Member Reviews
Having read THE GIRL BEFORE by JP Delaney I was anxious to read BELIEVE ME. THE GIRL BEFORE ME was intriguing and just creepy enough to keep it interesting,
BELIEVE ME was a fun thriller where you will be trying to figure out where the acting ends and the real story begins.
An interesting story that immediately intrigues and involves the reader, an actress hired to act the part of a woman interested in married men, hired by their wives, attempting to catch them in the act, until one such job goes very wrong.
A real page turner, multi-faceted characters will keep you reading long past your bedtime; do not pass this one up.
What a book! You won't want to miss this one if you like psychological thrillers. A murder and two suspects. JP Delaey brings you on a ride you won't forget. Wow. It will keep you guessing the whole book. Did the husband Patrick kill his wife and for what reason? Did Claire an excellent up and coming actress who is in America legally but without a green card yet, kill his wife? Why would she when she'd only met her that night. Police detective, Frank, and the Forensic Psychologist, Dr. Latham are asking for her help in finding evidence on Patrick. Asking is just a polite way of making her help in exchange for a green card vs deportation. But did they push to hard and push Claire into a psychotic break. There are so many twists and turns you can never be sure what is what and who is good and who is bad. I can't wait to read more from this author. I thank the publisher and the author for allowing me to read this digital copy in exchange for my unbiased review.
Loved Claire - rooting for her the entire time. Great ending - so unexpected! Highly recommend to any reader who enjoys psychological thrillers. Just wish I knew who the author really is so I can be sure to read more of his/her work, though maybe I already have???
This was definitely a rollercoaster of a thriller. The book had a great premise, an actress that was hired to act the part of a woman interested in married men, typically hired by their wives, to see if they were being unfaithful. I love the way the format of the sorry, it almost reads like a screenplay.
This book was so well-written that I found myself immersed in it immediately. I could not put the book down and found myself staying up way too late to read it. An excellent thriller/mystery that I definitely recommend to lovers of the genre.
*I would like to thank the author/publisher/Netgalley for the opportunity to read it in exchange for a fair and honest review*
really enjoyed JP Delaney's previous book The Girl Before, so I was looking forward to this one. Claire is a struggling actress from the UK that is trying to make it in New York. Unfortunately, she isn't getting many acting gigs. She is offered a job to lure men into sex so that their wife can catch them. But when Claire meets her next lure, Patrick, she finds that he doesn't take the bait... which just doesn't happen to Claire. Then when Patrick's wife is found murdered, Claire immediately becomes a suspect, as does Patrick.
Let the games begin... who is telling the truth and who is acting? This book is laid out so differently since their are a lot "scenes" - it makes the reader wonder if they are actually happening or are they just in Claire's head. Claire and Patrick soon begin a romance through poetry that they both have a love for. I thought this book was suspenseful with a lot of twists, you never knew which way it was going to go.
I don’t know what to say. I loved The Girl Before and I enjoyed every chapter of this novel until the final twist and then… well, there’s no way of sugarcoating it… I hated it. The ending was unexpected but not in a good way, since it made the whole plot unbelievable and ludicrous. In the afterword, the author explains how this novel is based on a book that he published before without success and this is the rewrite of that original idea. It is actually quite brilliant: an actress goes undercover to entrap a serial killer. Claire is a Brit who lives in NY. She is a talented actress but has no Green Card, so she has to find creative ways of making ends meet. For instance, she puts her acting skills to good use seducing husbands on behalf of their wives to help them with divorce proceedings. When one of such wives is murdered, suspicions fall on the hubby. Claire doesn’t believe that he did it because he seemed too earnest and likable, despite his creepy fascination with Baudelaire. In exchange for a Green Card, she offers her services to the Police to go undercover and find out if he did it. I worked for years in the production side of the theatre business, and I was surprised at how relatable the characters were. All those actors living for their art and sometimes getting too caught up in their drama reminded me of real people I knew. And despite of being a manipulative, narcissistic witch, I sympathized with Claire. I really enjoyed 85% of the book and would have given it 5 stars if it had ended there, but then “the twist” came and, based on what came next, I would have given it zero stars. So I will average my rating and give it 3. I hope the author has gotten these resurrected ideas out of his system and moves on with the superior novels that we all know he can write.
Believe me by JP Delaney was one of the most messed up thrillers I have read in a while. The question throughout the book is mostly --who do you believe? Claire Wright is the main character and she is an actress, a really good one. The story follows her through her entrapments of married men who cheat and her subsequent involvement in a murder investigation. The book is intense and creepy. The fact that you don't know who to trust throughout the crazy events that happen keeps you in suspense for the majority of the book. However, the plot had a few holes so I could not give it a 5 star rating. I definitely recommend to anyone who likes twisted.
Thank you NetGalley for the chance to read and review.
Thriller fans will probably enjoy this one, but I personally thought it it didn't hold up to The Girl Before. It does have a lot of popular elements, however: an unreliable narrator, multiple twists, etc.
Wow! This book was a head trip. Seriously messed up and yet I could NOT put it down. Warning: Believe Me has a lot of sexual deviance. In some ways it reminded me of Aleatha Romig’s Truth trilogy....which I have only read the first book. In this novel the reader is constantly trying to figure out what’s real as everyone seems to be acting. There is a murder. Who did it gets a bit lost along the twisted path Claire and Patrick hurl down. About 10% away from the books ending that thread gets picked up again, and I laughed out loud to realize I had gotten so tangled up in the sick “romance” between Claire and Patrick that I had forgotten there was a murder to be solved! It is rare for me to not be distracted by stories wandering off course of the main mystery. In Believe Me, I was neither distracted or annoyed about it, just pulled right along as the author surely was aiming to do.
Because of the themes, this will not be a book for everyone. But for those that can handle reading it, I would highly recommend it for its uniqueness and sleight of hand. It will be a book I remember for a long while. Well played, JP Delaney!
Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group for providing me with an advanced ecopy in exchange for an honest review.
This was such a good read! It took me the first few chapters to get into it but then I got hooked and flew through it. I had no idea what to expect next and just when I thought I had it figured out another twist came up. Claire is an actress in America without a green card and therefore takes the jobs she can get. She ends up working as a decoy for a law firm that works to help wives expose their cheating husbands. Assuming it will be just another typical night on the job Claire takes on a new client but shortly after the job is over the wife ends up murdered and the killer needs to be caught. This book will have the reader wondering who is being real and who is acting. I definitely recommend this to anyone who wants a fast and intense read that will keep them guessing till the end. Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an advanced copy of this.
I wanted to give JP Delaney another shot. I read The Girl Before and didn’t love it but the premise of this book sounded promising. I was really impressed with the suspense and twists and turns. Much better in my opinion.
This book kept me glued to the page. Claire was fascinating to me and I loved trying to figure her out as well as puzzle out the murderer in this very enjoyable thriller.
I recommend this one to lovers of books with very interesting characters who you’re never quite sure of. This is a good one.
Lots of twists and turns in this book, some of which I didn't see coming. Definitely didn't know how it was going to end!
This was an entertaining thriller, but it didn't totally do it for me. It served it's purpose as a quick airplane read, but it required suspension of belief for some things. It seems unlikely that the NYPD would willingly allow a person to devolve into a paranoid state for so long in order to catch a suspect.
Thanks to NetGalley for the free ARC in exchange for an honest review.
Fantastic-- another great book by JP Delaney that I can suggest to my customers. Lots of twists, and loved the main character-- you want to feel sorry for her, then hate her, then scream at her. All bought together brilliantly at the conclusion.
Great read, especially since so many second novels end up falling short after an amazing debut. This one however does not disappoint! I was reeling by the end, but in the best way possible. While the characters may not be exactly likeable they are definitely not boring! I love when authors explore the darker side that most are too afraid to let out and in turn when the characters are not afraid to let that dark side shine. I will be eagerly awaiting whatever and whenever another book comes from this author, that’s for sure.
Thanks to NetGalley for the advanced ebook copy in exchange for an honest review.
I don’t know what to think of this book. I liked some of the twists, however I didn’t like or connect with any of the characters. I also didn’t like just how unreliable the narrators were. I know that’s a commonly used writing method in thrillers and suspense novels, but it was over the top in this book.
Parts of the book are written as though they are a play or movie script. That didn’t work for me. I found it confusing.
Overall, I enjoyed the story for the most part, but wasn’t engaged with the writing.
It feels odd to say this, but JP Delaney’s Believe Me, was a book I both couldn’t put down and at the same time, didn’t totally enjoy. This is a true psychological thriller that is unpredictable and filled with twists and turns. I found myself wanting to know what was going to happen next and finding it impossible to predict, but at the same time it was a little dark for my taste.
The characters are well developed and believably confusing. The twists were often and amazing. But there were times where it felt a little over the top with craziness.
I did enjoy Believe Me, but not as much as a previous read from the same author. However, I do recommend this book if you like dark psychological thrillers. You won’t be disappointed and you likely won’t guess what’s coming!
Wow wow wow! Believe Me from JP Delaney is full of twists that left me thinking to myself, "what is going on here!!". Claire an English actress takes on jobs as a prostitute picking up philandering husbands.....seems simple, straight forward until she takes on the role of a lifetime....or is it? I thought I knew where this book was going but i was wrong! Awesome psychological thriller! Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for allowing me to read this book and give my honest opinion.
My first love affair with JP Delaney began with The Girl Before. This thriller is no different. I love JP Delaney's writing, first and foremost, and that paired with the twist and turns taken through Believe Me makes for an all-consuming story that I devoured in one sitting.