The Echo Wife - Sarah Gailey

 

 TW: implied domestic violence

This is a sci-fi domestic thriller that follows 2 women - Evelyn and Martine - as they navigate a truly unprecedented relationship. Evelyn Caldwell is an award winning research scientist who focuses on cloning - human cloning.  Evelyn's lab grows human clones and programs their personalities in order to fit the job - body double for potential assassination attempt, for example.  She's dedicated, focused, no-nonsense, and she's recently found out her husband is having an affair with Martine.  Martine is a clone made from Evelyn's research and she is the opposite to Evelyn in many ways and a seemingly perfect match for Evelyn's husband.  Except now the husband is dead and the two women team up in order to protect themselves and their future.

There are a lot of things I liked about this book, but my favorite was the concept and execution of the overall plot arc.  I was telling my mom about the plot and the first thing she said was that it sounds like a movie.  And I completely agree. I found this to be a very commercial, fun to read, intriguing story that I would 100% would not be surprised if it got a movie adaptation.  This is not a super heavy sci-fi read and there more thriller aspects really do a good job of balancing out the science-y stuff.  Gailey's writing was incredibly easy to fall into and I found myself getting lost in the pages for longer than I intended a few times (but who needs to go to bed on time anyway?).  One of my main worries going into this book would be that it would have a lot of either sci-fi or thriller elements and not much of the other.  However, all the aspects of what I look for in a sci-fi and a thriller were there but neither overpowered the other so my reading experience ended up being really satisfying from both sides. 

I didn't love the place in the plot where the book started.  We start with Evelyn as she's accepting an award and see her having to dodge questions about her soon to be ex-husband, Nathan. I was expecting to start before she found out about the affair so it felt like I missed out on a pretty central emotional moment to the plot.  We do get bits in flashback form where she found out about Martine and confronted Nathan but I still found myself wishing we would have started earlier and found out with her.  I also wish we didn't know Martine was a clone going into the book.  That reveal was built up so well and it really felt like it would have been a mic-drop moment in the book except that I already knew she was a clone going into the story.  I think if the clone reveal and the affair reveal were done together like a one-two punch it would have been really great.  But we miss out on the affair reveal happening before the book started and I knew about the clone ahead of time so both were less emotionally hard hitting than I wanted them to be.

I thought the science elements were handled really well.  I don't read a ton of sci-fi but the number one aspect that will make or break a sci-fi for me is how naturally integrated the science is in the book.  Some books really take me out of the story when they suddenly start feeling like a textbook when the science stuff is introduced.  The cloning technology wasn't too far out of reality (they grow humans in tanks filled with artificial amniotic fluid) and there were a lot of words that I recognized from all my soapy TV medical dramas so it felt grounded.  The technology felt like it could be only a few years away from current day, not hundreds of years in the future, so I think even non-sci-fi readers could have a good handle on that side of the story.  There were some parts that got a bit hand-wavy and skimmed over with general language and I'm glad we didn't get bogged down in every single step of the process being explained to the reader. (but maybe fans of more in depth sci-fi would find those omissions bothersome).  

On the thriller side of the story, this was a pretty typical domestic thriller with secrets being revealed throughout the story.  There weren't any super high action or high tension scenes (no high speed car chase running away from the killer, for example).  However, there were a ton of reveals and twists in the story that I didn't see coming - the one at 80% really threw me for a loop - so they were satisfying.  I do wish there was a bit more tension on Evelyn and Martine when they were trying to figure out what to do after Nathan's death and I think that would have helped with the overall stakes in the story.  Despite Evelyn stating that her career would be over if any of the events in the book got out, I never felt like she was ever really in danger of being found out.  I would have liked maybe a surprise lab inspection or something.  

Finally, I found this to be an overall character driven story, which is my preference.  The larger discussion in the book centers around what makes a person a person which was really interesting to watch Evelyn and Martine work through their feelings on.  There's also a bit of question of what is genetically ingrained in someone vs what can be artificially programmed into them.  Evelyn and Martine were the main two characters we followed, but we do get their interactions with Evelyn's lab assistant as well as scenes from Evelyn's childhood which helped show their different relationships.  Gailey did a fantastic job at really ingraining in the writing the different ways the characters act with one another.  Evelyn would be more curt and straightforward with her lab assistant than with other people and we can see that not only in her outward interactions and dialogue with him, but also her internal monologue would change.  I think Gailey did a fantastic job setting up the character relations for the reader to immediately know the status quo only for those relationships to be changed as the story progressed.  I wouldn't consider Evelyn an entirely likeable person - she's very cold, a bit rude at times, and does come across as a bit full of herself - but I found her to still be very human and easy to root for as the book's events unfolded which is really the best thing I could hope for.

Overall, this is a very well balanced sci-fi domestic thriller that would appeal to a broad range of readers.  I found the characters to be intriguing, the plot well paced with good reveals, and I was satisfied with the ending. I do think we missed out on some emotional connection since the book started after a big plot point that I think would have been better suited to be explored on the page.

256 pages.

Publication date is February 16, 2021.

Thanks to NetGalley and Macmillan-Tor/Forge for the ARC in exchange for review.

Get to Know the Thriller Reader Tag

 I saw this tag video from Griff Reads on YouTube and thought I'd answer the questions.  Sam said she took questions and inspiration from two other tags - get to know the romance reader and get to know the fantasy reader.  

What is your thriller origin story? i.e. How did you come to read your first thriller.

I remember finding Lois Duncan in the YA section of my local library when I was in 6th (I think?) grade and up until then I was reading mostly contemporary and some fantasy.  I didn't know books like that really existed and I was instantly hooked and read through the entire collection in a few weeks.  I then asked my mom if she knew of other books like that and she mentioned Stephen King and the rest is history.

What are your favorite thriller tropes? 

 Small town secrets is #1 by far.  Other top options are: maybe something supernatural is going on, serial killers, isolation locations (cabin in the woods, island, etc), and unreliable narrators.

 What is a thriller you've read in the past year that you would recommend? 

 The Dark Bones by Loreth Anne White 

This is the description from Goodreads:

When Detective Rebecca North left her rural hometown, she vowed never to return. Her father’s apparent suicide has changed that. The official report is that retired cop Noah North shot himself, knocked over a lantern, and set his isolated cabin ablaze. But Rebecca cannot believe he killed himself.

To prove it, she needs the help of Ash Haugen, the man she left behind. But Rebecca and Ash share more than broken hearts. Something darker lies between them, and the investigation is stirring it back to life. Clues lead them to the home of Olivia West and her deeply troubled twelve-year-old daughter, Tori. The child knows more about the murder than anyone can imagine, but she’s too terrified to say a word.

And as a cold-blooded killer resurfaces from the past, Rebecca and Ash begin to fear that their own secrets may be even harder to survive.

 What is your favorite thriller sub-genre? 

 Psychological thrillers and police procedural thrillers

 Who are your auto-buy thriller authors? 

 Gillian Flynn, Loreth Anne White, Stephen King

 How do you typically find thriller recommendations? 

 Usually book reviews on YouTube and the "Readers Also Enjoyed" section of Goodreads.  I've recently followed a handful of Booktubers who read thrillers but I'm still trying to work out if their reading tastes and preferences are the same as mine.

 What is an upcoming thriller release you're looking forward to? 

I'll be honest, I'm horrible at knowing about upcoming releases.  I mostly learn about them when I'm requesting books from NetGalley so The Burning Girls by C.J. Tudor is one of the more intriguing ones I've requested recently.

 What is one misconception about thrillers that you'd like to address? 

 I'd like people to know that thrillers aren't all serial killer murders and crime solving.  If you don't want a super dark read, then there are plenty of other sub-genres available. I've found mystery thrillers to be more tame as well as most domestic thrillers.  My mom, for example, really doesn't like the serial killer type books that I love but she really liked Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn and The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins. 

 Are there any content creators (BookTubers/bookstagrammers) that you follow for thriller recommendations?

 The one that seems to most align with my personal tastes and preferences is BooksandLala although she doesn't really like the crime procedural books like I do and she reads a ton of genres.  I'm still feeling out a few other Booktubers to see how their tastes line up with mine. 

 If someone had never read a thriller before, what 3 books would you recommend?

 Misery by Stephen King

 I think this is a really good example of what I love most about Stephen King - his character work.  We're in an isolated setting with just two characters and things get crazy from there.  King often has some supernatural or horror elements in his stories, but I find this one more a straight forward thriller (and the movie adaptation is also really solid).

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

This was the first thriller where I remember getting to the twist and it completely blowing my mind.  Like I did a double take while reading the page and had to re-read the last section just to make sure I understood it correctly.  I liked Gillian Flynn's other books as well, but I think this one is the most generally commercial of them so I think it would appeal to the widest array of readers.  This one also has a movie adaptation but I've never seen it and I've heard some pretty meh reviews about it so I'm not sure I'd recommend it.

 The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris

This would be for anyone who wanted to jump into the darker side of thrillers.  Police investigation and serial killers?  Yes please.  I feel like you'd be hard pressed to find someone who hasn't at least heard of Hannibal the Cannibal at least as a pop culture reference. I personally think the Hannibal book series should be more beloved than it is.  The film adaptation is iconic (and I re-watch it at least once a year) but I find the books just as tightly paced and disturbingly fascinating as the movies.

Darkly Dreaming Dexter - Jeff Lindsay

  Darkly Dreaming Dexter is the first book of an eight book series.  It follows serial killer and forensic blood splatter analyst Dexter Morgan as he balances his two very different lives while trying to solve a series of brutal murders. This is the book that the TV series Dexter is based on and the first season of the show follows the same investigation as this first book.  I watched the show back when it first came out and got to halfway through season 4 before I went to college and stopped watching.  When I started watching the show, I didn't know it was based on a book series but when I found out a few years later, the books have always been in the back of my mind as something I wanted to read.  I really enjoyed the TV show (the seasons that I saw anyway) and I love a good serial killer book so I was excited to pick this up.  Unfortunately, I was not really a fan of this first book.  I don't think it is a bad book, by any means, but it feels like one of those books that is pretty polarizing and people either love or hate.

The book pulls no punches and opens with Dexter ready to kill (and then killing) a child murdering priest. We are in his head as he waits, watches, then makes his move.  I thought this is a great way to start this story because there is no debating for the reader what Dexter is.  He's a serial killer with his own moral code.  The actual murdering is done off the page which I wasn't entirely expecting.  I didn't think we'd go full torture porn with super detailed descriptions but I did think we would get a bit more gore than we ended up getting (this held true for the rest of the murders in the book).  The opening was so strong and pushed the reader right into the deep end with Dexter that I was a little let down that there weren't more on-page murders in the book.  After the initial murder, the book does a good job at quickly and efficiently getting the reader introduced to all the people Dexter works with as well as his origin story.  The reader is given the bare essentials and we grow to learn more as we go on in the book, but the initial base information was really helpful to quickly get the reader grounded then move along with the plot.

The plot moves very fast in this book.  At only 300 pages we start out sprinting and don't slow down very much until the very end.  Depending on your personal tastes, this can go either positive or negative.  I'm a character-driven reader so I normally prefer slower paced plots in exchange for more deep character or relationship developments.  I did feel like the fast pace and shorter page count took away from the potential character development but there were enough quiet moments of introspection and we did get some good relationship moments so I wasn't too bothered.  I also fully acknowledge that this is the first book in the series so there is much more room for character development in later books as Dexter's story develops.  The plot is based around the police case trying to catch a serial killer so it does have a bit of that procedural aspect to the narrative that I know some people aren't a huge fan of.  I will say as someone who loves police procedurals, a good amount of the police work happens off the page.  We aren't sitting in on interviews with suspects that are dead ends or following around detectives as they canvass a neighborhood.  This is because we are 100% in Dexter's mind and Dexter's POV for the entirety of the book and he's just a crime scene technician, not an actual detective.

After letting this book settle for a few days, I realized what I disliked most and what really made this an overall unenjoyable read to me - Dexter.  Yeah, that Dexter, the main character.  I think this is where readers can go either way on this book.  If you like Dexter, I think you'll enjoy the book but if you don't (like I didn't) then the book becomes a pretty rough read.  Since this story is told in first person POV, we are in Dexter's head and it is structure in such a way that he is telling us the story.  We get everything filtered through his lens and we get his inner monologue commentary on everything and everyone around him.  I generally don't have a problem with first person narratives but holy heck did I want to get out of Dexter's head.  When the book started and I realized we'd be in his head for the entirety of the story, I was excited because I figured it would be such a unique and dark perspective to get. That opening chapter was fantastic and I would have loved to stay in that darker headspace for the entirety of the book. However, for the majority of the story, Dexter felt like a fifteen year old boy trying to be edgy by making murder jokes and he would get some pretty good mood swings.  I was expecting him to be much more sinister in his head.  We know he has these urges, this itch he needs to scratch, because he tells the reader, but I didn't feel the tension in him.  There was a question posed in the book of if Dexter could be sleep-murdering these victims because he sleep walks and had almost a sixth sense about the murders.  That's a pretty big mystery to figure out but Dexter seemed to be completely uncaring and almost a bit amused at the idea.  As a result of his flippant attitude toward this idea I didn't feel any suspense or even want to find out the answer.  I wanted to leave his head and go follow the detectives or other crime scene technicians - anywhere except stay in Dexter's head.

The ending of this book, for something so important and potentially life shattering, was pretty meh for me and the reason, for me, was that Dexter didn't seem to do anything - he had no agency.  We see him in the beginning of the book as a hunter watching his prey and now, in the moment where those dark skills would come in handy, he comes across like a bumbling local cop.  I couldn't get a handle on his character for the entire book and the ending felt like a mismatch of his inner voices battling it out to see who would win Dexter over at the end.  If there had been more tension built up throughout the book then that internal struggle could have been super powerful.  I think the theme for a lot of my issues with the book is that the elements were all there, but the pieces didn't fall into place so it overall didn't come together well.  

To end on a positive note, Lindsay has some really great almost poetic lines in the book.  The narrative is in first person, and it almost feels like there's another personality in Dexter that wants to write a literary novel and thinks in this really flowery prose. As a contrast, Dexter is much more blue collar and down to earth with his observations. These sudden tone shifts were really jarring to me when I was reading but this was the first book where I took pictures of the prose because there were some really good lines.  

Here's an example:

"The very body parts seemed to sing to me, a rhapsody of bloodless wonder that lightened by heart and filled by veins with an intoxicating sense of awe."

Then the next paragraph:

"I sat in my apartment, rubbing my sleep-crusted eyes and thinking about the stow I had just watched. It has been as near perfect as a press conference could be without free food and nudity."

I thought both lines were really great characterization lines, but I just had a hard time marrying them together as being from the same person. Again, we the reader are drowning in Dexter's head so all the lines in the book feel like they should be his direct thoughts.  There wasn't really any room for some third party narrator to be stepping in and giving descriptions.  I borrowed this book from the library, but I almost want to buy a copy just to go through and highlight all the lines that I really liked. 

 Overall, this was an interesting premise with a fast paced plot full of death and serial killers but I found the first person narration to be annoying and I couldn't get a good handle on the tone the book was going for.  

304 pages.

 As a final note, if this book's premise sounds interesting but you also don't like the execution or some of the narrative style choices, I'd recommend trying the TV show.  I'm only halfway through season 4 but I found the show to be a bit darker in tone (but still has some good comedy moments to break up the subject matter), Dexter's characterization is more concrete, and we get much more out of the other characters that really add depth to the show.  There were some pretty big plot changes between this book and season 1 of the show as well.

Romance Wrap-Up 1/1/21 - 1/15/21

It's Definitely Not You - Abby Brooks

This is an enemies to lovers story that follows handyman Joe and doctor Kennedy.  They meet when Joe is hired to be the live-in handyman for Kennedy's grandmother and fix up her house.  They butt heads immediately and both have very strong first impressions of the other.  Those initial impressions get broken down and the two realize that they were wrong about the other - so wrong that what they thought was hate turns out to be love.  I really enjoyed Joe and Kennedy's relationship build-up.  They had some pretty spicy banter when they didn't like each other and that banter slowly got more and more flirty as time went on. I thought both of them were really well developed outside of their relationship and I found myself invested in other parts of the story (like Kennedy's job at the local doctor's office).  I really enjoyed how vulnerable Joe was and how the hero of the story is the one that really has some baggage.  I think the beginning of the story was hinting at Kennedy maybe having some similar baggage, but I felt like it never really played out on her side.  I loved how Kennedy stood up for herself and let Joe know exactly how she was feeling and wasn't just taking any apology from him.  I wish we saw some more of Joe's insecurities earlier in the story.  We get a few scenes before the big blowup but I feel like they didn't have any real consequences.  I wanted him and Kennedy to maybe argue a bit about something, her to push him too far and him to get snippy, something that showed the storm brewing.  In the chapters from Joe's POV, we get his inner monologue where he mentions how some of her actions or comments make him feel, but I wanted more of that to show up in their actual relationship. 

Also to note: this story takes place after the Hutton Family series and we do see some of the Hutton characters in this book but it isn't necessary to read that series before reading this book (I didn't).  

 

Scoring the Billionaire - Max Monroe

This is the third book in the Billionaire Bad Boys series and follows football team owner Wes and team physician, Winnie.   He's perfectly content being a single guy in Manhattan, she's a single mom who isn't looking to be disappointed again, and their chemistry is undeniable.  I really liked how both characters had their own lives and priorities and how their relationship came completely out of left field for both of them.  They get together pretty quickly in the beginning of this book, but I believe there's more build up in book 2.5 of the series (Banking Her) which I did not read.  I would have liked a bit more build up of their initial boss/employee relationship at the beginning of this book only because I didn't really know these characters yet.  I really liked Winnie's relationship with the players on the team - she grew up with 4 brothers so she can give as good as she gets - and I really wanted more of those scenes.  Winnie has a 6 year old autistic daughter who is described as 'high functioning' I believe.  I'm not autistic, so I can't speak entirely on the rep in the book, but from what discussions I've seen, that label and the type of characteristics the daughter exhibits (math prodigy, excellent at memorizing facts, etc) are pretty stereotypical and are how a lot of neuro-typical people see autistic kids.  There is a big focus in the book on Wes and if he feels he can be a good enough father for the daughter (and if Winnie feels like he's good enough as well), which I thought was really well done. It took me a while to get into their romance I think mostly because there was a disconnect in how the characters were acting and how they were telling the reader they normally act.  Wes said so many times in his chapters that he had never seen himself as someone who liked kids, but for some reason he liked Winnie's daughter right from the start.  Since he didn't know why he suddenly liked the idea of having a kid and we didn't really get a whole lot of 'before and after' character development at that point, I was pretty disconnected from the book. This is probably my least favorite book of the series but it really came together in the end.  We get lots of the couples from the first 2 books which I always appreciate.

 With This Ring - Georgia Le Carre

This is a mafia romance that follows Freya and Maxim.  They are from two different Russian mob families and their fathers agree that they should marry in order to form a bond.  Maxim is taking over the business from his father but Freya wants nothing to do with the mafia lifestyle and is working with a friend to start up a jewelry business. Freya initially refuses the marriage and Maxim agrees that he won't force her to marry him but he does think the union would be a good idea. This book wasn't as dark as mafia romances usually are which was refreshing and I appreciated how strong Freya was against her father and Maxim.  She understands the rules of the world she was brought up in but she also knows how to push the limits to what a normal mafia romance heroine would be allowed to do.  I thought the two characters complimented each other perfectly and their personalities meshed so well. I really appreciated how Freya knew exactly the type of life she would have with Maxim and wasn't blindsided like some heroines are in this sub-genre.  I do wish there was more drama with the mob sub plot - someone was threatening them but it never felt really dangerous or like the main characters were really bothered too much by it. We are also told that Freya and Maxim knew each other when they were younger and I wish we had gotten a bit more of their relationship back then - either through flashbacks or just the characters remembering certain things from the past.

My Every Breath - Brittney Sahin

This is the second book in the Becoming Us series and follows Mia, daughter of a mafia hitman, and Cade, a businessman with a heart of gold and some ex-SEAL connections.  Cade spots Mia one night at a strip club and he is instantly drawn to her.  Once he finds out she's part of the mob and wants out, he's determined to help her and keep her safe.  She's initially resistant, but when push comes to shove, she trusts him and agrees to go along with him.  This is a pretty standard romantic suspense book, which I'm normally on board for.  However, I found the romance lacking and the suspense boring so this was overall a thumbs down for me.  This was insta-lust central which is fine except for the fact that I didn't feel like Mia and Cade grew together as a couple.  I didn't believe the chemistry between them and while they did open up emotionally to each other, I wasn't getting any feelings of real growth.  Honestly, at the end of the book, if they had just shook hands and walked away, I wouldn't have minded one bit.  It felt like once the pressure and danger-sexiness of the situation had gone, their relationship would have fizzled.  The suspense plot was interesting in premise, but I found it really lacking in execution.  We were told about how much danger Mia was in, what sort of cartel/terrorist/mafia criminals our characters were up against but I just didn't feel like the characters were in any real sort of danger.  Of course, with these books the reader knows the main characters will survive to live happily ever after, but I wasn't even worried for a second about any of the side characters or anything.  Overall, this wasn't a bad book, it was just entirely underwhelming for me.  

**There is mention of a drug overdose and human trafficking.

 

Point Roberts - Alexander Rigby

  This story follows five characters in their investigation into who was behind 15 gruesome murders in their small town over three Februaries.  Point Roberts is located on a peninsula in Washington State and borders Canada.  For twenty seven years, the town of Point Roberts gets completely isolated for the month of February to keep them safe from the killer.  Since the lockdowns began, there have been no additional murders but the killer has never been caught.  Seventeen year old Liza moves to town to be with her new foster family and she quickly learns about the murders when she finds a book washed up on the shore titled The Fifteen. Liza joins with four other townspeople to investigate the killings and to identify the Point Roberts Slayer after 30 years.

My favorite part of this book was the way the different characters were handled.  I assumed we would be in Liza's perspective for the whole book but we actually switch between the five characters - Liza, Theodore, Colette, Grant, and Maude.  Five different points of view is a lot for a single book and when I realized how many perspectives we were getting, I was concerned the story would get confusing. However, I was pleasantly surprised that the five POV didn't detract from the story at all.  I felt Rigby masterfully balanced the different perspectives and made them all unique enough that I didn't get characters confused.  The first five chapters of the book are spent introducing the different characters and their connections to the murders.  Then, for the rest of the book, we see them team up together as they investigate.  The first chapters laid such a solid groundwork for the characters that I had a clear vision and voice for each of them.  Then, later in the book when they are all together, I didn't feel confused or out of balance.  Rigby balanced the different perspectives very well and it felt like we had five equal main characters.  I loved the different relationships that blossomed between the characters and the way the group dynamic changed depending on how many and who was involved.  

Along the same lines, I expected the narrative to get bogged down with info-dumping about the fifteen murders.  Fifteen is just a whole lot of details to go through and give the reader the information about. Rigby managed to stay away from the dreaded info-dump and instead wove the different murders into the plot.  We didn't need to know about all fifteen at once, we learned about them one at a time as the characters discussed and worked through the evidence.  This methodical process allowed the rest of the plot to move forward so the reader could stay engaged.  I also found this made the different murders more memorable and while I couldn't list off all 15 by heart, I could keep them separate in my mind so when characters brought up X or Y murder, I knew which one they were talking about.

 Where the multiple characters and multiple murders didn't work so well for me was right at the end.  The last 15% or so of the book was a big of a slog to get through because of the amount of information just being told to the reader.  We get to the end, the group figures out who the Big Bad is and then there's a long story breaking down what happened 30 years ago where we find out the reason behind each of the fifteen murders.  It was just a lot of information to take in at once and the reasons were so similar with a lot of them that it felt pretty repetitive at times.  There also wasn't much action happening during the last 15% but there was a whole lot of talking so the pacing just dragged for me.  Also, at the end, the point of view switched from third person to first person and it was super jarring for me.  I think the reason was to give more of a personal perspective on how each of these five people was feeling now that they were close to finding the truth but after reading over 300 pages in third person the sudden shift was not working for me and took me right out of the story that I was super invested in.

I thought the overall mystery was really well crafted and paced.  I was impressed with how quickly the reader is sunk into the mystery of Point Roberts and the annual lockdown procedures.  I was immediately intrigued by the set up and the cast of characters introduced.  I really liked how each of the five main characters brought something to the investigation, it wasn't one person having all the epiphanies or finding all the clues.  They felt like a real team working together while also having their own worries or goals for the outcome.  The investigation is a bit slow, but after 30 years of no new evidence or much investigation at all, it is understandable that the group would need to go back over old evidence before breaking new ground.  I found this to be a very character-driven mystery story so the plot isn't too complicated with lots of red herrings in the investigation.  A good part of the story is the characters discovering things about themselves, their relationships, or the goals in life in tandem to the main investigation.  I think some readers might be put off by that and find the actual mystery a bit simple but I found the personal growth and connections to add to the mystery investigation. I did guess most of the reveal at the end, but still found it a satisfying reveal and some of the finer details I hadn't worked out for myself. 

Overall, this was a really interesting, character-driven mystery. I loved the premise and found the pacing and narrative to be really well crafted through most of the book.  The ending dragged pretty noticeably for me, but I still enjoyed it. 

416 pages

Thanks to BookSirens for the ARC. I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

 Publication date: February 1, 2021 by Alden, The Allegory Ridge Press

Her Perfect Life - Sam Hepburn

 Her Perfect Life is a domestic psychological thriller following two women - Juliet and Gracie.  Juliet is a down on her luck single mom struggling to make ends meet and keep going for her daughter.  Gracie, on the outside, has the perfect life.  She has a successful career as a celebrity chef, a loving family with her husband and daughter, and a beautiful new house.  However, behind closed doors her life isn't so perfect.  Juliet and Gracie meet while watching their daughter's dance class and find themselves becoming friends. As their relationship develops, they start opening up and sharing their backgrounds and personal troubles and the two discover just how closely their lives are intertwined. 

I really enjoyed the characters of both Juliet and Gracie.  I found them both to be dynamic, interesting, and complicated characters which made me want to root for both of them.  The book is told through alternating POV chapters between these two and initially I had a hard time because both of them sounded so similar.  Their circumstances and plots were very different, but their voice through the first 25% of the book was so similar that it felt like I was just reading about a single character.  However, once they started interacting with each other, I found their voices to be much more distinct.  Them meeting is also a catalyst for some of their personal insecurities to start showing up which I think was integral to developing them more as distinct characters.  With Juliet and Gracie being so different, I think it would be easy to have one character be obviously worse than the other, but I think there's a really good balance presented.  We get the good and bad of each of them, from both their own and the other perspective.  I didn't find the other side characters as well developed and there were so many of them that I honestly would get them confused if they were just mentioned by name.  I am very bad with names in real life and all the characters did have a purpose for being in the story - I don't think any of them could have been cut - so this might have just been a personal issue.  

The relationships between all the characters were really interesting as well.  Gracie with her husband, Juliet with her ex, Gracie and her best friend, and of course Gracie and Juliet. Each had a different dynamic and I thought it was really interesting to see how the characters changed depending on the situation.  Juliet is emotional, hot headed, and scared of her ex but with Gracie she is vulnerable and in need of a friend. Gracie with her best friend is confident and carefree but with her husband she is a bit paranoid and standoffish.  There are more side characters such as the in-laws and the nanny as well that are all intertwined.  Again, these relationships and the way they're developed throughout the story do a fantastic job at creating well rounded characters.

The plot got off to a bit of a slow start.  We find out a big conflict right in the beginning but it gets pretty much brushed aside almost immediately and the rest of the set up (about 25%) is mostly domestic stuff like picking up kids from school, finding a new house, going on job interviews, etc.  The plot and tension really pick up once Juliet and Gracie meet but getting through that first chunk was a bit of a slog.  Looking back, I think the beginning served for a good set up showing how different these two women are but I would have liked the plot to get moving a little more quickly.  The rest of the plot moved along at a good pace that really kept me engaged once I got past that slow beginning portion.

Of course, this is a thriller, and all thriller readers want a good twist.  I thought the twist was built up really well through Juliet's investigation and trying to find what Gracie was hiding.  I found Juliet's investigation to be really methodical and well laid out, but I found it mostly information gathering and then she puts it all together at the end without too much speculation or red herrings in the middle of the book.  I could see part of the twist coming, but was wrong about which characters were actually involved. I don't mind being wrong about twists in thrillers (I actually prefer to be) but when I reflected on the plot of the book, I couldn't really see any threads that would lead to the ending.  To be fair, the other characters were just as surprised so the twist character did a good job of hiding what they had done but the fact that I couldn't go back and pick up on little things made the reveal feel a little 'gotcha'-y. It wasn't bad enough to affect my overall enjoyment or rating, but it is something I could see some readers disliking.  It also could be that I just didn't pick up on smaller details so maybe this is just another personal issue. 

What did bother me was the ending, literally the very last page of the book, where a plot point that I assumed was resolved with the big twist ends up still being a problem.  Granted, maybe I was wrong to make such an assumption but I really think the plot and structure of the book was pushing the reader toward that thought of X being resolved because Y was resolved.  However, this turns out not to be the case and one of the big conflicts of the story comes back right at the end and we are left with a cliffhanger.  I've said it before and I'll say it again, I don't mind ambiguous endings or endings where not everything is tied up in a neat little bow.  If the book ended with the character wondering if X was still going to be a problem down the line, then that would have been perfectly fine.  But this sort of ending where we get smacked over the head as if the book is saying "look! look! X is still a problem!" is too heavy handed for me especially when this isn't being marketed as any sort of series.  Will we ever find out what the resolution to this plot thread is?  Probably not, and that would not bother me if the ending wasn't so flashy with the reveal. 

I really enjoyed Hepburn's writing style particularly when it came to the inner thoughts of these characters.  I find it really fun to be able to look back at the beginning of the story and see, in the structure of the prose, how the characters are changing.  I think this difference was particularly striking in Juliet's chapters where, by the end, we're getting these long rambling paragraphs as she is trying to connect all the dots of her investigation.  The writing really focused on the characters more so than the surroundings but I still had a good picture in my head of the different settings we get throughout the book.  I prefer a writing style that isn't super flowery while still being interesting and dynamic and I think Hepburn did a good job straddling that line for me.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book - bit of a slow start but once it gets going, it chugs along steadily and picks up speed right at the end.  I loved the writing style, characters, and relationships that Hepburn created.   Really solid domestic psychological thriller. 

392 pages

First published February 23, 2017 by Harper

New release date: February 15, 2021 by Bookouture 

Thanks to NetGalley and Bookouture for the ARC.

2021 Reading Goals

These are my reading goals for 2021.  Pretty straightforward.  Probably every booktuber/bookstagramer/book-person is making one of these lists.  I do have some specific books picked out for certain goals, but others are more things that I would like to keep in mind while selecting books over the upcoming year.  

Any recommendations for books that would fit into certain goal categories would be greatly appreciated!

Goal #1: Read more short stories.

I'll be perfectly honest, short stories aren't really my thing.  At least, I think they aren't.  I've never really enjoyed reading them and when I got my Fiction Writing degree, 90% of the reading and writing in that program were short stories.  I just always feel like short stories don't give me enough to really sink into.  I enjoy the feeling of really falling into a story and being enveloped by the characters and plot for an extended period of time.  I recently heard someone say that a goal of many short stories is to evoke a single feeling and that seemed like an interesting way to look at them.  To be fair, I was pretty indifferent to short stories before I went to college but my degree program really made me grow to borderline hate them.  But then again, I barely read any books for fun for the past 7 years since I graduated so maybe I've been a little harsh to the short story form.  I do have a few short story collections on hand that I'll give a good try.  I also found a collection of essays which I never tried to read because I figured I'd have the same general issues with essay collections as short story collections so I'll give that book a try as well.  One of the short story collections was my favorite out of the ones assigned for my classes so I actually kept it instead of reselling it.  I gave it 3 starts on Goodreads initially so it will be interesting to see if I like it more or less (or the same) upon a re-read sometime this year.

The books:

Just After Sunset by Stephen King

 

American Supernatural Tales (collection by Penguin Classics)

Vacationland by John Hodgman

 

 

Tunneling to the Center of the Earth by Kevin Wilson

Goal #2: Read more diverse books

I spent the first half of 2020 finishing my Master's degree and the second half of the year re-discovering my love of reading.  I was picking up pretty much any book that sounded good and I'll fully admit I wasn't paying any attention to how diverse the authors or characters in those books were.  I was purely focused on if the story sounded like something I would enjoy.  And while I will, of course, still pick up books for this reason, I'd like to be more mindful of the choices I make. I was watching this live stream from Bookish Realm where the panel discusses what it means to read diversely, how to track your reading if you want to, and gives some recommendations for diverse books.  I found the discussion very helpful in giving different ways to frame what 'diverse' reading can look like.  It doesn't all have to be hard-hitting contemporaries (which, I'll admit, is what I first think of).  It can be reading anything that is different from yourself (race, sexuality, language, religion, etc).  There's also been a ton of discussion this year around the publishing industry and how gatekeep-y it can be for authors of these marginalized voices and stories.  I'm a firm believer that showing companies what you want with your dollar can go a long way and I think the more we, as readers, branch out the better.  I am drawn much more to genres like thrillers, romance, mystery, and sci-fi over contemporary or literary fiction and one way I'm looking to diversify my reading is by reading translated works.  I recently saw this list of "Best International Crime Novels of 2020" and I picked out a few of them to be on my TBR for next year.  I also intend to track my reading via a spreadsheet so I can see in what ways I can make improvements to my reading habits to encourage more diversity.  I already know I read many more female authors due to the amount of romance I read, but it will be good to see what other gaps I can close in my reading list.

Here are some books already on my TBR:

The Honjin Murders by Seishi Yokomizo

 

The Tenant by Katrine Engberg

 

 The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones

 

Dear Child by Romy Hausmann

Goal #3: Read more Fantasy

Fantasy is one of those genres that I feel like people are either really into or they're pretty meh about.  I think because fantasy stories are, on average, the longest of any genre (not to mention much more prone to being a series) they can be intimidating for readers to pick up.  Plus, if you're reading high fantasy then there's the whole world building and/or magic system to set up and explain.  I think my main issue with the fantasy genre is that so much of it is series-based.  And I fully understand the reasons why but I'm not the target reader for a series.  I have some weird line in the sand in my brain that says if I spend a few hours and end up loving the first book in a series only for subsequent books to be let downs, I somehow feel like the time spent reading that first book is also a waste now.  I know there are lots of people out there who will recommend certain fantasy series non-stop but unless all the books in the series are a 4 or 5 star for me, I probably won't end up finishing the series.  I have read so many first books in fantasy series and really liked them, but then heard sort of bad things about the second book (or third, etc) and never returned to that series.  Or, simply, other books have more of my attention and I don't want to spend weeks or months just staying in one world when I could be reading so many different types of books.  Overall, I prefer standalone stories across all my reading genres and I would like to read more standalone fantasy books.  I do watch a few fantasy-heavy booktubers so I do know about a lot of the recent trends in fantasy in recent years and I sure have heard the merits of Brandon Sanderson touted more than once. I tried to look through some specific stand alone fantasy lists as well as short series that really piqued my interest and have gotten fantastic ratings so far in the hopes that I'd actually maybe finish the whole series.

Here are some books I picked out:

Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

The Gracekeepers by Kirsty Logan

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke

Goal #4:  Backlist physical TBR

My final goal is simply to try and focus on the books I already own.  I don't have too many, but most of them are unread.  I would like to try and pick up more books from my actual physical shelf rather than buy new ones every time I need a new book.  I also read a lot of ARCs, have a Kindle Unlimited subscription, and have an Audible subscription so I do get a chance to read a lot of new releases through these.  I already own all of the books I listed out for my short story goal as well as one from my fantasy goal so that's a good start. 

Finally, a word about the blog going forward:

I'm trying a new system for the first half-ish of 2020 to see how I like it.  The plan for blog posts is as follows:

New full blog posts every Friday

Romance Wrap-up on the 1st and 16th of the month

ARC reviews I will try to get out about a month before the book's release date in order to give people enough time to read the review and pre-order the book if they'd like to. 

2020 Summary and Stats

 2020 has come to an (almost) end and here's just a bunch of fun stats and info from this year of reading.

I will say that I started this year barely reading anything.  Being an English major from 2009-2013 killed just about any love for reading I had and I didn't read much since graduating (seriously, probably less than 15 books over the past 7 years). I kept wanting to get back into reading but my brain just wasn't having it for whatever reason. Then, as part of my 2020 resolutions, I wanted to start reading more books and I set my GoodReads goal at 20 books and got an Audible subscription.  I take my dog to daycare twice a week and it is about an hour drive round trip.  So I had 4 hours a week where I was in a car with nothing better to do than listen to audio books (I think I finished 3 over the first two months of the year?).  Then the pandemic hit and I didn't leave my house for 2 months and my audiobook listening dropped off.  Then, while I was finishing up my MBA degree during the first half of this year, I just decided to give romance books a try.  I had been watching some romance booktubers and I figured these sounded like fun, fluffy books that I could just enjoy and hopefully wouldn't trigger my English major aversion to reading.  Romance books were the ticket and the rest is history (that you can read on previous reviews). 

Total # of Books Read: 140

Romance Books: 115

Total # of Pages Read:  42,768

DNFs: 9 

 Longest/Shortest Books:

Average Rating: 

New Favorite Authors: Polly Hall, Melanie Harlow, Max Monroe, Lucy Score, Nicole Snow

Favorite book: The Taxidermist's Lover by Polly Hall

I read this book as an ARC and loved it so much I bought a hardcover copy when it was released.  There is a review on the blog already but I'd just say here that if you find the synopsis interesting go ahead and give it a go.

 

I also loved Riley Thorn and the Dead Guy Next Door by Lucy Score and I think that one has a much broader appeal.  It is a very light murder mystery comedy with a bit of romance and psychics mixed in so if that sounds more up your alley than The Taxidermist's Lover, I would highly recommend it as well.

 

5-Star Reads: 34

     

     

     

 

Least favorite book: I don't have one that sticks out to me.  I did make an effort to value my time reading and only pick up books that a) I really think I'm going to like and b) not feel bad about DNF'ing books that weren't working for me.  I usually DNF around the 30% mark and I do make a note in my GoodReads review about why I put the book down.  Here's a link to my DNF shelf on GoodReads if you really want to look through them.  I don't have any 1-star ratings this year and most of my 2-star books had some aspect I did like but usually didn't follow through overall in their execution.