3.5 stars rounded up to 4

Juan shows his wife a beautiful house on a cliff overlooking the beach. She immediately falls in love with it so he buys it for her. Not long after they move into the house, Juan does in a car accident. She's been widowed for six months now and she lonely and finds solace in alcohol. She starts receiving strange notes and comes across triplets who tell her they used to live in the house before her. She welcomes them into her home. It quickly becomes apparent that things are not as they seem.

We never learn of the wife's name. The author does a great job setting the scene. The house is a catalyst for everything that happens. There's several twists to keep you on your toes. The story has a creepy vibe to it. The story starts off slowly but the pace quickens with each turn of the page. The truth is revealed and the story starts to make more sense. All the loose ends are tied up.

I would like to thank NetGalley, Bookouture and the author Arianne Richmonde for my ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Atmospheric Suspense.....
A beautiful house, a new start, past mistakes and.....a dead spouse. An engaging,, atmospheric psychological suspense which is a slow burn but soon filled with twists and turns aplenty. It may be an unbelievable storyline with what seems a naive protagonist but this is fiction and the atmospherics keep the tale alive.

A fast pace as good as it gets thriller.
You won’t be one bit disappointed in this book. It’s written well has great character and characters and the descriptions are so realistic you will feel you are right there.
This is a must read. From start to dramatic finish you will not be able to put it down.

Thank you #NetGalley, #ArianneRichmonde, #Bookouture for this ARC. My won review.

A 5/5 stars and a very high recommendation to all.

With everything going on in life these days, it is sometimes difficult to concentrate on a book. Not the case here. This one drew me in from the very beginning and had me turning pages through most of the book. I say “most” because, well….more on that later.

I thought that the author did a fantastic job of setting the scene. I’m from the San Francisco Bay Area and spent many a weekend in the Monterey/Carmel area. It’s still one of my favorite places in the entire world (and I have traveled extensively). Big Sur, in particular, is scenic but remote, which makes the perfect place for this type of thriller.

As has been more common lately (or maybe it’s just the books that I have been reading), the house in question is as much a character as the people. It’s certainly the center and catalyst for everything that happens. Atmospheric is the word that comes to mind. Gothic also crossed my mind a few times, which is an interesting conundrum given the beauty of Big Sur.

I really don’t want to give anything away, so I’m going to be careful here. I loved the first three-quarters of this book. The pacing was good, the characters well-formed, and the plot was tight. I could tell that there was some serious gaslighting going on, but it was done in a subtle way at first, so that the tension built. The remoteness of the house contributed to that.

The author also did a great job of dropping little hints here and there that weren’t exactly red herrings but gave just enough info to keep the reader guessing. What is the wife hiding? What is in the woods? Is there more to her than meets the eye? And what happened to her husband?

Everything unwinds naturally, for the most part. However, I have to say that the last quarter was a bit disappointing. As secrets were unraveled, things got a little bit out of control and the limits of plausibility were stretched. It almost felt as if it belonged to a different book. While there were threads to the rest of the book, the whole tone of the ending was different. It felt disjointed.

I also found it interesting that the “wife” is never named (unless I totally missed it somehow). Everything is named, even the house. But she goes nameless. I suppose maybe that was an effort to allow readers to put themselves in her place? It didn’t bother me and didn’t distract from the story, just an observation.
I still enjoyed the book and would recommend it for the descriptions of the California coast and the expert gaslighting of some of the characters.

Prepare to be blown away! This book is incredible, a prime example of the genre done well. It’s fast paced, compelling reading that will have you gripped.

A sad story of a woman grieving her husband and moving into a glass fronted house onthe cliff edge. Gorgeous setting which turns out to be anything but. Add evil triplets and things that seem to happen that are odd, and there are some scares here! Very hard to believe much of what goes on but then that's the joy of a book like this - you suspend your sense of disbelief and off you go.

I might not be so keen to live in a beach house now I've read this though.

BLOG TOUR REVIEW

Review for 'The Wife's House' by Arianne Richmonde

Read and reviewed via NetGalley for Bookouture publishers and Bookouture anonymous

Publication date 24th August 2020

This is the first book that I have read by this author.
I will definitely be reading more and look forward to her next book!!

I was originally drawn to this book by its beautiful colourful cover and intriguing blurb. I must admit I was also biased due to the publisher being Bookouture. I have yet to read a book published by Bookouture that I haven't enjoyed. Hopefully this won't be the first... Watch this space! (Written before I started reading the book).

This novel consists of 57 chapters and an epilogue which are short to medium in length so ideal to read 'just one more chapter' before bed...OK, I know yeah right, but still just in case! In this case the whole book before bed!!!

This book is written in first person perspective. I enjoy books written in first person as it feels more personal and that your being told the story directly. It also creates a sort of bond between the protagonist and reader, well it does with me anyway!

This book is based in California, USA .

Wow!!! Where to even begin on this one!! An absolutely cracking page turner! I started reading it this morning... Well yesterday morning and could not put it down until I finished just before midnight!! What an absolute page turner.

I loved the storyline which kept me completely enthralled and in suspense the whole time. Ram packed with mysteries, deceit, shock surprises, twists, turns and everything you could ask for in a good psychological thriller.

Extremely well written, a very smooth and easy read. Fantastic descriptions which really sucked me into the storyline.

There was so much going on but just the right amount so I didn't get confused. I would never have guessed the bombshells thay were dropped towards the end!! There's nothing worse than knowing what's going to happen before your even half way through.

Fantastic characters and dynamics. I loved how the protagonist (I don't actually think her name is ever mentioned although I could well be wrong) developed and grew in strength throughout everything that was going on.

This is definitely one of the best books that I have read in a while, I couldn't believe how absorbed I was until I came to the shocking ending.

Overall an absolutely fantastic psychological thriller that is filled with explosive action, suspense and mystery.

Well done Arianne on an absolute success, you have definitely made my top author list!!! I look forward to your next book!!!

Genres covered include psychological thriller, mystery and suspense.

I would recommend this book to the fans of the above and just absolutely everybody to be honest!!!

338 pages.

This book is 99p to purchase on kindle via Amazon which I think is an absolute bargain for this book!!!

Rated 5/5 (I LOVED it ) on Goodreads, Instagram, Amazon UK and Amazon US and on over 30 Facebook pages plus my blog on Facebook.

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3.5 stars
This is a good psychological thriller but you do have to just go with it as the storyline is not very believable.
When Juan dies unexpectedly in a horrific car crash, he leaves his wife and beloved home behind.
We never find out ‘the wife’s’ name so it’s quite hard to write about her in this review.
When strange things begin happening around her and she gets a message saying she’s being watched, she begins to wonder if someone is after her.
Then she meets the triplets and discover that they used to live in Cliffside. They say their mother is dying and they have nowhere to live so she invites them to stay as she’s very lonely.
This I found very unbelievable and some of the events that take place after this are quite ridiculous.
However, I’ll put this aside as I suppose some people really are this guillible and to be fair it does then get interesting as I was keen to know how she’s get the house back from them.
A good thriller overall but a bit too unbelievable for me.
Thanks to Bookouture and NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book.

Thank you to NetGallery, Bookouture, and author Arianne Richmonde.
This book was about a widow that lives in a beautiful cliff side house. During a time of loneliness, the woman starts to see and hear things around the house such as footprints on the beach, phone calls with no voice at the other end, and strange scents throughout the house. As her decision to take refuge in her safe haven as a house takes root in her, a set of triples show up to her house. The triples seem to be answer to her loneliness and the end to all of the scary things that keep happening to her. So with that in mind, they decide to all live together.
They all seem to get along well at the beginning, but as everyone starts to get to know each other, the stories just don't add up. Then things really begin to change in their relationship and the triples are not who they claim to be.
What will happen to those who build the perfect life around the perfect house?
This book had a great premise, which is what first drew me to this book. The first half of the book had a slow build up of character development and mystery. The main character was a little to drawn in by all of the triples and her greatest desire to have company as well as a family. The woman kept making these crazy choices that had me wanting to yell at her to stop falling for their nonsense. The second half of this book is what really changed the pacing and held my attention. The twists and turns of the mystery was well developed albeit a little to convenient. The ending had a great and satisfying ending for all characters involved. Overall, I enjoyed this book and was glad that I finished it. I would like to read more books by this author!

I am sorry but I found this story too unbelievable to enjoy it.

Thank you to Netgalley for my copy.

This oughta be a movie! A woman is placed in an impossible situation with seemingly nowhere to turn. Things are not as they seem. Who can she trust? Each character has multiple facets--some good, some evil. All set in a unique cliffside house in Big Sur. The descriptions are vivid, making me envision the scenes that I really do think would make an excellent film. Definitely 5-star--I could not put this book down until I finished it!

Beware of triplets bearing gifts. That happens The Wife’s House, a weird, wonderful, sometimes confusing, always exciting psychological thriller. Narrated in the first person (we never learn her name) by the widow of international lawyer and businessman Juan Trujillo, we watch as a confident woman, grieving the recent death of her husband, nearly loses her mind and her life.

Shortly before his death in an accident, Juan had purchased Cliffside, a unique glass and wood house that juts out of a steep hill in Big Sur. Now living there isolated without Juan, she feels vulnerable and alone. First she watches three young people on the distant beach. Then, while on a walk, she meets triplets Dan, Kate and Jen. Finally, after she sees them walking through her yard, she invites them in. What follows is pure mayhem caused by addiction, mistaken identity, lies, a secret burial and the weather.

Arianne Richmonde has delivered a gorgeously visual story which should be made into a movie. The characters are well described and have depth beyond what is expected in a mystery, The plot is full of twists and turns but these twists and turns are different. And I have never read a conclusion quite like the one that ends The Wife’s House. 5 stars. I’m waiting for the movie.

In The Wife’s House we meet a woman who has recently been widowed and before her husband died he bought her a dream house which was a house built in the side of a cliff in Big Sur and made of glass. Strange things start happening to her, a drone hovering near her, watching her. Notes, texts it was getting quite surreal for her. Who is sending these messages and who is spying on her? Do they know her secrets?
I thought this was a good book, the world building was fantastic, I could imagine everything from the house to the beach and town very well and the picture in my mind made it all so beautiful.
The first half of the book was character and world building and it was very slow to get started but once we got past that it was a complete rollercoaster.
I found myself suspicious of everyone and not knowing how the book was going to end, I was on the edge of my seat.
The ending, BOOM I was not expecting that! I am so glad I stuck with it because it ended up surpassing my expectations. It was brilliant.

I was immediately drawn to the book by its cover image. It depicts a rugged, dangerous but also opulent setting and the writer does not disappoint in bringing this setting to life in the book.

Cliffside, the apt name given to the house pictured, belongs to a lonely, depressed widow. When 3 young, helpful, trendy siblings try to befriend her, she welcomes them with open arms and begins to see a way to put the past behind her. Or will it just come back to haunt her?

I think Arianne’s portrayal of the widow was quite clever and original. She begins as a character I care about, and a character I feel sorry for, and slowly disintegrates into a very foolish, selfish and unlikeable character.

The plot starts quite slowly, and you begin to think: how can this be a psychological thriller? But the landscape serves as a metaphor for the danger that lies ahead.

The last half of the book is much more fast paced, and has so many unexpected twists and turns! The ending was also completely unexpected, and I didn’t like or agree with the wife’s choice but I do feel it reinforced what an unreasonable character she is.

This is a thrilling first read by Arianne Richmonde, and comes highly recommended to psychological thriller fans!

Thank you to NetGalley, Bookoutre, and author Arianne Richmonde for an ARC of The Wife's House.

This is a psychological thriller and the reader doesn't know who to believe. We have an unreliable narrator who is obviously hiding a big secret, and the side characters are even more suspect. The setting is perfect for this type of story, an amazing house built of glass and steel on the edge of a precipice in the Big Sur. The views are amazing but so is the isolation, and this becomes a big factor in the later part of the book. The narrator is the widow of the title. Her rich and charismatic partner, Juan, recently died in an auto crash, leaving the wife lonely and lost in this beautiful but isolated house. Everything changes when she meets the triplets, but are they who they seem to be? I really don't know how to write about this without spoilers so I'll just tell you what I liked and didn't.

This was one of the harder books I've had to rate. The story kept me intrigued and reading late into the night, something that hasn't happened recently Five stars for that. The setting was spooky and the plot was twisty and not predictable, due in part to not knowing who was telling the truth. But I struggled with the characters verbal interactions. The triplets call the widow "little lady" and "sweetie" and just use this cringey vocabulary I can't imagine any 19-year-olds using. And our narrator was very gullible, and frankly stupid, in my opinion. But she is an unreliable narrator and these characters are generally not the most likable as they battle various addictions and mental flips. So if I leave my bias out -- that I like relatable characters -- the wife was actually a well drawn character of her type. I took off a star for the dialogue because it did seem stilted and it bugged me, but not enough to keep me from tearing through the story. I would say the ending was satisfying, if not a bit over the top. But this is one of those books you need to suspend your belief of the logical and come along for the rip-roaring ride!

It was hard for me to finally decide on a rating. Was it the best thriller ever? No. Was it all that believable? No. Did I enjoy it? YES! The first half of the book not much but character and relationships are being built. But the second half really took off and I loved how everything played out and came together. The chapters are pretty short which made for an easy read! If your looking for a book to blow your mind this one may not be it, but if you need a quick binge and addicting story with crazy characters this is a good choice!

Thank you netgalley for an ARC for my honest review!

The Wife's House starts out with the main character (who is never named throughout the book) walking along the beach when a drone flies over. The wife returns home to find red roses left with a mysterious note. Who is watching her and why? The wife is a widow as her husband has recently died in a car crash. She then meets the triplets who worm their way into being invited to stay in the house they grew up in. More strange thing start to happen. I suspected many things right from the start and some not until later, but was not really surprised by the ending.

Thanks to netgalley, Bookouture and Arianne Richmonde for a fun read.

Like a modern day Rebecca, we never find out our protagonists name, only that she is Mrs. Trujillo, wife of Juan Trujillo.

Our nameless protagonist has recently lost her husband. She spends a lot of time alone in her large glass mansion, called Cliffside. The house and a particular spot in the woods behind it haunts her. She mourns her late husband, drinks too much wine, and avoids her critical mother and friend as much as possible.

One day while walking in the woods, she meets a trio of young adults- triplets Dan, Kate, and Jennifer. Their mother is dying of cancer in Zurich, and their father passed away when they were just babies. Our protagonist welcomes the triplets into her home with disastrous consequences.

This book sinks into you and does not let go. The writing itself, and the construction of Cliffside, is extremely reminiscent of Du Maurier’s Rebecca. The beginning is has creepy haunting vibes, despite being set in California. The descriptions actually made me shiver, and I was reading this outside, in 80 degree weather.

The last portion of the book almost felt like it was written by a different author, though, and became more twisty and less realistic.

Overall, I really enjoyed it and would still recommend it!

When ‘The Wife’s’ husband dies unexpectedly in a horrific car crash, he leaves the beloved Cliffside home behind and unanswered questions.
When strange things begin happening around the beach and home, she begins to wonder if someone is after her. Then triplet siblings come upon her that used to live in Cliffside- they may be just what she needed. Some companionship and some life in the home again.
You feel like you are in a bad 80’s horror film when the wife makes one disastrous decision after another. It is by design and ends up having so many thrills, twists and turns that you hold your breath the last 30% of the book... What could possibly happen next??

3 Maybe The House Wasn't Worth It Stars
* * * Spoiler Free
This had a very intriguing concept. A staggeringly beautiful home on a cliff shown to a new wife by the man she loves. It hangs there perched, glass glittering in the sunlight. Beautiful woods surround this home creating it to be the diamond protected from the cliff.

How could someone not fall in love with this vision in an instant...And that is what this wife did. Her husband pointed it out, told her it would be hers and he made it a reality. Weeks later, this man was dead from a car crash on the twisting road leading up to their haven in the sky.

Now this woman is alone, lost in her grief and thoughts. But for some reason, she is not feeling alone at all, someone is watching her and the intent is not good. It is sly and threatening. They seem to know secrets no one should ever find out. All of these elements cause this woman to be vulnerable and confused.

This is your set up and our author will take you on a ride, one needing you to accept many different decisions and actions taken by her. It is the ability and desire to accept what is presented which will temper your reading experience. There is much to digest. Creative plot points, hints, and the final tying together.

This is a mystery, thriller, mind twist and can hold the reader's attention.