The premise of this book sounded so intriguing! A high-end holiday villa in Italy that has SEEN some things throughout history serves the ideal location for two childhood writer (and rival) friends (Emily and Chess) to reconnect and reignite their complicated relationship as well as provide the time for both writers to focus on their upcoming books.

I was immediately pulled into the present day storyline of Emily and Chess - I sympathized with Emily who is reeling from a recent breakup of her marriage and struggling to finish the next book in her popular cozy mystery series. I remained very skeptical of Chess - the seemingly perfect and almost fake friend - who specializes in self-help books.

The alternating storyline from the past (197os) that follows notorious rock star Noel Gordon who invites up-and-coming musician Pierce along with his girlfriend Mari and her stepsister Laura to join him at his fancy villa for the summer was much more difficult to get into. Primarily because most of the characters in this storyline were difficult to relate to and a bit unlikeable.

However, I'm so glad that I kept reading because when the two storylines beautifully came together, the payoff was oh so good! I really enjoy novels that mix mediums and pull newspaper articles, books, songs, etc to draw out the story. These elements really add to the 'realness' of the story and authenticity! One of my favorite reads of 2023 so far.

Thank you St. Martin’s Press for a digital ARC.
After reading the synopsis, I wasn’t sure if this was the kind of book that would appeal to me. I don’t read a lot of thrillers, but this dual timeline story that takes place in an Italian villa was pretty interesting. There are two POVs, Mary who was in the Villa Rosata in 1974 and Emily who is in the same villa, now named Villa Aestas in the present day, with her best friend, Chess. I found myself enjoying the 1974 timeline more, I guess because it has the allure of the 70s rock and roll attitude and love triangles. Emily & Chess weren’t characters I particularly cared for, but I think this was an intentional. This is a big assumption, but I feel like the author leaves clues throughout the story to explain some things that aren’t blatantly on the page. I finished this book around midnight and the next day, I couldn’t stop thinking about. I’ve read two of Rachel Hawkin’s previous thrillers, but this one is definitely different. In my opinion, it’s incredibly smart.

I was so beyond excited about a new Rachel Hawkins book, but this one just didn’t do it for me. I thought the setting was great, but I was just bored. I didn’t really feel like much happened and I didn’t love the characters. I may just have not been in the right mood for it. Thank you netgalley for my free review copy.

I am a super fan of Rachel Hawkins. I see a book by her and never read the description, I know that book will be amazing and the less I know the more fun I have while reading. The Villa was amazing!

Rachel jumps from past to present and back again effortlessly. There was so much in this book, part female friendship drama part thriller part historical fiction so many moving parts that kept me glued to my kindle.

Great book and I look forward to read more from Rachel!

First, thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the opportunity to read this entertaining book prior to its publication in exchange for an honest review.

I had read Hawkins’ The Wife Upstairs and really enjoyed the suspense in that book and not knowing until far along who the real “bad guy” was in the story. In this book, there is also a surprise at the end of the book – which was a great plot twist.

The book is written in two time periods: Present day and 1974. In each case, there are two women and at least two men that make up the primary characters in each time setting. The physical setting of the book in present day is the Villa Aestas in Orvieto. In 1974 it was known as Villa Rosato. Writing plays a big part in the lives of the characters in both present day and 1974 – whether it’s writing books (both present day with Chess and Emily, and in the 1974 timeframe with Mari) or songs (1974 – Lara and Pierce)

Present day characters are Emily and Chess. Both are writers and head to the Villa to rekindle their writing spark and their childhood friendship. Emily is in the midst of fighting an undiagnosed illness (lots of interesting theories on what is causing this!) and struggling with a greedy soon to be ex-husband in a divorce settlement. She write “cozy” mysteries (I didn’t even know this term – and am glad it’s come to light for me as I’ve read several series), and is struggling to produce the next in the series (probably because her husband wants 50% of the proceeds from her books – post divorce!) Chess is a rather famous author of self-help books. Chess seems to be more of a frenemy to Emily. She lusts after her husband and lies about it; and is jealous of her writing, despite her success in her own genre.

Emily becomes fascinated with the story of 1974 Villa Rosato and decides to divert from writing cozies to writing about the past events at the Villa. Matt is made out to be the bad guy because he wants money – but maybe he’s not as bad as we think. Emily is weak and naive, and easily led. She is the perfect foil for Chess and her pettiness.

1974 time period characters Mari and her stepsister Lara tag along for a getaway to the Villa with musician Noel Gordon and Mari’s boyfriend Pierce Sheldon. Also along for the ride is Johnnie – Noel’s dealer and gopher. Mari is the primary narrator of these sections….and goes on to write a book, Lilith Rising, about her experience at the Villa, a time that ends in a murder.

I did find the back and forth between the 1974 period and present day a bit confusing but once I really got into the book that went away.

Overall it was a great book – with a twist at the end between Emily and Chess and Matt.

I enjoyed this book. Hawkins puts together a story that is intriguing and clear cut. The way she morphed the two story lines, one of the present and one of the past, perfectly enhanced the story in a way that kept the reader going for more.
I didn't love the end, it felt a bit rushed. While Mari was clearly remorseful for what occurred at the Villa, Emily and Chess were not and moved on rather quickly in a slightly bizarre fashion.
Overall, I think my patrons who read mystery will enjoy this book. It was fast paced and I honestly could not tell where the story was going.

i hate to say it, but this book was BORING!! I would categorize this book as a thriller, since nothing thrilling really happened. I feel the one part of the book that was "thrilling" was incredibly rushed and overlooked. I usually enjoy books that go back and forth from present to the past, but both timelines were incredibly boring and felt like they read as their own books.
I wish the author's writing was equally as satisfying as the cover of the books.

This book hooked me with its moving plot, female friendship, historical fiction, and intrigue. However, I did not find many of the character to be believable or have the correct motivations. While I kept reading because I wanted to see where the story went, I would not say that I enjoyed it as much as I anticipated that I would.

I really enjoyed this layer thriller with the two main stories occurring in different timeframes! The first timeline takes place in 1974, when Mari was invited to an Italian villa with her partner (Pierce), sister (Laura), and other musicians. The present timeline follows Emily, who was invited to spend a portion of the summer with her friend Chess at the very same villa. Of course each character is layered with events occurring in their lives and background plots that impact their decisions, but upfront the reader is aware that this Italian villa will play a large role within the book.

Throughout this book, you can feel the slow burn and anticipation as the plot grows to its climax in both storylines. As one of the main characters, Emily, starts to connect herself to Mari, and her friend Chess to Laura, the book really comes together.

In one timeframe it is clear upfront that **something happens**, but the reader is unsure how it all wraps up together, or if **something** also happens in the second timeframe. I think this is what intrigued me the most: while I was waiting for one foot to drop, I was trying to figure out where the other foot even was.

The only part of this book that did not meet my expectation was the ending. There was such a buildup that the final chapter felt unclean, it felt a bit random. It is a good plot idea, but the whole book felt so polished until I got to the ending, if felt like a last minute idea. I would still recommend this book to anyone that likes thrillers!

Thank you to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for this ARC.

This is my first Hawkins novel, but I have read Erin Sterling. I was pleasantly surprised when I found out they were the same person. Overall, I liked this book more than I expected. It was not at all like the typical thriller, and this makes it even more enjoyable. The pace is fast, but keeps the readers attention, without giving up too many details. There were aspects that I did not find enjoyable, like the podcast part. It felt forced and there for little to no reason, as it does not add to the overall plot. It was also a little predictable, but I did not mind because I still wanted to find out how it ended. The ending made me question everything I knew, and everything that happened. If "houses remember," then which of journal entry is the truth?

I will be going back and reading more Hawkins novels.

I want to thank Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for an ARC of this book, and Macmillan Audio for an advanced audiobook.

Such a chilling book that was hard to put down once I got into it! I love Rachel Hawkins’ writing and this book did not dissapoint.

I will admit that this is 100% my fault. I’ve previously read The Wife Upstairs and The Ex Hex by this author and am continually unimpressed. Hawkins’ writing style is very elementary, which does allow for an easy read. However, there is always so much going on with the plot and I never feel like it forms a cohesive narrative. The pacing was also off for me. The first 84% of the book is slow and then the climax and resolution is crammed into the last 16% of the book. This left me constantly putting down the book and not really reaching to pick it up again. Overall, it took me 17 days to read 288 pages, which is highly unusual for me.

For this novel specifically, I felt like there was too much going on with the plot. We have Emily’s perspective taking place in the present day. She’s a cozy mystery writer that’s struggling to find inspiration to write after essentially writing about her love life but is now going through a divorce. Her childhood best friend, Chess, who is a successful self-help author – think Rachel Hollis and Glennon Doyle (which is always an immediate turnoff for me) - takes her on a trip to Villa Aestas in Orvieto, Italy. There is then a timeline and point of view shift to Mari in 1974. She’s staying at the villa with a group of problematic musicians. A murder occurs. We also have random interviews and articles related to the murder sprinkled in at the end of some of the chapters and I’m not sure that they really added value to the story. I think we could have incorporated that into either Mari or Emily’s perspective for simplicity.

One of my biggest issues with this book is the focus on toxic relationships. Toxic romantic relationships, I can take it or leave it. Toxic female friendships, I truly hate reading about them, and I don’t think it should be used as a plot device. Women struggle so much with friendships because we are constantly pitted against one another. I think it would have been powerful if Emily and Chess were childhood best friends that grew up to actually like each other. They do come together at the end of the novel to make a truly horrific decision that is not rooted in logic or reason.

Spoilers ahead…

To continue the above thought, Emily finds papers written by Mari that Mari left in a hidden part of the house when she visited the villa again in 1993 before her death. In these papers, she details what she feels should have happened when Pierce was murdered, i.e., taking it into her own hands to kill him. In actuality, Johnnie murdered Pierce and was sent to prison for it. Personally, I’ll let Mari off the hook because everyone that was involved at the villa that summer is dead, and she doesn’t believe that these papers will actually hurt anyone.

Enter Emily.

Instead of letting go of her relationships with her best friend and her husband after finding out that they were having an affair, she allows Chess to manipulate the entire situation. Chess convinces her that her husband is trying to kill her (not be actually poisoning her but because he causes her stress) and that they should invite her husband to the villa under false pretenses, where he is then involved in a “tragic accident”. This is completely glossed over in the novel and they both completely get away with it due to the reputation of the villa.

Ultimately, Emily takes Mari’s fictional account of Pierce’s murder and uses it as justification for murdering her husband. To be clear, both men are terrible human beings and neither of them deserved to die because of how shitty they were. She then goes on to write a book with her best friend, who she still doesn’t actually like or trust, even by the end of the novel. This isn’t terribly shocking because of how truly horrible Chess ends up being but she could have walked away at any point.

Overall, this book would have been a three-star read for me, but I absolutely cannot get over the ending. This includes the choices that were made and how rushed everything felt. If you enjoyed this book, you should check out the author’s other works. I will likely be staying away.

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press for the Advanced Reader’s Copy.

Two childhood friends- one a newly divorced cozy mystery writer, the other a Gwyneth Paltrow/Rachel Hollis/Brene Brown hybrid with an endless supply of linen leisure sets- take to an Italian villa for the summer, slowly unraveling the dark story of a group of famous musicians and writers who stayed in the villa decades before.

If you’re looking for something to read by the pool at your own Italian villa, this is a page-turner with a setting you won’t mind losing yourself in for a while. The text within the text references the importance of place (a house remembers) and Rachel Hawkins delivers, painting the picture of a house that’s equal parts luxurious and claustrophobic. It’s fast, it’s a little creepy, it’s a good time.

As for the story, which is essentially split between two timelines, I found myself disappointed by one and entertained by the other. The 1960s timeline follows a group of sexually, romantically, and professionally intertwined artists. We know from the beginning that their stay in the villa ends in murder, but get to watch their messed up group dynamics play out as our current day protagonist learns more about the crime. If you enjoyed Daisy Jones and the Six, you might like these badly behaved bohemians. I certainly found this the more interesting story, even though the family dynamics were… weird as hell, to put it mildly. The step-sisters are a lot more chill than they should be.

I could not get myself interested in the main/current day storyline. Making fun of self-help books and their authors is a favorite pastime for me, but even the opportunity to laugh at a Rachel Hollis joke didn’t make this part of the story enjoyable. There’s a bit of a twist in the end, but only enough of a twist to make me annoyed when it didn’t pay off or make sense (the explanation for the protagonist’s sickness felt especially under-thought).

Overall, this is a quick, fun, minimally suspenseful read that someone is sure to enjoy this summer- I just might not be that someone. The attempts at subverting the predictable endings in both stories just left the author’s message confused (friendships between women are… fake and/or violent?). But the hate-able men were very hate-able, and I appreciate that. Thank you to St. Martin’s Press for the digital ARC.

*received for free from netgalley for honest review* This was a really good read, i like this author so i admit i was expecting a good read lol and i did like this one. Ngl really had me in the first half of JC's explanation lmfao would recommend.

A vacation villa in present day Italy where two lifelong friends spend six weeks, jumping back in time to the villa in the 1970s where a rock star and some tagalongs spent a summer. It is a murder house, and houses remember!! What a story this was! It was a story within a story which sometimes can get confusing or slow, but this was entertaining and satisfyingly foreboding. I love Rachel Hawkins' writing style--total respect goes to her word choice and use of active voice. 4.5 stars.

3.5 stars rounded up. “The Villa” is a suspenseful, tension-filled read spanning two timelines, 1970s and present day. I was compelled to read this before vacationing at an Umbrian villa myself, just to really set the tone.
Overall, I enjoyed this novel, though I felt that more could have been made of the setting, both the house and the Italian countryside in general. I felt similarly about Hawkins’ Southern Gothic “The Wife Upstairs” - such potential to use the creepy, atmospheric setting as more of a storytelling device.
Hawkins’ characters are compelling; however, I found myself gravitating toward the 70s plot-line’s cast, as the protagonist in the present day kept making frustratingly avoidable mistakes. I also found Chess to be wholly unlikeable (though she is decidedly supposed to be).
While most of the book was a slow burn, building suspense and creepy vibes, I felt like the end was a bit rushed and multiple plot twists at the end felt unnecessarily confusing. Generally though I enjoyed this read and would say it’d be best read with a chilled glass of Orvieto in hand, while Carole King plays softly on vinyl in the background. (Thank you NetGalley for the advanced copy!)

This is my 2nd book from Rachel Hawkins and wow! This is such a great thriller. It's a gothic style suspense (I just finished reading The Cloisters and it's in the same style!) set in an Italian villa. I loved the setting!

This was my first Rachel Hawkins book and it was great! Love the storyline. I haven't read anything like it so far. I love the parallels between the 70's storyline and the modern storyline. Mari went through so much in her life, I kept forgetting how young she was. I was disappointed about how sick Emily was and it was chalked up to her body "knowing" about her marriage and the whole Chess and Matt thing wasn't as dramatic as I wanted it to but overall the storylines were great. I can't wait to read more of Hawkins books! 3 1/2 Stars!

It's taken 3 books under the name Rachel Hawkins for me to finally like a book by this author under this genre. I was disappointed with The Wife Upstairs, but it did get me to finally read and love Jany Eyre. I felt like Reckless Girls was boring and predictable, but, you know, someone famous had picked The Wife Upstairs as a book club pick and she was all the rage. I can admit I went in to this one with very low expectations. Now, I'm not saying it's the best ever, or that I loved it. I simply liked it.

Emily and Chess are best friends but as adults haven't stayed as close. Emily is recovering from some mysterious illness, getting a divorce, and having major writer's block on her tenth book in a cozy mystery series. Chess, who got mega famous (think Rachel Hollis, from Girl, Wash Your Face) on self-help and female empowerment, suggests that Emily spend the summer with her in Italy. Emily agrees, even though she finds out the Villa they will be staying in is a "murder house". A group of people, one famous before the visit, and 2 who became famous, after, along with 2 others all stayed there back in the 70s, when one of them killed the other. The one who gets Emily's attention is Mary, who wrote a book that lead the way in "feminist horror". She finds a copy of the book at the house and reads it and then listens to some podcasts about it and has a new idea for a book, more in the true crime genre.

I think of the timelines, I liked Mary's the best. I would say some of the twists are hinted at early on, and other's are not hard to predict, but for all that, of the 3 books under Rachel Hawkins, I like this one the best. I do feel the need to say, there is one choice Emily makes in regards to Chess that I will never understand.

It follows multiple point of views all revolved around the villa. With it being winter in Ohio with freshly fallen snow, it was nice to get lost in this Italian villa and the stories of those that stayed there. It did not have any big twists but it was still fun to read.