"Trust Me" is a murder mystery that begins with the trial of a young mother accused of killing her toddler daughter. As I began reading, I was reminded of the Casey Anthony trial, but of course the details are very different.

The central character is a reporter. Mercer Hennessey wrote in-depth pieces for a magazine until she left the working world to be a wife and mother. When "Trust Me" starts, she is still reeling from a tragedy that destroyed that new life. Her old friend and former editor lures her back to work -- and the real world -- with the opportunity to write a true-crime courtroom drama. The crime hits close to home, and it gets even closer as the deadline looms when a new "opportunity" is dumped at her front door.

I love Hank Phillippi Ryan's novels, but I must mention that, not only is "Trust Me" unconnected to her previous series or characters, it's also very different in tone and pacing. The others were fast-paced and thrilling. This one is more of a slow burn, very claustrophobic, with some moments of tense suspense.

I was really challenged to follow the clues and try to beat Mercer to the truth. (My theory didn't come close.) It's a testament to Ryan's plotting that both the red herrings and the important evidence are all there and make perfect sense as the story comes together at the end.

I'm a little torn about Mercer Hennessey. She's in a dark, vulnerable place, making someone who should be more savvy, very naive. Her grief leads her to make some questionable choices. I understand the fog of losing a family member, so I mostly give her a pass. Still, I did want to reach through the pages and shake her a few times.

As I was reading this, I was reminded in a way of "Gone Girl." It's not at all similar in plot or approach; the similarity is this: sometimes, you just don't know what -- or who -- to believe.

If you like a good mystery that will keep you guessing, I can highly recommend "Trust Me."

I received an uncorrected digital galley of "Trust Me" from Hank Phillippi Ryan so that I could read and review it. My opinions are honest.

Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan-Tor Forge for this DRC.
Trust me is a dark psychological of two damaged women. A reporter grieving the death of family and a young mother accused of murdering her daughter. Which is one is telling the truth, which one is manipulating all the events? Read this fun book and find out.
#Trust Me #NetGalley

In Hank Phillippi Ryan’s first standalone novel, Trust Me, Boston journalist Mercer Hennessey is still grieving over the loss of her husband and child in a car accident the year before, when she is commissioned to write a true-crime book covering the trial of young mother Ashlyn Bryant, accused of the horrific murder of her two-year-old daughter.

The crime at hand holds emotional resonance for Mercer as she watches the live courtroom footage. It’s a shocking case and no one believes that the party girl Ashlyn is remotely innocent—not even Mercer, who has not even an iota of sympathy for the frivolous Ashlyn.

Ryan shows the trial through Mercer’s eyes and threads information about the case and the certainty of Ashlyn’s guilt through her protagonist’s thoughts. However, everything is turned on its head when the young mother is found not guilty and, by request from the book’s publisher, is sent to stay with Mercer for two weeks at her home so the journalist can finish writing her book.

The plot at this point becomes a little muddled, but readers will enjoy the untrustworthy Ashlyn as she manipulates her own story and convinces Mercer to buy into her ever-changing version of events. Mercer begins to question her own sanity including the memories she has of her husband as she becomes increasingly involved with the supposedly innocent Ashlyn.

Trust Me, at times, is uneven with moments and situations that verge on the absurd, but its exploration of a woman’s psyche, the suspense of outing a possible diabolical murderer, and the unreliability of the narrator prove to be a wicked and fun ride for fans of psychological suspense.

5.0 out of 5 stars Trust Me...Trust Me...Trust Me...

Trust Me...A Real Page Turner!
Trust Me...Suspenseful!
Trust Me...Engrossing!
Trust Me...A Fantastic Book!
Trust Me...Hank Phillippi Ryan's Best Yet

Another winner from Hank Phillppi Ryan. Mystery, suspense and a riveting courtroom drama that will keep you guessing until the end. Her writing style addictive, turn off the phone and don't answer the door. You won't want to be interrupted. Highly recommend!

Not my favorite Hank Phillipi Ryan book but solid writing. I did not find the narrator completely sympathetic.

This is a book that will keep you turning pages. Great suspense which keeps you on the edge of your seat.

Summer is rapidly approaching, so you may be looking for a good book to read under an umbrella that protects you from the sun with a cold drink in hand. You will be probably looking for something trashy and light. Well, Hank Phillippi Ryan’s Trust Me is that kind of book. The only problem is, it’s not a very good book. Written in a tabloid style with clunky sentences, this legal thriller initially pushes some interesting buttons but gets lamer and lamer as it goes along as characters invent so many stories about how a little toddler was killed (the raison d’être of this work) that the reader may just throw up their hands and cry, “Uncle!” Or otherwise just throw the book across the room.

The book’s protagonist is journalist Mercer Hennessy, a Boston native who has gone pretty much reclusive after her husband and young daughter were killed in a car accident the year prior. Holed up in her own home, Mercer gets an assignment: write a true-crime book about Ashyln Bryant, a young woman who is about to go on trial for killing her two-year-old daughter. Naturally, Mercer (and everyone else in the novel) thinks Ashyln is guilty as sin, and is going to write a book that completely trashes her. However, things go awry when Ashyln is found not guilty due to a lack of forensics that ties her to the murder (or was it?). There’s a twist, then: Mercer still has to write a book that will tarnish Ashlyn, but now Ashlyn is in Mercer’s home hiding out from everyone, weaving a tale of deception as she goes along — or is she?

The novel is interesting in that it confronts the issue of bias, whether it comes to reporting or being a jury in a murder trial. Mercer is out to character assassinate Ashlyn, but eventually wonders if Ashlyn is telling the truth and didn’t kill her infant daughter. The book, then, is an examination of prejudices in society that work against defendants based on how they’ve been shaped by the media. However, I’m making this book sound smarter than it is. Trust Me is strictly a dime-store potboiler with very little subtext and whose existence is cribbed from the real-life Casey Anthony trial liberally.

What really works against Trust Me is that it is a snoozapolooza. During the first third of the book, the main character is housebound and is covering the trial by watching a feed on her television. Scintillating, right? Then, the action moves to the main character’s kitchen and a nearby bagel shop for conversation. The protagonist, in other words, doesn’t really protag. When she does, such as when she finds out that a juror has defied the rules of the courtroom, she goes against character and rats this individual out to the defense attorney. Um, doesn’t that go against the fact that, in doing so, she risks a mistrial and the book she’s supposed to write (and get handsomely paid for) would go into the garbage?

This is also a very talky book. Characters just talk and talk, hypothesizing what the real story behind Ashlyn’s daughter’s death really might be, and then the story changes — relegating the previous version of the story to the dust bin. In short, Trust Me is a novel that’s all about padding. If you took away the middle third of the book, which drags on and on, you’d have a book that would probably still work. However, the author is out to outsmart us and pull the wool over our eyes with all of her red herrings. It’s just not very clever. By the start of the final third of the novel, you may just stop caring what happens to these individuals because you can make heads or tails of the truth versus the lies.

The book also isn’t written very well. It’s really meant for people who don’t really have a large vocabulary but are interested in true-crime legal thrillers (can you call this book a legal thriller when the courtroom scenes are pretty much in the first third?). I’d mentioned the term “tabloid-style” earlier, and that’s exactly what this is. If you read magazines or newspapers that are dedicated to the latest in violence and celebrity-dom, usually merging the two of those things together, you will probably like this book. It just wasn’t for me — the writing was too juvenile and pedestrian.

That all said, there is an interesting tactic in Trust Me, as it contains a bit of a novel within a novel, so to speak, since we get to read snippets of Mercer’s work-in-progress. Those morsels may just be the most intriguing thing about this volume, because when the focus shifts away from the “fiction” that Mercer is writing or wants to write, things grind to a halt. For instance, one of the characters turns out to be paranoid, so when the fire alarm goes off in Mercer’s home during the middle of the night due to burnt toast in the toaster, we get a whole chapter devoted to who may have caused it. Don’t people remember when they make food for themselves? D’oh!

In essence, there’s a germ of a great novel in the premise of this tome. The whole nature of truth versus fiction that is weaved into the narrative of courtroom proceedings is fodder for a great read. Unfortunately, the material is in less-than-capable hands. Ryan is no word stylist or a writer with great flair. She simply just prattles on and on, and finally ties up the loose threads of her book in one fell swoop as though she realized that she’d gone on for something like 400 pages and needed to end things really quickly. In the end, Trust Me is less than satisfying. You should probably risk sunburn — better that than sitting under an umbrella in the shade trying to read this sorry excuse for a thriller. You may thank me later for the redness and discomfort.

Trust Me had me twisting and turning the whole time. Hank P. Ryan wrote such a convincing story that in the beginning I was completely convinced she was guilty, she killed her daughter. I honestly had no doubt.
Then even though skeptical, she started convincing me that she was set up, she didn't do it and someone else was to blame. Trust Me just pulls you in and makes you believe whatever you want and it is obvious with the way the author thinks and acts that Hank P. Ryan has experience in this area.
It was a great read that honestly left me unsure until the end. I hope to read more from this great author.

At first I thought this was going to be a really interesting read. A young writer named Mercer loses her husband and daughter in a horrible accident, and her next story is writing about a mother accused of killing her young daughter. She is supposed to be writing a tell all crime book about the case, but then the mother gets acquitted. Now her story takes a turn, and she still believes the mother is guilty. She now has to interview the mother in a "tell all" type story, and she is staying in her house with her. Then the book takes a weird turn, the mother starts making up all kinds of stories and theories about what happened to her daughter, and Mercer doesn't know what is truth or fiction. The last half of the book is just the mother telling different versions of what could of happened and Mercer trying to get the real story. I found the ending to be kind of unsatisfying, and the back and forth with mother was kind of confusing to the storyline but overall it was a pretty good read.

Hank Phillipi Ryan knows how to write a pulse-pounding page turner! Loved everything about this book and never guessed the ending.

Trust Me had me twisting and turning the whole time. Hank P. Ryan wrote such a convincing story that in the beginning I was completely convinced she was guilty, she killed her daughter. I honestly had no doubt.
Then even though skeptical, she started convincing me that she was set up, she didn’t do it and someone else was to blame. Trust Me just pulls you in and makes you believe whatever you want and it is obvious with the way the author thinks and acts that Hank P. Ryan has experience in this area.
It was a great read that honestly left me unsure until the end. I hope to read more from this great author.

Well...I wanted to like this book. And I did. For the first half. I was captivated and drawn into a story of a Casey Anthony-esque woman named Ashlyn on trial for the murder of her young daughter. Then it just got weird. And stopped really making any real sense.

Spoilers below:


I could NOT for the life of me understand why Mercer, who believed wholeheartedly that Ashlyn was guilty, would start believing everything Ashlyn told her. It got so completely old having Ashlyn hedge and give non-answers and nothing getting revealed. And then going off on these wild conspiracy theory tangents that Mercer, in her grief, supposedly swallows without even questioning? When things actually get resolved it's not a very good resolution either, it is anti-climactic and gives no sense of redemption for the poor murdered little girl.
All of the characters were basically patsies in Ashlyn's little mind game. You actually expect me to believe that this uneducated party girl could pull something over on absolutely positively everyone, leave no evidence behind, etc?
I so wanted Mercer to be in a coma and dreaming all of this when I got to the end. Or have this entire thing be an elaborate sting operation to get Mercer for her family's deaths. It would have been so much better and made much more sense.

In Trust Me, Hank Phillippi Ryan writes about a reclusive journalist, Mercer Hennessey, grieving deeply over the deaths of her husband and child. Like everyone else in Boston, Mercer has read about the mother on trial for the murder of her toddle.. She's convinced of Ashlyn Bryant's guilt, and reluctant when her former editor pushes her to write a book about the woman, 'an instant bestseller'.

Can Mercer trust anything Ashlyn says, and will she ever get to the truth of what happened?

The writing was so good, but the story just didn't charm me. Seemed to be a Casey Anthony story with less likable characters. Look forward to authors other books though.

I stayed up until the wee hours of the morning reading Trust Me. I don't know how to give the writing enough kudos. I was totally, completely into the story. Hank Phillipi Ryan is a master craftsman.

TRUST ME is the first novel I have read by Hank Phillippi Ryan. I enjoyed her style of writing and in many cases it saved this novel for me, on occasion I was ready to give up the story but not the writing.

Mercer, a journalist, struggles daily with the loss of her husband and child who died in an automobile accident. Ashlyn is on trial for the murder of her daughter Tasha Nicole. Mercer believes Ashlyn is guilty and accepts the assignment to watch a live courtroom feed and write an immediate book outlining the trial.

The premise of forcing Ashlyn and Mercer to spend an inordinate amount of time together was intriguing and in many ways it delivered. There were times I felt Mercer's confusion so much I was frustrated and overwhelmed with Ashlyn's behavior; a testament to the above average writing skills of the author.

If this book were a bit shorter and more to the point I would have loved it. I did enjoy this book immensely and thought much of it was timely.

"Trust Me" is twisty, psychological suspense. It's not perfect, but it is more than good enough.

Note to self: Rooming with an accused murderer may have a devastating effect on your psyche.

Also note to self: Check out other books by Hank Phillippi Ryan.

My thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for an advance copy of this book.

In the process of reading this, and so far so good. The initial setup to the story seems strong and I like the characters. Looking forward to finishing.

Thanks to NetGalley for providing an electronic ARC to me in exchange for an honest review.

Hank Phillippi Ryan does really well at my library, and I've been meaning to read one of her books for ages, so when this title became available, I requested it. And the writing is good ... but the story is ... meh.
Not only does it VERY closely resemble the Casey Anthony true crime story (flippant, "party girl" young woman; dead little girl, aged 2; incriminating google searches; shadowy possibilities that her parents knew; etc. etc.), it might as well BE the same story. The Casey Anthony case is even mentioned a couple of times.
The twist comes in with the protagonist, Mercer Hennessy, who is tasked with writing a true crime book about the trial of Ashlyn Bryan, accused of killing her toddler daughter, assuming that Ashlyn will be found guilty and the book will be a slam dunk in the supermarket book section. But then, <spoiler>Ashlyn <i>isn't</i> found guilty. And in one of the weirdest, least believable polt twists I have ever read, Mercer's editor talks Mercer into writing a book which tells Ashlyn's side of the story and explains what <i>really</i> happened.</spoiler>
Complicating the story is the fact that Mercer lost her husband and daughter (conveniently about the same age as the murdered toddler Ashlyn was on trial for killing) about a year previous in a car accident, which makes her fragile and stressed, <spoiler>and not really capable of dealing well with a possible child murderer sharing her space. Ashlyn's attempts to gaslight Mercer and make her focus on pretty much anything but Ashlyn and her dead daughter seem ridiculously transparent to me, but we're expected to believe that Mercer is so out of her head with the grief that has come roaring back up in the wake of the trial, that she cannot comprehend that she's being gaslit by this woman who has every reason to do so to further her (not even very well thought out) version of what "really" happened</spoiler>.
I think Ryan fans will enjoy this, and I'm interested in trying out the Jane Ryland series, but, ultimately, this book didn't do it for me.