Stephen Aston is a top heart surgeon and he’s about to get married, but to do so he has to divorce his current wife Pam, who is suffering from dementia, to marry the much younger Heather. Stephen and Pam’s daughters Tully and Rachel have to come to terms with what is happening to their family…and it’s going to take some effort on their parts. Heather’s younger than both of them and they presume she’s after their father’s money. Heather has secrets of her own…and perhaps Stephen does, too.

The novel follows the build up to Stephen and Heather’s wedding day, and the tragedy that overshadows the event.

Ms. Hepworth does a great job of revealing the family secrets one by one, letting the reader get to know each character and their motivations. The story is told through the POVs of Heather, Tully, Rachel and a wedding guest makes a few appearances with her perspective as well.

The Younger Wife is a good book to put on your summer reading list if you’re a fan of the domestic suspense genre.

Ehh. This one has some good reviews but I just don’t see the allure. It doesn’t stand out as being different from others in the genre. It’s very predictable.The ending really didn’t provide closure like I wanted.
TW: sexual assault, abuse, manipulation/gaslighting

The Younger Wife was an absolute thriller. I was surprised by the twists and turns numerous times and will be back for more from Sally Hepworth.

Pub: April 5th, 2022 by St. Martin's Press

Thank you to my friends @stmartinspress for the gifted copy to read and review 🤍

If you need a book to add to your summer reading list, look no further than The Younger Wife!

I’ve loved every Sally Hepworth book I’ve read and regularly them recommend to friends because they’re the perfect mix of domestic drama and mystery.

In The Younger Wife, we’re introduced to the Ashton family. Stephen, the patriarch of the family, is set to marry the much younger Heather. Except there’s one little issue- he’s still married to his first wife who suffers from dementia. His daughters, Tully and Rachel, are not impressed. This sets the stage for a rich and engrossing family drama.

The book is primarily told through three perspectives: Rachel, Tully & Heather. I love this narrative style as you really get to know each character’s POV. Heather was my favourite, though she definitely wasn’t at the beginning! Her backstory and the hidden layers that are slowly revealed drew me in and made me feel like I was on this journey with her.

At the heart of what makes this a winning book is Hepworth’s writing. The characters and issues they face are real and relatable. She’s not afraid to address real world issues like mental health, domestic abuse and disordered eating. This is done in a way that’s intelligent and obviously well research. It’s part of a character’s journey and not used for shock value.

Hepworth also listens to her readers and actually changed the epilogue in the original arc to reflect feedback. How cool is that! ?

10/10 recommend this book and Hepworth’s backlist. And make sure to follow her on social as she’s absolutely hilarious !

Thanks to St Martin's Press, NetGalley & Sally Hepworth for this ARC.

Really enjoyed this mystery, family drama book. Kept me intrigued and entertained till the end.
Hope to see more by her soon.

#NetGalley #TheYoungerWife #SallyHepworth #StMartinsPress #ARC #Goodreads

The Young Wife is the third book I have ready by Sally and it was very disappointing. When it comes to dysfunctional families, Sally is usually amazing. My problem with the book is one of the main characters was physically abused it came out as if she was delusional when it was clear as day. It is as if women are incapable to see when partners as abusive even when the partner does extremely kind things. There are more things I did not enjoy about this story but I will end my review here.

Thank you, St. Martin and NetGalley for a copy in exchange for an honest review.

Really enjoyed this book and want to continue to pick up more by this author. Pacing was a little slow but I think it can be overlooked.

I'm definitely a fan of Sally Hepworth and have read several of her books. This was another great one for me. I'm down with the domestic suspense/low key thrillers she puts out!

Told from the POV of three different women this book had me hooked for the beginning right through to the end.

Another hit for Sally Hepworth. Do yourself a favour and pick this one up!

Blurb

THE HUSBAND
A heart surgeon at the top of his field, Stephen Aston is getting married again. But first he must divorce his current wife, even though she can no longer speak for herself.

THE DAUGHTERS
Tully and Rachel Aston look upon their father’s fiancée, Heather, as nothing but an interloper. Heather is younger than both of them. Clearly, she’s after their father’s money.

THE FORMER WIFE
With their mother in a precarious position, Tully and Rachel are determined to get to the truth about their family’s secrets, the new wife closing in, and who their father really is.

THE YOUNGER WIFE
Heather has secrets of her own. Will getting to the truth unleash the most dangerous impulses in all of them?

Unpopular Opinion

To me, this was a family drama with a slow burning mystery. I am a thriller fan and this was not a thriller at all. Why it was marketed as one, I do not understand that at all. I did like the first half but then after that it lost its fizzle.
I loved The Good Sister! That one was excellent. I did not like The Mother In Law, and that was another one that was marketed as a thriller and that one was not a thriller either to me.
I did not care for any of the characters. I was so disappointed in this book. Then comes the ending!! OMG! It just turned it into one hot mess!

I want to thank Netgalley, Minotaur Books for the copy of this book in exchange for an honest review

I always enjoy a Sally Hepworth novel and THE YOUNGER WIFE was not an exception.

The Aston family is dysfunctional and full of secrets. The sisters Tully and Rachel have a difficult time when their dad Stephen is about to marry Heather. Heather is younger than Tully and Rachel but the bigger problem is their mother Pam is alive; Pam has dementia and Stephen plans on divorcing her. Heather is marrying into the right family, she has her secrets too.

The characters are defined and I invested in their stories. I would recommend this book to any one as it covers many genres and covers them well.

I did not like this book. I found it to be much closer to a contemporary drama than a thriller or mystery. And in contemporary dramas, I need to be invested in the character’s daily lives. However, I found the character’s daily lives in this book to all feel rushed and overly dramatic, which made the characters feel more like cartoonish versions of real people. This version of characterization would have been fine if the plot had been more thrilling, as I expect overly dramatic characters in thrillers. However the thriller plot really only started in the last 25% of the book. The books pacing issues created a confusing mix of family drama with twisty thriller that didn’t fully commit to either genre and ultimately produced a book that neither family drama readers nor thriller readers would enjoy. I also did not like the final twist, as I felt it undid any interesting work that the book was doing with mental health and gaslighting.

Wow. Unreliable narrators, second guessing yourself and what you're told, pitting your beliefs about what people are when they're someone of high esteem, mixed with the craziness of any family and you've got yourself one heck of a good story!

I loved all of the characters in this book. Each one was so well rounded and real. There wasn't a single one that I didn't fall in love with. It was hard not to fall into this story, too, because it was so realistic. Thr family drama was so real that it didn't once feel off or like it was too much.

Sally Hepworth has done it again. This was a riveting story that will leave the reader just as confused as Tully, Rachel and Heather. After all, do you believe what you're told or what you mind says you saw/felt? I guess we'll never for sure.

Tully and Rachael have lived an ideal life. Or so they thought. Their Father ,a successful doctor ,is dating a woman,Heather, just slightly older than they are despite still being married to his wife, their mother.
When things start to go wrong in their lives they are looking back and remembering some unexplained “accidents “.
Rachael and Tully are coming to terms with tragic events in their young lives that are threatening their relationships. Fortunately they have strong,supportive partners.
Things start to come together when their Mother, who is in a nursing home suffering from dementia, starts to reveal some of her life with her husband.
This book capture me from the beginning. I thought the ending was riveting.

I have loved every book Sally Hepworth has written. I keep waiting to find one that I don't like as much as the last one but they keep getting better. I loved the way she developed the characters and the story was so well done. I was on the edge of my seat through the entire book. I could not put it down!

This one was just middle of the road for me. I don't think I'd necessarily classify it as a thriller, but more like a family drama/suspense or mystery.

We follow three women: Rachel and Tully who are sisters in their 30s, as well as Heather who is 30 and in a relationship with Rachel and Tully's father Stephen.

Each character has their own struggles that they're dealing with, and we are trying to figure out what is exactly going on in this family. There are certain situations where the narrator isn't quite sure what happened, upon reflection of the situation. So they're trying to piece together what happened vs what they remember. Then there are a few mysteries surrounding this novel, as we get flashes into the future from another perspective.

Overall, this book was enjoyable, just not quite what I was expecting. However nothing really stuck out to me and I'll probably forget the details of this book really quickly.

I think if you're going into this expecting a thriller, you'll probably be a bit disappointed. But if you're going into this for the family drama, then you'll probably really enjoy this one.

Sally Hepworth is a master at the art of family drama and dysfunction. This newest work is no exception. I devoured this novel in one sitting.

The Younger Wife by Sally Hepworth had me captivated from the begin! I loved the family drama & all the characters…I loved hearing all of there stories! Great read! I would recommend this book!

4 out of 5 stars - Sally Hepworth has done it again!

Really enjoyed this book! Fast-paced suspense novel that I couldn't put down and kept me guessing!

Thank you to Sally Hepworth, St. Martin's Press, and NetGalley for providing me with an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

#NetGalley #TheYoungerWife

I read this book and listened to the audio version some months later, not realizing until I was fairly far along in the audiobook that I'd already read the story. Then I had to keep going because the audio version was engaging and I didn't remember what happened. (Does this suggest I am reading too many novels? Possibly.)

In any case, I loved the audio version; there is something about an Australian accent that makes every story seem more interesting, and this book used four narrators, all of whom did an impressive job.

There are a lot of slow reveals in this novel, and I don't want to give anything away, but I appreciated very much the feminist sisterhood that eventually forms among all the women, a surprise I didn't see coming in the beginning of the novel when several of the women seem pitted against one another. I also felt deeply the ways in which women are made to doubt themselves and to hide the harm that is done to them, to hope that pretending a bad thing didn't happen will be the same as if the bad thing never happened. I appreciated that there was a deliciously good guy in this novel to counter all the villains. I loved how the sisters grow closer by revealing their secret traumas to one another, and I love that the younger wife is a fully developed character, never a caricature. I also laughed out loud many times throughout the book, despite its serious subject matter. This was just all around a most enjoyable story, in which every twist was believable.

I'm grateful to Netgalley, McMillan Audio and St. Martin's Press for giving me a free ARC and audio copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. (less)

The Younger Wife is, as others have indicated, less of a thriller and more a domestic/family drama. There are certainly some mystery elements, but we see a lot more about relationships and family dynamics.

This book does contain some content on sexual assault and domestic abuse (emotional and physical).

I read the ARC provided to me by the publisher, then I learned that the ending had been changed so I read that before reviewing. The published version seems a more suitable way to cap off this story, so it honestly raises my rating a bit.

Thanks to Net Galley and the publisher for the complimentary digital review copy of this title.