the only reason i finished this book was because i was on a brutal six hour train ride from edinburgh to london & had nothing else to read. the dialogue was atrocious. the characters were half-baked. the stakes were overblown. it felt like a book i could’ve & would’ve written when I was twelve years old. how this woman got a byline from ashley audrain is beyond me.

Twenty-Seven Minutes vividly portrays the enduring effects of grief and loss, interwoven with an intriguing mystery. This well-paced novel captivated me with its satisfying conclusion and unexpected twist, making it utterly unputdownable.

Thank you to Netgalley for allowing me to read and review this book.

The summary of this sounded good but I just could not get into it at all. I struggled to get through this one. Too many characters, repetitive dialogue, and the story was just too slow for me.

This book just didn’t grasp my interest like I hoped. I got 25% in and realized the story felt too forced and I wasn’t really aware how all the changes connected nor did I care. So I skipped the rest!

I read an advanced reader copy of Twenty-Seven Minutes, by Ashley Tate. I had heard a lot of buzz about this novel, and was excited to read it. The novel is a suspense story of an upcoming ten year memorial of the death of a teenager, killed in a car accident on a bridge. But there is a catch. The brother of the deceased girl took 27 minutes to call the police, leaving questions if Phoebe would live if he acted sooner. But why did he wait? What happened?

The premise is interesting - and theoretically a good hook for a story. The reality, for me anyways, is that the way the story is told, through rotating chapters from the perspectives of four characters, plus interweaving chapters titled "ten years ago." just did not work. Yes, this is a very common plot technique. But somehow, the five perspectives just did not work for me. I wanted the story to advance, but you would get a nugget of information, and then take a step back, as 3 or 4 other voices were told. It did not make the book easy to read, but instead, seemed to drag the story out. And while the twist at the end was interesting and yes, shocking, by the time it occurred, I was just reading to get to the end. Add to that, I felt like the shock raised more questions than they answered, given the rotating chapters.

I hate being negative in reviews. But this one just didn't work for me.

The question at the heart of this book is why did it take teenager Grant Dean 27 minutes to call for help following a car accident that resulted in the death of his little sister, Phoebe. The book goes back and forth in time from the date of the accident to the present (10 years later) and gives us the perspective of several of the townspeople affected by the event.

While I really liked the premise of Twenty-Seven Minutes, I couldn't connect with the characters, which detracted from my enjoyment of the book. And while the author did a great job with building tension and teasing the existence of secrets surrounding the crash, it took too long to reveal what was really going on, and I lost interest about halfway through. If you do stick it out though, the ending is worth it!

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Fantastic premise for a book. A rainy night. 3 teenagers in an accident on a bridge. But it takes 27 minutes for them to call for help. What happened in that missing time? What are they hiding?

Unfortunately the story was slower paced and the characters were not very likeable. Lots of recapping the same story again and again but the twist at the end was solid. I just wish there was a bit more meat to the story.

Thanks to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

My Thoughts

Paraphrased and added to book quote: “Phoebe Dean was so special she glowed. This is what they’ll think when they think of her, when they think of young Phoebe Dean. Because over time all of her flaws will become slightly blurred, slightly vague. Over time the Phoebe Dean legend will live on without her”.

Selective Memorywill occur often in the case of someone dying because people choose to focus on positive traits instead of negative ones because they wish to Honor rather than be totally honest.

Privately what is shared is not always what is said publicly as there’s good and bad in everyone.

In Phoebe Deans case there are character traits that come to light that are very negative indeed!

Paraphrased book quote:“without Phoebe Dean around to age or mature or correct them, the actual complicated girl will fade away until all that is left is the one that they just remember as the special one, as the perfect one, as the one who died in a tragic accident as it rained, on a bridge”…

Viewed through the eyes of classmates Rebecca Jane Hoyt, June Alice Delroy, her brother Wyatt’s and Phoebe’s own brother Grant Dean readers learn a very different story about her.

By the time all of this is firmly established however and despite all of it being important to the development process in the story itself there’s still plenty left for you to find out about exactly what happened during those 27 minutes.

End result of which will probably be as big of a surprise to you as it was for me.

Be warned none of these characters are ones to exactly endear themselves to you.

[EArc from Netgalley]


On every book read as soon as it is done and written up for review it is posted on Goodreads and Netgalley, once released then posted on Amazon, Barnes and Nobles as well.

Now I understand why this book was "Read Now" ...
Honestly surprised Ashley Audrain provided such a positive blurb.
It was a struggle to finish.

With thanks to NetGalley for this e-ARC.

I really, truly wanted to like this book. Unfortunately, I’m too confused by it to like or not like it. The premise was good – there’s a car accident involving three teenagers, one of whom dies. There is a 27 minute gap between the time of the wreck and the call to 911. The mystery is what happened in those 27 minutes, especially since the girl who died would have lived if help had been called sooner.

SPOILERS AHEAD.

When it’s first mentioned that Wyatt disappeared the night of the accident, I figured that Grant had killed him. But then Wyatt popped up so I abandoned that theory. But then it turns out that Wyatt is a ghost. Or does June have a split personality? How did Wyatt drive a car when he’s a ghost? And why did he wait 10 years to appear?

I really wanted an epilogue to tell me how Grant was punished. He was revealed to be a horrible person. He killed Wyatt and Phoebe and manipulated a person with mental illness for a decade. I needed to know he got his comeuppance.

For a debut novel it shows promise and I’m looking forward to reading Tate’s future endeavors which I think will be better as she hones her craft.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Twenty-seven minutes is the story of a deadly accident that happened 10 years prior and the fallout since. I struggled reading this book. I didn't feel connected to any of the characters. I felt like the story kept repeating itself until it got to the end. I did like the twist at the end though.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC for my honest review.

Thank you to the publisher, and Netgalley for a chance to review this.

This was a pretty decent read. A little slow paced, but it was good. To me none of the characters are really likable, but I think they're written that way for a reason. With most thrillers I am still shocked by the ending, but I kind of guessed it with this one. Not 100%, but I knew something definitely wasn't right with the accident scene. If you're new to the thriller genre, and don't want anything too heavy I'd start with this one. I will say I liked it. I didn't love it, but I liked it.

While the premise of this novel is interesting, there were a lot of things that I found difficult to buy into. While Grant clearly had problems with Wyatt (trying to not add any spoilers....), there wasn't really enough explanation about what transpired between them. And June - why isn't anyone helping her? We know Becca has been crazy about Grant for 10 years, but we don't hear enough from Grant's point of view How about a little more history regarding Becca and Grant, Phoebe and AJ? To me, this book had too many loose threads that need to be woven into the story. June figures prominently in this story, but it took me a while to figure out how she fit into this story (I initially thought she was the mother, not the daughter). The book dragged until the end, and then it all wrapped up very quickly. I would have liked the plot to unfold a little more evenly. And why does Phoebe and Grant's mother choose to do a 10 year memorial? Why can't she be morea little bit of a comfort to Grant? So many questions, so few answers.....

This ARC was provided to me by NetGalley and the publisher, the views expressed are strictly my own.

Thanks to Netgalley and the Publisher for the ARC.

Ten years ago Grant Dean was driving his little sister Phoebe home, along with Becca who happened to be in the backseat of Grant's truck when a tragic car accident killed Phoebe. That same night June Delroy's brother Wyatt runs away after a fight with his dad. As the 1o year anniversary of the approaches, tensions start to boil over. Becca struggles to remember what happened even though she covered for Grant. Grant who continues to keep Becca at arms length and June who seems to be the only person who remembers her brother disappeared that night.

3.5 stars. I have feelings after reading this book. The storyline itself was good but the book felt a little chaotic. I feel like I wanted to like it more but something was missing. Overall, not bad.

Oh my goodness…. I could not get enough of this book…I cannot wait for her next book. This is fast paced and hard to put down.

It is said that everyone grieves in their own way, and this novel is full of characters who are really struggling with grief and loss. They also have plenty of secrets to try to hide in their small town. It took a long time (sometimes it felt like too long) to get to what had happened, but in the end it was all resolved in a satisfying way. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

For the last ten years, the small, claustrophobic town of West Wilmer has been struggling to understand one thing: Why did it take young Grant Dean twenty-seven minutes to call for help on the fateful night of the car accident that took the life of his beloved sister, Phoebe? If he'd called sooner, she might still be alive.

Sounds promising, right? As many reviewers pointed out : 90% snooze fest, 10% answers

The twist in the end - cool, well done and surprising. The way TO the twist : unbearable

The characters weren't likeable at all, I think the worst one was Becca with her constant moaning that nobody cares about her.

I really, really had a hard time reading this and I really don't like giving 2 stars but this just wasn't at all what has been "promised".

Thank you Netgalley for the ARC.

Twenty-Seven Minutes revolves around the 10-year anniversary of the death of a young teen, Phoebe, which was the result of a car crash over a bridge where there was a bit of a gap between when the crash happened and when help was called. We meet a few characters in the book - Grant, Phoebe's older brother and person responsible for the crash; Becca - another survivor of the crash but it is unknown why she was there; June - town spinster whose life was also changed the night of the crash when her brother went missing.

Book started off great - nice pace in the story revealing additional information around the night of the accident. The POV changed between the characters as you started to hear about their background and their stories. Around half-way through the book, the pace seemed to slow and while the story progressed, it seems like you already knew what you needed to about each of the players. None of them were particularly endearing, they all had sad lives and issues even before the crash. Once the book reached the conclusion, while I might not have exactly seen the end coming, it totally made sense to me. Book had great potential but fell a little short. I do want to thank Net Galley for giving me the opportunity to read an advance copy.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for the free e-ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I was excited to read this one and after, feel a bit let down. It is a good book and well worth the read but this is not a "fantastic" story.

The book is a bit slow at first. I think that more could have been done with the plot and the characters could have been further developed. With the death anniversary of Phoebe, the death of the elderly woman, the tear down of the bridge, crazy Becca, and Wyatt's disappearance, I kept waiting for something to happen, something suspenseful or explanative for the events but it just did not. The ending was easy to guess and fairly anticlimactic.

Thank you to #Netgalley and #PoisonedPenPress for this ARC!

Twenty-Seven minutes is a mystery/thriller with different point of views from the characthers and beautifully written. The timelines were also very well written. Set on the small town of West Wilmer where residents cannot forget what happened that faithful night ten years ago and a recent incident that changed the lives of the town forever.

I read this book in a day and I never looked back! The twist and the plot were pretty easy to identify but the different POV's kept me intrigued to see how everything was going to unfold. A couple of the characters were so unlikable that it made it hard to feel bad or connect with them in any way. I do wish that the ending would've given a little more, I wanted to know how the characters dealt with the aftermath.

Overall I give this 4 out 5 because it really was a great book and I will definitely read more from this Author.