I found this to be a fairly easy read if a little slow. Nothing to complain about except it didn’t live up to the drama promised in the blurb. I’ve read a few house swap type books recently and this fell in the middle neither brilliant nor awful.

I hate leaving a negative review but I just couldn’t get through this book. I got almost half way and just couldn’t do it any more. Something should’ve been happening by now. All we got was each character letting us know what mundane things were going on in their lives and how they were feeling. Plus the character whom we didn’t know who they were. So I had to DNF. I am so sorry. I really appreciate the opportunity to read this. I just wish it would’ve held my interest. I’m sure maybe the ending would be great. Hopefully after all that.

A house swap becomes more than a holiday when two strangers swap homes for a month!
Hurt and embarrassed after her boyfriend Joe turned down her very public proposal of marriage, photographer Prue Harris has fled her Norfolk village of Shelling for Madi Carew's flat in London. Madi meanwhile, thinks the peace and quiet of Norfolk will help her convalesce more quickly from her breast cancer treatment before she returns to her life as a stage actress. Each woman soon becomes immersed in the others' environment, making friends with their neighbours and becoming involved in the community. But though neither Madi nor Prue knows it, danger lurks at Madi's flat, in the form of an obsessed stalker who thinks Madi has ruined her life! How far will the intruder go to get revenge - and is Prue in danger? Don't expect a fast-paced plot - this is a very character driven story, and concentrates quite heavily on how Madi and Prue meet and interact with each others' friends, and find fresh interests in their new surroundings. But the element of the mystery of Madi's stalker adds an air of suspense early on in the story which helps sustain the readers' interest in the day-to-day realities of the lives of both women. Both Prue and Madi have issues to solve - Prue with Joe, and Madi with her estranged son Joe - between that and the unmasking of the mysterious stalker, there is plenty to keep you reading!

Be Careful What you Wish For is a frothy, charming romance with enough mystery swirled in to keep you quickly turning the pages. Can you change your life by simply changing places?

That’s what Prue and Madi want to know. Prue is 24 and has always lived in the same small town in rural England. A talented photographer, she has a dead end job at the local paper and spends her free time taking pictures at weddings. After a devastating and humiliating breakup, she agrees to switch houses for a month with Madi, a London actress.

Madi is recovering from a serious illness. At 62, she looks back at her life and accomplishments and sees only the negative. Her estranged on George is the result of an affair with a married man. When they broke up, he gifted her the fancy penthouse apartment that she trades with Prue.

As Prue and Madi delight in their new surroundings, make friends and discover projects, an anonymous stalker has targeted one of them. We don’t learn who the intended victim is until late in the book and it is only in the final pages when his/her identity is revealed.

Thank you, Vivian Brown. I loved seeing how Madi and Prue flowered in their new homes and found the joy they had missed in their old lives. This is a delightful, satisfying read. 5 stars.

Thank you to NetGalley, HarperCollins UK, One More Chapter and Vivien Brown for this ARC.

Prue, age 24, lives in a small town in the Norfolk area of the UK. After a very embarrassing incident which totally humiliated her, she has decided she needs a change. She has a small cottage left to her by her grandmother and lives very close to her family including her Dad, a vet. She works as a photographer for the local newspaper. Going online, she finds someone to do a house swap for a month which will use up her leave.

Madi lives in London in a nice flat. She is 62 and has worked as an actress for many years, both in Shakespearian plays and on television. She is recovering from a recent illness and feels like she needs a change. She wonders if it’s the medication she’s taking but can’t help but think she’s losing her memory. Thus, she heads to take Prue’s cottage for a month in exchange for her flat.

Prue is thrilled to be in London where she can put her photography skills to work taking great photos of the wonderful and beautiful city.

Madi is surprised to find the town is so small but quickly starts making friends with the neighbors. Slowly, she finds herself healing and learning to open up more to people.

This story is not as “thrillersh” as I thought it would be. It’s more of finding healing through making new friends. There are some good characters here. Tom is my favorite because he is a rare, kind man who sincerely cares for people. Of course, there is also Flo who won my heart from the first time I met her in the book. What a love.

Copy provided by NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.

Madi and Prue, are the two main characters, Prue is younger in her 20's and Madi is in her 60's, both with different life experiences. They have both just had a life event and are looking to escape for a while. They meet each other online and decide to swap houses for a month. Madi moves to the country and Prue to the city..They both have unexpected incidents while they are staying in each other's homes. They also meet new people and take some time to self reflect. They also both come to some realizations about their lives.  They also take part in tasks that help others, while living away from their own homes

This is a feel good, fairly easy read, I would say it was a cozy story, wasn't my favorite cup of tea, but overall a good story with a little bit of light drama.

I would read more novels from this author, was my first time reading her novels

3.5⭐
I was fortunate to receive a copy of this ARC from NetGalley. I have to say that sadly I was quite disappointed with this book. It was not the thriller that the blurb led me think, in my opinion. It felt more like a written version of the film The Holiday with 2 women swapping homes and meeting each others friends etc. Prue's name led me to the assumption she was a similar age to Madi, when she's actually only 24. She has been well set up by her Gran with a house and a cat! Every few chapters there was one from a person who clearly wishes to harm Madi, although we don't know why. I had various theories as to who it was, although I guess why very early on, and I was quite close with my thoughts! My favourite quote: "Cancer, exit stage left." I kept hoping that something was going to happen in this book, a big twist, but for me it just didn't arrive sadly.

Be Careful What You Wish For is what I would define as a captivating drama or women's fiction rather than a thriller per se and it involves some romance too. Whilst I cannot comprehend why this would be classified as a thriller I still enjoyed it. Essentially, it revolves around two central characters: Prue and Madi who meet online and decide to swap houses for a month. Prue currently lives in the picture-postcard Norfolk village of Shelling and is an aspiring photographer with a job working for the local newspaper which doesn't really satisfy her. She wants to escape village life due to her humiliation when her boyfriend Joe Barton publicly rejected her marriage proposal and needs time away to deal with the break up; she feels the anonymity of London will allow her to heal away from the village gossips and claustrophobic rural life. Madi is an ageing thespian and city dweller living in Belle Vue Court, London. After a long and arduous fight with cancer, she now requires some rest and relaxation having beaten it. Somehow during her illness, she lost the connection with her only son, George, and they became estranged.

This is a really charming story of friendship and becomes quite a life-affirming read, highlighting that you have to take life by the cojones in order to take yourself out of the darkness and into the light. I was drawn in hook, line and sinker from the very beginning even though it wasn't what I'd expected. Both Madi and Prue are engaging characters and are developed nicely. The best thing about them is that they're so relatable; they have issues just like the rest of us and I can relate to the feeling of wanting to escape and get away, especially with the COVID situation. If you enjoy relationship-based novels that are feel good, and let's face it, we all need a little pick me up with the situation at the moment, then this is a superb choice. It's well written, has some heartwarming moments, a little tension from the ”stalker" and is a quick and easy read, but if you're expecting a thriller I expect you will be disappointed. Many thanks to One More Chapter for an ARC.

Meet Prue and Madi - strangers who need a little break and to "get away", so they decide to house swap. Madi lives in the city, and needs to unwind and get away from everything, so decides to live in Prue's cottage in the country. Prue wants to live in the city and explore it's surroundings, so decides to move into Madi's place for a bit.

While she is there, strange things are happening - things are moved and placed somewhere she knows she didn't put them but thinks she is slowly losing her mind and being forgetful. Little does she know that she is being watched and someone is entering Madi's place, unbeknownst to Prue. Who is this person that is messing with Prue and what do they want? Prue finds herself thinking about someone back home by the name of Joe. She had to escape for a while from her town, but what happened that was so terrible that she felt the need to flee?

I enjoyed the suspense of it all in this story, and reading the novel from alternating POV's. Parts are told from Prue's side and parts are told from Madi's side. I also enjoyed the chapters that were told from the "unknown" character that was playing mind games with Prue, thinking of course that it was Madi. Afterall, how were they to know that Madi and Prue had chosen to do a house swap?

So much suspense I loved it.

As other reviewers have noted, this book was classified as a thriller, but I would have called it a family drama, verging on "cozy mystery". I did enjoy it despite the labeling.

Prue - who has lived in a rural village in England all her life, decides she needs a change of scenery after a bad breakup. Madi - who lives in London, needs some R&R after a long illness. Sight unseen, and without knowing each other's history, they decide to swap homes for a month. The character development was well done, as was the glimpse of life in the village. I loved how the author takes us on two parallel journeys as the women break out of their routines and make friends in their respective "borrowed" towns. Both women are likeable and make new friends while resolving family/boyfriend issues that had plagued them.

We get to meet some of the "village people" - Faith (Prue's mom), briefly Joe (Prue's friend and presumed boyfriend), and a host of others, but also the very enjoyable Tom, who takes Madi underwing. In the city, Prue makes friends with a young man who shares an interest in her photography and shows her the off-tourist spots. She befriends (okay, more than friends) the handyman, when she comes up with an idea to enhance the apartment building for the residents.

In between, someone is snooping around in Madi's apartment for reasons unknown. This interloper is thrown off when Prue moves in and changes the routine, leaving the apartment and returning at unscheduled times. Based on the first chapter, you can see where this is headed, and the last week of the swap goes awry!

This is a feel-good novel and an enjoyable read. It would be helpful to have the genre reclassified so as to not set up false expectations with the reader.

Thanks to NetGalley and HarperCollins UK, One More Chapter for an advanced reader's copy for review.

Reading Vivien Brown's new novel was an absolute joy. From the very beginning it is a tense and engrossing story. All the characters are so well-written, so fully-formed, I feel like I have known them for years.
Madi and Prue's stories are just totally absorbing and the plot was clever and suspenseful. The minor characters all came to life beautifully as well. The twists and turns all arrived when least expected.
I loved it from start to finish.

Eh... I felt this was too slow and I could predict what was going to happen so I didn't finish. Maybe next time.

I would like to thank NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for giving me the opportunity to read this book in exchange for my honest review.

I would like to start by saying that although it was classified as a thriller, I felt it was more of a women’s fiction novel than a thriller. That said, it was still really enjoyable, mysterious and it had some intrigue.
I absolutely loved the main characters and really enjoyed learning more about their lives. There is also a third character which identity is unknown to the reader for the majority of the book.
I really enjoyed the interactions between the main characters and their surroundings/other characters and I enjoyed the mysterious feel I’ve got throughout the book until the end.

The story does have a slow start but picks up to a rhythm that it is just right for the narration.

Although it was slightly different from my preferable reads, I thoroughly enjoyed it! Captivating story! Likeable and relatable characters! It definitely did it for me! I am interested to see what future books Vivien Brown will grace us with!


Thank you to NetGalley, Harper Collins UK, One More Chapter and Vivien Brown for an advanced digital copy of this books in exchange for an honest review.

Prue - something has happened in a village. She’s humiliated and wants to leave for a while. She craves for somewhere she can be anonymous. London
Madi - is a former actress. She’s recovering from a major illness and longs for peace and quiet.

The two women decide to swap their very different lives for a while. However, one of them has a stalker!
At times the book felt if was plodding along but picked up. Not a thriller as described but an enjoyable book.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the arc in return for an honest review

I don't know if this was really a thriller. It did have suspense and grab my attention but I was slightly confused. I almost felt as if each chapter built upon character development between the two characters, but then inserted the italicized persons dialogue chapters in between to make it more thriller-ish. The ending threw me for a loop, it's not where I thought it was going. 3.5 stars rounded up. Thanks netgalley, the author and publisher for my copy in exchange for an honest review.

This is a nicely characterized, well-written book that suffers from a bit of an identity crisis. From the cover and the blurb, I was expecting a domestic suspense novel. But most of the book is pure women's fiction/romance about two people who engaged in a housing swap and found new situations to enrich their lives in the big city (London) vs. the country, and vice versa The narrators are charming, and the writing is good, but I kept waiting for the suspense and mostly what came was romance and life reflections. Which, while nicely done, were not what I was hoping for in this book..

Then there's a third narrator who intervenes with a sort of sinister tone that makes you think wait, maybe I AM reading a thriller. But then, as soon as you go back to either Madi or Prue's narration, you find yourself in a women's fiction book again. I think if the author had chosen one or the other -- thriller or women's fiction -- the book would have read more consistently. A thriller needed more suspense and tension in the other narrators' portions of the story - but I would have just gone with the romance and coziness, myself. The "mystery" itself was my least favorite aspect of the novel. I thought the characterizations were the highlight.

So perhaps this is a case of "it's not you, it's me" - I was in the mood to read a very scary thriller, more consistent with the cover of the book, and what I got instead was a perfectly well-written romantic character study. If you like women's fiction and the home-swap idea, you will probably like this book a lot. If you are looking for more of a thriller or suspense novel, this one may not satisfy as much. I liked the way this author wrote a lot though, so if she wrote a more straightforward thriller I'd definitely give it a try.

Thanks to NetGalley, Vivien Brown and Harper Collins UK for the advance copy. My review is honest and my own.

Young Prue wants to escape village life and a public humiliation that she experienced and Madi, former actress, forgets things and is paranoid. So they swap houses.

Both want a different life. But someone lurks in the shadows...

Lovely book.

Essentially this is a novel about two women, young and old, swapping homes for a short while, both running away from a terrible illness and a rejected marriage proposal. Exchanging city life for country life and vice versa, Madi and Prue have never met but in temporarily taking refuge in each other’s homes they both have the opportunity to rekindle their love of life. Madi is an ageing actress, estranged from only son George, normally residing in Belle Vue Court, London. Prue, on the other hand is an aspiring photographer, stuck in a rut working for the local paper, living in a cottage in the village of Shelling, Norfolk and still reeling from her very public rejection by boyfriend Joe Barton. Be Careful What You Wish For is a sweet, (sometimes verging on the anodyne side), tale of the people they meet in their new surroundings and the impact these characters have on both Prue and Madi’s lives going forward. These two women are embarking on a new phase in their lives, gradually embracing change and in doing so can maybe even bring about change in their temporary environments, albeit in very different ways.

This novel takes an unexpected direction and dramatic change in tone from that of the prologue, in which the author adopts the much favoured foreshadowing method to hint at events to come. Instead of maintaining any real sense of intrigue or suspense, the storyline unfolds simply with chapters dedicated to both characters, giving the reader a limited backstory for both Prue and Madi. I enjoyed the way both women start to relax and adapt to their new surroundings; Prue who finds London intimidating to begin, and Madi who is initially keen to keep a low profile in the village. Not going to happen!! I would have been happy had the storyline continued in the same style, with perhaps some other characters given more depth (especially in terms of village life) rather than adding the mystery element but that’s only my personal preference.

In terms of characterisation, I found Prue a bit of a wet lettuce initially but as she begins to blossom into a more confident individual, more comfortable in her own skin I grew to like her more. As she detaches herself from the comfort of family life, ready to strike out on her own she grows in stature, becoming less of a feeble, insipid character. Madi, meanwhile, is a character whose edges seem to soften as the storyline progresses, thanks mainly to her new found friendship with Tom. I think I preferred the scenes based in the village of Shelling compared to events that take place in Belle Vue court, some of which didn’t quite work for me.

I’m sorry to say but there’s very little thrilling about this thriller with a narrative that is way too ‘cozy’ to be classed as a domestic thriller. Instead it’s a sweet if rather predictable novel with two likeable enough characters. I’m just not convinced the chapters that give a voice to an unknown individual, determined to wreak revenge on someone for past misdemeanours add much in the way of suspense or ever make the reader fearful for the intended victim. For me personally there wasn’t enough depth and detail within this element of the storyline, with everything all neatly tied up rather hurriedly which is why I felt it served very little purpose. Instead I would categorise this novel as more in the feel good,uplifting vein since the themes of reconciliation, coming to terms with unexpected turns of events and moving forward in life really fit this mould much better. Overall I think it is an enjoyable, pleasant enough read which didn’t need any sinister stalker type tone added to the mix. If you’re expecting thrills, suspense and intrigue, as the prologue hints at, then I think you’ll be disappointed.
This was my first time reading a novel by this author so I have nothing else to compare it to but despite my criticisms I wouldn’t be averse to exploring other titles in the future. I’ve decided on a rating of three stars because I did find this a pleasant enough way to pass the time but just feel it is a bit confused as to what direction it should take.
My thanks as always as always to the publisher and Netgalley for giving me the opportunity to read.

Prue and Madi each live very different lives in different types of areas. They are both looking to escape their current lives for a bit. They agree to trade homes for a month. It seems their lives have been traded as well and that isn't exactly a good thing.

This book seemed to be a mixture of two of my more recent reads, The Switch by Beth O'Leary and His & Hers by Alice Feeney. I enjoyed it. It wasn't as thrilling as I expected all throughout the story, but it had a very good twist at the end. I felt connected to the characters and was glad to see good resolve in the end.

I really loved this book! It was a great story of friendship and finding yourself. Seriously! Two women, at low points in their lives, swap houses for a month. They don't know each other, they just know they need a change. In each other's homes they find friendship and a sense of self. This alone made for a great story. Then, every couple of chapters, the story is interrupted by a mystery person bent on revenge and angry. As the book progresses the reasoning is revealed. It adds an entirely different story! But, while this was interesting, I felt like it distracted from the main story. It was as though Ms. Brown turned in her book about two women and was told, "you know what, thrillers are really hot right now. you need to add some suspense to this book." While I enjoyed that part of the story, I think I would have liked the book more without it. Still, a good read! (Side note: the title doesn't really fit either.)