Oliver is horrible! He's so abusive that he has put a woman in a coma. That's right off the bat. However, soon your reading about how did he become so angry and so evil? Alice could die from this, why was she even with a man this abusive? So working backwards you get all the back story, but even after all that, it still was horrible. For me, this book unraveled itself and I didn't care for it.

My copy came from Net Galley. My review is my own, left of my own free will.

One of the better books I've read in quite a while. You're completely hooked from the first line...

"I expected more of a reaction the first time I hit her"

What an opening line! The rest of the book does not disappoint. There really are no lulls in this story. The first chapter is told in Oliver's voice and of course from the opening line we know what he has done.

So how many times have we wondered how someone could harm another person that they claimed to love? Have you ever heard something shocking about someone you know? Have you felt disbelief? Or are you completely unsurprised by their actions?

The rest of the book alternates between people that have known Oliver...either as child, teenager or an adult. All of their memories and encounters with Oliver paint a very complex portrait.

From the very start with Oliver's nonchalant and matter-of-fact justifications we are left feeling very cold towards him. His lack of compassion and empathy is downright startling. It allows the reader to instantly hate Oliver and you have no problems at all distancing yourself from him.

As the book progresses and you see Oliver in different stages of his life...well, you can't help but to be drawn in a bit closer to him....

Are people born bad? Or do events and experiences make them so?

At the end of this story you're not sure if you hate Oliver completely or if a small part of you feels sorry for him. At some point I knew I can't change my mind on my feelings....but I am stuck sat here and wondered if just one instance had been different....one turn different, what type of man would Oliver have turned out to be? Or is that really just more of Oliver's nonchalant and matter-of-fact justifications trying to sway you? Even though he at no point makes any excuses for his behaviour...after all....it is what it is....

This is a disturbing read. But in such a good way. It was original. And best of all....it leaves the reader with shadows of the book haunting them long after the last page ends. Nugent has left me wanting more. I hope she graces us with another book soon. I didn't really care for the ending...but that doesn't bother me as much as it does some readers....after all....life doesn't always turn out as you would like it either...

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After thinking about this book a couple of days I have one more thing to add....

I wonder if we're meant to hate Oliver from the start....If his voice led off the story to make us bias towards him. Nugent has done a brilliant thing here....I mean, though out the rest of the story I found myself looking for the bad in Oliver. I was looking for him to burn a kitten in the woods whilst he was in school. I was looking for some type...any type of cruelty....to justify how I pictured him in my mind. To show me a hint of the man he was as he told his tale.

It wasn't there....

I am reminded of studies I have heard about....how we label individuals. Even professionals. One example in a study had doctors pose as a mentally ill person. They were admitted to a hospital after they displayed mental health tendencies. After they were admitted, they dropped the act and were their normal selves. Even though they were sane and logical, the workers and the doctors refused to see them as anything other than mentally ill. They ignored the evidence that said this person is not mentally ill....and instead sought to justify the label of mental illness....

My random musings of all this is to just point out.....

Did I hate Oliver and think he is vile based on the label I placed on him from the start? Did I completely overlook the child that he was simply because of the man he became? If we had read the story in chronological order, would we feel different about the entire novel?

See!!!!!!!!!! That's what type of book this is! It doesn't leave you in peace...days later you will still be thinking about it and asking yourself questions.....

Just saying.....

Review copy provided by Netgalley for an honest review

A dark, twisted, somewhat evil book about a very nasty man. If you like that sort of thing, this is a pretty good book. It's not really my style, but it was well-written. I would have liked it more if I could have found some shard of sympathy for Oliver, but he was too utterly soulless and twisted for that.

Oliver is just an ass, no two ways about it. It’s hard to read a book with so unsympathetic a central character but I kept hoing he might see the error of his ways. No joy there though.

Well crafted, I enjoyed all the different points of view

I started to hear some buzz about this book around the beginning of September, but I was disappointed. The story is told in flashbacks by Oliver and those he has had contact with over his life. That was not the disappointing part – the structure worked super well. The characters themselves, however, were archetypes with little depth or complexity. Oliver has some kind of personality pathology, probably narcissism with a dash of antisocial thrown in, and that’s about all you need to know about him. His wife is the bad stereotype of a librarian (she’s actually an artist, but not that kind of artist – you know, the vegetarian kind with dyed hair. The dowdy kind who wears cardigans and is a poor driver.) The older French woman? A winemaker, wise in the ways of food and sex. An aunt is a spinster sister, unattractive and not good with children. And so on.

Read if: Construction satisfies you more than character.

It's midnight. I have to go to bed. But I'm not sure I can. I started this book casually this evening. It has not let me out if its grasp since. 61% through in mere hours. Completely messed up villain/opening incident.
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Fini!! Richly textured. Never read a protagonist who is also the villain like this. Highly recommend. Someone else read it quick so we can talk about the ending!

I loved this book! Like opening a gift, layer by layer. Creepy but so good!

I loved the Oliver's voice. This book reminded me of a very dark The Rosie Project.

This book has you following Oliver, he is dark, cruel and savage but presents like an altar boy. Good storyline, great suspense.

You know when someone completely unexpectedly commits a horrible crime and the new reporters spend days interviewing people on television? They interview neighbors, friends, old teachers. Everyone expressing shock, maybe some hinting that they might have seen this coming. Well, that is Unraveling Oliver by Liz Nugget.

The story opens with the line, “I expected more of a reaction the first time I hit her.” With that sentence you are off and running into the story of Oliver Ryan and his wife Alice. It turns out that he didn’t just hit Alice, he actually beat her severely enough to put her in a coma.

The book, then switches to various points of views, friends and acquaintances of Oliver and Alice. They tell their version of Oliver. Oliver also shares his point of view. It’s the perfect technique for this kind of story.

This is more of a character study of Oliver, than a thriller. However, if you love delving into evil characters, like I do, this is perfect! I couldn’t put it down.

I received an ARC of the book.

With thanks to the author, Liz Nugent, and the publisher, Threshold, for the Advanced Reader Copy.
Well written psychological thriller. Highly recommended for readers of the genre.

Unraveling Oliver is a quick and compelling read about the livfe of an author, who's fame comes from a series of fantasy titles for children. He is accused of assaulting his wife - quite out of the blue. Through narration by a neighbor (his wife's former beau), his mistress, former classmates, and friends, we learn of oliver's rise to fame and his courtship of his wife, of his unique childhood, his college years, and how he came to publish his first book. It's hard to describe much without adding spoilers. Suffice it to say that readers of Gone Girl, the Girl on the Train, and similar titles will probably enjoy Unraveling Oliver.

Wow!!! What a fabulous book. Very suspenseful. I couldn't stop reading. Highly recommend!!!

As the book began, with Barney doing the narrating, I could easily hear him and visualize him as he spoke in his Irish accent. Barney was the book's most good-hearted character - - - in direct opposition to Oliver. As horrible as Oliver treated people, though, I couldn't help but feel sorry for him at first because of his sad and undeserved mistreatment in his childhood.

We know at the beginning of the book what he has done and that he will be paying for his crime - there's no doubt about that. The rest of the book, however, lets us get a look at WHY he "snapped" and slowly unravels his other crimes.

There are a number of characters and the chapters switch back and forth among them. Unlike the current trend of so many authors to just switch to another character and leave the reader to figure it out, in this book, each chapter was titled with the character speaking. I appreciated that!!

There's a lot to think about in this book and though some of the revelations weren't surprising in the least, they were interesting and helped explain (though they did not redeem him) his actions.

A very interesting book that I enjoyed reading.

Gallery/Scout Press and NetGalley provided me with an electronic copy of Unraveling Oliver. I was under no obligation to review this book and my opinion is freely given.

Oliver Ryan shared both his personal life and his professional one with his wife Alice. As a successful writer with his illustrator wife by his side, Oliver gave no cause for others to doubt the legitimacy of their life together. One shocking evening, Oliver beats his wife into a coma, leaving their friends and acquaintances reeling.

The story unfolds through a multiple perspective format, with points of view penned by those who supposedly knew the couple best. Oliver tells his own tale, from his rough childhood to his cold and calculating adult ways. The format gave the book more of a feeling of a series of interviews, which did not communicate the story to the reader well. Had the plot been able to unfold more naturally, I would have found Unraveling Oliver to be more compelling.

Handsome, successful Oliver Ryan has it all. He has a strong marriage to the beautiful Alice, the illustrator of his very profitable children's books. They have a lovely house, good friends, financial and artistic accomplishments, and yet all is not how it seems. 

The book opens with Oliver's shocking statement about his wife: "I expected more of a reaction the first time I hit her." 

Why would such a man hit his wife? And why would he continue to beat her until she falls into a coma? What could possibly make someone act in such a heinous way? 

That is what Liz Nugent's debut novel Unraveling Oliver has us asking. Each chapter gives another point of view, the voice of someone who had known Alice or Oliver for many years and who could offer up one more piece of the puzzle. Barney, the man who dated Alice before Oliver tells of how he lost the love of his life to the wealthier, slick Oliver. Oliver's friend from college, Michael (he's also the brother of Oliver's then-girlfriend, Laura) tells of their summer in France helping to rebuild a vineyard. The owner of the vineyard, Veronique, tells her heart-breaking story of how her family lost the vineyard and built it again, only to face even more devastating loss because of that summer. Friends, neighbors, and family all chime in to tell their part of the story, and it's not until you get all these disparate stories that you can understand the truth of what it was that caused Oliver to unravel. 

With hints of Patricia Highsmith's The Talented Mr. Ripley and Ruth Ware's well, anything, Nugent crafts an intricate look at the layers of a sociopath and the lengths to which he will go to keep his secrets secret. Unraveling Oliver is the slow unwinding of a man, of a life, of all the intricate lies that make a monster appear human. Twisty, compelling, and dark, and one not to miss. 



Galleys for Unraveling Oliver were provided by Gallery/Scout Press through NetGalley.com, with many thanks.

How do you come to understand and even be cordial to the mindset of a gorgeous sociopath, and explain his extreme criminal acts in a way that leaves him a little less of the monster that he is? Nugent does this brilliantly. Unraveling Oliver is a unique look into the mind of Oliver and the people whose lives he touched. Through changing points of view we get a clearer picture of Oliver, what motivates him, and what brings about his ultimate demise.
Nugent' writing is concise and intoxicating, pulling the reader into this web of a mind, and the strands lead to places you couldn't imagine. A poignant and subtle psychological thriller that should be on your list.

One of the best books I have read for a while. This author is very clever in how she writes and draws you in and how you start to form opinions about the characters then realise there is far more than meets the eye.
Compelling reading, thought-provoking story and very dark, I highly recommend this book.

Thank you!

Famous children's author (Oliver) unravels and hurts wife (Alice), but why?

I was intrigued by this story from the very first sentence: "I expected more of a reaction the first time I hit her." - Oliver

Why did Oliver hit his wife? What led up to the opening scene? The story began with Oliver committing a heinous act and then backtracked and alternated between many different characters as they shared his/her own perception of Oliver. I thought this method of story telling was very unique and found myself racing through the pages to find out more about Oliver and the crime committed in the first chapter. Why did Oliver unravel and hurt his wife, Alice? As each character takes a turn telling their portion of the story, more and more secrets are revealed. This one kept me guessing until the very end.

The following characters took a turn at deciphering Oliver's behavior:
* Oliver - pen name of Vincent Dax
* Barney - Alice's first boyfriend
* Michael - Oliver's classmate, brother of Laura (whom Oliver dated before Alice)
* Veronique - owner of vineyard in France, daughter of Vincent, mother of Jean-Luc
* Stanley - Oliver's childhood friend
* Eugene - Alice's mentally handicapped brother (Down Syndrome maybe?)
* Moya - Oliver and Alice's neighbor, Oliver's married mistress
* Philip - Oliver's half brother

Thank you to the author, the publisher, and NetGalley for a free ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review!