Thank you so much to NetGalley for the ARC.
I don't have much to say about the book, I didn't like it that much, and I don't even remember most of the plot anymore.

Trigger Warning: Books contains domestic abuse.
Lonely and abandoned by her abusive husband, Mary is quick to accept the friendship of widow Ruby after saving her life during an apparent seizure on the New York subway.

The older woman embraces Mary, urging her from her reclusive existence and back into life again.

But after Mary jokingly says she wishes he were dead, his body washes up in the East River, showing signs that his death was no accident.

The story kept me engaged enough to keep listening. Ruby appears lonely and disabled and Mary is broken after the abuse, so it seems a likely friendship. Things quickly spiral and Mary finds herself in another toxic relationship. It's very single white female and had enough twists and turns to keep you going. I think the writing could be improved, but as a reader, I wasn't super put off by it. This was my first by this author.

Thank you to Dreamscape Media, Cole Baxter, and Netgalley for allowing me an advanced copy! Catching up on all my reviews.

Okay I will be honest . This book has caught and held my attention. I was following the main character and understanding her situation. I was curious what would develop and where the story would go. I was curious to see how the relationship with the friend would be managed and how things behold turn out. When I got towards the end it did become a little grizzly but it did fit with the way the plot and story line was developed. I was having a bit of difficulty at the end because of this factor but all in all it was well written and if you like thrillers or psychological drama it will not disappoint .

I’m not sure I ever listened to a story like this one. I loved the dynamic between ruby and Mary- and seeing it unravel with each weird thing that happens.

After having finally left her abusive husband, Mary is getting back on her feet. She can't help but feel lonely and is trying to slowly build up her self-confidence after years of abuse. When she jumps in to help an older woman on the subway who is having a seizure, she is quick to accept a friendship with the woman, who she is learns is named Ruby, is a widow and former actor.

Ruby seems to be helping Mary get out into the world again, and becomes a trusted confidant. After helping Mary with a scary situation in which her ex-husband comes by, Mary appreciates Ruby's friendship greatly. But as time goes by, Ruby's friendship becomes very overbearing. When Mary's ex-husband winds up dead, all the red flags about her new friend start to come together in Mary's mind. Can Mary try to extricate herself from her new friendship without anything bad happening?

This book had a good premise and started off strong. But it got quite far-fetched after that. For example, Ruby is described as elderly, but yet the reader is supposed to believe that she is capable of tasks that require such physical force. Also, Mary is portrayed as quite a weak-willed, overly naive woman. I understand that the author was trying to play up the fact that Mary was emotionally abused for many years, but I feel that it was overkill. I also found the narrator's voice for Ruby to be very over-the-top "sugary", to the point of being unrealistic and annoying.

In conclusion, I found the concept of the book to be a good one, but the execution was off for me. I appreciate the opportunity to read and provide an honest review of this book.

Another great one from this author. Thanks to Netgalley for allowing me to review this book..I always enjoy reading Cole Baxter.

** spoiler alert ** Man, this book title should be NEVER, EVER trust a stranger!! I absolutely did NOT see it coming how fucked up Ruby was going to be! Mary's life was not great pre-Ruby but so, so much worse after she met and developed a friendship w/Ruby! I loved how strong and spirited Molly stayed throughout her entire ordeal, she was a bad-ass! Of course, my favorite part was Mary getting a happy ending after sh escaped from Ruby and brought her to justice!

#TrustaStranger #NetGalley

*received for free from netgalley for honest review* 3.5. this book had it's moments but overall i am unsure if this is a book i would reread again.

This was my second book by Cole Baxter and I really enjoyed it. After reading the description, I thought this would have more about domestic violence but that really wasn't the case. This is a pretty unique type of thriller that follows a bizarre friendship that you never know whether to trust. I could tell from the start that Ruby had something off about her so as the story unfolded I wasn't really surprised. I do wish the author had included more of the husband's storyline because that just seemed to be randomly thrown in and barely addressed. I think a bit more development of the issues in that marriage would have made this much more intense. Overall, I enjoyed this but think it was missing some opportunities to make this more intense and exciting, Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you Netgalley and Dreamscape Media for this advance listener copy in exchange for my honest review.

This was a great book. This is the second book from Cole Baxter that I've read and they were both great. Very good, edge of your seat thriller. I loved Mary as a character. I could relate to her and I empathized with her many times. She was authentic and realistic as a protagonist. All the characters were perfectly developed and Ruby was great as well. Baxter has good character development in his stories. The plot was great too. And, one thing I really like about Baxter's writing is that he doesn't try to over do it with twists. Too many thrillers try to throw twist after twist in the book and it ends up getting muddled. Baxter does not do this in his books.

Mary befriends Ruby after Ruby has a seizure on the subway and Mary helps her out. Mary quickly realizes that you can never truly know someone. Especially someone you just met.

To be clear, I give the book itself an enthusiastic 4.5 stars. However, the audio was TERRIBLE. I hope to never listen to that narrator again. Her voice for Ruby sounded like a child. It drove me nuts. Since this review is of the audiobook, I have to knock it down a full star. The narrator will likely cause some people to DNF this book. I would recommend it in print, not audio. 3.5 stars for the audiobook.

I want to thank Netgalley and the author for gifting me the audio version. Didn't really care for the story it seemed just unrealistic. I didn't really enjoy the narrator's voice. And to me the story could have been cut way down. The main character was absolutely so annoying and I was rolling my eyes at how clueless she was about the whole situation. The domestic abuse parts are seriously very very short but that even seemed over the top. I don't know just amateur writing.

The story is about Mary, her husband leaves her for a younger girl and even sneers at Maori and says “you’re just old!“ She’s 32. Then one day when she’s on the subway an older lady start having a seizure and everyone on the subway car is either laughing or looking away, except for Mary and thanks for being a good citizen she finally has a new friend or does she? At first her new friend showers her with gifts, nights out on New York City and Mary is enjoying all of it. Things are finally looking up since her jerk of a husband left. Until she does something for new friend doesn’t like and little by little she sees a new side to this woman, but by the time it’s over her new friends change of attitude isn’t her only problem.
I listen to the audio version of this book in the first thing is I thought the main character responded and on logical ways. The second thing is the narrator made the older lady sound elderly when she was only in her mid-50s. I also found it hard to get into the book and a lot of it I didn’t find to be logical. Like when her husband left it said she was left penniless yet the next day she moved into a one bedroom apartment in New York City and yes they said it was a tiny rundown apartment, but it’s still in New York City and the other things but I won’t bore you with the details. Her friend was supposed to be a fabulous over-the-top type of lady but I couldn’t equal that to the voice that was given by the narrator. Having said that I thought the narrator had a great voice if only she would understand being in your 50s does not equal elderly. I gave this book 3 stars because I found it hard to get into, the inner dialogue was too long and a lot of the scenarios were on logical. I was given this book by not Kelly and I am leaving this review voluntarily. Please forgive any grammar or punctuation errors as I am blind and dictate my review but all opinions are definitely my own. #NetGalley,#Thriller, #ColePorter, #Audiobook

This is my third book from this author and it was my favorite one yet!

Was a little predictable but listening to the audiobook, I definitely enjoyed! I would have changed the voice for the character, Ruby, but otherwise the narrator did a great job.

The author has a skill to write as a women realistically and I enjoyed that. It is very believable and authentic. Can’t wait to read more from this author.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the arc.

I love to be creeped out. This psychological thriller didn't do it. However, it was worthy of my time. Angie Kane, the narrator, would not have been my choice for this story. The voice variations didn't match the characters. Primarily, Ruby who is 50ish, audibly sounds frail and much older. This changes the storyline dynamic.

The how they met and why they stayed in touch was reasonable. Without spoiling, there were other red flags, i.e. signs that were not realistic but did make for a pretty good story. (After reading accidentally back-to-back books by this author, this was my favorite.).

The ending was too far fetched for me.

Thank you NetGalley for accepting my request to read and review Trust a Stranger.

The end of this book saved it for me. I am glad I finished it. The psychological torment was well done. I really wanted to like this book; it is the kind of book I tend to read. Unfortunately, I did not like either of the main characters until the very end of the book. I also found the fact that the "old/elderly" woman was in her 50's. I don't know a single woman in their 50's and up who speak like her. Thankfully, the ending pulled it together. I would try another book by this author. I think he has potential.

This is my first read from Cole Baxter. I found this book a little hard to stick with and Mary to be quite infuriating at times with her naivety. Angie Kane did well with the narration so 4 stars for her.

Thank you to #NetGalley, #DreamScapeMedia and Cole Baxter for allowing me to listen to #TrustAStranger in return for my honest review.

This is my third book by Cole Baxter, and every time I have such high hopes. The blurb about the book pulls me in and sounds so intriguing, but it ends up falling flat. The plot lines have such promise, but he adds too much extra that isn't needed, and the listener gets lost in the weeds and forgets where they are in the story. At its good points, however, this one is very twisty, there are twists and turns that you don’t expect, but there aren't enough to call this a psychological thriller. I did not love our main character, Mary. I found her whiney, childish, and naïve. When the twists were revealed, it was quite sad because it dealt with untreated mental illness, and I didn’t really care for that. As for the plot, I felt like I was left with many unanswered questions that left me wanting to know more.

Trust a Stanger is the story about Mary who is plagued with loneliness and self doubt after her abusive husband left her for another women.
When Mary sees an older women, Ruby, having a seizure on the subway she jumps in to help and the two quickly become friends. The friendship quickly produces many red flags, but due to Mary's issues with self-doubt she overlooks them.
While I did find myself wanting to shake Mary at times for ignoring those red flags, I also found her kindness and vulnerability incredibly likeable. There were several twists and turns throughout the story, some that I guessed, others that surprised me.
I found myself hooked into this story because I wanted to know more. I really enjoyed the way that this book ended.

I'm excited to look up this authors backlist and read more.

On a side note, I'd love to read a story about the life a Ruby before she met Mary.

Thank you to NetGalley and Dreamscape Media LLC for this audiobook.
Release Date scheduled for May 10, 2022.

#TrustaStranger #NetGalley

I really don’t like to leave negative reviews but I was not a fan of this. The story seemed a bit back and forth at times, chaotic and I wasn’t sucked in as much as I was hoping. I did enjoy the narrator though and I will look for more from her.

Trust A Stranger by Cole Baxter started out so promising and the blurb intrigued me, yet the ending did not live up to my expectations. I felt the romance in the book distracted from the psychological thriller aspect. Angie Kane did a good job performing the book. Thank you #NetGalley and #Dreamscape Media for allowing me to listen to this book.