This thriller, set in the Italian countryside, jumps between two timelines in the same villa. Writer best friends Em and Chess meet for a vacation in an Italian villa as Em is going through a nasty divorce and feels the pressure to finish writing her next cozy mystery. In the same villa, decades earlier, a violent murder occurred as a group of friends vacationed together. At first, it was difficult to keep up with the different timelines, but later the book comes together and I did not see the twists coming. The 1974 story was harder to follow than the present day, I think because the references between the two weren’t clearly explained. I did enjoy the book overall but I almost stopped reading at 40%. This was my first Rachel Hawkins book but I look forward to reading more.

Thanks to St. Martins Press and NetGalley for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you to St. Martin's Press, NetGalley, and Rachel Hawkins for this ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

I love thrillers and I really liked this book. I loved the multiple storylines. I loved the friendship between Emily and Chess. This is a book that I will recommend.

Rachel Hawkins does it again! Highly recommend! What an amazing book! This book is about a villa in Italy that two groups of friends go to for holiday during the summer. It is told in two different time periods…one was in the 70s and then present day. They are artists, musicians, and writers and gain inspiration form staying in the villa. They have more in common than you realize. That’s all I want to say cause I don’t want to spoil this book for anyone. Loved this book !

The Villa is Rachel Hawkins' best thriller in recent years. Her previous work, Reckless Girls, was fun but over-stuffed with characters. The Villa keeps things more intimate, bringing best friends Emily and Chess together for an Italian vacation to end all vacations. As Emily digs into the villa’s sordid history, she begins to think there might be more to the story--and more to her relationship with Chess that meets the eye.

4.5 stars. It's a breezy, fun thriller, splitting perspectives between the villa's past and Emily's uncovering of the past. It's a story within a story done cleanly, where both POVs are given equal weight.

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

I feel really bad, but I am going to DNF this book. The jarring switch of characters only a chapter and a half into this book did not work for me. The first two characters were a little bland, but I would have wanted to know a little more about them. The 1974 characters did not interest me at all, and I lost interest in the story overall after it.

Wow. I love Rachel Hawkins. The Villa tells the story of two best friends/frienemies who travel on vacation to Italy. The home they’re staying at is the same home a famous musician was brutally murdered in, in the 70s. Despite that, the villa is gorgeous, and a dreamy summer unfolds — despite a super competitive friendship between Chess and Em.

What I LOVED was the story within the story. Throughout The Villa, we bounce to Mari’s perspective and her writing, and excerpts from magazines/articles - which was SUCH a fun addition to the read!

Without giving ANYTHING away, the twists within The Villa (and yes, that’s plural) were so well-placed. This is a must read for your 2023 reading list!

Please do not use this review against me but this book wasn't really worth it.

Mari's story was interesting but predictable.
Em and Chess were unlikable but I did appreciate the plot twist; but even their plot twist felt predictable.
I kind of wish this book gave more but it just felt like a lot of filler. I feel like there could've been more with Em & Chess's story, especially being in Italy. There could've been more.
Mari's story was predictable but confusing. I wish she had actually killed Pierce and it had not been Johnnie. Her story felt forced and the part with seeing Noel and hearing from Lara was also confusing because did she write it? Did it happen in her head? Or did it actually happen?

Pub day: 1-3-2023

A remote Italian setting will always work for me and this one, even with its extreme creepiness, had me wishing I could pack my bags and live in Italy for a summer!

There was a lot I liked about this one, I particularly found the transitions from intensity to normality and back again to be an excellent way of holding my attention. Having two timelines at the same Villa, present day and 1970s, also worked well and tied everything together easily.

In the synopsis it states that this story was “inspired by Fleetwood Mac, the Manson murders, and the infamous summer Percy and Mary Shelly spent with Lord Byron at a lake Geneva castle—the birthplace of Frankenstein” and you can really see all of that as the story unfolds. I liked the 1970s character storyline a lot and found myself most looking forward to those sections.

In the digital version the abrupt changes from the past timeline to a podcast or the reading of a book was a little rough. Those sudden shifts would jar me out of the moment and take a bit to get back into the story. The only struggle I had was with the present day characters who were all a bit grating. Overall, I enjoyed my first book by Hawkins.

I really enjoyed THE VILLA! I thought the audio was done very well. I especially loved the alternating timelines.

This one will have readers really engaged and turning pages quickly! I personally loved the ending as well; there’s lots to discuss.

Emily and her best friend Chess take a vacation to Italy. Their rented house, Villa Aestas was known as Villa Rosato in 1974 when it was the scene of a terrible murder. Flashing back and forth from Emily and Chess to the circumstances of the murder in 1974, Emily tries to unravel the secrets the house holds.

"Houses remember" This was a fun, fast-paced thriller that keeps you guessing right to the end. Emily and Chess's relationship is strained and the similarities between them and the people in the house in 1974 are interesting. Emily's got a lot going on in her life, from her book series to her estranged husband to her distrust of Chess. Everything seems a little bit surreal.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for providing me with an advance digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Available January 3, 2023.

Thank you to @stmartinspress, @librofm and @netgalley for the #gifted copy of the book.

This book was inspired by Fleetwood Mac, the Manson murders, and the infamous summer Percy and Mary Shelley spent with Lord Byron at a Lake Geneva castle which was the birthplace of Frankenstein.

I enjoyed listening to this on audio. The narration was very good.

Emily and Chess were close friends growing up. Life has gotten in the way over the years. Chess became a self-help author and Emily a cozy mystery author, recently separated from her husband after being ill. Her ex-husband is pushing her to finish her book series to pay him the money he believe he is due.

Chess invites Emily to spend some time with her in Italy and write. Emily thinks this is the break she needs, but little does she know she is in the middle of history and trying to figure out the murderer in a decades old murder mystery.

Overall, it was a good story, but it was a bit slow for me with the dual timelines. I did enjoy the final twist!

Authors Emily and Chess have been best friends for years, but their relationship is complicated; Chess seems to have it all, including a bestselling self-help book and subsequent pop empire, while Emily is struggling to crank out her next B-list mystery novel. When Chess invites Emily on a trip to Italy, Emily sees an escape from her impending divorce and a chance to work in relative peace. What she gets is far different: secrets revealed by both the best friend she thinks she knows and the Italian villa where they're staying. Rachel Hawkins writes a murder mystery/frenemies thriller with enough tension, betrayal, and intrigue to keep the reader on the edge of their seat the whole book.

Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC!

The Villa was wonderful - I read it in one day. It is the story of two "besties" - Em and Chess who go away on a vacation to a villa in Italy to write their own (or possibly collaborate) on a book. While there, they read a novel written in 1974 by Mari and her married boyfriend staying at the same villa with their intertwined group of people. Em also discovers a hidden diary left behind by Mari that uncovers more mysteries of the villa. Secrets are uncovered, relationships are tested, lies are told - I highly recommend The Villa!

Thanks to NetGalley for an arc of The Villa. Think part Daisy Jones, part Rock Paper Scissors, part the Most Likely Club. I’m a Rachel Hawkins fan so I was excited for her newest book.
So this book is a story within a story. The timeline goes between the 70s and present day. While the storylines are very different, they also have similar themes: Female bonds, romantic relationships and creating art. Daisy Jones vibe comes in with the 70s sex drugs and rock and roll substory. Present day, there are friends competing ala The Most Likely Club and two friends writing books a tiny bit like Rock Paper scissors in the meta nature of writing books within books.
I didn’t love any of the characters. I’m not sure if I was supposed to, though. Part of the theme of the story is how flawed the characters are and how those complexities can serve different purposes.
This book earned a solid 4 stars from me. It was an amalgamation of thriller, female friendships, and pop culture. However, because the characters weren’t compelling to me and sometimes their reactions were so far from what I would expect from most people, it took it down a notch for me. The main character’s paranoia could definitely have been played up more, too.
Overall, I am definitely going to be recommending this to my book loving friends. I devoured it in two days. If you have read her other books, this will rise above them.

This book had me hooked from the very beginning. The alternating timelines between today and the summer of 1974, in addition to the different media forms included (podcast, books, music lyrics) was a little jarring at first, but I ended up loving it and thought it helped tell the story.
The Villa explores complex family relationships, friendships, betrayal, and how life can veer off course of how we think and believe it should turn out. I loved how morally gray these characters were and I did not guess the ending, which I loved even more!

I voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book; Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for allowing me to be an early reader.

I was so excited about this book because I’ve loved the last two books by this author - but this one was really just meh . Overall the story seemed very slow; the current story of the two friends often seemed repetitive and at time kind of boring - and like who needs friends like these two ? The author did throw in a few unexpected twists here and there that kept the story a bit more interesting but overall it was too slow for my liking .

The Villa comes with a murderous history from the 1970's, and two best friends have just booked it for the summer. The haunts of the past begin to infiltrate its inhabitants as one slowly uncovers manuscripts of what truly happened nearly 50 years ago with a group of rockers.

The 70's vibe, the Italian setting and the mysteries had me hooked. And, throw in two complicated friends with a messy relationship, guess what you've got a suspenseful winner. I couldn't stop reading as I was anxious for the resolution to the twist and turns from the past to the present.

Thank you St. Martin's Press for the complimentary copy.

I loved the Reckless Girls so I couldn't wait to dive in to the Villa. Once I started reading, I discovered the focus of the story was a Villa in Italy near Orvieto. Having stayed in a Villa in Italy and having had visited Orvieto, I knew I was going to enjoy this story even more.

The Villa features two timelines that both center on the villa. The modern day story line follows best friends Emily and Chess, both writers. Chess invites Emily to the villa for the summer so they can both focus on writing. The second timeline takes place in the summer of 1974 where several musicians are staying at the villa to write music. We soon learn that a murder had taken place at the villa in July 1974. Emily soon becomes immersed in figuring out what exactly happened that fateful summer, and then starts suspecting that Chess isn't who she thought she was.

The Villa started off slow, and I didn't care too much for most of the characters. But half way through the tensions started to ratchet up and you just know something is going to happen. There were a few things about the ending that left me feeling a little bit unsatisfied, and a few things that just felt a little not very plausible. But there were some twists at the very end that I totally wasn't expecting. Overall I really enjoyed the Villa and it kept me on the edge of myseat. I found there was a lot of depth to the characters and the plot but do wish a few minor things were different about the ending.

I would have DNF’d this had it not been an ARC and on my NG shelf. It just solidified for me that I don’t love reading books that are about rich people behaving badly,

A tale of two writers (okay, more than two, but roll with it) in two different timelines, an idyllic Italian villa with a haunting history, and several deeply flawed human beings. I enjoyed how the two timelines twisted around each other, dovetailing here and diverging there. The details of each storyline unfolded slowly, allowing me to contemplate the possibilities of what might happen next. I did not expect the final twist, and I'm still trying to decide if I liked how it ended, but I'm leaning toward a "yes." All in all, an enjoyable read.