If someone altered your past, altered your memories - would you still be the same person after?
Watching one of your closest friends behave completely opposite of her personality you basically chalk it up to a psychotic break. You suffered a concussion during the same time so you can’t clearly remember the situation. Then you start having weird déjà vu and visions that make you start questioning what really happened. Told from multiple points of you view - This exciting and thought-provoking thriller was a wild ride. Follow a group of teens as they discover the truth about their current lives and what their true past has caused them to become.
With being a fan of Kelly Armstrong‘s previous work, I knew that the story was going to shock me and make me think long after I was finished with this book. A fast and compelling read.

3 &1/2 stars! I love reading Kelley Armstrong. And I was very excited to get an ARC digital copy from NetGalley!

This book was a fun easy read. I like the general idea of the book but I am going to be honest after about 3 quarters of the book I was ready for it to end. There are just some issues in the book that are so unbelievable to me that made me question what the heck I was reading from time to time. Having said that I did like reading this book and the end wrapped up nicely.

I do give this book a trigger warning for talk of sexual abuse.

It's been a bit since I've read anything from Kelley Armstrong, but when I read the summary, I was instantly intrigued.

A young adult psychological thriller with a sci-fi twist? Yes, please!

When Blythe and her friends witness an unexpected outburst at their school, they'll soon discover their memories of the event, and what's to follow doesn't make sense. As they learn the truth, they're left with the question of how far they are willing to go to save their classmates?

My only true complaint would be not knowing this would be a new series, but in truth, I should have realized the possibility as that aligns with Kelley's writing style.

This books begs the question if science really tried to help the children when they were younger? Is it really helping a young child without even thinking of precautions in case things failed? What would happen when they started to remember? As your reading you aren’t sure whether to trust Blythe’s thoughts or even Gabrielle’s thoughts. As Blythe and her friends dig deeper for the truth it may not only surprise but make them question their lives.

Thank you NetGalley and Tundra Books for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review!

This is my first book by Kelley Armstrong and it will definitely not be my last! This was such a refreshing read and such a different book than anything I’ve read before! I loved how Armstrong draws the reader in during the first chapter and just doesn’t let you go. I’m pretty sure that I read this all in one sitting because it was so good and I didn’t want to put it down!

We follow a group of friends (Blythe, Gabrielle, Tucker, and Tanya) who have always been close, but recently different events have caused them to drift apart. Blythe found her friend Gabrielle covered in their principles blood standing in front of the deceased principal, but almost just as fast as the event happened, the memories disappeared. The group of friends are scrambling trying to figure out what happened and why the memories seem to keep popping up different than what they originally remembered. I don’t want to go too much further because I don’t want to spoil any of the book! I originally went in blind, and I feel like that just helped me enjoy the storyline so much more! Overall, I absolutely loved this book! The characters were so well written and I loved discovering more and more about them as the book went on! Definitely would recommend checking out this book!!

This review will be posted to my Instagram blog (read_betweenthecovers) in the near future!

Psychological thrillers are a particular weakness of mine. This one checks all my boxes. I honestly don't think I've read anything by Armstrong before, but I'll be seeking her out if I ever see the end of my TBR stack.

Blythe and her friends are relatable and familiar. I mean, I work in a high school and I can "see" these characters in my hallways. Thinking back, not one was described in enough detail to form a picture for me, but I think that added to their development because they could be anyone I encounter any day of the week. Their reactions to the things that happen in the story are real.

Armstrong doesn't pass us information in bits in pieces. She starts right away with Gabrielle and a dead school principal. And then that's covered up. It rolls on from there. The story unfolds around the characters. It's both a thriller and very cloak and dagger. Who do you trust, when you aren't sure you can trust yourself?

I finished the one in a sitting. It grabbed me and wouldn't let me go until I had the answers, and it wasn't what I expected at all.

Thank you to Netgalley and Tundra Books for the advanced readers' copy.

4.5, WOW. Someone Is Always Watching was really really entertaining. The beginning was a little slow and confusing at first since so many characters were introduced at once, but the story really picked up quickly, After a certain point, it was hard for me to put the book down.

I love thriller novels, and this book delivered everything that should come with a thriller. There were so many twists and turns with an overall jaw-dropping storyline. It was also really hard for me to make predictions (which I like because I love being surprised when everything is revealed). If you enjoyed A Good Girl's Guide to Murder, you will definitely enjoy this as well! I am really hoping for a prequel because I am dying to know the backstory behind CMT.

Thank you NetGalley and Penguin Random House for this ARC!

I really enjoyed this book. A wonderful twist at the end made this book totally worth it, and I was hooked from the start. At times, the different POV changes were confusing, but for the most part, I could keep up with the story. I wanted more Chloe, but the character development was well done throughout!

I'm looking forward to recommending this book to my students.

This book surprised me. Armstrong has been one of my most revisited comfort authors since before I was a teenager. She's always been adept at creating a ragtag group of teens with supernatural powers, often with larger-than-life obstacles to face, in addition to the regular drama and minutiae that makes them ultimately relatable. It's a formula that works well for her.

However, with Someone Is Always Watching, she eased back on the minutiae and dialed up the grittiness of the story. She took the intricacies of friendship, memory, and sanity, and she wove them into an action-packed exploration of identity and redemption. She allowed the reader to predict enough twists to feel satisfied, but kept the ultimate twist under wraps long enough that the conclusion was far from disappointing. It was a whirlwind, and I hope that there is more of this story left to tell.

To start off with this review, I thought the story concept was very good. I personally felt like the execution was lacking in some ways however. I feel like we were introduced to so many characters right away, so it was very hard to remember who was who. I also felt like the writing made it seem like we were missing a lot of info at the beginning, which made it feel like I missed a book that I should have read before this one, so it was hard to understand most of the time. Again, I thought the idea was very cool, kids having their minds wiped after they had some huge trauma in their life, and slowly regaining it. After I could finally differentiate all of the characters, I thought they all had decent personalities. I do, however, feel like Blythe rubbed me the wrong way and was too much more often then not.
Overall, I thought this book was interesting, but could have been executed better.

Thank you NetGalley and Penguin Random House for the digital ARC!

Someone Is Always Watching by Kelly Armstrong is a fun, YA mystery/thriller. The story follows Blythe and her friends who discover that their memories are not to be trusted. The beginning hooked me right away, but then I started to get lost. Overall, it was an interesting storyline, a bit of dystopian elements; however, I found myself confused throughout. A book just not for me.

This was actually so much fun. It was a YA Thriller that had a little Dystopian elements that I just loved! This was fast paced, engaging from the get to go and it kept me enthralled from beginning to end.

I went into this blind, and I'm honestly so glad I did. I think it worked really well because I didn't have any expectations, instead I got to unravel the mystery with the gang themselves.

My only issue with this book was when we had the grand reveal there wasn't much information on how stuff like that happened. What was the science behind it? How did they achieve it? I really wish we would've gotten so more information on that instead of just a sentence or two.

I really enjoyed this story and the characters. The story was fast paced and kept my interest the entire time. It was the perfect amount of twisty, engaging, and secretive. This is definitely a book you want to go into blindly and I'm happy I did. I couldn't believe any of the reveals and loved the slow burn romance that was included. The story was unique and I would love to have another involving this same world. The book is told from multiple POVs and really makes you wonder...can you trust everyone you know, including your parents.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Random House Canada for this ARC in exchange for a honest review.

I had really high hopes for this book, but ultimately I found a lot of the situations and relationships to be strange. The dynamics among Blythe and her friends were really weird, like when Gabrielle is holding a box cutter to her throat and Blythe sees Tucker and starts thinking about how much she misses him. Despite several other characters from the friend group having occasional POV chapters, none of them were developed enough to make their voices distinguishable from any other character. While the big reveal of what CMT was doing was interesting, there was very little resolution or details given about it. It was never explained how the teens' memories were replaced or how their fake memories were implanted, and there was very little conversation between each character and their respective parents about what their parents had done. Or what the characters had done - Blythe vomits when she learns that she accidentally killed her sister, but after that, she seems to come to terms with it almost immediately. Even though the point is that since their memories were removed and replaced, none of them are the same person anymore, but Blythe learning what she did is still something that needs extensive time to process.
For the whole of the book, these characters are sneaking around behind their parents' backs, convinced that their parents are doing something bad. Especially given what Gabrielle was saying during her breakdown at the beginning of the book, everything seemed to be setting up for the parents/company to be malicious figures. And while that was certainly the case with Tanya and Tucker's father, most of the other parents, like Blythe's, wanted the best for their children, even if they were a little misguided at times.

I’m a little conflicted on my feelings for this story. Overall it was interesting and set at a good pace but I found myself confused more often than not.

Getting into the story we know Gabi is acting weird suddenly with no hint of what’s going on. The night the principal died was the first thing that threw me for a loop.. I felt the way Blythe’s memory loss was handled was confusing. I had to read the blurb I the back to understand what happened.

Then shortly after I noticed I didn’t know what the characters looked like. There’s no further mention of their looks besides tucker being called a white boy and them stating Tanya has blonde hair. Nothing. I was puzzled trying to picture these characters.

We go back and forth between characters povs occasionally but going into a chapter I noticed things felt off. It took me a while to realize it was because the POV changes from first person to third with different characters. That felt odd to me and would take me out of the story adjusting to the new POV.

There were genuinely parts of this story I enjoyed. I liked the characters and piecing together what happened with them. The concept of the story with the memory issues and the cause behind it was interesting. It had me paranoid and not wanting to trust any of the characters. The connection between Tucker and Blythe was sweet and I enjoyed the addition of it. The only thing I was disappointed with the characters was not getting more of Chloe and Sydney. I felt there was more to explore there and the characters were a little forgotten.

The ending felt a little underwhelming considering what happened. I felt like there should have been more and bigger lead up. We knew what was happening with CMT and just had the one reveal and it felt a little lack luster.

*4 stars out of 5 stars*

I went into this book anticipating a typical YA thriller and was pleasantly surprised! Someone Is Always Watching is a gripping book with a horrifying concept. It was full of twists and turns and left me questioning what is morally correct. I was hooked from the first chapter and read it in one sitting. I definitely recommend going into this book relatively blind as it will add to the mystery and enjoyment.

The biggest problem I had was just a style choice that did not work for me. There are multiple POVs and they are all told in third person instead of first person. I found myself getting confused about where I was in the story. However, it did not take away from my enjoyment of the novel.

Someone Is Always Watching is out April 11th!

Thank you Netgalley for providing the ARC ebook! All opinions are my own and are given voluntarily.

Great story! This is exactly the kind of book I like, intrigue, good characters, spooky element. Lots of questions at the beginning, fun trying to figure out what's going on.

This was a really enjoyable read. It's easy to fall into the story quickly, and Blythe is an excellent narrator who it is easy to care about. And what a situation she has found herself in. It's clear pretty early on that someone or something is tampering with her memory, and as pieces of the truth are slowly revealed, there's just enough unsaid each time to keep you on the edge of your seat for more. I will say, this isn't the kind of book that has a big, completely unexpected and surprising twist at the end. Rather, it reveals small twists little by little, and the culmination of everything leaves you with this eerie, unsettling truth of what's happened to these kids.

What I really love is the type of questions that the book and this kind of mystery thriller leaves you with. Who is the bad guy in this story? In some ways there may seem to be a clear one, but at a slightly different angle, it's not so black and white. Can an action that seems cruel be justified by a good motive? And where do we draw the line between who gets a second chance and who doesn't? This book poses all of these questions in a way that is thrilling and entertaining. It'll definitely get you thinking for a little while afterward.

Thank you to netgalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

This is the first time I've read a book by Kelley Armstrong. I'm a big fan of books like One of Us is Lying and when I read the synopsis for this one, I felt like it totally gave off that vibe. I was in the mood for a good, quick YA thriller and this one hit the spot. I think the premise of the story is really interesting and not something I've come across before. At times, I felt like the plot got a little convoluted with the characters and there were so many different players in the game, I had a hard time connecting much with any of them. The beginning really hooks you in and then towards the middle it kind of gets lost but by then, you're already so deep in, you just have to finish to at least get an explanation for WHY and HOW all of this is happening. Which I guess in a sense, is the hallmark of a good YA thriller. All in all, a fast and easy read. Nothing that changed my life but it definitely got my thriller fix in.

I love Kelley Armstrong's writing and will always read everything she writes. Unfortuantely, this wasn't my favourite KLA book. One thing is that I really dislike the name chosen for the MMC, so that just kept pulling me out of the story. I was disappointed that cameras didn't play a larger role in the story as a whole. To me it was a bit anti-climactic to learn that they really only affected the one character. There were a couple of other similar red herrings and I was disappointed when they didn't come up again. The main reason I don't rate this story any higher, though, is how quickly the solve and resolution went. I felt like the story raced through the third act and ended too soon, but not in a good way. There certainly is also a lot of positive things to say about this story. I really liked how morally grey so many of the characters are. I enjoyed the casual inclusion of queer characters. The teens all had very distinct voices, and I liked being able to spend a bit of time in all of their heads. Overall, I'd rate this book 3.5 stars.