I have started and stopped this book a number of times and finally forced myself to finish it. This is undoubtedly one of the most ridiculous books I have ever read with one of the most annoying characters ever. The decisions she makes are unbelievable and over and over she wonders how she has gotten into these situations. It sounded like a good story but it wasn’t for me

Nicole and her husband Brad have arranged a house swap for the summer while Brad is working in London. Brad did not want Nicole to go with him on this trip, but she convinces him to allow her to accompany him to London. She has a list of all the things she wants to do when she arrives in London and Brad is at work. That doesn't happen. First, the London couple never arrive at Nicole and Brad's house in LA, someone breaks into the home where they are staying, and Nicole is threatened by two thugs in a local museum. The trouble does not stop there. The police aren't very helpful and neither is Brad who seems distracted by work so Nicole is left to work out what is happening herself.

This is the classic house swap gone bad. It is also an engaging mystery with plenty of twists and turns, some classic bad guys and a handsome undercover cop. Also plenty of action with kidnappings and explosions as Nicole inadvertently gets mixed up with some very nasty criminals. Unfortunately, this book has a few niggles for me. There is too much happening involving a person who does not know the country at all. She is very naive and tends to believe what she is told by people she doesn't even know. She takes huge chances and travels all over the United Kingdom, being chased and followed. At now time does she go to the U.S. embassy, which pretty much anyone would do when the police do not give you much help. I am looking forward to the next book in this series to see if these things change and become a bit more believable as I really did like this gutsy amateur investigator.

This book is the kind of mystery I love, a real page turner with a lot of plot twists, continuous action and a narration that reflects a droll sense of humor. I thought the characters were both likeable and believable. I was pulling for Nicole to escape through this harrowing (yet somehow amusing) tale of an innocent abroad who accidentally picks up (or loses) the wrong suitcase, and attracts the attention of some very dangerous people.

It was going to be a simple swap of houses. Her condo in LA for a house in London. It was also an attempt to rekindle her marriage and she felt that by paying more attention to her husband and being with him full time, things may improve.

It proved to be an adventure of a different kind. There were many strands in the story. People began following Nicole. Her husband did not find it strange even when a bomb exploded in the vehicle she was going to drive, just a few seconds before she got in. It killed a neighbour who was very kindly trying to show her how to start the car. Even then Brad felt that she was imagining things. This was when Nicole began to think that Brad's preoccupation may mean bigger things than just a flirtation with an office assistant.

Throw in thuggery, drug smuggling, money laundering, sleuths and the local police on a trail of everyone and you have a complicated plot which did not seem that it was going to have a happy ending for lots of people.

The book is fast paced but it is not quite a mystery or a thriller. Interesting reading though.

Goodreads and Amazon review up on 11/5/2017. Review on my blog mid August 2017.

Full review also at http://www.reviewingtheevidence.com/review.html?id=10835

Sure, we've all had our bad vacation experiences—lost luggage, bad food, hotel rooms that weren't up to snuff.

But Nicole Graves has us all beat when she goes on an extended trip to England with husband Brad—he's there for business and she's there to save their shaky marriage. She does lose her luggage, but that's only the beginning.

The Graves have house-swapped: their Los Angeles condo for the London home of Frederick and Muriel Lowry. Before even arriving, they find out that the Lowrys' tenant will also be in the house. The tenant, Alice McConnehy, turns out to be helpful, although she mysteriously goes missing for days at a time. There are strange men stalking the home and looking for the Lowrys. Nicole's husband doesn't seem too concerned—he's working late, with his secretary, and Nicole soon comes to suspect they are having an affair.

That's just for starters. The vacation from hell deteriorates even more. Nicole is attacked by two thugs who threaten her if her husband doesn't "pay up." Do they mistakenly believe she is Muriel Lowry? And where are the Lowrys? Nicole can't seem to get in touch with them. As Nicole begins to sleuth, she gets herself into greater and greater danger.

THE SWAP is a combination of fast-paced thriller and amateur sleuth mystery. It may be a little over the top at times, and you might wonder why Nicole doesn't just go home. But she's a relatable heroine who doesn't run away from her problems, and by the end you are glad she has stayed on. The author is at work on a second novel in the series, and we look forward to Nicole's adventures—wherever they may be.

When Nicole and Brad Graves from Los Angeles swap houses for the summer with Fred and Muriel in London, Nicole thinks it may be a chance for she and Brad to work on putting their marriage back together.

Little does Nicole know what adventure awaits her – and it’s not a romantic summer with her husband exploring the historyand museums of the UK, shopping and dining out. From soon after they arrive at their swapped house, Nicole is dodging potential abductors and murderers. From a car bomb to kidnapping to attempted murder and more, Nicole is swept up in a maelstrom of events she doesn’t understand and over which she has no control.

It’s takes a few chapters to set the stage, but once the action starts, you won’t be disappointed. The exploits of Nicole Graves are just beginning, and I look forward to the next mystery she sets out to solve.

Four stars.

This book is a real page turner. about a house swap between an L.A. couple and a couple from London. The Americans take possession of the house in London, but the Londoners are never heard from again. Soon it's apparent that the London couple have fled, leaving something very bad behind.

The Swap was featured as one of the year's most anticipated mysteries by iBooks.

Nicole and Brad are from LA, and have swapped houses for three months with Muriel and Freddy Lowry of Chiswick, London. Nicole hopes the trip will help revitalise her marriage,

The thing which impressed me the most about The Swap was the research. I’ve lived in London, and the details were spot on, from the description of Victoria Station to Nicole’s fascination at her first visit to Sainsbury’s (one of the major UK supermarket chains).

Most books I read that are from American authors but set in England (or anywhere outside the US) are riddled with vocabulary and setting errors, so it was refreshing to find one that not only had no noticeable errors, but perfectly captured the London I remember. The only thing which caught me was when Nicole commented about how a character pronounced ‘vase’ as ‘vaaze’. Well, that’s how I pronounce it, so I was left wondering how Nicole pronounces it.

But that’s not to say the story wasn’t good. It was. Yes, I still have fingernails but only because I set the book aside a couple of times to recover. The plot and suspense were both excellent, with plenty of unpredictable twists. If The Swap has a failing, it would be that the characters weren’t quite as good. I didn’t get the impression Nicole grew or changed as a character, but that is often the nature of thrillers.

Thanks to Light Messages Publishing and NetGalley for providing a free ebook for review.

It all sounded good in theory: when Nicole’s husband Brad is offered a short working stint in England with an IT company over summer, Nicole thinks that it would be the perfect opportunity to break routine and rekindle their marriage. The plan is to swap homes with Frederick and Muriel Lowry, a couple Brad has had contact with through his work. However, soon after their arrival in London, Nicole is having serious doubts as to whether this was a good idea. Brad is more distant and distracted than usual, and she is experiencing some strange incidents in the Lowry’s home, which scare her. When she is threatened by thugs looking for the Lowrys, who supposedly owe money to someone who will not stop at anything to get even, she discovers that the couple have never actually arrived in the US as arranged. Worst of all, Brad is refusing to take her seriously, putting her fears down to jetlag and paranoia. Soon things escalate and Nicole is finding herself on the run – from the thugs, the police and her husband.

The premise of the story – a house-swap gone terribly wrong – was intriguing and I found myself quickly drawn into the book as our unsuspecting couple arrives in London only to find that the house is not what they were expecting. However, the rest of the book was a bit of a mixed bag for me. It was interesting to find out that the author, Nancy Boyarsky, has a background as editor and writer of textbooks and political articles, because it is obvious that she can write well. However, I think that this explains some of the problems I had with the story – at times it read a bit too factual and dry, with stilted dialogue, telling instead of showing and inconsistencies with character development. This may just be due to The Swap being a debut novel in quite a different genre than the author is used to.

Personally, I also felt that Boyarski was trying to pack too many twists and turns into the story (Nicole is like a little spinning top – she never stays in one place for longer than 5 minutes), which at times made it choppy and frustrating to follow. Then, running out of time, there were whole “summary” paragraphs condensing numerous events into a few explanatory sentences, rather than letting them play out. Despite plenty of action and a fairly tense cat-and-mouse game, I felt a bit put off by some clichés used in character development, and found it difficult to connect with Nicole, who I felt lacked emotional depth (as did her relationships). Seeing that this is the first of a series, I am hoping that Nicole’s character will evolve over time and develop a bit more personality. As long as Nicole can pull off the plucky female investigator role, I think the series has a lot of potential. As for now, I remain sitting on the fence ...

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with a free electronic copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

I really enjoyed this book set in England. I don't believe that I would want to ever swap my house for someone else's house especially in a foreign country. This book had many twists and turns and I could not guess who the bad guys were. I received an ebook copy from the author for a fair and honest opinion that I gave freely.

3.5 stars

Nicole Graves abandons her job to spend the summer in London with her husband Brad. Brad was going to be working in London all summer, and it made sense to see if she could spend more time with him and patch up their failing marriage.

Brad has arranged a house swap, so Nichole and Brad will look after a house in London while the Lowrys move into Nicole’s house in LA. It seems like the perfect arrangement, even though Brad disappears early in the morning and comes home late from the office. It isn’t exactly what Nicole was hoping for.

Nicole was still finding her feet in a new city when people start arriving on her new London doorstop, looking for the Lowrys and threatening Nicole with violence. The Lowrys never arrived in LA, so are they in trouble too? Nicole starts to realise just how nasty these thugs are when the next door neighbour is murdered, but will the police believe her suspicions?

Nicole is an interesting character. However, I did find her hard to get a grip on, as she seemed to vacillate between being a bold adventurer and someone who was naïve and a bit wet. I got the suspicion that the author wanted me to see some sort of change in the main character, but there wasn’t any clear progression, or a change after any particular incident. Her behaviour seemed to depend just a little too much on her mood, and this made it hard to relate to her. I found her a little frustrating to be honest.

Brad had a surprisingly small part to play and was not very well drawn. Possibly this was an advantage, as I suspect that other bit players were more interesting. Even the character of the drug lord was better drawn and was more sympathetically constructed by the author than the husband.

The plot was the best part of this book for me. It was cleverly constructed, and ticked along at a quiet pace. The pace did build towards the denouement, which was appropriately messy but well handled by the author.

There was a good sense of place in which to tell the story, and London and its surrounds feature enough to keep Nicole out of sorts and vulnerable to mistakes made by being in an unknown city. The flavour of the city was well drawn and added to the sense of adventure away from home.

There was a lot to like in this book, but ultimately I found it not as satisfying as I was hoping from the start of the book. It is a gently paced thriller with the solid grounding of a relationship drama. This will be a good holiday read for those who like a gently paced adventure abroad.

Advanced reading copy provided by NetGalley for an honest review.

Nicole blamed herself for not realizing something was wrong. Brad’s silence and the gloom that seemed to surround him since they left LA. After a day or two Nicole started to feel she might be in danger but no one wanted to believe her. When the car blew up with the man inside it Nicole knew that was no random act of terrorism. But she couldn’t convince Brad it had anything to do with them. Yet Nicole knew they were in serious trouble. Through the plane ride to London Nicole was trying to figure out how to fix her and Brad’s marriage and where it had gone wrong. There was a rift between Brad and Nicole and she was determined to fix it.Brad and Nicole had been married seven years and this was the fourth trip in the last year that Brad had went away on business. Nicole was very curious about other people. Nicole was an office manager for a law firm. Nicole had a gift of prying things out of people, figuring out connections and unearthing information no one else could seem to fins. Nicole was having a lot of doubts about this trip. They were having a house swap with the Lowry’s in England. But Nicole was not happy to find out they had a tenant at the Lowry’s house The tenant was a qualified nurse specializing in home care and was only at the house in between cases. Brad was an accomplished techy but also a futuristic visionary and he had enough charisma people believed in him and followed him. Brad prided himself on being able to do two- three things at a time. Brad had already set up a desk in the bedroom and was on the phone with his assistant Brenda that he said had to also come to England to help him. Strange things started happening to Nicole and they weren’t good things. Then the Lowry’s never made in their condo in the states. Then Inspector Richard Reinhardt comes looking for Mr. Lowry. Also the tenant Alice McConnerhy seems to have vanished. Then Nicole finds out there is a problem with their car back in LA and talks to the police in LA and then Scotland Yard.
I couldn’t seem to connect with this story. But there is a lot of action and things happening to Nicole: car exploding, boat exploding, thugs chasing her, house being broken into and Nicole is locked in the bathroom, her missing suitcase, people trying to kidnap Nicole undercover cop,and Nicole being attacked at the museum. There was a lot of twists and turns . But still didn’t WOW me for some reason and why didn’t anyone believe Nicole? Anyway for the twists and turns alone I gave this a three.

Brad and Nicole have organised a house swap in London and things start to unravel as soon as one of the suitcases go missing at the airport.

Nicole is convinced that the house was broken into whilst she was inside, that she's being watched and threatened. No one seems to be taking her seriously and with her fears over her marriage she's going through a very fraught time.

The house came with it's own tenant who shows Nicole around parts of London.

Just what has Nicole found herself in the middle of? Who can she trust, is she telling the truth. You begin to wonder what will happen next and whether Nicole is going to get to the bottom of things.

It took me a little while to settle into the book but once the story started picking up I was eager to read more. I stayed up late to finish this one. (less)

This was a great psychological thriller and I was so happy to see it's book 1 in the Nicole Graves mystery series. Nicole arranges to swap houses, Los Angeles to London for a summer change. From the moment she steps foot in London she feels something is wrong. She learns the Lowry's never showed up to get the keys to the LA house and she is soon being followed and threatened but no one will believe her. When she is kidnapped she wonders if anyone will even know she's missing. Knowing she has only herself to count on she takes on the drug smuggling, money laundering criminals. Can't wait to see what is going to happen in the next book, hopefully she and the hunky London police detective will get together. This is Nancy Boyarsky's first novel and I'm so glad she wrote it.

The Swap was a quick read because it was a hard to put down book! What started as a house swap summer vacation in London turned into an intriguing mystery. Danger was not what Nicole expected from her trip, but she found plenty.

It was well written with lots of suspense and a mystery I couldn't figure out. The author did a great job with lots of twists and turns to make me as paranoid as the main character! It was a fast paced story that had you questioning each character and what their motives were. Good guy...bad guy? Read this book and find out.

I highly recommend this exciting mystery and look forward to more from this author!

* I received an ARC from the publisher and NetGalley. I voluntarily reviewed this book.

Great book. Excellent storyline and wonderful main characters. I would highly recommend this book.

Nicole and her husband Brad have arranged a house swap for the summer while Brad is working in London. Except the London couple never arrive at Nicole and Brad's house in LA and not long after they arrive in London strange things start happening to Nicole. First, someone breaks into the house and then she is followed by a couple of thugs and threatened. The police aren't very helpful and neither is Brad who seems distracted by work so Nicole is left to work out what is happening herself.

This was an engaging mystery with plenty of twists and turns, some classic bad guys and a handsome undercover cop. Also plenty of action with kidnappings and explosions as Nicole inadvertently gets mixed up with some very nasty criminals.

I requested this book because I like mysteries but It was a struggle for me to finish this book. It is not even the writing style, but I never warmed to the heroine and the mystery was so cliche that it was no mystery at all.

So in the end it was just ok for me.

I received this free from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Nicole and her husband have arranged a house swap with a couple in London. Nicole hopes that time away from LA and time together in London will help their rocky marriage. Once they get to the house in London things go awry. The couple that they swapped with never arrive at Nicole and her husband's condo in LA, and she cannot even reach them by phone. She begins to notice people following her which progresses to threats made against her. Nicole thinks that her husband will believe her when she tells him of these threats but he does not and neither do the police. Nicole is in a lot of trouble, and she will have to face it alone.

I truly struggled through this story. I kept pushing myself not to discontinue reading.

First, I really dislike Nicole. She is the main character, and it is hard for me to read a story about someone I don't like and hope that they will be ok. I would catch myself saying quite often, "She is so stupid!" I was so frustrated with the foolish decisions that Nicole made through the whole story.

And as if Nicole's decisions weren't enough, I had to come face to face with every cliche that could be written in a thriller/mystery. It's no fun to know what's going on the whole time you are reading a story that you are supposed to be guessing at. I need some mystery, please!

And to top off the whole thing, the romance in the story was distasteful and unrealistic. I won't go in to too much detail because I don't want to spoil anything.

Overall, this was just a very disappointing read that I had been excited about. It all fell flat.

I rated this 2/5 stars.

The Swap: A Mystery by Nancy Boyarsky is a fun mystery book. It is not quite a cozy mystery but it is also not a suspense or mystery thriller. Nicole and Brad Lewis are flying to London for the summer. Brad’s office has sent him across the pond to handle an acquisition. Nicole insisted on going with Brad because she felt that they need the time together, not apart, to work on their marriage. They arranged to swap houses with a couple named Lowry. The Lowry’s would live in the Lewis’ condo in LA while the Lewis lived in the Lowry’s home in Cheswick. Nicole starts having trouble from the moment they land at Heathrow. First she is missing a suitcase, then someone breaks into the house and locks Nicole in the bathroom, and then she is attacked at the museum. This is just the beginning of Nicole’s adventure in the United Kingdom. Nicole is determined to find out what happened to the Lowry’s and why someone keeps trying to kidnap her. Read The Swap: A Mystery to find out what happens to Nicole and the solution to the mystery!