Ok so... mixed feelings but ended up reflecting on this one after I finished and decided I mostly did not enjoy it. I'm sorry :(

Things I loved:
- The title and cover (intriguing)
- So many people hyping up the book
- Opening the book with an A-list party is always a good beginning
- Multiple POVs
- Great writting

Things I didn't love:
- Too many characters
- More mystery than thriller
- Lots of fluff/ boring middle
- Slow most of the story line

I was expecting a juicy, drama filled mystery...but that wasn't what was delivered. The book spent too much time describing the actual club and its perks and amenities and didn't spend enough time on the story line. I stuck with it and it did pick up but it was a bit too little too late.

The book rotates its POV between Adam, Jess, Annie and Nikki but there are a whole slew of other characters and it was hard at times to keep track of and it was frustrating at times.

The Club was underwhelming, it did pick up toward the end but overall it was just okay.

The Club came to my rescue from the “terrible, horrible, no good, very bad reading slump” that I have found myself in for a while now. It’s not that I haven’t been reading. I read all kinds of things constantly. I just couldn’t find a book that captivated me for long until this one. It is chock full of interesting characters with fascinating back stories involved in a well plotted mystery taking place in a glamorous setting. Now that my reading mojo has returned, I am in search of the next page turner.

ARC provided in exchange for an honest reviews

I really enjoyed so many aspects of this book! The constant change in locations and time periods, the varying accounts told by a number of the main characters, and the way the story twists and turns to reveal what happened on the island. The characters were all well developed and the story was very intriguing. It caught my attention and didn’t let go until the final chapter! I would definitely recommend to anyone looking for a murder mystery with lots of characters and narratives!

Thank you to NetGalley and HarperCollins for giving me a copy of this eARC in exchange for my honest review!

Ellery Lloyd, the pseudonym for husband-and-wife writing team Collette Lyons and Paul Vlitos, has just published their newest thriller, The Club. It revolves around the Home Group, a global organization of deluxe celebrity clubs that provide vacation spots for its famous and wealthy clientele to hobnob with their kind and take refuge from the public’s invasiveness. Managed by the charismatic yet violently temperamental CEO Ned Groom and his brother Adam, the Home Group is launching its latest club, Island Home, on a private island right off the coast of London. Invites are sent out to several guests, including a Hollywood actor couple, a talk show host, and an up-and-coming film producer. But as it turns out, these patrons are harboring dark secrets that are about to collide with the dubious pasts of Island Home’s very own personnel and leave bodies in their trail.

**Trigger Warning** Readers, please beware this book’s depiction of murder, sexual abuse, pedophilia, alcoholism, drug abuse, car accidents, and parental death.

Having enjoyed People Like Her, the Instamom thriller with which Lloyd debuted last year, I was keen to dive into The Club, which Reese’s Book Club selected as their March 2022 pick. However, I was deeply concerned for almost the entirety of the plot’s sluggishly paced first half. This section sets up the ensemble of Home’s guests and employees in a fashion that breaks the ever-important “show, don’t tell” writing rule. It spends too much time telling us about their backstories and their relationships with everybody in the VIP establishment via an alternating third-person POV with which I found hard to connect. If this tedious first half had been condensed, it would have been quicker to reach the immensely more riveting second half of the book.

It doesn’t help that snippets of a Vanity Fair article that’s issued in the aftermath of Island Home’s opening are interspersed throughout the plot, giving away increasingly informational hints as to who died and how their tragic losses transpired. It’s meant to ratchet up the tension, but it only contributes to the first half’s dawdling nature

Like I said, though, The Club drew me in once the second half started. Fitting, since that’s when the threads of everyone’s individual subplots intertwine and you really begin to learn what messed-up crap the complicated characters are hiding. Aside from Ned’s personal assistant Nikki Hayes and Island Home’s head of housekeeping Jess Wilson, the only ones I truly rooted for (and kept mixing up until the second half, which apparently happened to other readers as well), almost everyone else belongs on varying levels of the slimeball scale. And that’s not a bad thing. Lloyd executes the trick of pulling you into a locked-room mystery that’s full of well-written douchebags without causing you to feel like they’re so unbearably unlikable that you have to DNF the book.

The somewhat predictable climax is enjoyable nevertheless, while the denouement isn’t nearly as tidily wrapped up as I would have expected for a thriller. This latter point was probably a deliberate choice, considering a passage near the end that contrasts the murky and incomplete conclusions of real life with the clean and final answers of fictional murder mysteries.

Overall, The Club won’t knock your socks off, but if you’re a Lucy Foley fan, you can stand the first half’s slowness, and you want a thriller that thrives on the glitzy and shady facets of its characters, I recommend adding this to your TBR pile.

I really enjoyed the introduction of the characters with the slow build up of the different threads of their part of the story. I also enjoyed the setting and descriptions of the setting.

The Club was an entertaining entry into the locked room/but on an island sub-genre of mysteries, and kept me guessing the entire ride. Unlike many in this pattern, some of the characters were even likeable!

A murder mystery at a uber fancy, celebrity only, club!? What a great premise!
When I saw it as a read now, I grabbed it right away.
I was disappointed in how slow this read. The different narrators made it confusing and I had to go back a few times to remind myself whose perspective/story it was. There were also minor characters to keep track of which just got to be too much. I did like the Vanity Fair story part of the book and found that to be the most engaging.
Skip this one. Two stars. Thanks to NetGalley for a digital arc.

Thank you to NetGalley and Harper Publishers for the preview of this book! The Club is a fast-paced, thriller novel that leaves you guessing pretty much through to the very last page. When the Home Group is opening their most extravagant club to date, the members and staff alike are primed for the most eventful launch in history. However, chaos ensues from day 1, and no member or staff is exempt from the mayhem. Lloyd writes this story in a unique way, following different first person POVs; it is hard to follow at first, but then you can't get enough of the flipping perspectives. This was a quick read that kept me hooked.

Thank you to NetGalley and Harper for the ARC for review.

Despite a bit of a slow start and a few issues with the writing style, I had enjoyed spending a snowed in afternoon with The Club.

The multiple POV aspect of this book is skillfully done - the character's stories almost all intertwine in various ways, and little surprises keep coming all the way until the end of the book, with some of them being expected and others more surprising. Groundwork for the ultimate conclusion is laid throughout all of the POVs as well, and at times I thought it was a little heavy handed, only to discover that a ton of subtle pieces had been sprinkled in, as well.

The last third of the book felt like chaos - the walls that had been closing in on various characters causing different people to act out in different ways. Something that kept me engaged was that while I couldn't have predicted at all what was going to happen based on how the characters had been drawn and behaved up to that point, at the same time, it made sense in the moment, when push came to shove under the immense pressures they were facing.

My only minor complaint is with the writing style - this book felt very bogged down at times with a specific writing quirk. Everything - EVERYTHING - got multiple examples. A room's decor was mentioned: a painting, a rug, a vase, a stack of magazines. Amenities on the island were discussed: a sixteen item list of spas, yoga pavilions, pools, restaurants. A celebrity mentions public opinion: four examples of false narratives.

This is in every POV, how every character thinks, often in how they speak, in the writing style of the interspersed article describing the incident in retrospect. So, so, SO much of that could have been cut with zero impact on the story at all.

Other than that, this book was really clever and enjoyable, and I ended up reading it in one sitting.

Thank you NetGalley, Harper Collins, and Ellery Lloyd for the eARC of this book!

If you like Lucy Foley-style mysteries, you will love The Club! Anything can go wrong when a bunch of famous, rich people are on a private island for an exclusive club launch…

What I liked:
Multiple POV
Lots of character backstory

What I disliked:
I wanted the chapters sectioned differently. Switching POVs mid-chapter was really difficult for me.

Overall, The Club is an enjoyable read! Although the twists fell a little flat for me, I’d still recommend this book to anyone who wants a fast-paced, “locked room” type mystery.

3.5 Stars rounded up.

A group of A-list celebrities, a remote island getaway, a weekend with no rules...what could go wrong??

Ned Groom began Home, an exclusive club for VIPs, as a place where the world's elite could gather and let their guard down with the promise of utmost secrecy. With clubs all over the world, Home quickly became THE place to be a member. With the launch of the newest Home, Island Home, things aren't quite as they seem and the delicate balance of power, secrets, and the past are threatening to change things forever. But these A-listers won't go down without a fight.

This was a quick and intriguing read. I can't say I loved most of the characters, but Jess and Nikki both really stood out and I loved their storylines. I can definitely see why this is a Reese's Book Club pick! If you like celebrity memoirs/thrillers/slower-paced books, this one is for you.

Thank you to NetGalley and Harper for an e-arc of this book in exchange for my honest review!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to review this book.

This was a quick, compulsive little read. Home is an ultra exclusive club for celebritties--a place where they can go to just be themselves. When a new Home opens on an English island with only one road on and off the island, things are bound to get a little wild. What no one expects is murder.

I enjoyed this book. It's one of those books where things are fairly easy to figure out early on, but the writing is engaging enough to keep the reader locked in.

Are you one of those people who likes to read about the latest celebrity gossip while standing in line at the grocery store? If so, you will most likely find this book entertaining. This is a juicy read that has several fun twists to it. However overall it did miss the mark for me. I loved Ellery Lloyd's first book, People Like Us, so I was very excited to read this one. The concept of the book is a great one and I enjoyed the format of alternating story with the newspaper article. Here is where it fell short for me - this book was too descriptive, had too many points of view and took too long for the story to get going. Now once it finally does, it's interesting and exciting. But the pace was too slow for me.

My thanks to Ellery Lloyd, Harper Collins and netgalley for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Like lots of characters and lots of backstory? Then this book is for you. For me? It was just too much. My eyes got tired of rolling at some of these characters. I also felt like it took forever to get to the really crux of what was really going on. The multiple point of views and history of each of these characters just had my brain in a jumble. Was not a fan, but I know other readers really do enjoy the multiple viewpoints. Take this with a grain of salt. If you choose to read it, let me know what you think!

This book was kind of like a car accident- you know from the very first page that everything is going to crash and burn but you just can’t seem to look away. I was completely captivated by the story. It was clear very early on that all of the narrators had secrets, as did the majority of the main players, but the unique web that connected them all was what kept me turning pages. There is as several points I had to stop reading and let the pieces slowly connected. It’s stories like this, stories about the rich and famous that make me thankful for my humble life. While the characters in this story were all horrible people, the story itself was entertaining and was well paced. The multiple narrators, kept things interesting and the ending was satisfying.

Good story with despicable characters, didn't like any of the featured characters. Told in multiple points of view, but done well. Thanks to Netgalley for the opportunity to read this book.

📚Book 9 of 2022: The Club by Ellery Lloyd

💬Reader’s Digest Version: Home is an exclusive club for A list celebrities and some of the most powerful people in the world. It’s a club everyone wants to get into..until the price of ownership costs more than even the richest members are willing to pay.

🏃🏻‍♀️My Take: This book was ok. Mildly intriguing at times..and predictable AF. No major twists that I didn’t see coming. As far as thrillers go..this one was a little bland for me. That is not to say it wasn’t entertaining..it was a fun, fast page turner. Perfect beach read or for anyone that needs a quick page turner to get lost in for a day.

🌟My rating: 🌟🌟🌟/5.

Murder? Yes!
Mayhem? YES!
Drama? HECKK YES!
Exclusive club on a remote Island? YOU GOT IT!
SECRETS, SECRETS, SECRETS!!

Oh, the drama! Apparently, drama is what I like. It's the jam to my peanut butter; the Fred to my Ethel- I could not get enough, I flew through this book faster than any other lately and I'm actually pretty sad to be finished with it. I felt that the author(s) really brought the characters to life and made them plausible, authentic. I obviously have no idea what it's like to be a famous ANYTHING- but I felt the stress, the tension, the expectation through the pages I read. There was no 'fluff'- I didn't have to sift through un-necessary jargon or wordy paragraphs which bog down storylines (and lately thrillers). The opening scene throws you right into the midst of the action, keeping you on the edge of your seat throughout. I enjoyed the multiple POVs and how each character viewed themselves and others. I loved the different sub-plots, each person had their own secrets, and their own motivations for their actions...which were INTENSE.

Howdy bananas, this was a great read and a wild ride that I wasn't expecting.

This is one of those books that I lost interest in pretty early on but pushed myself to finish because I was given a free copy for an honest review. I honestly think if I could watch this, I would have most likely liked it more. There were so many characters, so many details to keep up with. I didn't find a lot of on the edge of my seat moments, even though there is a little twist at the end. This is like a where to be and what's hot right, celebrity column. I loved Gossip Girl, so you'd think this would be a book for me, but I just wasn't feeling it. That said, if they make a movie, I'll probably watch it. lol

Thank you to @Netgalley for an honest review.