This was a fantastic debut novel! I loved that while it was a thriller it also had the drama with the neighborly gossip. I devoured this one!

Thank You to St Martin's Press and NetGalley for an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

If you are friends with your neighbors and think you know all there is to know, think again. Do you really know what happens behind closed doors, could they harbor secrets you know nothing about and would never suspect.
This is the truth for neighbors living in a cul-de-sac, including sisters, that organize a block party every summer.
The story is told over a year's time beginning with the arrival of a new family moving onto the street and the following summer's party. The story is told in a back and forth style between summers from the perspectives of many individuals, concluding with a very dramatic explosion of truths.

This was a thrilling ride of constant revelations with a cast of well formed characters, leading to a surprising finale.
I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a fast paced well of secrets showcasing the fact that nobody really knows their neighbors the way they really think they do.
Fantastic Book!!!

🪑 I’m pretty impressed by this debut novel! There was a lot going on and I thought the author juggled the various narratives well.

🪑 The story is told from two time periods (one year apart) and two POVs – Alex and her daughter Lettie. If I’m honest, I really couldn’t stand Lettie. She annoyed me tremendously. I also hate it when the adult female MC is an alcoholic in books like this. It is a big turnoff for me when that stereotype is used.

🪑 There are a ton of side characters to keep up with. I think the author did a good job with such a large cast, but I must admit I was getting a little bit lost as a reader. It took me a while to get the hang of who everyone was.

🪑 One of my favorite elements of the book was the neighborhood online chat. I can’t tell you how many chats like that I’ve read in real life. The author nailed just about every demographic possible!

🪑 Overall, I think the author created a complicated tale and an interesting murder mystery. While I had a few nitpicks, I do think it was a good read. I look forward to her next book.

Thank you @NetGalley and @stmartinspress for an eARC of this book, which I have reviewed honestly and voluntarily.

The book opens on present day, someone is murdered, you don't know who, and then the book shifts to one year prior. I really enjoyed the shift in the book as this is where the reader gets all the background on everyone in this small subdivision. As I got to know everyone, I had to restrain myself multiple times from jumping to the end to see who got murdered and who the murderer was. The author wove an intriguing mystery that kept me guessing to the very end.

The novel opens with a party taking place on Alton Road in the Meadowbrook Community. It is the annual Memorial Day block party and Alex, part litigator and part neighborhood busy body, is in charge, again. Very quickly we learn that a murder has taken place, and the neighborhood is buzzing as to who the victim might be.

Then we jump back in time a year, to be introduced to the families on Alton Road, their dramas, and see what might have led to a murder. We have two narrators, Alex, and her teen daughter Lettie, who clues us in as to what is happening with the younger set on Alton Road.

The things I liked in The Block Party, first, lots of drama! Drama on overdrive. Everyone has secrets or dirty laundry and we slowly begin to discover it all. I liked that even though there were a multitude of characters, I was able to keep them separate in my head and distinguish between them fairly quickly, which is not always the case. I've read some books with a lot of players that it takes me until three quarters of the way through the book to keep them straight.

I also liked the fact that I couldn't guess the answer to the mystery. And I also liked that there was more than one mystery, in fact there were several! Also, if you hate how some mystery dramas have such quick wrap ups of the story at the end when everything is being solved, than you'll like ending. It is deliberate, it is explained, it is not rushed. And then we even have an epilogue, where we visit the key players a year later. So all this was enjoyable.

On the complaint side, I did think the novel was quite a bit too long. I listened to the audiobook, and although it was well done, I wanted to hurry through at parts because I felt we were going over old ground. Some judicious editing would have made this a tighter, more intriguing book, at least for me.

Overall, though, I really enjoyed The Block Party, and it was a book that made me want to finish it and find out the answers. I would give it a 3.5 stars, but I'm rounding up because I do think it was good writing, just long.

Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and St. Martin's Press for allowing me to preview this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

<b>The Short of It:</b>

If you like neighborhood drama, in that “train wreck” can’t look away category, The Block Party is your book.!

<b>The Rest of It:</b>

The folks on Alton Road are about to host their annual summer block party. The anticipation is palpable as the neighborhood prepares their dishes, opens up the wine, and settles in for a lovely evening. What they don’t anticipate is the sound of sirens blaring through the neighborhood. You see, there’s been a murder.

The author takes us back to Alton Road a year before the murder. As a reader we are introduced to each household and all of their secrets. There’s an alcoholic in denial, paternity questions, teens battling depression and worse. As a reader, I had the feeling that I was listening in on private conversations. It’s deliciously wicked and at times so stressful! I was wondering how the author would carry that pace throughout but Jamie Day does! I could not put the book down. Every time I picked it up it was like returning to a favorite show.

The Block Party was just what I needed. Flawed characters. Secrets. Beautiful people with a lot of insecurities. All living in gorgeous homes with manicured lawns. It’s as if someone lit a match and set the neighborhood on fire because it is non-stop drama. I loved it.

For more reviews, visit my blog: <a href="http://bookchatter.net">Book Chatter</a>.

The Block Party by Jamie Day is a novel about a highly dysfunctional upper-middle class cul-de-sac. Told at 2 different points on time from 2 points of view, it has quite the build up to great reveal(s). Maybe just slightly too loud and drawn out. One point of view is Alex, the mommiest mom in the cul-de-sac, with a wine drinking problem and penchant for getting involved in everyone else's problems. The other point of view is Alex's teenage daughter Lettie. These chapter have a very YA feel to them. Lies, deceit, misunderstanding, murder and mayhem ensue in the year this books takes place.

My favorite parts of the book are the neighborhood message boards and there's just not enough of those in the book!

Overall a fun read that has that YA vibe for about half the book and slogs a little along getting to the conclusion.

Thank you to St. Martin's Press and Netgalley for an advanced readers copy of this book for my honest opinion.

While overall I enjoyed The Block Party it didn't quite deliver on the thriller aspect that I was expecting. It did have me questioning a few of the characters at different points but it was longer than it needed to be. The ending caught me by surprise, which I really liked.

The people who live on a cul-de-sac on Alton Road have so many darn secrets! On the night of their annual Memorial Day block party, someone gets murdered. We don't know who died or who the killer was because the book flashes back a year prior and works back up to the murder.

The story is told through the POVs of Alex and her daughter, Lettie. Through them, we get to know all of the neighbors and all of their drama! I didn't really find any of the characters likable, but I was definitely invested in finding out what happened at the block party!

Although this was a bit of a slow burn and the book could maybe have been a little shorter, I thought it was entertaining.

Thank you, @netgalley and @stmartinspress, for the gifted e-arc and physical ARC of this book!

3.5 stars rounded

The Block Party follows a close and gossipy neighborhood through dark secrets and ends with a high crime. With past and present mixed together, we learn of each neighbor’s history which helps to unlock what happened the night of the block party. The plot twists were pretty predictable and trigger warning for sexual assault. With that said, this is a fun quick thriller for a weekend read.

I really enjoyed this debut novel by Jamie Day. I am just realizing this "neighborhood thriller/suspense/mystery" is a subgenre that is gaining popularity, and I apparently am here for it! I found myself hooked from the opening prologue where impressions of neighbors were created in my mind, only to be ripped to shreds as the story went along. The reader gets the thrill of the experience of being a fly on the wall of several character's lives, all who live on an idyllic street, but where what goes on behind closed doors is not what neighbors suspect. MOST of the characters had good and bad aspects to them. It took a while for me to know which ones I was rooting for or against, which was part of the fun. I loved the device used where teenagers of the neighborhood have secret lives their parents never would suspect and parents have secrets they would be mortified to know their kids are telling each other. The murder that this story builds around is almost like a locked room mystery. For a long time, we don't know who the victim is and once we do know, there are a limited number of characters who could be the culprit. This book kept me on the edge of my seat and there was not one story thread that disappointed.

Oh. My. What a fun thriller! I loved it. The setting was perfect and the web of lies was juicy. This was a quick read and I enjoyed it all. The plot, the characters, and the setting!

Thank you so much @StMartinsPress for giving me this ARC in exchange for my honest and unbiased review (Release Date | 18 July 2023)

SYNOPSIS | Alton Lane is a popular wealthy neighborhood, but when a murder takes place after their annual Memorial Day block party everyone begins to question how well they actually know their neighbors.

WHAT I LIKED:
- I liked going through the majority of the book not knowing who was murdered or why
- witnessing the story unfold only through the eyes of Alex and her teenage daughter Lettie
- the snippets of gossip from the community board sprinkled throughout

WHAT I DIDN'T LIKE:
- a lot of characters to keep track of
- the story unfolds over the course a whole year which honestly just felt like a very long time
- considering how much drama there was the story moved along quite slowly
- pretty much everyone is unlikeable

This book reminded me of Liane Moriarty or Lisa Scottoline. It was a thriller with deeply interconnect characters and tons of twists and turns. I really liked the wide range of characters and the plot that kept me guessing. This was a fun book, that had my attention from early on and I really enjoyed.

Received a digital ARC of this book via NetGalley.

Contemporary mystery set in a suburban neighborhood. I enjoyed the little passages from the rest of the neighbors communicating with one another online about the going ons in the neighborhood very realistic. Novel had an interesting storyline.

Liked the premise and the audiobook narrator a lot. But this was just OK for me. There was SO MUCH wine drinking I don't know how Alex could remember anything from one day to another, never mind run a business, or keep her relationships afloat. Some unexpected twists but some predictable ones too. Lots of mentions of Me Too, and a soliloquy or three about the environment or feminism, were woven throughout. Good use of dual timelines, but the ending was crammed too full of revelations to feel satisfying.

Alton Road, where there is an exclusive cul-de-sac with beautiful homes and plenty of secrets. The residents of Alton Road have an annual Memorial Day block party. Usually it’s all fun and games with friends. but this year things will be a bit different.

The Block Party is told from two points of view – Alex, a lawyer turned mediator, who tries to hide her excessive drinking from her family, and Lettie, her activist teenage daughter. Other characters abound and the story unfolds over the year prior to the current party. All the reader really knows it that something has happened at the annual neighborhood get-together and the previous year’s events all lead up to it.

Jamie Day has written a well-plotted novel. The characters are well-defined and, while I didn’t like some of them very much, I found all of them to be interesting and varied. This is what I liked about The Block Party. What I didn’t like as much was the pace of the story. It’s a slow buildup to the final scenes and while I anticipated something happening, it was difficult to figure out just what that something would be. That part is really ok with me, but the slow pace took away some of the suspense and I just wanted it to be done. NetGalley provided an advance copy.

Couldn't get into this at all. There were too many characters, none of them likeable and in the end, I just didn't care.

It's time for the annual summer block party on Alton Road. The reader is taken back to last summer's party and the murder of one attendee. You are back and forth between the two Memorial Day blow outs. There are two distinct groups that attend, the adults and parents and the kids and high schoolers. They all have secrets and it leads to murder. Sometimes the number of characters can be confusing. Lots of drama and some real things that should stay secret. This is the first book by Jamie Day that I've read.

3.5 This was good. The overall plot was well thought out, and had lots of moving parts that all worked well together and came to closure. There were a lot of characters and relationships, so it took me a while to ensure I knew who everyone was, but the writing was good and helped. My only real qualm is that not a single character was likable or memorable. I am fond of unlikable characters, but I feel this was less of a purposeful character choice for these characters, and more of them just being annoying. Also, like NO ONE liked each other. Kind of frustrating to read when the characters are so meh about one another and always arguing.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.