So, This Week.. I Read 5 Great/Terrifying Thrillers!

Why Hello!

I hope you are all having a lovely Spring season so far 🙂 I haven’t done too many Book Review’s recently, but this week seemed like the perfect time. I’ve been in a bit of a reading slump recently, and all that changed this week. Recently I’ve been dealing with some pretty intense health issues, mainly related to a dental/jaw situation. I had no idea how much it would spiral out of control, and over the last two months, I’ve been hospitalized three times. Last Friday I finally had my long awaited surgery, and I’m feeling SO much better. So long story short, I’ve had about a week straight of not being able to leave the bed…. So of course I read FIVE books! I really had the Universe looking out for me, because every single one of them was amazing! I was BLOWN away by two of them specifically, and just can’t wait to go on and on about it for you guys.

1.) “One of Us is Lying”

By, Karen M McManus

8/10

“Things will get worse before they get better.”
― Karen M. McManus

I’ll be honest I’ve had this book on my “To Be Read” shelf for YEARS. I had almost kind of written it off, only because I felt I might have “aged out of it”. It’s a VERY High-School centric thriller (which i mean I LOVE, but I just have so many books to read it wasn’t top of my list). THEN I saw that brilliant trailer for the new TV Show “One of Us is Lying”.. and I immediately dug this out. I mean.. I spent 30$ on the book , and I might as well read it if I’m going to watch the show, right?!

Anyways… how many ways can you eat your own words?! I fucking loved this! The only reason I didn’t give it a 10/10 is because it was still very YA (which is it’s intended genre). But wow wow wow, was I EVER gripped. I read this cover-to-cover in three hours. I also weirdly DID NOT GUESS THE TWIST!!!! This alone is an accomplishment.

Pay close attention and you might solve this.
On Monday afternoon, five students at Bayview High walk into detention.
Bronwyn, the brain, is Yale-bound and never breaks a rule.
Addy, the beauty, is the picture-perfect homecoming princess.
Nate, the criminal, is already on probation for dealing.
Cooper, the athlete, is the all-star baseball pitcher.
And Simon, the outcast, is the creator of Bayview High’s notorious gossip app.

Only, Simon never makes it out of that classroom. Before the end of detention Simon’s dead. And according to investigators, his death wasn’t an accident. On Monday, he died. But on Tuesday, he’d planned to post juicy reveals about all four of his high-profile classmates, which makes all four of them suspects in his murder. Or are they the perfect patsies for a killer who’s still on the loose?

Everyone has secrets, right? What really matters is how far you would go to protect them.

2.) “Invisible Girl”

By, Lisa Jewell

8/10

“amazing how boring you can get away with being when you’re pretty. No one seems to notice. When you’re pretty everyone just assumes you must have a great life. People are so short-sighted, sometimes. People are so stupid. I have a dark past and I have dark thoughts. I do dark things and I scare myself sometimes. I wake in the middle of the night and I’ve twisted myself”
― Lisa Jewell

Oh my GOODNESS! I have had this book on my shelf for so so long. I always knew it looked good, but for one reason or another I always had something else on my radar. I randomly started reading it last week, and I was sucked in immediately.

This book has a few different POV’S (which I sometimes find annoying in books, but not this time) and they were all gripping. I loved the short chapters too. There is something about a short chapter that leaves you on a cliffhanger each time, that really propels the reader to keep going.. even until like four in the morning!

This was such a multi-layered twisted tale. At it’s core it’s about a missing girl, but it’s about SO much more. It’s about her therapist, her family, her therapist’s family.. their neighbors. etc. That sounds complex, but this book makes it so simple. I thought I had the “mystery” solved like 5 times, and the twists kept shocking me over and over. I really loved this!

The author of the “rich, dark, and intricately twisted” (Ruth Ware, New York Times bestselling author) The Family Upstairs returns with another taut and white-knuckled thriller following a group of people whose lives shockingly intersect when a young woman disappears.

Owen Pick’s life is falling apart.

In his thirties, a virgin, and living in his aunt’s spare bedroom, he has just been suspended from his job as a geography teacher after accusations of sexual misconduct, which he strongly denies. Searching for professional advice online, he is inadvertently sucked into the dark world of incel—involuntary celibate—forums, where he meets the charismatic, mysterious, and sinister Bryn.

Across the street from Owen lives the Fours family, headed by mom Cate, a physiotherapist, and dad Roan, a child psychologist. But the Fours family have a bad feeling about their neighbor Owen. He’s a bit creepy and their teenaged daughter swears he followed her home from the train station one night.

Meanwhile, young Saffyre Maddox spent three years as a patient of Roan Fours. Feeling abandoned when their therapy ends, she searches for other ways to maintain her connection with him, following him in the shadows and learning more than she wanted to know about Roan and his family. Then, on Valentine’s night, Saffyre Maddox disappears—and the last person to see her alive is Owen Pick.

3.) “The Perfect Child”

By, Lucinda Berry

10/10

THE MOST TERRIFYING BOOK!!!!!

“No matter how many times I was questioned by the police, it never got easier. My nerves jumped into high gear automatically. They always made me feel like I was lying, even when I was telling the truth.”
― Lucinda Berry

Oh. MY. GOD! This book scared me so badly, that a week later I literally am still HAUNTED by it. It is very reminiscent of books like “The Push” or “Sour Candy”, that I’ve read. I also LOVED these both. Maybe I just love books about child psychopaths?! This might be an “issue” for me haha.. but regardless.. this book is fucking HORRIFYING.

I don’t want to give any spoilers, but this book is basically about a family who are desperate to have a child of their own, after struggling with infertility. They end up adopting a young girl who has been abandoned, and it seems too good to be true… and then….. it gets TERRIFING! My skin is crawling thinking about it still. AHH!

A page-turning debut of suspense about a young couple desperate to have a child of their own—and the unsettling consequences of getting what they always wanted.

Christopher and Hannah are a happily married surgeon and nurse with picture-perfect lives. All that’s missing is a child. When Janie, an abandoned six-year-old, turns up at their hospital, Christopher forms an instant connection with her, and he convinces Hannah they should take her home as their own.

But Janie is no ordinary child, and her damaged psyche proves to be more than her new parents were expecting. Janie is fiercely devoted to Christopher, but she acts out in increasingly disturbing ways, directing all her rage at Hannah. Unable to bond with Janie, Hannah is drowning under the pressure, and Christopher refuses to see Janie’s true nature.

Hannah knows that Janie is manipulating Christopher and isolating him from her, despite Hannah’s attempts to bring them all together. But as Janie’s behavior threatens to tear Christopher and Hannah apart, the truth behind Janie’s past may be enough to push them all over the edge.

4.) “Good Rich People”

By, Eliza Jane Braizer

10/10

ABSOLUTELY GROUNDBREAKING. A TOUR DE FORCE!

“No one ever prepares you to deal with death. Death is a secret you keep until you die. It is the only thing that unites us all and yet we never, ever talk about it.”
― Eliza Jane Brazier

Okay before I even get into this book’s plot… we NEED to discuss this COVER. It’s an absolute work of ART! I will attach a few photos of it here….

I knew this was going to be fantastic, and it completely blew me away. It was such a dark satirical take on wealth, culture, LA.. and almost everything that is toxic in our society. The narrative voice’s of the POV’s is so fresh & lyrical and REAL… I literally found myself marking off 1/2 of every page with hi-light’s. The writing was STUNNING. Also the plot was dark, twisted, and fucking SICK. This is one of the best books I’ve ever gotten my little hands on.. and the COVER!!!!!!

Lyla has always believed that life is a game she is destined to win, but her husband, Graham, takes the game to dangerous levels. The wealthy couple invites self-made success stories to live in their guesthouse and then conspires to ruin their lives. After all, there is nothing worse than a bootstrapper.

Demi has always felt like the odds were stacked against her. At the end of her rope, she seizes a risky opportunity to take over another person’s life and unwittingly becomes the subject of the upstairs couple’s wicked entertainment. But Demi has been struggling all her life, and she’s not about to go down without a fight.

In a twist that neither woman sees coming, the game quickly devolves into chaos and rockets toward an explosive conclusion.

Because every good rich person knows: in money and in life, it’s winner take all. Even if you have to leave a few bodies behind.

5.) “Verity”

By, Collen Hoover

9/10

My Book-Tok Recommendation Book

“A writer should never have the audacity to write about themselves unless they’re willing to separate every layer of protection between the author’s soul and their book. The words should come directly from the center of the gut, tearing through flesh and bone as they break free. Ugly and honest and bloody and a little bit terrifying, but completely exposed.”
― Colleen Hoover

I love Tik-Tok, especially the book side of it all. I have seen all of Collen Hoover’s books recommended like 1,000 times. I’m not a big Romance Genre reader, but “Verity” is her first Thriller. I HAD to read it, and it did NOT disappoint.

This was such a twisted little tale. I loved the Literary aspect of it so much too. I don’t want to talk at ALL about the plot because I can’t even say anything without spoiling it. Let me just say… I read the whole thing in three frantic hours.. I suspected like every character in the book.. and was left disturbed and horrified by this book. It got VERY DARK, and I did not expect it. I just loved it all so much.

Lowen Ashleigh is a struggling writer on the brink of financial ruin when she accepts the job offer of a lifetime. Jeremy Crawford, husband of bestselling author Verity Crawford, has hired Lowen to complete the remaining books in a successful series his injured wife is unable to finish.

Lowen arrives at the Crawford home, ready to sort through years of Verity’s notes and outlines, hoping to find enough material to get her started. What Lowen doesn’t expect to uncover in the chaotic office is an unfinished autobiography Verity never intended for anyone to read. Page after page of bone-chilling admissions, including Verity’s recollection of what really happened the day her daughter died.

Lowen decides to keep the manuscript hidden from Jeremy, knowing its contents would devastate the already grieving father. But as Lowen’s feelings for Jeremy begin to intensify, she recognizes all the ways she could benefit if he were to read his wife’s words. After all, no matter how devoted Jeremy is to his injured wife, a truth this horrifying would make it impossible for him to continue to love her.