I loved the story but i wanted more from it im not sure how or what i would’ve wanted but i wanted more

I'm sorry, what? My real reaction after reading Twenty-Seven Minutes by Ashley Tate. OH, how I wanted to love this book, and a lot of it I did, I just wish there was a certain route that the author had not taken because it ended up confusing the heck out of me. The book is adeptly named after the amount of time it took Grant to call 911 on the night of the crash that took his sister's life. We dig down deep into the character's lives and motivations as the story goes on, and let me tell you, the sh*t ain't pretty. There are a lot of tough topics touched upon in this book and I would definitely recommend checking triggers before heading in.

Twenty-Seven Minutes is a debut novel and a pretty slow burn despite being told over the course of only 3 days, so I am glad I decided to go with the audio. It would have added something extra had there been a narrator for each viewpoint, but Nikki Thomas did an excellent job bringing the emotion of the story to life.

The small-town reality of people gossiping really stands out in this storyline, and I couldn't help but find it a little funny when Becca gets into an argument with a customer (whom she knows) when the woman is talking about Phoebe's upcoming memorial and how sad it is without thinking about what Becca went through being a part of the accident. There is definitely a touch of dark humor in here that I appreciated, but it was really sad as well. I am in the minority on how much I enjoyed this one, so if it sounds good to you, you should definitely go for it!

Thanks heaps for the opportunity to read this book and review it. Appreciate the eARC in exchange for my honest review. Unfortunately a DNF for me so giving rating for fairness.

3.5 stars

The books starts with Phoebe Dean's tragic car accident. How much of a successful life this lovely girl was supposed to have, all she had ahead of her. All of it taken in an instant. If only the ambulance arrived 27 minutes sooner Phoebe would still be alive. How heartbreaking!

June lost her mother to an accident on the same bridge Phoebe died on 10 years ago.

Grant is Phoebes sister whose life was taken on a bridge that now will be removed. Grant drove drunk which caused the accident and killed his sister.

Becca is Grant's girlfriend and was present in the accident. She still encounters memories from that night.

The timeline is sorta messy and hard to follow but it's still a good plot. However very unorganized more of a sporadic layout but I appreciate the authors attempt. We definitely learn aboit our different characters, throughout and how they connect.

DNF
I had to DNF this book and I am ok with it.
It is kinda hard to keep track of everything and it says GD sooo much, I just couldn't deal with it anymore. I understand authors can do this and i usually just pass by it and do not let it effect me or the book but this was way too much esp since I was already not enjoying the book too much.

I really did try to get into this one, but it just did not hold my attention at all. I found the multiple POV's confusing and jumbled up, and most of the characters unlikeable from the beginning. I wasn't intrigued much by the mystery and unfortunately found myself bored.

Thank you to Netgalley for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I feel like I’m really not sure if I liked this book or not to be honest! It t was sooo slow and I got bored through a lot of it unfortunately. I would say this is more of a mystery rather than a thriller too.
I really didn’t get on with the characters in this book either and nothing was really holding my attention

The small town of West Wilmer is always asking what happened in the twenty-seven minutes between Phoebe's accident and the 911 call. Ten years later, they might just get answers. But will the town be able to withstand the whirlwind of uncovered secrets and lies?

Billed as a dramatic thriller, ultimately this just fell flat for me. I enjoyed the dual timeline and how it was told from multiple POV's. However, all the characters were so unlikeable it became a slog to read through. I don't know if I would have finished had it not been an ARC. With that said, from a technical aspect, the writing was very well done. But with a cast of extremely unlikeable characters, it was hard to truly get into and enjoy the book. The surprise was nice, but it would have been nice to see some additional character growth between the two timelines. The characters in the present largely still resembled themselves as teenagers, while you would expect some sort of personal growth ten years later.

Thank you to NetGalley, Ashley Tate, and Penguin Random House Canada, for providing me with a copy of this publication, which allows me to provide you with an unbiased review.
Phoebe died in a car crash 10 years ago with her brother Grant at the wheel and friend Becca in the back seat. 10 years later the families are just as dysfunctional as ever and a memorial ceremony is going to be held. Not everyone believes it was an accident and secrets and lies are revealed.
This is an entertaining, well-written, psychological thriller which is told in two time-lines by multiple narrators. It is a fast paced and suspenseful novel.

I'm not sure how I feel about this book. I was so excited with the premise, and it started off with a bang. However, there were a lot of characters to keep up with and most of them were pretty unlikeable. This isn't always a bad thing, but I didn't feel like I was really rooting for anyone except to find out what they were hiding (which I loved!). A lot of the book seemed a little repetitive, but I couldn't give up because I needed to know what happened!!

Loved the description of this book, but had a hard time getting into it. Will definitely try again because it sounds like an intriguing story!

In a book like this, you don't want friendly characters; you want a cast that's shifty and capable of anything, and this book delivers exactly that. I'd say more, but I don't want to spoil the surprises. If you enjoy psychological thrillers with plenty of red herrings and twists, "Twenty-Seven Minutes" is a must-read that will leave you questioning everything until the very last page.

Imagine a town held captive by the mystery of their brightest star's untimely demise... Phoebe's passing left a void in the heart of the community, shrouded in whispers of that illicit party and the haunting delay in her brother's emergency call. As the decade anniversary of the tragedy approaches, the town plans a poignant tribute, stirring the pot of secrets and restlessness among those who've held their tongues too long. The quest for truth unearths more than some bargained for, challenging the resolve of even the most determined truth-seekers.

"Twenty-Seven Minutes" delivers a masterclass in suspense, weaving a narrative so gripping, the final twist will catch you off guard, leaving you reeling. Perfect for aficionados of edge-of-your-seat thrillers, this book marks the arrival of a new heavyweight in the genre. Dive in for a rollercoaster ride through the shadows of the past, and brace yourself for an ending you won't see coming.

This one is complicated. I’m torn. I didn’t hate it, but it was hard to get through. There are multiple main characters whose point of views are being flipped back and forth between throughout the book. On top of that there are multiple timelines that we are jumping. It took me awhile to remember who was who and to get to know the characters while trying to keep their connections straight. I also found myself annoyed with a few of the characters and their behaviors, but I guess if the point is to create tension and dislike of some of them in order to mislead the reader the author did a good job of that.

The overall plot was interesting and it had me guessing and changing my predictions of what was going on throughout, and in the end I was totally wrong and shocked by the twist. However it felt like it drug on and took forever to get to that point. It was a bit repetitive at times and there seemed to be a lot of unnecessary flashbacks which just added to the overall confusion.

All in all I would say I don’t regret reading it, it wasn’t awful, but I can’t say I would really recommend it either. It was just meh.

2.5 Stars (Rounded to 3 because you can’t do halves.)

(Posted review to Goodreads, Amazon, and IG)

Twenty-Seven Minutes is a definite slow burn but there are plenty of red herrings and twists to keep your attention right to the shocking final twist. I loved the dual timeline and pov that gives you an unreliable narrator so you can be kept in the dark until the end. None of the characters are particularly likeable. In a book like this, though, I don’t want to be friends with the characters. I want to feel that they are all shifty and capable of the worst. This book succeeds in doing that. I can’t say much more in the interest of keeping this review spoiler free!

I have posted this review on Amazon, Goodreads

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/6139087419

And Instagram

https://www.instagram.com/p/C4LqbJBLezz/?igsh=MTZjd3VmYnMwN2lqZQ==

I was really excited for this based off of the potential of the plot but was disappointed when there was no character connection built between the reader and the characters. I didn't feel for any of the characters or care about their stories. The ending was good but I just wish there was a deeper connection built and more character development.

Twenty-Seven Minutes
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Author: Ashley Tate

I requested a digital advanced readers copy from NetGalley and Poisoned Press and providing my opinion voluntarily and unbiased.

Synopsis: Phoebe Dean was the most popular girl alive and dead.

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?

Someone knows what really happened the night Phoebe died. Someone who is ready to tell the truth.

With Phoebe's memorial in just three days, grief, delusion, ambition, and regret tornado together with biting gossip in a town full of people obsessed with a long-gone tragedy with four people at its heart—the caretaker, the secret girlfriend, the missing bad boy, and a former football star. Just kids back then, are forever tied together the fateful rainy night Phoebe died.

My Thoughts: I would not really classify this as a thriller, to me, it was more of a slow burn literary mystery story. The story opens up with an intriguing thought process. The first chapter opens up to the ten year anniversary of the local popular girl, Phoebe Dean’s death, a car accident that killed her. Her brother, Grant, was in the vehicle with her and for some unknown reason, waited 27 minutes to call for help. Most of the rumors circling this tragedy was that he waited so long to “sober up.” Since this was the tenth anniversary, her mother wanted to do a memorial party. Pheobe’s death hit the town pretty rough and with the memorial coming up, all of those emotions are also brought to the surface. The theme is the impact of a devastating loss to the family and through the community.

This story is told from the POV of multiple characters and in both past and present timelines. There is a timeline from ten years ago and then the present timeline is leading up to the memorial. As the story goes along, so do the timelines until they meet. The POVs: Grant, Becca, June, and Wyatt. Grant is the brother; Becca was the other party involved in the vehicle and Grant’s on and off girlfriend. Wyatt is June’s brother. June’s mother just passed away and her brother, Wyatt, has been MIA since the night of the accident. Then we have Phoebe, the star of the community, she is intelligent, beautiful, and is on her way to great things. With this type of story, pacing is very important, as well as setting the tone. I thought the author did a great job at the pace, delivering information when it was necessary. The details were done well, you could feel a part of this small town. The story is not only narrated in character form, but their thoughts and how they reflect on the plot. Tate did a stellar job at pulling the characters through the story, developing the plot (again through the characters), and having a solid ending. Tate even works a little paranormal fantasy in the book that were quite chilling.

This is not a fast-paced thriller, it is a slow burn. It is dark, disturbing, chilling, and captivating. If you go in with this expectation, then you will enjoy the journey. This was a story of grief and trauma. The small town was closed knitted. The relationships were flawed, messy, and imperfect. I had the ending picked out fifteen different ways and I was still wrong, which I love when an ending can be unpredictable in today’s saturated market. I really enjoyed this book. For a debut novel, it was stellar and I know we can expect great things from Tate in the future. I would recommend this book to other readers and I would definitely read another novel by Tate.

I was so excited for this book bsed on some hype surrounding it. Unfortunately it did not hook me in the way I hoped it would. We read it for our book club which truthfullhy is the only reason I stuck it out - but I had a hard time connecting with the characters and did not enjoy the storyline overall.

Thank you so much @PoisonedPenPress for giving me this ARC in exchange for my honest and unbiased review (Release Date | 30 January 2024)

SYNOPSIS | For the past ten years, a small-town has grieved the death of a local high-school student (Phoebe), but the main question on everyone's mind is "why did it take her brother (Grant) twenty-seven minutes to call an ambulance for help?".

WHAT I LIKED:
- claustrophobic small-town atmosphere

WHAT I DIDN'T LIKE:
- far too slow-paced for my liking so by the time we found out why... I stopped being invested
- the constant timeline jumping was very distracting
- the plot was very grief heavy which I just wasn't in the right headspace for
- the majority of the characters are pretty unlikeable & I had a hard time caring about them
- some open lingering questions

A strong story, filled with twists and just enough secrets to keep the reader intrigued. With strong characters, the story advances and develops with ease keeping the reader fully involved.