While this book had some great suspense there were a lot of loose threads. I also feel that it should have been billed as a YA novel, it was definitely more juvenile than an adult book.

I was frustrated at the length, I think it could have moved much faster and been less pages. Why did we have Wyatt's point of view? He was dead? And that was the mystery - what did that have to do with the 27 minutes? Are we to assume that it took 27 minutes to throw Wyatt off the bridge?

And I'm not clear on what Grant's issue was - was he taking steroids? Was that the drug problem?
And Becca and Grant, was there ever a relationship? Or she made it all up?
And Grant and Harley were involved, but later in the book there's mention that he throws a football with her kids? WHEN? He's so messed up and angry with a bad leg...I can't really see him throwing a football in good mind frame with anyone .

Disappointed at the ending and what the big reveal was. So much talk about June's mom and her illness, who cares? And what was with the journal moving all over the house? And why so much talk about urine smell on the journal? Or urine smell on the bed?

Could have been 100 pages shorter......definitely wouldn't recommend.

This book was a slow one for sure. It took too long for me to get into it but overall it was a good story. I couldn't find myself getting "close" to the characters and couldn't keep up with the amount of characters as well. It felt a little like if I had to solve a mystery of who was who while keeping up with the story so I felt like that took away from the story too.

If you like multi - POV and timelines that go back and forth then this would be a good book for you. I recommend it to someone who is on the bridge from simple to complex stories as I feel this would be a good story for someone like that.

Thank you to the NetGalley, the author, and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

thank you to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

this one had so much potential, but it unfortunately dragged on for most of the almost 400 pages. i was hooked in the beginning but sadly lost interest shortly after the start. there were too many characters to keep up with and an emphasis on the drama rather than the suspense. i’m glad i stuck around for this ending because it was wild, but not much happened until the last 5-10%. this was a debut, so i’m willing to give the author the benefit of the doubt and try out their next novel.

2.5 stars. This book was super slow to me. I appreciate a slow burn, but this was too slow. I also felt it was repetitive. These characters weren't likeable and still seemed extremely immature, even in adulthood. There were also a lot of characters to keep up with and there were points where I was confused.

There is a lot of suspense building, but the ending came in fast as a train, and then it was over. I couldn't guess the big twist at the end, but it felt slightly rushed. This was just ok to me.

Thank you NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for an ARC in exchange for my honest and voluntary review.

Good book but I found a little slow to get started! I ended up enjoying it so I will give it three stars. If a friend asked if I recommended it I would say yes

Twenty-Seven Minutes was an amazing read - I love endings that I don't see coming, but that don't materialize out of nowhere. While a slow-build suspense, this was a page-turner. I really enjoyed the characters, the plot was solid, and the ending was spectacular. I look forward to rereading it again!

It wasn't particularly to my taste. It felt overly-dramatic and the characters weren't fully fleshed out. The twist also was quite self-indulgent.

Phoebe Dean died ten years ago in a car driven by her brother Grant, after leaving a party. There was a 27 minute delay between when the crash happened, and the call for help. Some of the people in their small town think Phoebe might have been saved if help had come sooner. Was her brother, Grant, trying to avoid a DWI or was there another even darker reason why he didn't call for help immediately?

Ten years later the small town still seems obsessed with the accident that took the one girl in their town who showed promise and may have made something of herself had she lived. Phoebe and Grant's mother is going to throw a memorial, because she was too upset to do anything to honor Phoebe at the time of the accident. It is never explained why it has taken ten years to correct this omission, but it serves as a plot device to age the characters ten years and show that they really haven't moved on from this accident. Becca was also in the car, and has always been obsessed with Grant.

I hate to be too critical of this book, because to me it read a little like a YA novel, even though the characters were now in their late twenties. I found them all weird and impossible to relate to in any way, but I am also much older than them, so perhaps I am not the best audience for the book. For me, the storyline dragged, and I skimmed through some parts that seemed repetitive. There was a mystery: what happened in those twenty seven minutes? But for me, it just took too long to get there.

I feel like a younger audience who is into dark and moody stories with damaged characters and a little mystery would enjoy this book.

Thank you to NetGalley, Ashley Tate, and Poisoned Pen Press for allowing me to read this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

3.5 stars & I'm feeling generous tonight so rounding up (but also because this was all written and kept me engaged and wanting to keep reading). This story was good and twisted, like the characters and their relationships are twisted, not necessarily extremely twisty although there are a few.

This story was really beautifully and descriptively written. I loved the experience of reading it. The characters are seriously flawed and I didn't particularly like any of them but it didn't make me dislike the book or story line. This book opens with a serious bang with a girl laying in the rain, dy!ng on a bridge. Wow, what a start! Told from multi POV and multi timeline.

There are several different POV so it takes a bit to find out who's who and how they relate to each other. Also multi timeline, there are specific chapters from "THAT night/ day" that progress along; and in addition, there are flashbacks in the character's 'current' chapters too (indicated by italicized text, so you'll have to be paying close attention when reading via audio book). Once it becomes clear who each narrator is, I found the multi view and multi timeline easy to follow.

Overall, I really liked this story; the ending fell a little flat for me. There are some twists throughout but they're mostly a play on the same and the biggest reveal at the end felt a little "meh" after allllll that build up.

Would recommend if you love:
-multi-POV
-multi-timeline
-a big secret in a small town
-unreliable narrators

🌟🌟🌟.5
"Twenty-Seven Minutes" was one of the top thrillers I was excited to read in 2024. As someone who enjoys discovering new authors, I always look forward to reading debuts. In this book, Ashley Tate crafted an emotional narrative that delves into domestic drama, sibling relationships, and the secrets of small-town life. Her writing is captivating and her portrayal of teenage life in a small community is realistic.

While the big revelation that took a decade to unravel wasn't as shocking as I expected, the plot was well-crafted and engaging. The book had a dark sense of foreboding that made it feel depressing and slow, but it was still interesting. I will definitely be interested in reading more from this author.

Thanks to Poisoned Pen Press for providing this book through NetGalley. As always, all opinions are my own and left voluntarily.

#TwentySevenMinutes #AshleyTate #PoisonedPenPress #NetGalley #justfinished #Debut #ARC #honestreview #thriller #bookreviewer #thrillerbookloverspromotions #thrillerfriendsunite #thrillerobsessedbookishclub #ReadersOfTheLateArc #TalkWordyToMeTeam #lovetoread #bookworms #lovebooks #booknerd #readaholic #bookstagrammer #smalltownsecrets

I just couldn't get excited about this one. Too many POV's, I guessed the reveal pretty early on and it was just an ok story.

Twenty-Seven Minutes by Ashley Tate starts off with Phoebe Dean laying on the side of the road taking her last breaths. If only the paramedics were called within those long agonizing twenty-seven minutes. If they were called as soon as Grant and Becca woke up then Phoebe would still be alive. 10 years later it is coming up to the anniversary of Phoebe's death and her mother is going to throw a memorial for her. June's brother Wyatt, had left town on the night of the accident never to be seen or heard of since. Wyatt shows up out of the blue and wants to attend the memorial with June. He only has a limited to fix what happened 10 years ago. Grant, Phoebe's brother has always told Becca that the accident was her fault and she must keep their relationship a secret. Becca is in love with Grant however he is only using her to cover up the fact that he was the one driving that fateful night. The ending of this book is so unbelievable that made all the sense in the world. Beautifully written and exicuted to the end. I felt the sorry for Becca the whole time that I was reading this. She was so blinded by her love for Grant and didn't see what a real jerk that he is. Thank you to NetGalley and Headline Publishers for giving me an advance copy of this title.

I really struggled with this one because it felt very YA to me. The characters did not mature at all over the course of ten years and they were all quite unlikable.

There were a few things I did like about the book that kept me interested enough, It is fast paced and the twist ending is very much a shock. I did have that edge of your seat feeling for most of the book. It did start to feel like I was waiting forever for something to happen though.

Overall, I think this one was a decent debut and I would be interested to read more from this author.

Unfortunately I could not get into this book. I thought I’d like it based on how it started… then too many characters were introduced, and I didn’t connect with any of them, and I found myself not caring what happened. It was a DNF for me.

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

When it took twenty-seven minutes for Grant to call for an ambulance, it took his sister Phoebe's life. She was the most popular girl both alive and dead. Now ten years later, her mother wants to have a memorial for her and the entire town is talking about it. Meanwhile, June's mother has just passed away. Her brother also disappeared the night that Phoebe Dean was killed, but nobody is talking about him. While the buildup for the memorial is closing in, will the truth about what happened that night finally come out?

A fast paced read that keeps you guessing about what really happened. The author does a good job holding the readers attention while going into the history of the characters. A great book!

This was a very engaging mystery/thriller! This is a story about a long-ago murder and the ripple effect it is still having ten years later. The timeline moves between the past and present and while it did take me some time to reorient, it really added to the suspense. The small town setting and characters were great and there is a twist that I genuinely enjoyed. I am excited to see what Ashley Tate comes out with next! Thanks to Ashley Tate, Poisoned Pen Press, and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I can NOT believe this is Ashley Tate’s debut novel!! It was fantastic and absolutely thrilling.

This novel starts out in Phoboe’s POV. She knows what caused the car accident, but she is dying, and she can’t figure out why her brother, Grant, hasn’t called for help.

10 years later, shortly before the anniversary of Phoboe’s death, tensions run high as 4 friends gather together and uncover the truth of what happened that tragic night.

This book started out slow and then ramped up in the middle but then kind of went off the rails at the end. I think it’s a good story overall but it was just all a bit of overkill at the end, overly dramatic. I would give the authors next book a try because I quite enjoyed her style of writing .

There were times I liked this story, but most of the time I did not like it. It was well-written but the characters...it was exhausting reading the frantic desperation, constantly repeating things and all of the them ranged from dysfunctional to mentally ill. The author did a great job of conveying this repetition as desperation, so the repetition didn't bother me in and of itself, however, it wasn't enjoyable to read in the slightest. The other major issue is that I could see the ending way too early, every bit of it. I wasn't fooled by the red herring (of sorts) at all. I think this author has a great ability, that I hope is applied to a setting less exhausting so we can get a meaty story. I understand why she chose to write this and I can relate very well to her desire and drive to write this story, but I hope for a better one in the future.

Thank you to Poisen Pen Press for an eARC of this book. All opinions are my own.

I unfortunately didn't enjoy this book. I found it repetitive and hard to get into. I will definitely try another one from this author!