Eliza is a middle aged woman who is the moderator for the Hudson Valley Ladies Bulletin Board. Since her children have grown and left home, she has found it difficult to leave her house and she struggles with agoraphobia. Being part of the online group gives her a purpose in her community even though she finds it hard to leave home, but while she’s leaving the store one day she hears about a new online group, Valley Girls. Determined to stay relevant, Eliza starts a rumor about her next door neighbor and what she thinks might be happening when she’s watching a man visit the neighbors home.
Three other women play prominently in the novel: Amanda is Eliza’s long time best friend who comes back home to New York with her children when her Hollywood husband finds himself receiving #metoo accusations, Allison is a new mother/powerful New York City who decides she wants to raise her son in a quiet community and Olivia is a young woman who’s husband has just moved their young family to Hudson Valley but feels like a fish out of water.
This book is about family, but even more it’s about the power of strong female friendships. I really loved seeing the character development as these lives and stories intercept and connect. It’s such a great story about mental health and recovering from trauma, marriage and friendship. It’s the perfect, joyful read for feeling positive and hopeful. •
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Eliza Starts A Rumor by Jane L. Rosen is a fun read that swerves into the serious zone in an appropriate manner. Eliza is the long-running creator and admin of a virtual notice board for her community. When she hears about a new upstart rival online community she decides to post a rumor on her board to spark interest. This rumor leads to an unraveling of families and friends in the town. Lots of drama and intrigue that keeps the book moving along at a quick pace. Read and enjoy!

Ahh rumors and gossip in the suburbs, why is this a topic that never fails to intrigue me? The whole premise of the book is exactly what the title states, an empty nester named Eliza starts what she thinks will be a harmless rumor and turns out to be anything but. In actuality it is the catalyst for a series of events that effects many people in the Hudson Valley, some she knows and others she doesn’t. So, an interesting premise for me for sure and it’s told via multiple perspectives providing a birds eye view of an entire community which I always enjoy. I loved the female friendships that developed throughout the book and was invested in all of the characters lives.

This wasn’t quite the lighthearted summer read that I was expecting it to be, yes it had plenty of humor but it really dove into some pretty dark topics. Just wanted to give a heads up for anyone that may mistakenly think this is all lightness like I did. I still wouldn’t say it’s super heavy overall, just know there are some moments that were rough. But in the end it was ultimately an uplifting read and one I enjoyed.

At first, I thought this was going to be a predictable story of small-town women bonding over the struggles of motherhood and relationship issues. It turned out to be so much more. I was in tears by the end and was left with the satisfaction of having seen characters grow in truly brave and real ways. What a nice surprise to read this book!

Not as enthusiastic a fan as many reviewers, I thought the book was just okay. I felt that it was a very brief look into each person, lacking the depth needed to care about the characters and their trials and tribulations. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.

Eliza, married with twins and missing the sisterhood of close friends and sorority sisters, starts an online community called "Hudson Valley Ladies' Bulletin Board".

Fast forward twelve years and Eliza finds her site is losing ground to a new milennial group called "Valley Girls", so she anonymously creates a post that generates a lot of feedback but also wreaks havoc for several couples.

Eliza Starts a Rumor is ultimately a book about friendship and how women perservere in the "me-too", "times up" movements.

I related to Eliza and her agoraphobia (although not due to the same reason); the fear and panic are real and well represented.

Thank you to the publisher for the advanced copy; all thoughts and opinions are my own.

Eliza Starts a Rumor is perfect for fans of Big Little Lies and Little Fires Everywhere. I had no expectations going into this book and I absolutely loved it. I laughed out loud and cried several times. I loved this story of how a rumor spreads like wildfire among the suburbs! A must read!

Welcome to The Hudson Valley, where we meet Olivia, Jackie, Alison, Amanda and of course Eliza. This was an amazing story of real life. It shows the joys and miracle moments life has to offer as well as the mistakes and regrets. It’s a love story between friends and marriage, children and family.

I enjoyed this story and these characters were fantastic. I felt like I was there, living this story with them and like they were also my friends. I went through every emotion with them and loved every bit of this book. I highly recommend this one and I'm so glad that one of my good book friends recommended this.

Love the themes of female friendship, mental health, and marriage. Good character development and refreshing, new plot. This was a quick read for me. Will definitely recommend for purchase!

What a beautiful book about friendship, love, and heartbreak. It was a fast paced read that was filled with characters that I want to be friends with.

Four women. One on-line forum. Jane L. Rosen has a gift for storytelling. This one packs a more serious punch than "Nine Women, One Dress," yet is still filled with engaging characters and relatable story lines. While dealing with #metoo issues and infidelity, there is a sisterhood that triumphs between two brand-new moms and two high school BFFs with teenagers. It is also refreshing to have a number of good men in the cast of characters of different generations. This will be a wonderful book for book groups giving them a plethora of issues to discuss: #metoo, trauma, parenting, marriage, social media, and even Shakespeare's relevance in modern culture. Highly recommended!

Thank you to Berkley and NetGalley for a DRC in exchange for an honest review.

Eliza Starts A Rumor is a scintillating and poignant book that explores infidelity, sexual abuse, female empowerment, and the strong friendships among a group of women. Told from multiple points of view, this page-turner of a book deals with these hard-hitting subjects with honesty and dignity.

It is the story of four women living in the Hudson River Valley in New York. They’re lives are all affected by a rumor that one person posts in an online message board. I totally didn’t see the end coming. I thought it was a little out of the blue and took a pretty serious turn. It was good book .

Ah, the joys of small-town living. Eliza runs an online bulletin board for her small town, a place where women go to get their questions answered about babies, love, etc. But Eliza has her own secret--she can't leave her house. When she finally makes it out to the store, she overhears younger moms talking about a new bulletin board and starts to panic that hers will fall by the wayside, so she creates a fake story about a man cheating on his wife...and all hell breaks loose. This book made me laugh out loud, cry a little, and contemplate how we never really know what's going on in other people's lives. I absolutely adored this book, and I cannot wait to read more by Jane Rosen!

A post to a social media group intended to bring more readership changes the lives of several women. Eliza runs a social media group for mothers in her immediate area. While it's been popular, it's starting to lag as the group ages, and after overhearing of a new group for a younger audience, Eliza decides to stir up some drama with a post she makes up after observing her new neighbor's strange behavior - concocting an imaginary affair. But her post resounds with many, including Olivia - whose husband IS the man Eliza has seen with the neighbor, and the imaginary affair may not be so imaginary... Meanwhile, Eliza is dealing with her worsening agoraphobia, another reader Allison makes a friend on the website Jackie, who isn't all she appears to be, and Amanda, Eliza's friend, may be able to help more than she knows. A story of relationships, friendships and life with social media, it's a good example of women's fiction that makes a good read.

Fun summer reading. Chick lit. An interesting story of what can go wrong in a small town where everyone seems to be interested in everyone else’s business.

Eliza Hunt has run The Hudson Valley Ladies’ Bulletin Board for fifteen years. She is happily married and has raised her twin children, who are now in college. Much to her dismay, she discovers someone has started another bulletin board called Valley Girls, which is now competing with hers! She has been giving out parenting advice for years and feels so threatened by the new offering that she writes a gossipy “rumor” post on her board.

It is through this post that she comes to be friends with Alison Le, a lawyer raising her infant son alone, and Olivia York, who thinks her husband is cheating on her. Eliza’s best friend, Amanda Cole, and her two daughters have recently moved in with her father across the street from Eliza. Amanda left her movie-producer husband, who has been accused of scandals involving many women. Add to all this that Alison has made a friend on the bulletin board who may not be who she thinks, and Eliza is having trouble even walking outside her front door!

Eliza Starts a Rumor has a unique plot--dueling bulletin boards for women! The characters were well-developed and had a lot of interaction. The book explored current social issues of the #metoo movement, rape, agoraphobia, PTSD, infidelity, and self-mutilation. It was so refreshing to see women bonding and supporting each other throughout this book.

Despite some of the heavy topics, Eliza Starts a Rumor had some hilarious moments and was a quick, cute read!
Thank you to NetGalley and Berkely Books for giving me the opportunity to download, read, and review this book!

As anticipated, this was chick lit: a story of love, divorce, family, friendship, single parenthood, agoraphobia, cheating, and lies. The multiple storylines weave together well and build to a satisfying conclusion. This will make a beach read with some depth. 3.5stars

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the chance to read this arc in exchange for an honest review.

Eliza is hiding a secret from her family, a big one., when the one thing that is going for her, the Hudson Valley Ladies' Bulletin Board of which she is the moderator of starts to falter. To keep it going Eliza posts a rumor on the board to make it more relevant and the impact is unexpected, could the rumor actually be true? A story of truth and lies and women finding themselves and supporting each other.

I pick books I think I'll like, simply because I don't want to be disappointed when I'm reading. That being said, I enjoyed this one even more than I thought I would. The characters felt real and relatable, and I like the ties to current-day problems. I was not expecting Eliza's story twist, and I appreciated how it happened. I loved how the story flowed. Overall, I just really enjoyed it. When I set my Kindle down after reading the end of the book, I even said aloud, "That was a good one."