Everyone Who Can Forgive Me Is Dead is a page turning debut thriller that keeps you guessing til the very end. The novel follows Charlotte (aka Charlie) who we meet in therapy, where she is trying to remember a mysterious (to the reader) experience that happened years ago in college and how exactly she is involved. The novel jumps between two timelines (then and now) and slowly unravels the mystery of what really happened during 'Scarlet Christmas'.

I really loved this book. First of all, I love a thriller with an unreliable narrator and Charlie is exactly that. We, the reader, spend the entire novel trying to decide if Charlotte is a victim or a perpetrator and what really happened that night. The author keeps the truth well hidden throughout the novel and had me speeding through to get to the end. While I did have some issues with the writing style of the author (very long run-on sentences) and I do think some of the smaller twists are fairly easy to predict if you are an avid thriller reader, I do believe Hollander did a wonderful job in including a lot of unpredictable turns and topped it with an absolutely insane reveal.

After reading this breathtaking, whirlwind of a novel, I'm so excited to see what Jenny Hollander puts out next, especially with this book being their debut novel.

Read if you like:
- fast paced thrillers
- alternating timelines
- unreliable narrators
- huge casts of side characters
- crazy endings

Thank you to NetGalley for providing an advanced reading copy in exchange for an honest review.

EVERYONE WHO CAN FORGIVE ME IS DEAD was a solid debut by Jenny Hollander 👏🏻

My thoughts:
-psychological thriller
-dark academia vibes
-not your typical past/present timeline
-flashbacks that slowly unfold to tell us what major event happened while the MC was in college
-bingeable

The ending was wrapped up with a bow (a little too much for my taste) which is great for those who like that in a thriller. I’ll be looking forward to more by Hollander in the future.

Thank you Minotaur for my arc ☺️

This wasn't bad by any stretch of the imagination, and I'll happily read any future books by Hollander, but this wasn't super memorable for me -- it kind of blurred with all of the other "lone survivor of a traumatic and bloody incident/hinky memories/unreliable narrator/rich lady wanting to maintain her current lifestyle and keep her hot, rich fiance on the hook" books I've read. I think fans of Stacey Willingham and Ashley Winstead will love this - it has some fun twists and turns!

Ten years ago, magazine editor and London native Charlie survived a violent murder at her NYC college on Christmas Eve dubbed "Scarlet Christmas." After cutting out her college friends and moving on with her life, she's a success in business and engaged to be married to a wealthy publishing heir. Life is far from normal though, as a portion of that Christmas Eve is a black hole and Charlie suffers from anxiety and panic attacks. When a movie about "Scarlet Christmas" is announced, produced by her college BFF's twin sister, Charlie spirals and desperately tries to fill in the blanks with the help of her therapist. The writing is solid, but I personally don't love a story told by an unreliable narrator. There are a couple fantastic twists, but the big reveal and the motivation behind the movie felt a little weak.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest review.
Nine years ago Charlie was a witness to the horrifying event the media now calls Scarlet Christmas. which left 3 people dead. As she continues to rebuild her life and put that night out of her mind, she finds out that one of her former classmates is making a movie of that night in honour of the upcoming 10 yr anniversary. As the reporters start to hound Charlie and her family again, some of the secrets that Charlie has kept from her fiance start to surface and tensions start to rise. This was a good read and I enjoyed it, I found it a little slow at times but once the full story came out if was not too bad.....Enjoy!!!

2.5 stars for this unremarkable debut "thriller"

While Hollander's writing was fine, her characters needed more development in order for me to connect with or care about them. I also had trouble understanding the motivations of several characters.

I am not a fan of the repressed memories trope as it feels like a cheap gimmick used to add mystery and drama, and in this case, also made for an annoying protagonist.

I really enjoyed this debut novel. The way the timeline and story unfolded was creative and kept me turning pages, and there were a few twists that I didn't see coming. I also personally enjoy reading about people who work in publishing/are writers when it's done well, and since the author herself comes from this world, she writes about Charlie's career in a much more realistic way than we often see it portrayed; no, that's not necessarily something every reader will care about, but I do! Will definitely read more from Jenny Hollander.

Charlie Colbert fled the trauma of "Scarlet Christmas," leaving behind a world of whispers and blame. Nine years later, she's claw her way back - magazine editor, glittering fiancé, a mask of control hiding the shattered pieces of her past. But the scars run deep. When a film threatens to unveil her truth, the carefully constructed fortress cracks. This time, though, Charlie's not running. This time, the woman who was branded a witness will become the warrior, determined to reclaim her narrative and confront the ghosts that haunt her, even if it means facing the darkness she's spent years avoiding.

Damn. Take a college tragedy, live through it, without talking it through, and you can see just how messed up your life can really become. Blame, guilt and black outs where you don’t know what you could have been capable of filter through this story for many characters and develop the plot seamlessly. The details and threads that overlap and then combine were masterful and have this mystery coming full circle by the end. I couldn’t put it down.

I thought this was pretty good for a debut. It was very much a slow burn as I read, very impatiently waiting to learn what really happened on Scarlet Christmas. Charlie’s desperation to keep the events of that night secret led her to do some things that I found very unsettling. Everyone else, however, just excuses her behavior, which made zero sense to me. Otherwise, it was an intriguing premise that definitely kept me reading.

3.5/5

Everyone Who Can Forgive Me Is Dead is a thriller about a woman who survives a criminal act and how she reacts when a movie is planned on the events. I thought the first section was good, it held my attention even though I had no clue what the crime actually was for a chunk of time. The second part kind of went off the rails for me, the main character becomes increasingly unreliable so it gets weird. I have to say I was disappointed in the reveal as to what Charlie's problem was and felt the ending was a letdown. The characters were interesting. Charlie is the one we get to know the best, the rest are kind of glossed over. Cate comes across as a bad alcoholic and nuts, but maybe a good friend... that will be for you to decide. I would have liked to know Gunnar and Jordan more, they both seemed interesting but were not really in the book enough to get to know. All in all, I enjoyed the book and look forward to reading more by this author.

This debut thriller was just ok for me. It’s the 10th anniversary of Charlie being a witness to a horrific crime and someone wants to make a movie out of it. With the help of her therapist, they try to help her with her memories but I had a hard time with the slowness of the whole book. I do look forward to this author’s next book. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this early release in exchange for my honest review. To be published February 2024. I do love the cover!

I’m not sure if this was the author’s debut book, but it was my first time reading her and I will definitely come back for more.

“Everyone Who Can Forgive Me is Dead" is a gripping psychological thriller that explores the lengths one will go to protect themselves and the consequences of buried secrets. It delves into the complexities of human nature and the transformative power of truth. Hollander explores guilt, therapy, and self medication with a confident and sure hand, weaving Charlie's present day narrative with flashbacks to the events leading up to the Scarlet Christmas. Fans of twisty psychological thrillers will enjoy this fast paced tale.My thanks to Netgalley and the Publishers for my advance Reader Copy. This is my honest review.

Thank you Netgalley for the advance reader and audiobook copy of Everyone Who Can Forgive Me Is Dead by Jenny Hollander in exchange for an honest review. This book sure took some right angles. Everytime I thought I knew where it was headed it changed. I even said "What!?" a few times. I really enjoyed it and read it in a day.

Charlie is a surviver of Scarlet Christmas, a terrible day at Carroll University School of Journalism where three of her classmates were murdered. However, Charlie can't remember the event in its entirety and with a movie about it being released soon, she worries she was more involved than she thought.

I really enjoyed this book. It was a quick read for me that I was able to pick up and put down while on vacation. The plot was easy to follow and the present tense and flashbacks were clearly labelled so you knew the timeframe you were reading in. Another thing I really liked is that the main character, Charlie, is an unreliable narrator. She can't remember what happened and refers to her memory of the event as a black hole. I enjoyed the pace that the background of the event was given to us as Charlie slowly worked through therapy.

One thing I found rather confusing was in the beginning of the book, I thought it said that two characters were dead, but later, they were revealed to be alive. I'm not sure whether I simply misread or if that was a part of Charlie's memory not being correct, but it still didn't alter the book too much.

This is a quick thrilling read! I really enjoyed this one. We spend the whole book frantically trying to figure out what happened when Charlie was blacked out the night of a terrible tragedy during grad school. Did Charlie do something awful like she really thinks she did? I will say I was waiting for the twist and there was one but it's not what I was expecting! I can't decide if I loved the ending or not because it is so far from what I was expecting but that's not a bad thing. I definitely recommend Everyone Who Can Forgive Me is Dead.

All of a sudden, every book I pick up seems to have a college theme. Everyone Who Can Forgive Me is Dead takes place when the MC is in her thirties, but harkens back to a major event that happened when she was in journalism school.
Charlie is the editor in chief of a posh magazine, engaged to marry into a super wealthy family. But 9 years ago, she was a grad student that witnessed a horrible event that left three people dead, now known as Scarlet Christmas. Now, one of those involved is planning a movie about the ordeal. And Charlie is all too aware that the story she told at the time will not stand up to scrutiny. Because while she couldn’t remember what happened, that didn’t stop her from acting like she did.
Hollander does a good job of detailing Charlie’s PTSD and the therapy she’s been in. But she never adequately explained why Charlie felt obligated to lie to the investigators and why she just didn’t admit to not knowing.
Hollander takes her time setting up the premise, using a back and forth timeline to keep the reader off balance. But I did feel that the ending was just a little too pat. (Although I did appreciate that a dog was central to Charlie’s healing.) And call me obtuse, but I had to go back and re-read the section when she remembered what happened because I couldn’t really figure out how one of the victims died.
I wasn’t enthralled with Hollander’s character development. Charlie never felt quite real to me. Tripp was just a cliche of the rich white guy. And I never had a real sense of why Cate was so manic.
My thanks to Netgalley and St. Martin’s Press for an advance copy of this book

I absolutely adore when I read a great debut but I’m always a little more impressed when said debut is a mystery/thriller. There’s something so impressive to me about an author having the ability to craft not only a gripping story but one that is well executed and has the right amount of reveals and turns to keep the pacing perfect. Bonus points for twists that make sense and strong writing, all of which I found in this one!

While I personally found the pacing to be appropriate for a thriller, there are arguments to be made that this could qualify as a slow burn. Details about the horrific night that changed Charlie’s life are revealed very slowly but I thought the author did a great job of spoon feeding enough information to keep me pretty satisfied. The ending was a tiny bit underwhelming but was still a very worthwhile read for me and I will definitely be excited to see what this new author does next.

This is an easy and quick-paced read following a group of friends as they meet and form their cliques in college. They were all present when a murder-suicide occurred on campus, dubbed the “Scarlett Christmas”. Told from the viewpoint of Charlie, who some called a survivor while others considered her a witness. She lost three of her friends, and is haunted by what actually happened that night compared to the witness statement she gave.
Jumping from past to present, it revives the events leading up to the fateful night. Just as I would feel sure I knew who was evil, then a red herring is tossed my way. I was a bit confused and would have done better if I had kept a character log while reading. But thanks to the miracle of the Kindle file, I’m able to search by name and quickly review all I needed to know about a particular character. This was a twisty thriller with an unexpected end.
Thanks so much to St. Martin’s Press, Minotaur, for an ARC in exchange for my honest review. The publishing date is February 6, 2024.