Book Title: The Writing Retreat
Author: Julia Bartz
Publisher: Atria Book/Emily Bestler Books
Genre: Mystery Thriller
Pub Date: February 21, 2023
My Rating: 3 Stars

Awww a book about books!
In this psychological thriller Roza Vallo, a famous horror author invites five up and coming female novelists to her home Blackbriar Estate in the Adirondacks for a month-long writing retreat. The competition is fierce, but there is a whole lot more at stake than just winning.
It is an once-in-a-lifetime opportunity has our protagonist Alex, an aspiring writer and associate editor in a publishing company. Among the four other aspiring writers is Wren, her former best friend with whom her problems remain unresolved.
Roza has them following a rigorous schedule as far as the writing goes, expecting them to write a full- length novel by the end of the month, motivating them with a lucrative publishing deal for the “winner”, whose novel would be judged as the best. Alex soon realizes that this retreat is not going to be easy.
What follows is a thrilling ride with secrets, lies, manipulation and hidden agendas that has the group oscillating between sticking together and suspicion directed toward each other and their enigmatic facilitator/mentor Roza. What is to be seen is how far would each of them go to fulfill their dreams and at what cost.
I went into this excited as I love the idea of the retreat; however when the very first word in the book is profanity and have a low tolerance for it (have been bullied-called a prude and a Sunday School teacher among other things).
My thoughts were okay I want to read this so it can either get worst or better.

I hung in there but it never got great for me. It was more of a struggle than I expected.
There are many 4 & 5 star rating so obvious many love it and I have no doubt it will find the aright audience.

Want to thank NetGalley and Atria Book/Emily Bestler Books for this early eGalley.
Publishing Release Date scheduled for February 21, 2023

The Writing Retreat follows Alex, a struggling author experiencing a writer's block, as she engages in a writing retreat with her idol, horror author Roza Vallo, and four other aspiring writers, including her former best friend with whom she has a contentious relationship. The task given to them at the writer's retreat seems insurmountable: write a book in 30 days. However, Alex finds inspiration and is thriving creatively, only to be stifled by the strange occurrences in the manor, manipulation from the other participants, and ongoing bizarre behavior from Roza. The situation escalates as truths are revealed, leading to an insane amount of twists and chaos. I loved the perspective of following an author's process with the traditional thriller elements included. The secluded location of the mansion also lead to a creepy feeling right from the start. I found the writing beautiful and the structure very well done. Thanks to Simon and Schuster and Netgalley for the advance copy!

I was really impressed by the writing of this novel. The storyline fell into place right from the beginning and continued throughout. Such a suspenseful story and the ending was such a great surprise!

The Writing Retreat by Julia Bartz is an impressive debut that left me constantly trying to fit in a few pages every moment that I could. I really wanted to see how it would end! This was my favorite thriller that I read this year.

Roza Vallo is a famed thriller writer that many young writers admire - many would do anything to meet her but she is famously mysterious. Alex and Wren are ex-best friends who both dream of being authors, and when Roza launches a writing retreat for 5 up and coming authors they both get chosen and have no choice but to put aside their differences and show up. What follows is a nightmare….

I really enjoyed this one - it was atmospheric, moody, interesting, dark, and surprising. I do wish that the “action” was more thorough - I felt like once we got to a scene where a major confrontation was happening it was quickly glossed over. There were also interpersonal dynamics that were introduced that I wanted to know more about. But, all in I found this to be really entertaining and I kept wanting to go back to the book to finish it which is always a great sign!

Thank you to Netgalley and Atria Books for the ARC - the Writing Retreat will be out 2/21/23.

The Writing Retreat was an enjoyable read! I would recommend picking this up if you’re into psychological suspense. It was fast paced and kept me guessing until the end. I will say most of the characters weren’t likable but I think that’s by design.

I've definitely never read anything like this before, and I don't think it's true to say I enjoyed it. I was very hooked for the first 50%, i was trying to sneak chapters in every chance i got to figure out what happened, but then it took a turn there to a wild ride of events.

Something wildly dramatic happened on every single page! If you're looking for a page turner, i really think this book does a good job of keeping your attention.

Random, but one critique is I didn't feel like the excerpts of the book Alex was writing sounded that good?

Overall, I wouldn't recommend this book.

"She showed me how I could take my deepest pain and use it to create something beautiful."

Congratulations, Julia Bartz on this gorgeous, crazy, wild ride of a debut novel!!

When Alex, along with four other female authors, is invited to a writing retreat at the home of her idol Roza Vallo she knows her life will never be the same. What starts as an intense writing competition quickly spirals into chaos.

I highly recommend this book for a fast-paced, multilayered thriller to cozy up with this winter!

Thank you @juliabartz and @netgalley for this ARC. The Writing Retreat publishes on February 21, 2023

Alex is struggling. She and her best friend aren’t friends anymore, she hates her job, and she’s had writers block for a year. She gets invited to a writing retreat in rural New York hosted by her favorite author, Roza Vallo. Alex, along with four other unknown female authors, are now competing to write a brand new novel with the winner getting a huge publishing deal. One of the guests disappears during a snowstorm and everything begins to unravel…

This book truly broke me out of my reading slump. Bartz had me hooked from the first chapter! I really enjoyed the mix of a twisty psychological thriller with some supernatural elements. The end gets a little over the top, but I didn’t feel like it detracted from the overall story. Great debut!

Thank you to Atria Books and NetGalley for the advanced e-copy of this book.

The synopsis of this book sounded incredible, but unfortunately it did not deliver.

There was waaay too much wokeness for me. If you are looking for a far left leaning political agenda, then this might work for you. The sex was gross, weird, and frankly unnecessary. Demons? Nope, run far far away from the evils of this world! Drugs used to spike drinks! Since when is it ok to drug someone !?

There were too many characters to fully develop. The actual stories being written at the retreat were woke, or made zero sense altogether. The supernatural aspect didn’t work. This novel had potential had the story stuck to the actual retreat and missing person storyline.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

I loved this book. It was a perfect winter suspense, I felt like I was trapped in the house with the women at this retreat while I flipped through the pages of this story.

If you're looking for a quick, captivating "what the hell is going on?!" with twists that you're not going to expect, I definitely recommend picking this one up. What a great debut by Julia Bartz.

Good thriller. This was a great concept for a book. Alex is invited to a writing retreat hosted by her favorite author Roza. When she realizes Roza also invited her friend that she had a falling out with Alex is nervous but wants to make the most of this retreat.

It did start out a little slow and it did take me a while to get into the book. I could put this book down and forget about it but once it started getting interesting it drew me in. I wanted to know what was going on.

The ending kind of wrapped up pretty quickly but it wasn’t excepted. This author did some good twist and turns through out the book. I was really surprised by some of them. I would definitely recommend and read more by this author.

I was extremely thrilled to read this. The synopsis was about a writing retreat that the main character Alex is attending. Little did she know her ex best friend is also in attendance thanks to her friend, Ursula. Theyre staying at a world famous author Rozas estate with her and are assigned to complete a full novel by months end.
Now let’s get into it.
I had high hopes for this. I loved the cover, it sounds extremely thrilling. But I was let way down. It’s so slow, almost hard to finish. I feel like certain things are forced down your throat the whole time. The excerpts from Daphne are not needed I feel like they were very boring. This book had so much potential and I was really hoping for a good outcome. But halfway through and things finally started to feel thrilling and that’s at the low level of “thrill”.

I will always say yes to a Julia Bartz book. Her pacing is smooth, her characters feel contemporary and believable (enough), and the stories are just FUN. While this one took off on a kind of crazy loop-de-loop, I loved reading it. A perfect atmospheric thriller for winter.

The Writing Retreat follows Alex who is starting to give up on her dream of becoming a published author. One day she receives an opportunity to attend a month-long writing retreat with other writers. Once she arrives she finds out that she must complete an entire novel by the end of the month. At the end of the month the author will choose one winner to get their novel published. Things seem to be going well but then one day one of the authors vanishes during a snowstorm. Alex senses that something sinister is at play and wants to find out the truth in order to save herself.

This book was so good. It does start off a little on the slow side. Like the thriller, part of this book does not happen until about half way through. But man once this book gets going it was so good. The plot twist reminded me a little bit of the plot twist in Riley Sager's book Lock Every Door. I do not want to give too much away in this review but I highly suggest this one. The only thing that I did not like about this book was that it had a book within a book. And I am not a fan of that. I did feel like the ending could have been a little stronger ( but that is just me nitpicking ). But wow this was such a good thriller.

Thank you so much NetGalley, Julia Bartz, and Atria books for the ARC of this book. All opinions are my own.

I did not like this at all. It had potential but quickly went off the rails.

Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this ARC in exchange for an honest opinion.

BOOK REVIEW 💯 📚

Once again, thank you to @netgalley for allowing me to read this ARC of The Writing Retreat. Another 5 star read that I can't wait for everyone else to get their hands on!

Alex, is a struggling wanna be writing stuck in a dead end office job. Her dream is to leave her job to be a writer....only problem? Major writers block. Just as there seems to be no end sight, Alex is invited to an exclusive writing retreat hosted by her favorite author in her own home. The only catch is, her ex best friend was also invited.
As the retreat progresses and things begin to turn strange...like killings, creepy games, and secret passageways strange. Alex soon realizes being stuck with an ex best friend isn't all that bad if it means making it out of the retreat alive.

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This was really good. I love reading about messy women, especially if they're put in interesting stories like this one. For me the book just kept getting better and better as it progressed. I will certainly recommend it to others when it releases and maybe even reread it.

Thanks to the publisher , Author & NetGalley for the ARC of The Writing Retreat… what do I say about this, I knew from the first two words that I would love this book and would really connect with the main character, Alex.. I did enjoy this book for the most part , good plot and good characters and pretty solid debut.. I did find parts of the book a little unbelievable and a lot going on, however it kept me engaged in the story especially the story within the story and I pretty much flew through it.. would recommend this fast paced thriller.. 4 stars!!

I really enjoyed "The Writing Retreat"! It was such a twisted story of an author's retreat gone wrong. It was fast-paced and fun. The only part that I didn't enjoy as much was the ending. I honestly thought that I had missed some pages. But right at the end of the book, everything was explained. Definitely an exciting and twisty thriller! I can't wait to read more by Julia Bartz.

I really struggled going back and forth if this was a 3 or 4 star read 🥴 there was a lot I liked but there was also equally a lot I didn’t like

so I’m ending with an even 3.5⭐️

in THE WRITING RETREAT, julia bartz crafts a tremendous feat for a debut author - a remote old mansion location, a snowed in cast of characters, and of course interesting backstories for all of the characters to make the reader actually care about them

however, what really took the cake for me was the queer representation and the overall arching theme of lack of BIPOC representation in literature. kiera has so many conversations with the others throughout the book on how it feels to be the token BIPOC woman chosen to go on the writing retreat, and as an author, she reflects that in her story writing too.

unfortunately, the characters and plot had a mind of its own and quickly went off the rails for me 🥲 I normally love a heart-pounding fast-paced adventure as the truth behind the super creepy setting is revealed, but the characters overall were so whiny and self-centered that I was almost hoping for their demise at times 😅

and I pretty much guessed the plot twist from the first half, which normally I enjoy doing, but seeing as how that was the main “gotcha” point of the book - I was a bit disappointed 😅😅😅

overall, I would recommend this one to anyone wanting a good ol remote location thriller, as long as they don’t set their hopes too high.

a fabulous debut from julia bartz!!! thank you to netgalley and the publisher for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review!

rating: 3.5 stars
wine pairing: bordeaux red blend