I love Kelley Armstrong's books! Someone is Always Watching follows Blythe, a rule-following teen, who witnesses her friend have a mental breakdown and attack a teacher. The next day, she can't remember what happened and then is gaslit from there onwards.

This is a fast-paced thriller that focuses on the psychology and relationships with a mystery to solve!

Blythe needs to break the rules and figure out who is trustworthy.

When one of their friends has a violent breakdown at school, Tanya, Tucker, and Blythe go looking for answers. What they find will change how they view themselves, and the world they know.
This is more of a dark suspense novel rather than a traditional thriller or mystery. It tackles some tough topics, including trauma and identity. The characters are well developed, and the science is compelling, if more fiction than fact. The reveal about memory modification is fairly early on, and the bigger mystery is how deep the story goes, who all is involved, and who is pulling the strings to reveal the truth. While the pacing of the book is generally consistent, the ending does feel rushed. There are questions let unanswered, and the conclusion feels a little incomplete. It almost feels like it's setup for a second book.
All things considered it was an engaging read that kept me interested till the end.

The first sentence grips you into a wild ride of friendships, dark secrets, and what we will do to protect them. This YA psychological thriller about a group of friends who are left to put the pieces together after one of them has a breakdown. After ranting about cameras and about being watched she is later found covered in blood alongside her murdered teacher, But with no memory of the attack, her friends are on a mission to help her and find out the truth. They know that she is not capable of such violence. Or is she? The truth they unravel is even harder to accept. Who can they tell? Who can they trust? This mystery explores how our memories affect our identities, and how we view the world. I really enjoyed watching this mystery unfold, it left me wanting more.

Thank you Net Galley for providing me with the ARC copy for an honest review.

Thank you Net Galley for the arc.

I really love YA thrillers and this book is a really strong example of why the genre is amazing. It's quite fast paced and thrilling, with new questions being opened up with each discovery. I really liked the friend group and how the characters are all really well fleshed out. The sciency concept is also very interesting, but I wish it could have been explored a little more. Also, as a person with migraines, loved the inclusion of the MC getting migraines and the romantic interest being nice by getting her coffee and meds, that's so sweet of him!!

Someone is Always Watching by @kelleyarmstrongauthor

“A f***ing psychopath just ambushed you in your garage, and you’re getting pissy about his vocabulary?”

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

First off, thank you to @netgalley @kelleyarmstrongauthor and @penguinrandomca for an advanced copy of this book!

Now onto the review!

Some of my favourite thrillers are Armstrong’s Young Adult Thrillers and Someone is Always Watching follows that same outline as her others, which I really enjoy.

So let’s get into what I liked:

1. We have a solid friend group where all of the characters are flushed out nicely.

2. There is normally some type of institute or facility at play.

3. The plot is evenly paced and well balanced with the character development and world building.

4. The writing is great!

5. Something that I have noticed, and absolutely love, with Armstrong works over the recent years, is that she is putting more effort into making inclusive books especially ones that do talk about social issues. In this case we get a realistic, not a stereotype, ACE (asexual) character. While this character is not a MC, she does play a huge part in the novel and is my favourite character (she is such a bad ass). We also get a few other LGBTQIA+ characters but what really stood out was the accurate ACE rep.

6. The issues and conflicts here are very grey! And I love that!!

Now for why I rated it 4/5 stars:

This book is oddly similar to her Darkest Powers series but instead of supernatural influences we have science. I LOVED that series, but because of the similarities, I feel like I read this story before. There isn’t much new here besides being a bit more inclusive and a hell of a lot more grey when it comes to the “villains”.

If you enjoy thrillers in general, I think you will love this one, whether a teen or an adult. I will point out that I did guess two of the main twist points but still loved it and wanted to see how it all played out. I was not disappointed.

Well, well, well! That was quite a read! I went in expecting the usual young adult thriller but boy, was I wrong! Someone is Always Watching is an ominous and gripping book, filled with paranoia and who's plot is shrouded in mystery. 

I really, really enjoyed this one! The story took a direction I wasn't expecting but I loved. It had me completely hooked from the first couple of chapters. I'm being vague on purpose as I think the less you know going in the better! I went in relatively blind and it definitely added to my enjoyment!

Thank you to Penguin Random House, NetGalley and Armstrong for this digital copy! I thoroughly enjoyed this book and recommend it to any fan of YA thrillers! Someone is Always Watching is out April 11th!

* Please research any trigger warnings before reading *

3.75/5. I thought this book was pretty good. It reminded me a lot of other popular YA thrillers like one of us is lying and a good girl's guide to murder, so if you liked those I think you would really enjoy this one as well! I have been in a bit of a rut with reading sooooo many thriller/suspense novels lately, but this one was very unique. It was definitely very fast-paced and I grew to love the characters. My rating wasn't higher because some of the events and the twists in the book were such a stretch, but overall it was an enjoyable read and I do recommend it!

It started out slow. why does everyone have a headache? lol but it got me wanting to know what was going on eventually. I never read anything by Armstrong before but i liked her writing style so I'll read more by her. Glad I read this.

Thank you to Netgalley and publisher for this ARC!

Unfortunately I am rating this book a bit low with 2.5 stars. While I had a great experience reading from this author's fantasy series' as a teen, this one did not work for me. Considering it was a thriller/mystery, I was able to predict 90% of the twists. Most of the reveals were given too easily to the audience and too obvious. The writing and characters were also lacking. I liked the overall message and appreciated seeing some LGBT+ rep. Although I would be interested in seeing some own voice reviews to see how what they thought of it.

This was a fair and enjoyable read.I did enjoy the writing of this book. It’s not super flowery or dense and was easy to devour. The characters and the mystery was fun. If you just want a mystery thriller to have fun with, I think it’s worth the read.

ARC kindly provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I really enjoyed this book and couldn’t put it down. Kelley Armstrong is one of my favourite authors and I was very excited when I got approved for reading this book. Thank you to Netgalley, Kelley Armstrong and Penguin Random House Canada for an opportunity to read an advanced copy of this book.

Firstly, thanks to NetGalley for providing me with the ARC.

I was excited for this book but I found that it fell flat. I guessed the general story line quite early on in the book and I felt as though it lacked what any good thriller needs; this sense of urgency that encourages you to read more.

The characters were a little boring but the romance between Tucker and Blythe was okay. Overall, a book that has a good premise but perhaps not for me.

3 stars

Such a fast read with lots of twists. There were things I figured out and things that did not know until the end.

What a fun twisty ride!! Told from mainly Blythe’s perspective but some supporting characters occasionally, was easy to follow, kept me guessing and wanting to know more! Quick read and would recommend!!

Someone’s always watching it a totally different book. Has a touch of everything including a little bit of science. Fiction . Not usually my favorite but it was ingesting. A science experiment, teenage murderers and even some romance i loved how fast paced this was and how no one is who you think they are

I figured out what was going on when Gabi and Blythe both complained of headaches. This happens pretty quick in Someone Is Always Watching. This doesn’t mean that the journey to the “end” isn’t fun - it is.

Kelley Armstrong gives us complicated characters who then are dropped into a difficult scenario. Relationships have already been formed and blown apart before we even meet the gang. I have to confess that the twins take the story for me. I loved the dynamic between Tucker and Tanya. I adore their bickering because it “hides” their sibling's ride or die attitude for each other. Tucker is the biggest sweetheart which is the complete counterpoint to Tanya’s hard-ass behavior.

The mystery is good. I didn’t guess the killer until Armstrong told us. The group is fun and interesting. I really liked this story. I hope there is a sequel because there are still some answered questions.

I really liked the concept and some of the friendships worked, but some of the characters were a bit under developed and I found the pacing of the plot a bit challenging especially since the ending was a bit rushed . I also felt like it needed one more chapter to close some openings. I wish the friend group had been a little more flushed out, maybe with more flashbacks but did enjoy some of the twists.

As a side note I feel that the formatting of this eARC really distracted from my experience reading and may have impacted my score. While I am understanding of the nature of a uncorrected draft, the in consistent spacing made it difficult to understand who was saying various lines of dialogue which may have impacted my understanding of characters

This book was DIFFERENT. I absolutely loved the dystopian vibe that the author managed to portray, without it feeling too different from reality. Some parts were a bit hard to follow because the characters were introduced so quickly, but once I caught on to who everyone was, I was riveted. I did not see the twists coming!

3.75 stars rounded up to 4 stars!
Really fun and fast paced mystery that kept me on my toes. I love mystery/thriller books where you don’t know who you can trust and everyone is a bit of an unreliable narrator and this definitely had that. I found that the resolution a bit lacking in the end and I felt like there was still some loose ends but really enjoyed reading this book!

I love the basis of this story. If violent tendencies could actually be overwritten in the brain, there would be unlimited practical applications in our judicial system. As for the story, a group of teens begin to have memories that have no basis in their lives. As these memories trigger flashback reactions, they search for the cause. They find that they are enrolled in a behavior modification experiment, but that leads to so many more questions. What is real? Who's behavior is being modified? Are they dangerous now? Who can be trusted? The teens have to face their pasts, live with their present and still hope for a normal future. Is the experiment just a form of control, or does it actually have the potential to help them assimilate normally into society? You question the ethics of tampering with someone's mind against their will versus the safety of society, and the ethics of using children as test subjects in general. I found this to be a compelling story from the point of view of a test subject with a painful past. There is honest emotion, and a desperate search for the truth despite the possible outcome. I connected with the characters regardless of their position in the story/study - they all have authentic motives and responses. Fantastic concept and so engagingly written!