I enjoyed reading The Younger Wife. The novel is about the Aston family. The matriarch Pamela suffers from dementia and recently moved into a nursing home. Her daughters Rachel and Tilly are upset by their mother’s illness and feel even worse when their father Stephen announces his engagement to a woman named Heather. Not only has it been a short amount of time since Pamela’s diagnosis, but Heather is young enough to be the sisters’ friend.

The sisters try to be supportive for their father’s sake but cope with their latent feelings through unhealthy ways. Besides this character arc, the novel’s main mystery is that on Stephen and Heather’s wedding day, someone meets a violent death while the couple is signing their wedding certificate. Along with Stephen and Heather, Rachel, Tilly, Pamela and the officiant are in that enclosed room. As readers, we want to know who killed whom and why.

Besides being a mystery and slightly less a thriller, The Younger Wife tells an interesting story about trauma and how we cope with it in our own ways, even if those methods are destructive. I was impressed with how the author weaved these two arcs into something cohesive and compelling. I also found the ending surprising and was interested to learn how Hepworth got the idea for this story in her acknowledgements.

2.5 stars, rounded up.

I really enjoy Sally Hepworth's writing. I find it interesting and the multi-faceted women she provides in her stories are fantastic. The Young Wife is no exception to this. While, at times, it did start to feel a bit overwhelming keeping up with who was who with regards to side characters (as none of them were that interesting), it was all building up to a fantastically interesting thriller. And then, the ending made it all come crashing down.

For me, in a thriller, there has to be some satisfaction with the actions taken. The reasoning behind the actions needs to make sense to me, and it has to be enjoyable to get there. However, the ending of this book was, genuinely, ridiculous. It made the edge of my seat waiting for the resolution feel like an absolute waste of my time. This rating would be lower, if it weren't for how good the writing was up until 80% in. After that? It all falls apart.

Told from 4 different perspectives, this book kept me guessing the whole time and unsure of who the reliable narrator was in the story. The different POVs really allowed for great character development and unexpected twists and turns.

Psychological. Intense. Hopeful.

This was a great read! Thanks to NetGalley and St Martin's Press for an advanced copy of this new book, coming out April 5 2022! I really enjoyed this read!

The majority of characters pulled me in and had me hoping that everything turned out positively for them almost immediately. They were well-rounded, consistent, and relatable characters, which I really liked!

The plot bounced between the wedding and the past, which worked together to create tension and mystery that gripped the reader!

I recommend this book if you're looking for a slow-burn, psychological thriller! Get it April 2022!

It's a great thriller! The story is more psychological norm rather than unbelievable. How often do you read a story regarding an older man marrying a woman the same age as your daughters? It's all over in today's world. However, Hepworth throws in a twist here and there that makes me wonder if everything is as it seems. The story goes through multiple points of view and plays with the reader's perception of the event. Every single character is well developed. Everyone has a back story that adds to the book as a whole. It clouds the reader's perception to what is true and what is not up until the last sentence. This story was very well thought out and written.

Thank you to St. Martian's Press and NetGalley for letting me read this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This was a very intriguing book. The author took us down a path that seemed pretty straight but with enough side paths that getting to the truth was not as simple as it appeared to be.

Stephen Aston is in his 60s, a successful, highly regarded surgeon and married to Panela, a dementia patient, when he falls in love with a Heather. Stephen has 2 daughters, Natalie (Tully), 37 and Rachel, 35. Their concern is that Heather is 34 and their mother still has days where she recognizes them. Tully is married to Sonny and they have 2 sons, ages 5 & 3. They have a secret, their marriage is in trouble. Rachel bakes cakes for a living. She has a secret that has prevented her moving on in life. Can she trust Darcy with her secret?

All of these people are vague in their statements and this leads to a lot of assumptions. We all know what happens when we assume things.

I enjoy Sally Hepworth stories and this is another hit. I wonder where she got the idea of this one. It is brilliant!

Stephen is a sixty-something man who becomes engaged to Heather, a woman younger than his two daughters, Tully and Rachel. The problem is he is still married to his wife, Pam.

Heather, the glowing bride-to-be is actually likable and soon fits right in with the family. But Heather has a few secrets.

Rachel is a wonderful baker who owns her own successful business. She eats to hide a past tragedy and to soothe her anxieties.

Tully is married to a successful lawyer who somehow loses all their money. As she struggles to hide her shame she harbors another secret. She is a kleptomaniac.

Pam is Stephen’s wife. She is excited to attend the wedding and Stephen himself walks her down the aisle to the front row! But she also has secrets!

This story caught my attention from the very beginning. The reader knows there is a tragedy but does not find out who the victim is or exactly what has happened until the end. Told in multiple viewpoints, alternating timelines, and easy to follow short chapters, Hepworth does a great job building the family drama to a dramatic conclusion. This was the first book I have read by this author. I will definitely be reading more!

Triggers: rape, physical abuse, dementia

My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher, St. Martin’s Press, for my eARC. This book will be released on April 5, 2022.

I absolutely sped through this one, but the suspicions I had in the early aughts of the book only held and were then proven right. It felt predictable; the twist at the end was cute and has me scratching my head, but it wasn't enough counterevidence of the conclusion of the book to make me question the characters' choices. A good read, but not particularly substantive.

Dr Stephen Aston announces to his grown daughters, Tully and Rachel, that he is engaged to a much younger woman, Heather, There is only one small problem, He is still married to their mother, Pam, who has dementia and lives at a care facility, His solution is to get a divorce and marry Heather. Tully and Rachel are appalled by the idea that their father would simply dismiss their mother in this way, What kind of a man would do that? And what about the things their mother has been saying? IS it the dementia or something darker coming to light? As Rachel and Tully work through their own issues as well as decipher what is going on with their parents, Heather begins to have doubts. The walk down the wedding aisle was never quite so bumpy. The walk down memory lane is not exactly smooth either, All the character go through both self discovery and the realization that those who your things you knew best, may be the ones you know the least about.
This is a fast read and characters, although flawed, have a relatable aspect to them. You will fly through the pages to get to this wedding day!

My thanks to NetGalley for ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review,

Thank you NetGalley, the publisher, and the author, for the opportunity to read and give an honest review of this book.

It is certainly true that most every family has its difficulties and its secrets. The Aston family really seems to have more than their share.

Rachel deals with her problems using food. She cooks and she bakes. As a matter of fact, the business that she owns is an at home bakery. Her sister Tully’s problems surface in the form of shoplifting. She has done this since she was eleven. The girls are in the process of slowly losing their mother through her dementia. Meanwhile, it seems like their father has moved on, finding a new girlfriend, and making plans to marry her. Their step mother-to-be is younger than the sisters. She has her own baggage from her family of origin. As a result, she tends to drink more than she should. Well, what is Dr. Stephan Aston’s issue? He certainly can’t be the upstanding flawless man he seems to be.

The mystery contained in this book includes almost $100,000 in cash found in an old hot water bottle and the name ‘Fiona’. As Rachel pursues all the clues and puts the pieces together, things start to make sense. Things aren’t always as they seem.

The characters in this book are flawed but likable. If you like a story about the strengths and weaknesses as well as alliances in families, this book is for you.

Imagine being engaged to a man who’s daughters are roughly around your age AND who’s mother is still married to their dad ! With me so far !?
Now imagine trying really hard to make a good impression on your soon to be strong daughters who have their own personal issues !!! The family drama is so intense that I stayed up way past my bedtime ! Sooooo worth the bags under my eyes the next day !
You won’t believe the twists revolving the father and the secrets that come to the surface !!! A definite page turner and an absolutely wonderful read ❤️❤️

This is my first Sally Hepworth read but it definitely won't be my last!

I absolutely loved every page of this story. The mystery was well-developed, the characters had depth and were well-rounded, and the family drama was just so very interesting!

I also think that this is the kind of book that must be read by a book club or with a buddy, because half the fun is discussing the story afterwards.

Rachel and Tully aren’t sure what to make of their father’s new fiancée. It’s uncomfortable on multiple levels. First, Stephen Aston is still married to their mother, Pam. Second, Stephen’s fiancée is the same age as Rachel and younger than Tully. Stephen assures them that it will all work out. Pam is in a nursing home with dementia and won’t even realize the divorce is happening. As the wedding gets closer, all the women begin discovering secrets of the family and become determined to unveil the truth before the marriage license is signed.

I’m not sure what to make of this. The Younger Wife began as a standard psychological thriller that I was expecting from Hepworth. As I read on, I was getting more frustrated by how much the women were being gaslighted and how their mental health was portrayed. They all seemed helpless and in need of a man to save them. While I appreciate partnership and open discussions about mental health, this didn’t really hit the mark for me.

Hepworth definitely succeeded at an ambiguous ending, but that frustrated me too. After an entire book of women being gaslighted and questioning their own realities, the reader also is left confused on what was reality. I suppose this is indicative of real life in that there are not always clear cut answers. If you want a family drama with surprising twists, this could be for you. Just be aware you will be left feeling confused and unsure of which narrative to trust.

I received this book in exchange for an honest review. Love a book with an amazing twist. Intriguing characters and an unexpected ending. Sally Hepworth did a remarkable job of building this story. Highly recommend!

Stephen is a father of two and a popular surgeon in the area. Heather meets him while redecorating his house and falls in love with him as his wife's dementia progresses. She sees this as a way out of her awful upbringing. When she meets Stephen's two daughters, around the same age as her, they are none too pleased with her. They think she's a gold digger and how dare she date a married man?

Each chapter switches between 4 points of view. You really get to know each character in depth, especially his daughters Tully and Rachel. Heather was a pleasant surprise as I didn't think I was going to like her as much as I did. We start to unravel a sinister secret about Stephen being kept from everyone. Or are they imagining it? How can they ask their mom about it when she doesn't even recognize them?
The book starts at the wedding of Stephen and Heather where something awful happens and ambulances are called. The story then jumps back a few months to show us how they all got to that moment.

I thought this was very suspenseful with an amazing character driven storyline. Everyone felt incredibly realistic and you truly never know what goes on behind closed doors, no matter how well you think you know someone.

This was a 5 star read for me until the last 30 pages. I can't explain that without giving spoilers but I can see how this ending could upset some people. It also felt very rushed in the end. But overall I really enjoyed this one!

Welcome to the Aston family- Stephen Aston, respected cardiologist, Heather, his much younger fiancée, Rachel and Tully, his adult daughters, and Pam, his wife/ex with dementia. What could go wrong, besides the obvious? Well, this thriller leads you down many paths, once you think you know something, you don't! The reader begins at Stephen and Heather's wedding, and then we go back in time to get inside this family and their secrets-of which there are many! The characters became real to me, I felt like I really knew them- until another twist to the story! This was a 'can't put down book' for me!

Thank you to NetGalley and St Martin's Press for the ARC in exchange for my review.

The Younger Wife is a new novel by Sally Hepworth. It is a book FULL of family drama!

Stephen Aston is set to get married again, this time to a woman who is younger than his daughters. The only problem is, Stephen is still married to Pamela, who is in a long-term care facility for dementia. While Stephen’s daughters aren’t thrilled with the idea of their father divorcing their mother (rather than waiting for her to pass), they eventually see his point. Pamela doesn’t remember him all the time and often when she does, she’s very agitated. Everyone deserves to be happy.

But everyone has secrets they want to keep hidden. Tully (Natalie), Stephen and Pamela’s oldest daughter, takes to shoplifting to deal with her anxiety. It is something she has been doing since she was eleven years old and no one, not even her husband, knows about her secret. Rachel, the youngest daughter, was the victim of a secual assult at the age of sixteen and that is the reason why she doesn’t date. Heather, Stephen’s soon-to-be wife, also has a secret. Her father was an alcoholic who strangled her mother to death and is now in prison. Stephen has secrets of his own, but he’s doing everything he can, even lying to his family, to keep them hidden.

I LOVED this book! Each family member had their own secret, so I felt it was well balanced. Sometimes when one character has a secret, the focus is too much on that one character and that one secret, but this was well done.

I was constantly trying to read ahead to see if I could get some clues as to what was going to happen. That, for me, is a sign of a great story line! I couldn’t get enough of it!

With everyone and their secrets, I wanted to know when (or if) their secrets would come to light. I loved how Tully and Rachel shared their secrets with one another and it brought them closer. THey both had this idea that they had to be the “perfect sister” and their secrets would ruin that. But it did the opposite. It made them better sisters.

I really like how Fiona’s point of view from the wedding day was threaded in. Not only did we want to know all the secrets (and if Stephen in fact was an abusive husband) we wanted to know what happened in private at the wedding and to whom.

Let me just say, what happened at the wedding was a fantastic ending. The whole book was written with us not knowing for sure if Stephen was an abusive husband. That one point at the wedding, Heather, Tully, and Rachel were certain they had their answer, so they acted on instinct. As the days after the wedding go on, we’re not certain if they acted correctly or not. I love that! I can see some people might not like not knowing for certain, but I really liked it. If the women didn’t act, they’d always have that doubt in the back of their mind about when something might happen next.

Overall, I loved this book. I give it five stars. I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own. Thank you to Netgalley and St. Martin’s Press for the advanced copy.

Sally Hepworth is a master storyteller . This starts off with a murder at a wedding and goes back from there. .Tully and Rachel , sisters are dealing woth the fact that their Father Stephen is getting married again to a younger woman . Problem is he is still married. Twist, turny , you won't be able to put this domestic thriller down

I think this has great potential but just fell a little short. It was like the tease of the abuse and how much each character was suffering but not dealing with it. Tully was stealing for years and nobody figured it out and she never got caught? Rachel went through a horrible ordeal and told no one and they just laughed it off that she wouldn’t date? Heather was told she had a drinking problem and was being gas lighted. Just wasn’t my cup of tea.

Very, very fatigued with thrillers with “wife” in the title. It’s even getting harder to make these stories differ from each other. I did not enjoy this one.