Scenes of the Crime by Jilly Gagnon fell a little short of expectations for me. Emily, our protagonist, writes for a major sitcom but feels like she is destined for more. Emily feels like she has a story worth telling, a story that can get her out of her lackluster job and get her the recognition she feels she deserves. As a teen, Emily’s friend disappeared while they celebrated spring break at a winery owned by the family of two teens. Emily feels like if she can get her group of friends back together at the winery she can gather clues to solve the mystery of Vanessa and help her career at the same time.What secrets have her friends been hiding and will digging them up solve the mystery? Does Emily herself have secrets that will surface during this reunion?
This was a 2 star book for me. Plotwise, the story itself is very well told but predictable. The scenery is beautiful and vivid. I see a lot of potential for the author. There wasn’t one single character that is redeemable or likable. Maybe that was the author’s point but for me personally it’s hard for me to like a book with unlikeable characters.

DNFd at 30%

The premise is intriguing: a group of ex-college friends return to an isolated Oregon winery in an attempt to find closure for their friend's disappearance 15 years ago. Present-day narrative is broken up with pages of a screenplay.

This has formulaic thriller traits: friends who aren't really friends, a years-old story about a missing person, an isolated location where they're the only ones around... other than the screenplay parts, none of it felt unique or engaging.

I got a third of the way through and decided I didn't like any of the characters, wasn't invested in the mystery, and didn't find it fast-paced enough to keep my interest.

Thank you to NetGalley and Bantam/Random House for this eARC in exchange for my honest review.

Did AI write this?
No offense to the he author, but this book was all the tropes tossed together and stirred into a story. I felt like I was reading mad libs.

Friendship reunion in an isolated locale?Check.

Everyone kinda hates and suspects each other?
Yup.

Something mysterious happened years ago and they are down to figure out wtf happened now?
You know it!

Add in a bunch of wine and whining from one dimensional characters and you've got this book.

This was an interesting and unpredictable suspense novel told from the perspective of a writer trying to write a screenplay based on the disappearance of her friend in college by organizing a reunion with the other girls who there when she went missing to reenact what happened and try to gain some answers. What she discovers is not at all what she was expecting. I enjoyed this one. It was a twisty ride.

I absolutely loved All Dressed Up by Jilly Gagnon, so I was really looking forward to her next book. I'm sad to say that I was disappointed. The first 45% of this story was tedious and full of unnecessary descriptions of the winery and everything else. Nothing happens and I was extremely bored. The rest of the book was much better and moved at a quicker pace. I found the parts written as a screenplay confusing and pointless, since they just gave you an alternate version of what actually happened. It made it hard to tell what was real and what wasn't. I found it to be a strange addition that just didn't work for me. The characters were unlikable as well and it was hard to imagine how they were ever friends. I'm so sorry that I didn't love this one as much as I did her previous book. Hopefully other readers will enjoy this more than I did.

Thank you NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine for the ARC.

Emily, a screenwriter for a lucrative but insipit sitcom, sees the exact look-a-like of her dead best friend, Vanessa, at a coffee shop which drives her forward in writing a script about what took place when Vanessa died on a girl's weekend at a remote winery in Oregon. Emily has no memories of the evening in question but convinces the other women to return to the winery for one last friendship gathering and to try to figure out what happened. Multiple formats here can be difficult to follow - Emily's screenplay that may or may not be accurate, the story from the trip where Vanessa died, and the story from the present day return to the winery. Lots of secrets and questions - did someone kill Vanessa? Is Vanessa really dead? What really happened? Could be a good discussion mystery.

I found this atmospheric story absorbing; from its setting, an isolated beach house and winery on a remote part of the Oregon coast; to the characters, a group of former college friends now in their forties; to the plot, with its gothic overtones of the supernatural. The action alternates timelines between 15 years in the past during a college spring break; the present, when the friends have reconvened at the beach house to honor their friend, missing since that fateful holiday; and the version of events as portrayed in one character's movie script from a time in the near future. Emily, the script writer; Vanessa, the charismatic missing woman; Brittany, the mean-girl frenemy who owns the beach house; Paige, Brittany's sycophantic sidekick since college days; and Lydia, the intellectual goth girl, are all great characters. The happenings in the story require a hefty suspension of disbelief at times, as is common with this sort of psychological thriller, but provided a reader can overlook some unlikely plot lines, the novel is very readable. The action moves swiftly, keeping the tension high, and switching between timelines also serves to prolong the suspense, with the truth gradually being revealed as the story progresses.

Based on the title and cover I was excited to begin this book which I expected to be a great mystery. Sadly I was totally disappointed with this. It begin really well but then really hit a very low slow moving story about 5 friends who are trying to go back to the place where one of their friends mysteriously disappears. I found all the characters boring and even though I read it to the end I could not bond with any of them. I just did not care who did the crime. The story went back and forth for 15 years to present and it was totally distracting. Sorry to say, this one is just not one I can recommend.
I wish to thank NetGalley and Random House - Ballantine, Bantam for allowing me to read an advanced copy of this book. I have voluntarily read and reviewed it. All thoughts and pinions are my own.

Oh this was a mess of cliches, been there done that. Not a book I could fi ish, seeing as how I have read this same premise over and over and over.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC.

Scenes of the Crime didn't grab my attention. I got in about 13% and just couldn't continue. The characters were okay, the going to the script and back was a little confusing for me and it just didn't grab me and want me to read more. Usually when I put a book down and pick it back up I know exactly what is happening. With Scenes of the Crime, when I picked it back up, I had no clue what had happened. I wasn't "absorbed" into the story. I couldn't finish this.

Emily has two goals. To find out what happened to her friend Vanessa 15 years ago, and to finally write a screenplay about the events leading up to her disappearance. She convinces her other friends, Brittany, Paige, and Lydia to get together for a closure weekend. Surprisingly, they all agree, and before you can say nice to see you, well, it’s actually not. These former friends don’t actually seem to like each other very much and honestly, no one, except for Emily seems to really care what happened to Vanessa. Certain items appear, and soon it seems that there is more to Vanessa‘s disappearance than Emily knows.
Told through Emily’s eyes, in the now, and through the screenplay she is writing, I admit to getting slightly lost at times. I wasn’t sure what version of the story was real and what was just made up. If these women are anyone’s idea of best friends, well, let’s just say I seriously cannot imagine having friends like these.
There were chapters that had me page flipping, and then there were one’s that just left me confused.

Cleverly written novel that jumps between 15 years ago and the present. Presented, in part ,as a script
A group of college friends go for a weekend at a Winery 15 years ago) and one just disappears. No body and no one has any idea what happened…except some of them are not telling the truth about the last interaction they had with the missing and one thinks she knows the whole story but does not say anything.
In the present time, I chance visual of a woman who might be the missing girls prompts one of the girls to start writing a script about finding the truth of the disappearance,. She invites all the other girls to a Winery weekend to get closure on the whole event.
Answers are found along with a surprising ending*.
Very good. I recommend. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me this ARC.

Scenes of the Crime took me on a mysterious journey with former college friends, bound by a dark secret from their past. The story revolves around Vanessa, the magnetic center of their group, who vanished without a trace during a fateful girls' trip at a remote winery. Fast forward 15 years, and Emily, now a disillusioned screenwriter, spots a woman resembling her lost friend, igniting her determination to uncover the truth behind Vanessa's disappearance.

As Emily orchestrates a reunion weekend at the winery, the secrets of each friend come bubbling to the surface, leaving me with a sense of unease and suspicion towards them all. However, I couldn't shake the feeling that Emily's motives were not solely driven by the quest for truth but also fueled by her desire to create the ultimate screenplay to escape her own mundane life. The story weaves between the present, past, and Emily's screenplay, adding layers of complexity to the mystery. While I found the surprise ending a bit underwhelming, the characters' narcissistic tendencies and the story's pacing made it challenging for me to fully connect with the book. Overall, Scenes of the Crime is a thought-provoking exploration of friendship, culpability, and the blurred lines of storytelling in Hollywood.

This was told from the viewpoint of Emily, a screenwriter. Fifteen years ago, she and four college friends (Brittany, Vanessa, Paige and Lydia) spent a holiday at a remote Oregon coast winery owned by Brittany and Vanessa’s wealthy grandparents. One night of over imbibing sees Vanessa go missing, presumed dead.

In present day, Emily is determined to solve the mystery of what happened that night so she can write a lucrative screenplay and leave her boring job behind. The four estranged friends (read “frenemies”) reunite at the winery for closure and discover that secrets have been kept by each of them regarding that night and their relationships with the charismatic but manipulative Vanessa.

I really wanted to like this book more, and this author is a really talented writer, but I had two issues here. First, the story is told in two timeframes (15 years apart) and in 2 formats (Emily as narrator and Emily’s screenplay scenes). So not only are we reading past/present events and their interconnections, we are reading Emily’s viewpoint and also her creative license with the events included in her screenplay. This format was distracting and confusing as I had to continually go back to figure out what elements were “real” and what was “fictional” (and sometimes I was still left in the dark). Second, none of the characters were likable/redeemable. They all were self-absorbed, and most were spoiled, conniving and just plain mean. I would like to have had at least one of the women be relatable in some way.

As I said, the writing is definitely above average, but the overall layout just didn’t work for me.

My thanks to NetGalley and Bantam for providing the free early arc of Scenes of the Crime for review. The opinions are strictly my own.

The structure of this story is intriguing. Real-time narrative is enhanced by sections of the main character's fledgling movie script. These scenes of the crime provide insight on the main character's suspicions as well as flashbacks that offer the reader insight into the true nature of the friend group relationships. I've only one complaint. The setting descriptions are luxurious and long...Sometimes a bit too lengthy. I found myself skimming large paragraph chunks of description to get back to the narrative. Beyond that, the mystery is nostalgic and slightly gothic, with the secluded setting, rich winery history, and underground caves. A great book to settle in with for a long night of uninterrupted reading.

This is my second Jilly Gagnon book and I really enjoy her writing style. 5 huge stars for that! The plot of Scenes of the Crime I feel has been told before; 5 old college friends reunite years later, in this case 15 years later to deal with all the emotions of the disappearance/murder of someone in the group. Emily is now a writer on a tv sitcom and plans to write a screenplay on the disappearance of Vanessa, hoping to use this as a way to solve exactly what happened that night all those years ago. Some of the chapters in the book are actually written as a page of a that screenplay and I liked the uniqueness of that. All the characters are difficult to like and while that didn't turn me off, it was hard to understand how these girls were all friends in college to begin with. Overall I enjoyed this story.

"An ambitious screenwriter tries to solve her friend's disappearance by re-creating their fateful final girls' trip in this riveting locked-room mystery from the author of All Dressed Up.

It should have been the perfect spring break: Five girlfriends. A remote winery on the Oregon coast. An infinite supply of delicious wine at their manicured fingertips. But then their center - beautiful, magnetic Vanessa Morales - vanished without a trace.

Emily Fischer was perhaps the last person to see her alive. But now, years later, Emily spots Vanessa's doppelganger at a local café. At the end of her rope working a lucrative yet mind-numbing gig on a network sitcom, Emily is inspired to finally tell the story that's been percolating inside her for so long: Vanessa's story. But first, she needs to know what really happened on that fateful night. So she puts a brilliant scheme into motion.

She gets the girls together for a reunion weekend at the scene of the crime under the guise of reconnecting. There's Brittany, Vanessa's cousin and the inheritor of the winery; Paige, a former athlete, bullish yet easily manipulated; and Lydia, the wallflower of the group.

One of them knows the truth. But what have they each been hiding? And how much can Emily trust anything she learns from them...or even her own memories of Vanessa's last days? Suspenseful, propulsive, and interspersed with scenes from Emily's blockbuster screenplay, Scenes of the Crime is an unforgettable mystery that examines culpability, the shiny rearview mirror of Hollywood storytelling, and the pitfalls of female friendship."

I mean, the only reason you'd go on this trip is if you're the killer and want to silence everyone right?

Jilly Gagnon's "Scenes of the Crime" was a fun and twisted mystery full of new reveals and interesting characters. I felt like this book was a grown-up version of "Pretty Little Liars," which I thoroughly enjoyed. I was intrigued by Emily's sketchy memories from the night of her friend's disappearance, and different roads each member of the group took after experiencing such a loss.
While I loved the flashbacks to the past as readers learn what led to Vanessa's disappearance, I didn't like the way it was written as a script, it made it disjointed and kind of took me out of the story. Otherwise - this book kept me turning pages, needing to know what was next!

Thank you to Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine, Bantam And NetGalley for an arc edition of this book in exchange for an honest review.

A script writer, Emily, who cannot deal with the past of losing a close friend rallies her old girlfriends for a final weekend away at the winery where they last saw their lost friend, Vanessa. Slowly the past gets revealed through the storytelling of our MC and through the script she is writing for her show. Layers are peeled back and secrets revealed as we eventually learn what happened to Vanessa and who was guilty. Lots of twists and turns have you guessing and rethinking who is the culprit.
A different mystery with a story in a story. Well done, but a little slow in moving along at times. A solid 4 stars for me.

2.5 confusing stars

Emily Fischer is our main character, now a screenwriter, and still dwelling on her college friend’s disappearance 15 years ago. She’s writing about the disappearance and decides to bring the friend group back together to unlock her writer’s block and solve the case. The setting is a remote winery on the coast of Oregon with dramatic cliffs and dangerous staircases.

It sounds like an amazing premise, but I struggled to keep the women and their stories straight. Perhaps five characters were too many. The modern-day chapters were intermixed with scenes from her screenplay. Again, this sounds terrific, but I kept mixing up what was real, what was in the screenplay, and what I should be thinking.

What really happened to Vanessa 15 years ago? Each girl has a different recollection and none of them were honest with the police. Each girl also has skeletons in their closet that they are protecting. And just how strong were the friendships anyway? Some of the girls had money and others didn’t, so there was often that power play in the mix.

I might need to take a break from thrillers as they all seem to be following the same formula these days.