Like an off-the-beaten-path mountain road, this book is twisty! Just when you think you have it pegged, you realize you've been thrown for a loop. This book is about a philandering, despicable husband and the hold he has over his wife. Or does he? The authors do a great job with keeping the reader on their toes. Do not miss out on this one, folks!

There’s an excellent chance you’ll rate this book higher than I did.

I was only two chapters into this book when I wondered, “Is this like (a favorite read from 2015)?” I’m not sure why I thought this - different genres, very different plots - but having wondered, I kept looking for hints.

So at some point in this book, I might have thought “OHHHH,” and instead I thought, “Yep, there it is.” I believe some of the following chapters felt tell-y to me, because they expanded on ideas I’d been weighing up for many pages already.

I thought one of the other central ideas was an effective one to explore, and overall I enjoyed the book. A couple of ending revelations make things tidier than they need to be, but that’s a quibble.

If you like this genre, I’d say give it a shot. There’s no way this book could compete with the ghost of one of my favorite reads of the decade, but it survived the experience. Unless you happen to ask yourself the same unlikely question, you’ll probably enjoy the reading.

(Goodreads review closes with a spoiler for the genre of my 2015 read, and a second spoiler for the author/title.)

According to its description, the reader will make a number of assumptions when reading this book--that it is about a jealous wife and how she is obsessed with her husband's choice of her replacement, that it is about a woman who is starting a new marriage with the new man in her life, and that this first wife was a terrible wife who the husband is fortunate to have out of his life. Then the warning comes: Assume nothing.

Vanessa Thompson is the wife, divorced from wealthy Richard, and is barely managing to survive. She lives in a haze of alcohol and is only jarred out of it when she learns Richard is planning to remarry. She wants to protect the future wife from what she went through when she was married to Richard.

This book is excellent, full of twists and surprises. It is one of those rare books where at the end I felt compelled to go back to reread passages just to be sure I squeezed every last drop from them. The storyline is so riveting that the book is definitely difficult, if not impossible, to put down. The conclusion was shocking and unexpected, just the kind of book that leaves the reader wanting more. And I do--I hope the next book by these authors is just as good as this one. I'll be waiting for it!

Much like the narrator states, there were several times in this book where I made an assumption that turned out totally wrong. I was intrigued from the very beginning and found myself up until 3:30am because I just had to know how it ended. Definitely a read I plan on recommending.

I voluntarily read the advanced sneak peak of this book and I loved it. I need more ASAP, I can not wait for this book to come out!

The very title attracted me to this book. I knew, on reading the blurb, that it would be a rewarding thriller, and the Prologue made good on the promise. It showed an ex-wife stalking the beautiful woman who has replaced her in her former husband’s affections.

As we read the book, we become aware that Nellie is engaged to be married to Richard Thompson, hedge fund manager, and incredibly rich, and that Vanessa, Richard’s ex-wife, is determined not to let the marriage be solemnised.

Now divorced, Vanessa works as a sales attendant at Saks, lives with her mother’s sister, Aunt Charlotte, and has a drinking problem.

Nellie is a pre-school teacher, who also waitresses at a downscale café. She is the only daughter of her divorced parents.



The story comes to us in the first person present tense point of view of Vanessa, the ex-wife, and the 3rd person past tense point of view of Nellie, the girl friend.

The dual perspectives in different tenses help us to engage with the two characters in different ways. With Vanessa’s present tense, we know that she will be the one to upset Nellie’s world; with Nellie’s past tense, we learn that she is the one to whom things will happen.

And while we wait for Vanessa to upturn Nellie’s world, we find that our own has been upturned.



The jealous ex-wife, the naïve fiancée and the virtuous, loving husband are at the heart of this triangle, that’s how we see it, until our assumptions, every single one of them, get torn to shreds.


For nothing is as it appears in this book. And so while the stereotypical old name, Nellie, might conjure images of a naïve waif, Nellie has her own baggage, something that causes her to have nightmares and to sleep with deadbolts on her door.

Vanessa sounds very sophisticated, and yet she was scorned by her husband. But she is no victim. She can barely hold it together. She has a drinking problem and it is overwhelming her. She is in danger of losing her salesgirl job at Saks.


At first, we don’t know what went wrong between Vanessa and Richard; just that there was some deceit on the part of Vanessa that caused the rift. Vanessa’s failure to get pregnant for the 6th time causes Richard to drift apart.

He blames her drinking habit and then he learns that she had been pregnant back in college, a fact that she failed to mention to him.



I liked the seamless manner in which the flashbacks were introduced into the current narrative. At first, we just get bits of memories from Nellie and Vanessa.

We hardly ever get to see things from Richard’s perspective, except as he appears to Vanessa and Nellie.

He does truly appear to be too good to be true. We wonder what Vanessa did to lose a catch like him. What is the extent of the betrayal that Richard faces again and again from the women he loves? After all, Vanessa too had only been Richard’s second wife. Before her, there was another who deceived him.

When Nellie recalls Richard’s words, She wasn’t who I thought she was and then, later when he tells her, Even when I’m not there, I’m always there with you, they take on ominous overtones.



It is in Chapter 10 that Vanessa makes the first suggestion relating to the woman who will replace her, Who will miss her when she disappears?


I didn’t dislike Vanessa, and that was my first cue that I wasn’t expected to, that my expectations were about to be blown away. She has had a hard life, with a father who passed away early and a mother who wasn’t there for her. She has made wrong choices, but she is not bad.

There were so many similarities between Vanessa and Nellie that I wondered if that was Richard’s type: new to the big city, naïve and innocent, and a little bruised by her past.



The authors play around cleverly with the memories, giving us a little at a time, so we can piece them together. Initially, we get Vanessa’s flashbacks, but not Nellie’s.

At first, the memories point towards one truth, and then gradually they acquire a different hue. As Vanessa recalls what really happened, not what she wants to imagine happened, she says, We all layer them over our remembrances; the filters through which we want to see our lives.

But maybe that is true of every marriage. Maybe being in love carries the requirement of filtered vision; perhaps it is so for everyone.


I liked Vanessa more than Nellie. Richard and Maureen, Richard’s sister, I didn’t like at all. They were too perfect for my liking. I thought that Maureen was hiding something.

It was at Chapter 18 that my assumptions about the plot and where it was headed were completely overturned.

Every character got flipped over, the twists kept piling up and the scenario appeared anew. The best way to sum it up would be to say that nobody is what we think they are.

As Vanessa says, The full story is far too tangled and complex to unravel.


I’d definitely recommend this one.

This book was WOW! Just when I started to think that I had figured something out, a twist occurred and I had to rethink where the storyline was going.

The characters were so intriguing - well developed with hints of mystery so that you didn't quite know everything about them. Just when you thought you had someone finally figured out, BAM!, no you didn't.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and would like to thank the author/publisher/Netgalley for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.

So many twists and turns....kept me going until the very end!

I'm sorry but I didn't like it. I found myself reaching for other books, which for a "suspense" is never a good sign. Overall, I was just bored. The writing felt long and repetitious, with endless descriptions of things that didn't need such a long description and after some time felt like a checklist (example: when Nellie sees the new house for the first time).
There were no time breaks, helping to distinguish a jump in time, which made reading confusing. A lot of the time I had to stop, go back, reread because I thought I had skipped something.
By the end, the straw that broke the poor camels back was that I didn't care for the characters. The "heroine" was whiney and pathetic, the husband was a schmuck and overall the story was so far-fetched and convoluted that I just wanted it to end.

If you love a good twisty plot then this is the book for you! The Wife Between Us is hands down bringing on the OMG moments.

Greer and Sarah have truly delivered a novel that will keep you guessing cover to cover. Every time you think you've got it all figured out - they throw you for a huge twist. Every. Time.

With some of the most gritty and real characters I've had the pleasure of getting to know in a long time - The Wife Between Us is one of those novels that feels completely real - you just hope it doesn't happen to you!

Bottom line: Fab characters, Fab story line, Fab writing style!

This suspense/thriller was a fast read with some twists and turns that kept the book interesting. The story alternates from the first person point of view of Vanessa, the ex-wife, and third person through Nellie. Vanessa appears broken, jaded, and a bit desperate to stop the impending marriage between her ex-husband and his new wife. Nellie, on the other hand, is young, full of vitality and seems to have finally found her Prince Charming.

Don't read any spoilers and don't read other reviews about this book. Go into it blind and you will enjoy it more.

I really enjoyed the creative plot and the way the story was told through different points of view. Some of the plot was a bit of a stretch for the imagination, but not enough to dismiss the story altogether as ridiculous.

This book will be published January 9, 2018. I received an electronic ARC thanks from Net Galley for my honest review.

Nellie used to be married to successful hedge fund manager Richard. After seven years, Richard begins an affair with a coworker. Nellie seems devastated, and oddly obsessed with 'the other woman'. And so begins the wild ride of The Wife Between Us!

I really enjoyed this book. It’s cleverly written, but I do think the publisher’s blurb detracts from the book, it’s best to go in knowing nothing about the story. The book grabs you right away and I found myself unable to stop reading long after I should have gone to bed. It’s full of twists and turns and they do not feel forced, looking back everything works, like I said very cleverly written.

The authors nail the ending; it”s both satisfying and fitting after the twisty ride of a plot and totally believable characters. You won’t want to miss this one.

The title of this book would lead you to believe that you'll be reading about a woman who is obsessed with her ex husband and the new woman who has become her replacement. You would only be partially right. As the synopsis says, ' assume nothing'! You'll think you have things figured out and then there will be a twist that changes everything you thought you knew. This is a very well crafted story which will keep you engaged until the very last page.

You might think this is about a young woman who is engaged to the “perfect” man. You might think it is about a vengeful ex-wife. You might think it’s about a wonderful, caring man that is recovering from a miserable marriage. This book is actually about that and more. This book will keep you guessing until the very end. It’s engaging and twisted. The characters are very well developed. It will definitely keep you up all night trying to figure out what you think you know opposed to what’s really going on. I highly recommend this book!!!

Wow! I love how this kept me guessing throughout the whole book! A woman trying to tear apart her ex and his fiancé. Is she obsessed and in denial??? Or is she filled with true warnings for the new bride? Just enough details were given along the way to keep this a fast- paced novel! Even the epilogue had me saying, "I didn't see that one coming!" Enjoyed it very much and would recommend to anyone who enjoys a fast - paced, twisty suspense novel!!

Wow! I have long been a fan of Sarah Pekkanen but this collaboration with Greer Hendricks is really exceptional. Major plot twists, turns, & surprises make the book impossible to put down. Machinations, manipulations, & a seemingly unstable & unreliable but sympathetic narrator heighten the suspense. I never saw two major plot twists coming, both of which left me reeling & wondering how I missed them. I hope these 2 authors team up again & the result is as spectacular as The Wife Between Us!

Wow. What a crazy, sad, thrill ride of a book! From the book description, it sounded like the typical jilted ex-wife jealous of the new and younger girlfriend. But once you start reading, it becomes an entirely different concept and much separate from the typical ex-wife of a cheating husband storyline.

At first I was led to believe that the story was from two separate perspectives - the ex-wife and the new fiancee. But as the story progresses it becomes something entirely different. I was a bit confused at first because it seemed like I was reading two different viewpoints and the author was incredibly ingenious to lead the reader to think that way. As the story of the main heroine, Vanessa or Nellie, unfolds, there are incidents where you wonder if it was all in her head or if there was something wrong with her. Once again, the author cleverly wrote it to lead the reader to think that way. But then, as the layers begin to peel away, those incidents in the book becomes clearer and you realize that the main character wasn't crazy or messed up after all.

In the Wife Between Us, love was so twisted and so abused. I don't think one single person in the story even knew what true love was, except for the relationship between Nellie and her aunt - their love was real and honest and I think that was what kept Nellie sane throughout all the craziness of her life as a wife and then trying to piece together all the missing parts of her marriage.

I won't give any spoilers in my review, but I thought the book was very well-written. At some points there were bits of confusion, but then as the book delves further into the story, the mangled parts became clearer and then I was at the "ah-ha!" moment when everything was explained at the end.

Although the ending was satisfactory, there was still the character of the husband's sister - what was her motive? Was she just as unbalanced as her brother was?

There are many elements of abuse in this book - emotional and physical. I could really feel Nellie's painful descriptions and the pitfalls of her wondering if she was going crazy. The author pinpointed how abuse can usually be. Sometimes one doesn't truly see it until a turning point in their lives and then they feel the fear of someone else being abused just the same. There wasn't anything too graphic to read about the physical abuse but for those who have suffered through some type of abuse in their past, certain parts could be quite painful.

I would definitely recommend this book to someone who loves a good detailed and twisted thriller. Prepare to keep reading until you stop to the very end because the writing is so engaging and deceptive that you'll want to know just what is going on.

4.5 stars

It is nearly impossible to write a review for this book without giving away some sort of spoiler, so my best advice is to jump into it blind. The twists are so jaw dropping, you will find yourself re-reading what you just read to make sure you read it right! I anticipate this book to be one of the most talked about of 2018!

This was a compelling read, with a ton of well-executed novelistic trickery. After finishing, I had to mull over the story for a good long while before I could set down my thoughts. Time and again, my assumptions were shattered as events played out. The suspense built, and built, and built, with quite a satisfying resolution. But I don't want to mislead other readers -- it's not all literary sleight-of-hand and clever plotting: The characters are so vivid and well-drawn that I will be thinking for a long time about Richard and Nellie and Vanessa and Emma and Kate and their roles in each other's lives. I've told many friends to watch for this book when it is published next year -- and I'm sure they'll hear the buzz from many sources. (I received an advance reader's copy from NetGalley).

Wow!!! What a crazy ride!! Nellie and Richard are getting married and it seems perfect, except for the calls where no one speaks and his crazy ex-wife. Vanessa feels like she is going crazy, her ex is remarrying the perfect woman and she can't stand it.. But things are not what they seem and with each turn of the page there is a new revelation that will have you wondering how you missed the clues.