This one had me captivated from the beginning. I loved it!
Seven women all have reasons to kill Jamie, only one did, will you be able to figure out which one did it?

Content Warning

This book contains depictions of child abuse, the aftermath of sexual violence, physical and emotional abuse against women. Speak of the Devil treats all of this as best as any author can.

TL;DR

Speak of the Devil by Rose Wilding is a hell of a ride. Her depiction of gaslighting is as devastating as it is accurate. Follow seven women as they try to figure out who among them killed the horrible man that connects them all together. Can they find the murderer before the police do? And if they find out who killed him, will they protect her? Highly recommended.

Disclaimer: The publisher provided a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Any and all opinions that follow are mine alone.

Review: Speak of the Devil by Rose Wilding

Fiction can be a powerful tool for depicting societal ills. It is a tool of empathy that places us in the head of a wholly different person than ourselves. Sometimes, that’s wonderful; sometimes, it’s uncomfortable; sometimes, it’s horrifying. On the best of occasions, it’s all three. Speak of the Devil by Rose Wilding fits all three categories. It’s an uncomfortable story about wonderfully flawed women in a horrific situation. The women are all connected by a monster of a man, and readers feel for the women as we learn their stories. We feel empathy for them even if we don’t condone their actions. Speak of the Devil is a book that deals with tough, downright awful, things done to women in an empathetic way. It asks tough questions of its readers to which there are no good answers. Speak of the Devil is a tough, impressive, wonderful debut.

Seven women are called to a seedy motel on New Year’s Eve in 1999 where they find the severed head of Jamie Spellman. Each of the women’s lives have been affected by Jamie. None for the better. Kaysha Jackson, a journalist, had gathered all these women into a seeming support group for those whose lives Jamie has trashed. She takes it upon herself to protect the other women since she was the one to bring them together. When the head is found by the motel staff, the detective assigned to the case is Nova Stokoe, a woman dealing with a crisis of conscience. Nova also turns out to be Kaysha’s ex. Kaysha and the other women of the support group must figure out who killed him before Nova and the police do. Why did the killer do it?

Speak of the Devil by Rose Wilding is a third person, close omniscient point of view thriller. The narrative flits back and forth through time to flesh out the women’s lives. It’s a quick book filled with difficult topics, and Wilding handles everything with skill. She balances sensitivity to her subject while making poignant character portraits and maintaining enough tension to keep readers glued to the page. Speak of the Devil is an impressive debut.

Characters

All seven women and detective Stokoe get their time in the spotlight here. Wilding excels at fleshing out these characters enough that they feel real and enough that we care about them without oversharing. The book opens with the seven finding the head, and then detective Stokoe arriving on the crime scene. It proceeds forward to the next day, New Year’s Day 2000. Then the novel flashes back in time to paint a picture of Jamie’s affect on a particular woman. While building her female characters, Wilding also builds Jamie’s character through the eyes of the other women. He’s a fascinating and wholly disgusting person, but none of the women in here are exactly good. Each woman has her own flaws; they lie; they cheat; they undermine other women. These actions, however hurtful, pale in comparison to the harm Jamie causes. He is a sex predator, through and through, potentially a pedophile. To him, other people exist solely for his own use – whether for pleasure, career advancement, or camouflage.

At the beginning of the book, I wanted to know who murdered Jamie. As the story progressed, I cared less and less because I became wrapped up in these women’s lives. They were interesting, heart-breaking, and so very human. (I also cared less and less because Jamie was truly terrible.) Wilding doesn’t ease the pressure on her audience though. Throughout the book – in the past and present – the heartbreaking continues. I felt for each of these women even though I didn’t like some of them.

Nova and Kaysha were my two favorite characters. Kaysha did everything she could to cover up the murder and protect the women. Her intentions were noble if not legal. Nova, as a lesbian cop, struggles with the structural biases in the police force, and it’s causing her to question her job. While I may not agree with these women’s thoughts, I found them compelling and thought-provoking. Their relationship, past and present, is adorable and self-destructive. Now that I’ve finished the book, I hope they found a good couple’s counselor and begin to work on themselves and finding a way forward for them.

Narcissist by Nature or Nurture

Jamie Spellman is a narcissist. He used these women to get what he wanted without sparing a thought for the effect it would have on the women’s lives. They were tools to him, and he used them to build a life that allowed him to be a shit to more and more women. He did truly horrible things. Gaslighting was his preferred tactic, but he wasn’t above drugging, abusing, or lying. Through any means necessary, he would achieve his ends. So, how did he get that way?

Jamie’s mother died during childbirth. His aunt, then, proceeded to raise him. She was cold and distant. She blamed Jamie for killing her sister. Jamie’s mother and aunt had fled their strict father, yet another horrible man. Jamie’s mother wanted an abortion, but Jamie’s aunt wouldn’t let her get one. When his mother died, Jamie’s aunt couldn’t forgive him. She raised him but was not mothering. On his birthdays, they visited his mother’s grave because that was what the day was. It wasn’t Jamie’s birthday; it was the anniversary of his mother’s death. His aunt wouldn’t even say ‘happy birthday’ to Jamie.

So, Jamie had a shitty childhood. One could even say that the aunt was emotional abusive and/or stunted his emotional development. Does that really result in psychopathic behavior? Or was that already in Jamie’s biochemistry? Was it a combination of both? Did his awful upbringing exacerbate his natural terribleness? I don’t have the answers, and Wilding doesn’t give her thoughts on it.

The inclusion of his aunt in the group of women Jamie has wronged strikes me as odd. She thinks Jamie wronged her by killing her sister, but that’s one ruined life Jamie can’t take the blame for. Is Wilding asking if the aunt bears any blame for what happened to the women? Well, one character in the book sure thinks so. But for Wilding and for me, that’s too simple, too pat, and it relieves Jamie of his own agency. People have shitty childhoods and don’t become monsters. I think that Jamie’s upbringing set the stage, but Jamie took to it, and he acted out his own shitty drama upon it.

Was Murder the Right Option?

Jamie was a terrible person who scarred these women. Each of them were hurt to their very cores by Jamie; for some, this included physical hurt as well. He emotionally and psychologically manipulated six of the seven women. His effect on their lives significantly altered the course of six of the seven in horrible ways. But did he deserve death?

It’s clear that had Jamie survived, he would have continued as the predator that he was. His death saved other women from pain and abuse. That’s clear. He needed to be stopped, and that’s exactly why Kaysha formed the group. They were trying to stop him using a legal system that didn’t (doesn’t) believe women. Separately, a few had tried to stop him, and the system failed them. Would they have succeeded as a group? (Your answer indicates whether you’re an optimist or pessimist.) In the end it doesn’t matter. Death stopped him despite his horrors stretching beyond his grave.

Wilding doesn’t make a judgement on whether murder was the only way to stop him. But she also paints the portrait so that the audience considers his death from a legal or moral standpoint instead of an emotional one. Readers will not mourn Jamie Spellman, but we can debate whether murder was the correct method of stopping him, and whether the murderer deserves to be punished. Wilding further complicates this by depicting the legal system as flawed and biased against women. It leads to interesting thoughts about what justice means.

Personally, I don’t think Jamie deserved to die. He would have better served society by being imprisoned and removed from affecting women’s lives. (Though he’d probably find someone to gaslight through penpals and the internet.) That said, I don’t think his murderer should be punished. Society is better off with that man’s removal, but individuals shouldn’t be able to remove someone without some sort of due process to ensure that the removal is appropriate and best for society. In the case of a terrible person like Jamie Spellman, there are extenuating circumstances that don’t result in a justified killing. But justice isn’t served by jailing the murderer. That person saved others from a monster.

Conclusion

Rose Wilding’s Speak of the Devil is a wonderful, tough book. It starts out as a murder mystery but quickly switches into a race to protect the murderer from the police. Wilding poses ethical and moral problems with this novel that aren’t easily answered even if they’re enjoyable to read about. The women in this book experience truly horrible things, and readers will feel for them. By the end, you’ll want to protect them as much as Wilding does. Highly recommended.

Speak of the Devil begins with an intriguing set up… seven women in a room surrounding the severed head of the one man they all have in common. It’s an interesting premise, and a complex exploration of the ways in which evil manifests itself. Let’s just say, there is never a time when you feel sad that this man was unalived.

Author Rose Wilding does a good job of presenting the points of view of the seven women, all of which had a motive to kill the deceased. However, I did predict who the murderer was pretty early on, though all of the characters had compelling motives. And I’m not sure I like the way that said murder is “resolved” at the end of the book. But I did appreciate the way that Wilding depicts complex issues of privilege and class.

Thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for the ARC.

Interesting story to hear how one man did seven different women wrong! It brought into question "nature vs. nuture" as well! I wanted to slap Olivia for being so naive though! I would recommend, even though it was slow in some parts.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

Speak of the Devil falls somewhere between mystery and Clue-like whodunnit, and quite frankly it was a delightfully devious and dark plot to escape into.

The book begins with the head of decapitated man in a room with a group of women who all had excellent reasons to want him dead, and then alternates between perspectives of the Detective Inspector whose working the case and the women and their backstories of how they knew the victim. The victim who is most certainly and clearly, not a good man. The victim who evidently deserved his grisly fate.

Put those two threads together and you have a deeply addictive and compelling storyline that had me literally glued to the page. I read this whole thing in one morning simply because I kept wanting to see how much worse of a man Jamie could be, and I was dying to figure out who actually killed him. When you have multiple suspects who are all VERY POSSIBLY the killer, with VERY STRONG motives, it becomes very hard to guess.

This is the exact kind of summer thriller reading we love - easy and absorbing, messy and dynamic characters, layers upon layers of secrets and topped off with incredibly well crafted plot twists that add to the story and finish it with satisfying aplomb.

Be sure to put this into your pre-order baskets this week so you can get this immediately into rotation. You’ll certainly need to get in on this guess-the-killer fun.

Thank you @minotaur_books for the copy and @rose_wldng - I bow down to your twisty murder mystery brilliance!

One of the most unique thrillers I have read in awhile. Seven women joined together by one common denominator: a dead man. All with interwoven stories of heartache, sadness & brokenness. All of them had reason to kill him, but which one actually did? Rose Wilding's storytelling kept me one the edge of my seat throughout the entire book. I loved the plot & all of the twists that came along the way.

A novel that begins with a dripping, stinking severed head displayed atop an open Bible will not be to everyone's taste. This tale of seven women who had reasons to deliver that fate to the man who wrecked all their lives will appeal to those who enjoy graphic violence and stories of revenge by women against terrible men.

I read the blurb for this book and couldn’t wait to read it. I wanted to read it so badly, so I was thrilled when I was approved for the ARC. It sounded like that song from the musical “Chicago”: The Cell Block Tango, you know?

He had it comin’
He had it comin’
He only had himself to blame
If you’d have been there
If you’d have seen it
I betcha you would have done the same

You know that feeling when that number is on screen or stage, right? How it starts out titillating and tense? How you’re filled with curiosity and suspense? Each woman tells her tale, sordid yet unapologetic, because her man was a bad man and the system certainly didn’t care what he did to her–they only cared that she was a murderer. And then the chorus explodes into a thrilling frenzy between each tale, with all the women imploring the audience to understand what the system didn’t.

Yeah, no. That’s not what this book was. It’s not what it sounded like, felt like, or read like. How this book qualifies as a thriller I have no idea, because it bored me to tears. I honestly almost DNFd it, but I made a promise to myself to try to DNF less books this year simply because they weren’t “my thing” and try to persevere. In the case of this book, I was treated to three different unwarranted naps because it put me to sleep all to find out the killer was exactly who I thought it was.

Look, I get what the book was trying to do and I applaud the effort. The idea was even top-notch. However, the execution was totally lacking. Stilted prose, too many coincidences, and not even thrills to raise a single goosebump make this book time I won’t get back.

I was provided a copy of this title by NetGalley and the author. All thoughts, opinions, views, and ideas expressed herein are mine and mine alone. Thank you. Due to personal policy, this review will not appear on any social media or bookseller website owing to its three star or lower review.

File Under: Crime Thriller/Just Not For Me/MurderThriller/Suspense Thriller

I enjoyed this book. Told from multiple POV, all seven women had a valid reason for revenge and had come together to decide how to stop Jamie. But who actually did the killing? The characters were all well developed and likable and the story moved along at a good pace. It’s a bit on the dark side, but still believable.

I'm shocked I haven't seen this book around more! I loved it! I think this is a such unique procedural crime-novel that follows seven women. This book is super dark and not really a thriller, but more of an atmospheric crime-novel, and I really enjoyed it! I found myself totally hooked and pulled into the story. The alternating POVs are a bit confusing, but that didn't stop me from liking the book and story. The ending is satisfying and doesn't feel rushed.

Thank you so much @stmartinspress @rose_wldng and @netgalley for the eARC of this one that just came out on 6/13!

One man is found dead and seven women are all possible suspects. The man is one of the most heinous, evil, narcissistic characters I've ever read about. The book definitely makes you question your feelings on what punishment truly evil people deserve for the damage they inflict. The women are all dealing with their own issues and I enjoyed trying to figure out who actually carried out the murder.

It took me a minute to keep all of the characters straight, but I was invested in their stories. The story was captivating and thrilling but there were some moments that had me emotional. Check trigger warnings for sure.

I would grab this one if you get the chance!

#SpeakofTheDevilBook #stmartinsinfluencer #thriller #newbook #read #reading #reviews

Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for this read. This book was okay but not for me. I do think others will like it but I read tons of thrillers and once I read too many similarities, I start to reject the read and can not keep going. I did finish the book but it was slow and not that interesting for me.

(𝘛𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘬𝘴 𝘵𝘰 @𝘮𝘢𝘤𝘮𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘢𝘯.𝘢𝘶𝘥𝘪𝘰 𝘢𝘯𝘥 @𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘰𝘵𝘢𝘶𝘳_𝘣𝘰𝘰𝘬𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘧𝘳𝘦𝘦 𝘣𝘰𝘰𝘬𝘴.) 𝗦𝗣𝗘𝗔𝗞 𝗢𝗙 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗗𝗘𝗩𝗜𝗟 by Rose Wilding has at its core a dead man, a very, very bad dead man, a man many women had reason to murder. As the book opens, seven women sit in chairs horrified to see Jamie’s head on a table in front of them. (This happens on page 1, so I’m giving nothing away.) One was the woman who raised him, another his wife, another his friend and colleague, another a woman he’d raped, and others he’d seduced. All had reason to hate him and all claimed innocence. Into their midst comes police investigator Nova, a woman with complicated connections of her own.⁣
⁣
I listened to this one on audio which at first wasn’t the simplest thing to do. I had to really pay attention as the story shifted from perspective to perspective. It was challenging for the first 10 or 15 percent, but then each of the characters became very distinct and clear in my mind. Narrator Colleen Prendergast did a fabulous job with such a big cast. While I enjoyed listening, this thriller really teetered on the edge of being too much for me. It was a jigsaw puzzle of a story, where some of the pieces felt a little forced. Still, I admire Wilding’s ambition in delivering a complex mystery. It was fun and that title? Perfection! ⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

This book has multiple POVs, narrated in the third person, fast paced & both started and finishes with a BANG (all things I love). The story did not take shape in the way I thought it would at all, which made me that much more intrigued!

I had such a hard time rating this one for a few reasons.
- I really really enjoyed the book once I got into it, but it took a while to get into it
- The women’s stories were so intriguing (& soooo fxcked up) that at some point I couldn’t put it down, but it was a little predictable solely based on HOW it was written.
- I still loved the way it was written (confusing I know), but some of the language/slang threw me off.
- I was having a lot of trouble keeping up with who is who. There are so many characters and then more characters connected to those characters. It made it really hard to follow at the beginning. But once I learned who was who and did what and the connection, it was an easy, breezy read!

So would I still recommend this book? Yes! I’d love to hear everyone’s thoughts on it! This was a super anticipated read for me & im glad to have gotten my hands on it! ☺️

Giving this one a 3.75/5!

Thank you so much NetGalley, Minotaur Press & Rose Wilding for the DRC in exchange for an honest review.

This is the book version of a one room movie. It could have been intriguing but it’s just not.

I was intrigued enough to read on but started to skim pages and flipping to the end. There are just to many women, too many similar stories and it just feels like a rehash to me. Maybe I’m genred out but it was a slog at some points.

I kind of recommend it. The story structure didn’t work for me but I know others will appreciate it.

There are a whole lot of suspects in this mystery about a man that turns up without his body in a local hotel. A group of women are planning to meet and discover his head upon arrival. Each of the women has a very reason to have killed him. And their ringleader has an in with the detective investigating the case. I will leave you with that as I think you should discover the rest on your own, as the author intended.

I would recommend this one for anyone that enjoys a good mystery or likes to see a bad man receive what's coming to him. There's a distinct girl power element to this that I quite enjoyed.

Thank you to Netgalley, the publisher and the author, for an ARC of this book, in exchange for an honest review.
The premise of the book drew me in but once I started reading it, I just couldn’t get into it at all.
I wish the author, publisher and all those promoting the book much success and connections with the right readers.

3.5 stars

Speak of the Devil by Rose Wilding is a psychological thriller.

First, let me thank NetGalley, the publisher St. Martin’s Press and in particular Victoria Cordoso for sending me a widget, and of course the author, for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.


My Synopsis:    (No major reveals, but if concerned, skip to My Opinions)
On New Year's Eve, seven women are gathered in a hotel room, staring at the head of a dead man.  All of them had a motive to kill Jamie Spellman, but no one admits to the murder.  

Included are: Jamie's wife Sadia , his co-worker Ana, an old acquaintance from university Kaysha, his ex-girlfriend Sarah,  his aunt Maureen,  an old friend Olive,  and young Josie. This is not the first time this group has met in this hotel room, but it is the first time that Jamie was with them (well, part of him).

Jamie was not a good person.  Among his less than admirable traits, he was a black-mailer, a cheat, a thief, a rapist, a manipulator, and a murderer. Only one of the seven believe he was good.

Three days later, DI Nova Stokoe is called to the scene of the  crime.  A head is found, perched on top of hotel bibles.  The  body is missing, but the bible verse hints of revenge.  The air smells of bleach.  A coiled snake, surrounded by other symbols was painted on the wall behind the head.  That symbol is from a cult case that Nova has been working on for weeks, but Nova knows it is a replica, meant to mis-direct this investigation.


My Opinions:
This was a rather dark book with topics ranging from rape, sexual discrimination, and domestic violence, to murder...and almost everything in between. Most topics were covered quite well.

Basically, the book was about an emotionally and physically abusive man, and the women he hurt.  A lot of the book dealt with reasons the women justified his abusive nature, and their eventual reactions to him.

Be warned that there are a large number of characters, but because they were diverse in age and demographics, I found it fairly easy to keep them straight.  I had more of a problem with the constant back and forth in time-lines for each character, which is how their associations with Jamie were told (ie their back-stories).  As well, at points the book was overly descriptive, and therefore dragged.

On the other hand, the plot was quite good, the characters interesting, and I loved the ending.  It was a compelling and thought-provoking book.  It was also disturbing.

I will definitely be watching this new author!

One dead man seven women who could all be suspects rose wilding has created a well plotted mystery with an OMG wow conclusion. This is one of the five books I couldn’t wait to read and I must say the author definitely delivers. The women all seem to come from different walks of life and have served a different purpose for Jamie Spellman. What they all had in common was a reason for killing him and although the reasons may be different which one became deadly. It will be up to detective nova to figure out. They had way too many people to many reasons but the ending is so worth it! I really enjoyed this book and think it is one of the better books I have read this summer it is definitely a five-star read in a book I highly recommend. so many of the characters or likable, The story is interesting in the short chapters moves it along quickly this is truly a book you should read if you love good deathly plotted mysteries. I received this book from NetGalley and the publisher but I am leaving this review voluntarily please forgive any mistakes as I am blind and dictate my review.

“𝑰𝒕’𝒔 𝒒𝒖𝒊𝒕𝒆 𝒂 𝒈𝒓𝒊𝒔𝒍𝒚 𝒄𝒓𝒊𝒎𝒆 𝒇𝒐𝒓 𝒂 𝒘𝒐𝒎𝒂𝒏, 𝒃𝒖𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒓𝒆’𝒔 𝒔𝒐𝒎𝒆𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒂𝒃𝒐𝒖𝒕 𝒊𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒔𝒆𝒆𝒎𝒔 𝒍𝒊𝒌𝒆… 𝑰 𝒅𝒖𝒏𝒏𝒐, 𝒂 𝒘𝒐𝒎𝒂𝒏 𝒑𝒖𝒔𝒉𝒆𝒅 𝒕𝒐𝒐 𝒇𝒂𝒓.”

The cover and tagline of this book had me intrigued right away: “New Year’s Eve 1999 - Seven angry women. One dead man.”

Right away, I thought of François Ozon’s 2002 film Huit Femmes, as both the film and this book highlight a group of women with motives for killing one terrible men. The parallels end there though, as Speak of the Devil opens with a gripping opening chapter where you meet the women surrounded a severed head of said man. Each woman has a reason to want Jamie dead, and I worried at first that keeping track of so many points of view would be tricky (and sometimes that was true). Although it took me a bit to get into, I found myself furious at the way Jamie treated each woman, gaslighting them and tricking them for his own selfish gain. I was especially angered at the sexual assault of one woman, who wasn’t believed at the police station about the rape. I later learned that Rose Wilding drew from her own experience of dating someone who isolated her and gaslit her into thinking both she was unworthy of him and yet couldn’t live without him, which shows in the honest way she wrote. I really liked the unraveling layers that reveal the connections Jamie had with each woman, along with seeing how they are connected to each other. The downside to so many points of view is that it was hard to fully connect to each character, and the ending feels a bit abrupt.

Speak of the Devil is a story of retribution, loneliness, control, and taking back power. It is a dark read that, although lacking some tension, shows that Wilding’s writing has a lot of promise. Thank you to Minotaur Books and NetGalley for the ARC!