I couldn’t be happier to read and review one of the most anticipated thrillers of 2022! A brilliant, smart, intriguing psychological thriller from Hendricks& Pekkanen! Of course I’m thanking my lucky stars to have a chance for exclusive reading time!

My favorite thriller duo DID it again! They wrote an engaging, slow burn, character driven story by creating one of the most interesting fictional character: yes, Avery became one of my all time favorite heroines!
Let me talk more about her: Avery Chambers: one of a kind sharp witted, reckless, snarky therapist who is quiet a combination of fixer and private investigator detects everything about your life, bringing out all those dirty secrets, the things even you haven’t realized keeping inside of yourself and voila: she patches you up, gluing your broken pieces and fixing you with care.

Even though this book was a little long and it started like more contemporary fiction then thriller till things get heated at the first half, the pure existence of Avery in this book and her different approach, her stalker-ish tendencies, her mind games and sharp wit hook you from the beginning. I have to admit her character and her back story were far more interested than the “ Golden couple” Bishops!

Marissa - the wife of Golden couple hires Avery to fix their marriage. She already knows Avery’s license was revoked but a friend highly recommended her. Washington Post already published an interesting interview about her and her unusual methods. Who cares if they contain the breech of privacy ; at least they work?!
In ten sessions, she guarantees you to fix the marriage.
But her first encounter with Bishops doesn’t go uneventful! Marissa sucker punches her husband with the first surprise session ( poor guy doesn’t know they’re going to see a kind of marriage counselor) but another punch she throws hurt more: she confesses she slept with a young from gym! Poor Matthew goes berserk! Thankfully Avery is with them and she promises they are in good hands.

But what if the both of parties keep dirty secrets. Well, don’t worry, Avery has eyes and ears in everywhere. She eventually finds out every dirty details!

In the mean Avery also deals with intruders who threat her behalf of powerful pharmaceutical company Acelia : the very same company she anonymously called to inform FDA about their misconduct about their medicine trials which have high rates to kill people. Now they want her to be their snitch, trying to learn from whom she got the information.

Those two mysteries are keeping your interest intact. And the ending is smart, some revelations are foreseeable but last one was still well executed.

The writing style is engrossing, the characters are well developed, multi layered and easy to relate.

This is not my favorite book of the duo but it is still smart written psychological thriller/ mystery with great characterization. They never disappoint me!

Special thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for sharing this digital reviewer copy with me in exchange my honest opinions.

What a great book, one that will surely please any reader! The story centers around Avery, a well-known therapist, who has a unique way of treating her clients... not only with her ten-step plan but by spying on them, as well. She is working with a couple who has been referred to by friends as "the golden couple", trying to revive their troubled marriage.

With a web of lies, unexpected turns, more than a bit of mystery, this case has kept Avery on her toes throughout. Besides the fact that the story held my interest so well, I liked that the chapter headings alerted the reader as to was narrating that certain one. In the past, I have quit reading books, because of the fact that I was so confused, wondering which character we were talking about now!

Dog lovers are in for a treat with this domestic thriller featuring an adopted rescue pittie, Romeo* (who's the most likable (and the best judge of) character in it).

In their previous shrink story, "An Anonymous Girl," the coauthors gave us a cat and mouse.

In this one, they give us more of a connect the dots — between an unconventional (and unlicensed) therapist, her former date, her current patients ("the golden couple") and their work and family relations.

It's a knotty tale of deceit, betrayal, and revenge that ropes the reader in, but not initially as it keeps hitting the brakes to deliver backstories. I sped through it after Part I!

While it mightn't meet expectations of fans of the coauthors, it should be a <del>bone</del> bona fide hit with readers who enjoyed Carola Lovering's "Too Good To Be True."


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*Note the names in the story (MC Avery means counselor. IMO, she missed her calling as detective).

Thank you to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for the digital ARC!

Avery is a therapist with an unconventional 10 sessions treatment that she says will fix you. Marissa and Matthew seem like the perfect couple, but Marissa cheated. She is trying to save them, so she enlists Avery's help for couples therapy. This is the state of their collision course.

Okay, I will admit that I was not excited to read this. As a therapist, this didn't thrill me since Avery lost her license and I didn't want to read about something that was ethically wrong for clients. However, it was a wild ride and I surprisingly liked Avery! I am still in shock that I am admitting that, but she clearly admits her faults and has nothing to hide. The story is more about everyone else's mess she is entangled with, but there's some substance to her life as well. I won't spoil it for you because I did not see it coming.


Thank you to NetGalley and St Martin's Press!

Marissa and Matthew have the perfect marriage, or so it seems, until Marissa has a cheat night with a long time friend of their’s, Skip. Marissa wants to fix what she has done because she loves Matthew and her 8 year old son Bennett. She seeks the help of Avery Chambers, a therapist who claims she can help any one with 10 sessions of her treatment. Avery attempts to help the couple, but secrets arise and she finds herself questioning her every move.

This was another fantastic novel from authors, Hendricks and Pekkanen. I don't know how they do it, but each book they release gets better and better! This one had me on the edge of my seat. Everything is not as it appears to be and I found myself questioning what was going on. Definitely grab a copy of this one, it's an engaging read you won't want to put down.

Many thanks to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for my ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This review will be posted to my Instagram Blog (@coffee.break.book.reviews) in the near future.

So hard to review. Just very conflicted. There were parts I liked and parts I did not care for. Like An Anonymous Girl, there was more I disliked than liked, and a lot that just didn't make a whole lot of sense.

Having read other books by Hendricks and Pekkanen, I thought I knew what to expect with this one. Not until about halfway through did I realize my expectations were completely wrong. The Golden Couple centers around Marissa and Matthew, a married couple, and their (unlicensed) therapist, Avery. Based on this description, I assumed the story would be similar to An Anonymous Girl. However, the stories could not have been more different. The Golden Couple is written from two perspectives, those of Marissa and Avery, and they were both equally interesting. Both characters were well-developed, their stories were transparent, and their motives clear from the beginning. They both had their own struggles and desires, although these were not always clear to each other.

The story seemed straightforward at the intro, Marissa having committed infidelity and wanting to work things out with Matthew. As the novel progressed, the characters surrounding Marissa, Matthew, and Avery seem to have their own agendas. I didn’t know where the story was heading until the very end. Overall, this was by far my favorite Hendricks and Pekkanen novel. I found it to be the least predictable as well as the most believable of their stories. I was interested in finding out more about the characters and their lives, and I enjoyed the moments of suspense and mystery. 5 stars.

As another reviewer said, good but not great. This was a twisty mystery typical of the authors' previous work but it just didn't have the wow factor for me that say, The Wife Between Us did.

This team of writers never fail to deliver an exciting story. I was intrigued from the beginning by Marissa and Matthew Bishop, the "Golden Couple", who have sought out therapy with Avery Chambers, a therapist who specializes in intensive short-term counseling.

Marissa and Matthew have marital problems stemming from an infidelity on her part, and Avery begins by trying to work through this issue. It is soon apparent, however, the couple are not sharing information truthfully and their problems are even more complicated.

Avery has very unusual techniques in her practice, actually investigating and digging for the truth behind the couples' lies.

The book took me on quite a ride, not knowing who to believe and/or who to trust. I highly recommend this book.

While it looks pretty straightforward, a troubled couple visits a high profile yet radical therapist to resolve their marriage break. As the story progresses, we see there is a lot more going on under the surface. The therapist has an agenda that puts her at some risk, so she is often looking over her shoulder.
The straying wife tries to understand and explain, the cuckolded husband comes around more quickly than we would expect. The friends and co workers on the periphery all have something to hide.
As things are revealed the bad guy is one we may not have expected ( except for the more cynical among us).
This is a fun story, enjoyed reading it.

Thank you for my early review copy. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I believe this book will be a huge bestseller.

It is rare that I have enjoyed a book to the point of giving it a 5 star rating, but this is well deserved! These authors never cease to amaze me with their writing!
Avery Chambers is such a captivating character with her promises of fixing her clients in 10 sessions. She has no boundaries since she is no longer licensed and will stop at nothing to get to the truth! Marissa has committed the ultimate marital sin by cheating and is desperate to tell her husband Matthew and then allow them to move on with their lives and work through this issue with Avery’s help.
The twists and turns in the story left my head spinning but that is what a great book does! There were characters that turned out to be completely different than what they appeared and some that seemed to grow with time!
I throughly enjoyed this book all the way to the end. I felt that it tied things up quite nicely! Thank you netgalley, Greer Hendricks, Sarah Pekkanen and St Martin’s Press for the ARC in exchange for my honest review!

This is such a great read. Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen are a dynamic writing duo, and ill read anything they publish at this point. Marissa and Mathew are the Golden Couple who come to former therapist turned consultant Avery. Marissa has betrayed her husbands trust and wants to work on getting their marriage back on track. But there are some very surprising twists and coincidences that come to light that may detail everyone's plans. I loved all the characters; they are all so well developed and real that they just draw you straight into the story. My only complaint is that the final coincidence is just a little too far fetched for me, but other than that it's an excellent book!

I received a copy of this book from NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

OMG this book! The only other book I've read from these authors was The Wife Between Us, which I really enjoyed, and as a result I had high hopes for this one. I was NOT disappointed. I read the whole book in one sitting, went to bed far too late, and have zero regrets about any of it.

I'll start with the characters. There isn't one character in this book that is straightforward which was nerve-wracking and exciting all at the same time. I always try not to get too attached to any of the characters in this genre of book because you never know what you may happen that changes everything. That was not difficult in this book because Avery, Marissa, and Matthew are all deeply flawed and complex characters. Almost all of the side characters are as well for that matter.

Then there are the twists! The turns! There were so many that it was insane and I saw basically none of them coming, which I love. I can't say too much without spoiling something but trust me, you will not be disappointed if you appreciate some solid twists.

My only complaint would be the storyline involving Avery and the whistleblower incident. I didn't feel that ultimately it added much to the story other than atmospherically in the sense that Avery is scared and paranoid. I also didn't love the way that particular part of the story wrapped up. It seemed unnecessary and maybe a little out of character?

Overall this was a great book and I would HIGHLY recommend it to anybody who enjoys this genre.

Marissa and Matthew begin counseling services with Avery to repair an infidelity on Marissas part.
This is a fast paced psychological thriller with not too many characters to keep up with.
I loved this book and I look forward to hearing how well received this book will be!! The infidelity is the least interesting think about this "Golden Couple"

I found this book to read more like a mystery/thriller than a contemporary novel, which is a good thing! Avery is a therapist, though she does not have a license to be one after violating the rules and having it taken from her as a result, that does not prevent her though from being a consultant. She has developed a 10 step program to resolve issues, any issue, either with an individual or a couple. Marissa and Mathew seek her assistance after Marissa has an affair and feels her marriage has been damaged as a result. Avery agrees to take them on and starts with the first step, confession, where Marissa confesses her infidelity to her husband, who understandably is upset. Avery is not your usual therapist, she gets very involved in the lives of her clients, following them when they go on a date, digging into their work lives, getting in their face when they complain. Avery is also dealing with a serious threat to her safety that started when she reported a pharmaceutical company to the FDA for falsifying test results. She gets calls asking for the name of the person who had told her about the tests (a former client she's protecting), she has a state of the art security system and is hyper aware of her surroundings at all times. I did not see Marissa and Mathew's eventual outcome at all, I was totally blown away, in a good way. This was a very good book and I highly recommend. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Thank you to NetGalley for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review. The first third of the book was unimpressive. Then, holy moly! I couldn’t tear through the pages quickly enough! There are so many red herrings, twists, turns, and seemingly innocuous characters, it is the very definition of a psychological thriller, possible the duo’s best to date. My mind is still reeling, trying to connect all the dots. A simply superb novel.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the Kindle ARC. I haven't read any of Greer Hendricks & Sarah Pekkanen's prior books but after reading The Golden Couple, that might change. Avery is a controversial therapist who is counseling Matthew and Marissa who are having marital problems. People who are a part of Matthew and Marissa's lives on a regular basis all begin to look suspect with possible motives for wanting their marriage to end. The story is tense and quick-paced. Suspense/thriller is not my usual genre but its nice to read a book in the genre that is a great read. It was difficult to put down The Golden Couple.

The Golden Couple is a twisty, unpredictable thrill ride that will keep you guessing until the end...

Matthew and Marissa are a seemingly perfect couple with a young son, a beautiful house and an enviable lifestyle but Marissa made a mistake that threatens to uproot everything. Her one night of infidelity has put her marriage in jeopardy and she knows that she has to take drastic steps to fix it. She and Matthew enlist the help of an extremely unconventional therapist whose methods will put them in situations that will either make or break the bonds of their commitment.

There are so many characters in this book.who make you question their trustworthiness... is Marissa's assistant Polly helpful and naive, or is she trying to sabotage Marissa's marriage? Is Avery - the therapist whose license was recently revoked - truly trying to solve their issues, or is she creating more problems? Does their oldest friend have their best interests at heart, or are his motives more sinister than they realize? Or do Matthew and Marissa have their own buried secrets that will ultimately destroy their picture-perfect image?

Buckle your seatbelts for this fun, suspenseful adventure that will keep you on the edge of your seat.

I am a huge fan of the team of Hendricks and Pekkanen, and every time I see a new title of theirs coming up I snatch it eagerly... This one was no exception. It started out brilliantly and for 80% of the book I was captivated. The characters, the plot, the misdirection, the unreliability - it was all there, and while some of it felt vaguely familiar, there were enough unique and original elements to keep me furiously flipping pages.

Then, on a dime, a significant character significantly shifted and suddenly triggered a domino effect in which everyone was the exact opposite of what you expected, and every situation meant the exact opposite of what you'd been led to believe all along. I get unreliability as a construct. But flipping every 180° isn't really unreliability so much as a jarring shift, equivalent to "and it was all a dream!" or "and it turned out there were twins!"... It's oddly tidy in a book that focuses on the messy nature of human relationships - and the falsely perfect faces we do often feel compelled to mask them with - and here it felt discordant with the tone and tenor of the rest of the book. It made me roll my eyes on a big surprised way.

That said, the women write compelling domestic thrillers and I did enjoy the vast majority of this one. I just think it feels like authors find themselves compelled to add more and more twists, coming farther and farther out of left field, lately in order to meet the ever-expanding need for the unexpected. Doing so can produce an unnecessarily forced feeling. While I enjoy a good twist as much as the next girl, if everyone is consistently the opposite of what you are led to believe in these types of stories, as is increasingly the case at least in those I read, it's not really a surprise anymore when they turn out to be revealed as such...