysterious new assistant, harbors designs of her own that threaten to upend everyone’s plans.

With a hurricane brewing offshore, each woman finds herself trapped on the island, united against a common enemy. But as deceptions come to light, misplaced trust may prove more perilous than the storm itself.

WILD RIDE.

Goodness this book took me in so many directions I could hardly keep a handle on everything happening. Which definitely kept the pages turning.

What I did realize though is that this type of thriller isn’t my favorite? The writing is great, the story is intense and disturbing, but something about it just didn’t click for me in the end. Maybe some of the subject matter was a bit too much. I can’t quite pinpoint the vibe.

I liked that this kept me guessing at every turn. The flashback scenes added to the history and built up to the reveals well. As the hurricane rocked the island and crap really started to hit the fan I HAD to know where things were going.

I’m glad everything worked out in the end and that there was an epilogue. This kind of story had to have that closure. An intense tale for sure.

Overall audience notes:

  • Thriller/Mystery
  • Language: strong
  • Romance: multiple brief open door
  • Violence: mild-strong
  • Trigger/Content Warnings: suicide, murder, physical altercations, gun violence, kidnapping, drug use, rape, forced miscarriage, substance abuse, nonconsensual drugging

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