Stacy Willingham is one of my auto-buy authors! She has yet to let me down.

While this was a little slower than her other books, it did not disappoint.

I loved the college setting with glimpse into fraternity house life. It definitely took me back to my college days! The friendships and relationships between characters were very unique, and kept me wanting to know more.

I wish there was a little more suspense throughout the book. Sometimes the slow-burn was a little too slow for me, but the ending made up for it!

Stacy Willigham has earned a spot as one of my top authors. All three of her books have been knockouts for me. This one was different from the others because of the college age FMC. Stacy does such a good job at writing a tense unsettling atmosphere. I felt like i was there with them in that cold, college house. I was surprised by a few of the twists and guessed the other. This dark academia thriller is perfect for fall. I cant wait to shout this one out on my bookstagram pagesinpittsburgh!

** Thank you for this ARC! **

Oh, I loved this book. I read it in one sitting. I was already a fan of Stacy Willingham, so it didn't come as a surprise.
I loved the character developement, the storyline, the events. Even though I kind of guessed the twist, it still was very well written.

Thank you to NetGalley, Minotaur Books & St. Martin’s Press for this advanced copy in exchange for my honest review. This book is definitely a slow burn but the ending is worth it. If you enjoy college/ high school friendships this book is for you. Stacy Willingham's has such a beautiful writing stile. I enjoyed the fact that the description of the house was taken from her real college life experience. Events and characters are so realistic in this book. Margot is a very relatable character for a lot of people. We all know someone like her in our life. She is never a center of attention but she always gets friends who are complete opposites. Margot feels jealous, sad, depressed, obsessed etc. You will enjoy her story! I am giving this book four stars. Can't wait to see what is next for Stacy Willingham.

This was much more fun than I expected! In my head, I thought this would be the typical shy girl-meets-bad girl story I've read so many times before, with an appropriately bland protagonist who loves reading and hates college life, and an inappropriately seductive newcomer with skimpy clothes, red lipstick, and a drinking habit to rival a sailor's. I was kind of right, but kind of wrong as well.
Originally, the two girls are portrayed as the stereotypes I've already outlined, and my hopes fell. But as the story developed, I wasn't sure what to think about the characters anymore. They kept surprising me. I couldn't fit them into the boxes I'd laid out in my head. The mystery was full of twists and turns, and I had no idea where it was headed. I loved the ominous atmosphere- it felt very different from other bad-girl thrillers I've read in the past. It made me take the novel a little more seriously. Obviously, there's some parts in the book that really need you to suspend your disbelief, but I expected that. It never got to the point where I couldn't enjoy the story anymore. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book, and I can't wait to read Willingham's backlog!

I finished this book late last night and I'm still reeling from all the twists that this book had. The first half of the book is a lot of setting the stage and could be perceived as slow, but I promise the payoff will be there. If you are like me and are trying to figure things out, there are a lot of twists in this story. I could not put this one down. Thank you to NetGalley and St Martin's Press for a chance to read this early in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you to Netgalley and publisher for an arc in exchange for my honest review.

Publication: January 16, 2024

Rating: 2.5 stars

This is my second book by Willingham and her first one that I read (All the Dangerous Things) fell right in the middle for me. Not terrible but not the best I've read either when it comes to thrillers. Unfortunately, this book fell a little lower which makes me think that this author and I don't mesh.

Things I liked:
- The setting (felt very 60's/70's but was aiming for 22/23)
- The writing style

Things I didn't enjoy:
- Very slow plot
- Toxic young women
- Dual timeline with the sluggish pace

Perfect for fans:
- Unreliable narrators
- Slow burn
- Mystery readers
- Big Little Lies vibes

This was my second Stacy Willingham book and the one that official made me a fan! I loved A Flicker in the Dark, but this is one of the best thrillers I’ve read, ever. I have found it very rare to come across a thriller that is both a page turner that you just can’t put down and also beautifully written but this was the exception for me. Her metaphors give the reader visuals so vivid I had to pause several times simply in awe of how real it felt. Stacy Willingham has a way of transporting her readers so deeply into a world she created entirely on her own that when you put it down it takes a moment to adjust back to reality.

Only if You’re Lucky was a wild ride and I loved every minute of it. I will be ordering copies to gift to all of my thriller loving friends for the holidays and I’m excited to have found an author who “does it all” and doesn’t sacrifice writing quality to just push best selling books out faster for more profit. You can tell she takes her time and perfects her craft and it pays off.

This was just so so for me. This was about friendships at a college. I would imagine it’s hard to appeal to a wide audience when writing about a specific age group like that. I’ve read some good ones; unfortunately this iwas not one for me. Thank you NetGalley for this ARc.

I want to start this review by saying that a 3 star review is still a good read for me. I still recommend a three star read. I just preface that there was something about it that didn’t make it great. I also want to say that I am so honored and excited that I was able to receive an ARC of this book! I have read both of Stacy’s previous books and gave one a five star (All the Dangerous Things) and one four stars (A Flicker in the Dark). That all being said- this was a three star read for me. I am comfortable reading morally grey characters as long as their morally greatness is done for a good reason/cause if that makes sense. I have a hard time reading about characters that are morally grey for extremely selfish reasons. That was almost all of the characters in this book. Stacy’s other books were dark but this seemed darker for some reason. There was no good outcome. No one “won” in the end.

Meet Margot. She is headed into her freshmen year at Rutledge after a tragic summer where her BF of forever died via an accident. She has no friends. She is lost. She is looking for a tether.

Enter Lucy Sharpe. The girl that everyone seemingly wants to be. The girl that is confident and cool as a cucumber without trying to be. Lucy decides to take Margot under her wing. She asks Margot to move in with her and her two BFs, Nicole and Sloan into a house that is connected to the Kappa Nu frat house via a backyard shed. The four of the girls are there the summer before sophomore year with a handful of guys. Margot is along for the ride and learning the lingo when she runs into someone from her past- Levi Butler. Her BF’s boyfriend and the last person to see her alive. Margot tells her roomies the dirt on Levi and warns them to stay clear but how can they when he is pledging the frat next door?

Margot starts to question Lucy when she hears different warnings from her roomies and notices little things that she does that seem off. Why did she avoid the guy at the party who said he recognized her from their home town? Why does she ask Margot so many questions about her BF Eliza? Then Levi shows up dead after the pledge initiation party and Margo realizes she has no clue who she is living with.

This book is a dark look into friendships and how far people are willing to go to protect the one’s they love for the better or worse. I want to thank NetGalley and Minotaur Books for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I am curious to see what other people think about this one! Let me know :)

I loved this book! I will definitely recommend it. Thanks so much to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Thank you Stacy Willingham, St. Martin's Press and Net Galley for providing me with an advanced reader's copy and giving me the opportunity to read Only If You're Lucky! I've enjoyed Willingham's books in the past and I was very excited to begin her third novel.

Only If You're Lucky is a slow burning, thrilling novel that centers around the themes of friendship, struggles of belonging, betrayal, secrets, morals, and the dualities of good and evil. The novel focuses on the main character Margot and her experience in college while mourning the death of her childhood best friend, Eliza. While attending college, she is mesmerized by one of her fellow students, Lucy Sharpe, and is surprised when Lucy asks her to move in with her and her two friends, Sloane and Nicole.

When a fellow student connected to Margot's past dies unexpectantly, Margot must overcome all the challenges connected to her insecurities, forming friendships, and all the reminders of Eliza.

Overall, I rated Only If You're Lucky 3.5 to 4 stars. I really enjoyed that the book switched back and forth between the past and present day. It kept me on my toes and the narrative went into the present day during really suspenseful times. Willingham's style of writing is also very engaging and I often felt like I was there in the story.

One thing I struggled with was I never fully connected with any of the characters. I found them all a bit flawed and unlikeable, but I suppose that could've been the point. All the character's are incredibly complicated and one theme that is touched on is the duality between good and evil. There were times where I didn't agree with the characters, yet I think in the end that's okay.

I also found the stakes a bit lower than Willingham's previous books and other psychological thrillers. I would say this is more of a fiction/friendship book with a splash of thrill.

Overall, I enjoyed reading this book and I'd definitely recommend to other Willingham fans! Thank you once again for the advanced copy!

2.5 ⭐️'s - Only If You're Lucky is a slow burner that tells the story of a group of college friends. Lucy, Sloane, Nicole, and Margot rent a house from the fraternity next door. The book explores the challenges of forming relationships as a young adult, care-free partying, and the insecurities of navigating the transition between teenage and young adult years. Most of the story is told from Margot's point of view and hops between her present life as a college sophomore and a past traumatic event. The juvenile perspective reads as a darkly themed coming-of-age story.

Despite some notable points in the novel, this book would be better served under the classification of young adult or dramatic fiction. While the lurking story of a murder hovers in the background, Only If You're Lucky focuses more on the relationships between the girls and Margot's emotional struggles. It lacks any meaningful suspense or twists expected from a suspenseful adult thriller.

There is one particular point that deeply affects the plot. The current timeline is implied to occur now (2022/2023). However, there is a substantial absence of technology and social media. 19-year-old college girls aren't constantly posting and checking TikTok, Snapchat, or Instagram? They only communicate in person - no texting, DMs, or Snaps. Without spoiling the story, one character's background is a mystery and is often questioned by the other girls. Wouldn't they Google her? Or look up her social profiles? In the acknowledgments, the author shares the setting of the story was inspired by somewhere she lived in college. I think memories of her own college experience (which would have been the early 2010s) overwhelmed her perspective a bit. Is this a huge deal? Not usually, but in this case, ignoring the modern instinct (and accessibility) to look up anyone makes most of the story unnecessary.

In summary, if you are looking for a fictional drama that dives into themes of peer pressure, jealousy, and the need to belong, Only if You're Lucky is a great pick. However, as a reader expecting a twisty thriller, this truly missed the mark.

I did enjoy the ending. The last quarter of the book has a significant shift in pace, attributing to my final score of 2.5 stars. Thank you, NetGalley and the publisher, for providing an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This book was a slow burn, but once it picked up it blew me away! I loved it! The characters were so developed and easy to relate to. The story line was interesting and made me want to solve all the mysteries. I highly recommend this book. This is my third book by this author and she has become one of my favorites!

Stacy Willingham has a unique ability to paint a picture that completely draws me in. Just like her previous books, Only If You're Lucky is so vivid and mesmerizing that you can't help but read it quickly. I felt most of the characters were well rounded and brought to life. I loved the dynamic relationships and thought it was a great read!

Amazing! Another banger of a story from Stacy. She’s definitely one of my favorite writers. Her detailed, entrancing story telling is unmatched and so appreciated when you read lots of thrillers as I do. Sometimes they all start to sound the same, but not Stacy’s. The story was fun, twisty and while I did guess one twist, the ending held a few surprises!

Thank you to St. Martins Press, NetGalley and the author for the advanced reader copy!

“Friends for life is a myth, a fable. A feel-good fairy tale we tell ourselves to avoid having to think too hard about facing the world alone.”

Margot was facing the world alone during her first year of college, just after tragically losing her BFF in their affluent Outer Banks town in North Carolina. No one was charged with her murder, it was deemed and accident, but it haunted Margot’s every waking moment. A few months prior to Eliza’s mysterious death, Margot’s life had been picture perfect. The girls were inseparable, planning their upcoming lives at Rutledge College together. They were the best of friends, knew each others secrets, and spent all their time together until Levi Butler moved next door. Eliza became smitten with him, and there was a cosmic shift in Eliza’s attention to Margot. Margot began to feel alone and cast aside, she was not happy.

Resentment and anger between the young friends reached an apex just weeks before Eliza’s untimely death. In Margot’s eyes, Levi Butler was the singular cause for their rift, and she completely blamed him for the state of their relationship. Margot and Eliza had a huge fight and were still not communicating when Eliza fell to her death unexpectedly. Of course Levi was with Eliza that fateful night, fanning the feelings of hatred Margot harbored. Deemed an accidental fall there were no arrests made in the death of her beloved friend. Margot knew who she blamed, and his name was Levi.

During Margot’s first year of college at Rutledge, she was still grappling with tremendous loss of Eliza. Lucy, an enchanting coed befriends Margot and Margot is completely and utterly smitten with her. She craves what she had with Eliza and is hoping to recreate that with Lucy. Like Eliza was, Lucy is always the center of attention. People are drawn to her, they follow her lead and do what she says. Margot is no different. She follows Lucy’s lead wholeheartedly, desperate to have that closeness back in her life. She feels lucky to experience it again. Sadly, people aren’t always what they seem, and Margot will learn this lesson the hard way.

As Margot enters her second year of college, her life becomes uncharacteristically turbulent. She throws caution to the wind, resolute in becoming a different kind of person. She has moved in with the captivating Lucy, the timid Nicole and straightforward Sloane and believes her life is just about perfect. Soon after, Levi Buttler, a new incoming freshman at Rutledge, threatens to ruin her happiness by being a fixture in her daily life. Levi is now a part of her social circle, and causes her to relive all kinds of suppressed emotions.

Not long after Levi comes to college, he is suspiciously murdered and Margot is consumed with suspicion about her own past, her good friend Lucy, her other friends and some of the choices she’s made in her young life. As the police focus on Lucy, Margot, and the roommates for answers to Levi’s death the story starts to unravel revealing the truth about both deaths and the sinister details.

Just when the reader thinks (s)he’s figured out the plot another speck of the truth is revealed and is led to a completely different conclusion. This was an excellent book with so many unpredictable secrets.

Thank you Net Galley, Minotaur Books and Stacy Wellingham for this ARC in exchange for an honest review. I’ve read all three of Stacy’s books and I cannot wait to read her fourth. Do yourself a favor and pick this book up on release day 1/16/24 or preorder, you won’t be sorry!

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Hands down, this is Stacy Willingham’s best book yet. I’ve been following her work for the last several years, ever since I received an ARC of her first book, A Flicker In the Dark, and absolutely loved it. It’s truly been such a treat to watch her writing develop over her last two books, and the fruits of her labour really get to shine through with this piece.

Fundamentally, this is a story about the intense friendships—and secrets—that develop between young women during their college years: the first time that we’re “on our own,” but also for so many of us these years are still a period of truly learning who we actually are, and who we may become. While (ideally!) the murder(s) within the book will not be directly relatable for most, I do believe that many other aspects will ring true for many people.

The final series of twists is rolled out in exquisite fashion, and if you’re a fan of the multi-layered slow burn thriller this book is absolutely for you.

Margot and Eliza were best friends since kindergarten. After high school they had plans to attend college together until Eliza dies in a tragic accident. Afterward Margot doesn’t know how to go on without Eliza. She starts college but just gets by. At the end of her freshman year, Margot meets Lucy, Sloane, and Nicole. Lucy is very similar to Eliza with her outgoing personality and draws Margot in to her world. But soon a classmate is dead and Lucy is missing.

This story really looks at female friendships, jealousy, and the desire to belong. It was a slow burn. There was an alternating timeline of before and after but it just took a really long time to get anywhere. I thought it was a little twisty but truthfully nothing too exciting. And the ending felt too rushed for me. I felt almost exactly the same way with Jar of Hearts. Good book, but not anything I felt overly excited about.

Thank you to the author, NetGalley, and St Martins Press for the advance reader copy. Publication date January 16, 2024.

Margot is the introvert always flying by the coat tails of her best friend Eliza. When Eliza dies suddenly the summer between high school and college, Margot is left reeling with what comes next. Enter Lucy, a shining star that stands out in a crowd and draws the attention. Lucy pulls Margot into her inner circle along with Sloane and Nicole. The girls are all vastly different, but somehow seem to coexist around Lucy.

Over the course of a year, the girls bond deeply and cling to each other like buoys. When a pledge from the next door fraternity winds up dead, questions arise. Who is Lucy? Could she have ties the girls didn't know about? More importantly, where did Lucy go?

Go for a ride with this book about dramatic friendships seized by tragedy. A slow burn that has you connecting the dots through the eyes of Margot.

Stacy Willingham really switched it up with this one. I typically see her books flipping between the past (younger self) and more of a current main character. This book centered around college age girls throughout the story. Still very much a before and after, but not quite the same. I would venture to say that this had less thriller vibes than her others. It's driven by friendship and protecting those you care about.

Thank you to Netgalley, Minotaur, and St. Martin Press for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest opinion.