Stacy Wilingham is an auto-buy author for me. Nothing about this review changes that.
She’s been an auto-buy for me since I first indulged in A Flicker in the Dark, which remains one of my fav thrillers.

Only If You’re Lucky has a college campus setting and follows dual timelines. Margot is having a rough time in college after her childhood best friend died the previous summer. Margot spends her freshman year generally hiding and mourning the death of her best friend in the comfort of her dorm room. Lucy spots Margot one day on the quad and invites her to live with Lucy and two other girls off-campus. Margot leaps at the opportunity and lives with them in a dingy old house owned by some college frat guys (not the best of landlords!). As Margot bonds with Lucy and her housemates, she emerges as a new version of herself. Exploring new things. Being bolder. Being braver. Making new friends. But, remember, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde were the same person…

Having recently graduated with my doctorate (criminology) and being officially PhinisheD with school, I enjoyed the nostalgia associated with this one. Beautifully written, slow burn thriller. Liked the exploration of good v. evil and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Book also explored the dynamics of female friendships; this aspect wasn’t as appealing to me, but then again, it usually isn’t my thing. Enjoyed the college setting and the spooky old house atmosphere – I could definitely image this taking place in one house in particular I lived in as an undergraduate lol. After I got about halfway into this one, I was ready for it to be finished. I know, I can’t believe I said that.

Only If You’re Lucky is a bit different than her previous thrillers. I agree with @reading_is_infectious that the target audience for her junior book is a bit younger than the previous two. I recommend this book most strongly for upper-level college students or anyone interested in reliving their college life (though hopefully your college life wasn’t so similar to this book!).

Also recommended for fans of Ruth Ware’s It Girl. Scroll WAAAAYYYY back for my review on that one lol.

3.5

Authoring Ranking: A Flicker in the Dark, All the Dangerous Things, and Only If You’re Lucky.

Received this eARC from @netgalley @minotaur_books and @stmartinspress in exchange for my honest review!

It’s official: Stacy Willingham and I are simply not meant to be. I’m always excited by the premise of her books, only to be consistently disappointed.

Only If You’re Lucky is a murder mystery revolving around a group of angsty, dramatic college kids. The plot had potential.... but gosh, the text is so wordy. It was difficult for me to push through. I found myself skipping pages to get to the point.

The female protagonist is meek. Self-pitying. I couldn’t stand her. In fact, none of the characters were remotely likable and it took away from the story. The ending was predictable.

I very much appreciate the ARC and the opportunity to read and review this novel. I wish I had loved it!

College friendships coming back together and adding some murder. Sounds like something I would like. In fact I did it was amazing and I didn’t figure out the twists. Also the cover is beautifully done I can’t wait to buy a physical copy of this book

I’ve read both of Stacy Willingham’s previous books and really enjoyed them so I was excited to receive this eARC! Unfortunately this one fell a little flat. I was bored the first half but plugged away hoping for a great twist. It also fell a little flat. I found the friend relationships superficial and not believable. Margot and Lucy did not seem like girls that would ever be friends. I’ll continue to pick up SW’s next books as I enjoyed the other two. This was was just a bit of a miss. Thanks to Netgalley for the arc in exchange for my opinion.

I enjoyed the main character Margot as she uncovered the truth about Lucy and what really happens with her best friend Eliza. Overall a solid thriller that kept me engaged.

In this haunting thriller, Stacy Willingham offers a mystery set in a dark campus atmosphere. “Almost too nice” Margot has escaped the Outer Banks and is now attending the small college her best friend, Eliza, had enrolled in. Only Eliza died right after graduation under suspicious circumstances that involved her new next door neighbor, Levi. A year later, sophomore Margot moves into a house with the bold and enigmatic Lucy and two other girls — Lucy’s personality is a lot like the outgoing and magnetic Eliza’s was. Adventurous, enticing, nakedly curious, but a bit manipulative. And suddenly, to Margot’s dismay, the bad memory — Levi — is pledging the fraternity right next door. Margot eventually tells her trio of roommates that she blames Eliza’s death on Levi, who had stalker-ish tendencies towards Eliza. Lucy picks up on the unease between Margot and Levi and starts poking at Levi.

We know from the start that Lucy is missing and Levi is dead. There’s a lot of binge drinking, pill taking, weed smoking, hangovers and blacked out memories happening every weekend — circumstances that can easily develop bad consequences. What happened to Levi and the missing Lucy and how are all the other roommates involved? Will more be revealed about Eliza’s accident? Is Levi’s death also a coincidental “accident”? Told in alternating chapters as “Before” Lucy’s disappearance (and even earlier as Margot reveals more about Eliza) and “After” Lucy’s disappearance, this is a neatly structured campus mystery and a commentary on partying too hard and relying on alcohol as the chief source of “fun.” As the story continued, I just wanted someone, anyone, to sober up and volunteer to be a designated driver. Yet, there’s a twist you probably won’t see coming. 4 stars!

Thank you to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for a free advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review!

Literary Pet Peeve Checklist:
Green Eyes (only 2% of the real world, yet it seems like 90% of all fictional females): YES Eliza had green eyes.
Horticultural Faux Pas (plants out of season or growing zones, like daffodils in autumn or bougainvillea in Alaska): NO But there’s a creepy island and tree roots that conveniently trip people at the scariest times.

I am a big fan of Stacy Willingham but, while this book was enjoyable, it was not my favorite of hers. The pacing was slow for me and I had a hard time connecting to the characters. I did love the college setting and the twists at the end were great. She knows how to write a thriller! This gave me The It Girl vibes, so if you were a fan of that then you will likely enjoy this too! While it wasn't the fastest paced thriller, I still would recommend giving this a read!

I was so excited to receive an arc ebook of Only If Your're Lucky from NetGalley because I have heard tons of hype surrounding the author, Stacy Willingham. This is my first read by Willingham and unfortunately, it wasn't my cup of tea. This is a book where pretty much nothing happens for the first 65 percent. It moved painfully slowly. It mainly consists of college kids partying and getting drunk, It didn't interest me. All of the characters are unlikable. I didn't relate to any of them. All of the friendships seemed fake and toxic. Every character seemed awful and psychotic on at least some level. The ending was not at all satisfying for me. It didn't feel believable and it was hard to care since I hated all of the characters.

I really wanted to love this one! I was a huge fan of Flicker in the Dark and have been waiting for another 5 star read… unfortunately this was not that for me. I found myself feeling bored and uninterested throughout the book. I pushed myself through thinking there may be a great twist ahead… there was not. It was all very predictable. However, I will continue to read Stacy Willingham- looking for that next 5 star read! Thank you, St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for this ARC!!!

4.5 stars!!! What a slow burn with a wild ending. I thought I had figured it out a few different times, but man was I wrong. Great character development, of pretty much all the main key players. The plot & the building of the slow burn were enjoyable. I would have liked it to move along a bit quicker but each step was a little more nugget of information-it’s just a matter of paying attention when those moments occur. I liked the underlying tones of friendship, and the lengths one goes for friends- including the loyalties to one another. The continuing connections to Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde made the literary connections enjoyable as well.

Thank you NetGalley for my ARC of this book!

I am obsessed with Stacy Willingham’s books and I was so excited to have the opportunity to read her latest one early. This book definitely had a different vibe than the other two and I loved it! The story takes place on at an off-campus college frat house. The book is told from a then and now POV and there are so many unreliable characters. It’s definitely a bit of a slow burn but Stacy weaves together such a gripping and dark story that I was invested right away. There are secrets, lies, twists and turns and I enjoyed reading how all the pieces came together.
Read if you like:
-Small college town setting
-Dark academia
-Female friendships
-Past and present timeline

Margot Is a student at Rutledge University, a school she chose to escape tragedy from her hometown. When she makes friends in the dorm and moves in with them, someone from her past appears, and she starts to doubt everything she thought was true.

For once I did NOT guess the ending of this book! It was very well done with twists and turns, and little clues (that I didn't pick up on!) all the way through.

Thank you Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

“What we did together is tattooed across all of us now, a permanent mark like a friendship bracelet tied tight around our wrists.”

Personal review: ⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Dark, twisty tale of female friendship deeply rooted in lies and hidden secrets - but just a bit too long. I was very interested in the beginning of this novel, and at the end, but the middle got a bit monotonous and I struggled to maintain attention. I loved the character of Lucy Sharpe, although I don’t think I was supposed to! Margot was just an ehh main character. I was interested in this plot and wanted to know who killed Levi and what actually happened to Lucy. Written in dual timelines going from the past to current day, I enjoyed the twists and turns from Stacy Willingham. Thank you @netgalley for the Advanced Review Copy in exchange for my honest review.

Synopsis: Lucy Sharpe is larger than life. Magnetic, addictive. Bold and dangerous. Especially for Margot, who meets Lucy at the end of their freshman year at a liberal arts college in South Carolina. Margot is the shy one, the careful one, always the sidekick and never the center of attention. But when Lucy singles her out at the end of the year, a year Margot spent studying and playing it safe, and asks her to room together, something in Margot can't say no―something daring, or starved, or maybe even envious. And so Margot finds herself living in an off-campus house with three other girls, Lucy, the ringleader; Sloane, the sarcastic one; and Nicole, the nice one, the three of them opposites but also deeply intertwined. It's a year that finds Margot finally coming out of the shell she's been in since the end of high school, when her best friend Eliza died three weeks after graduation. Margot and Lucy have become the closest of friends, but by the middle of their sophomore year, one of the fraternity boys from the house next door has been brutally murdered... and Lucy Sharpe is missing without a trace.

I’ve read all 3 of Willingham’s thrillers so far, and all of them have ended up at around 3 stars…maybe this author just isn’t quite for me.
this was a pretty well plotted college-set murder mystery thriller (all ingredients i love), but i never really felt super invested in the story, and was never dying to pick it back up (it took me almost 4 weeks of on-again-off-again reading to finish it). I think the issue for me was that i never really cared about these characters enough to care what happened. also i’m dying for someone to add up just how many freaking similes she uses because it got to the point where it was distracting.

I am never let down by Stacy Willingham. Her books are nearly always a win for me and this was no exception. I felt like I fell a little bit in love with Lucy myself throughout this story. I truly felt like I was in college, living in that house. I was hooked.

As a fan of "Flicker in the Dark," "Only if You're Lucky" was a disappointing read. Set on a fictional college campus, it chronicles the rise and fall of group of students that live in an old house together. Ring leader Lucy is charismatic and manipulative, luring quiet Margot into her fold. Margot is haunted by the death of her High School best friend Eliza and is eager for a new beginning. The book opens ominously: Lucy has disappeared, and a student has been murdered. Margot can't believe her life has been struck by tragedy once again and becomes a person of interest by the police.

The pacing did not hold for me at all. Told in alternating timelines, it drags the reader through past events to slowly reveal Lucy's fate. I realize this is a personal perference, but a thriller feels much stronger to me when the reader is discovering facts along with the characters, instead of the characters (and thereby the author) hoarding secrets that all come to light in the end in a "gotcha" moment. The characters in this book are also exceptionally mean, and lean into the cruel college girl trope. I felt apathetic and uninvested in the story, and disappointed it didn't contain the wit and spookiness of Willigham's previous work.

At first, it started off slow for me. It seemed pretty straightforward and I wasn’t sure where the story was going. But the slow burn was definitely worth it and I did not expect what happened!

Margot and Eliza were the best of friends. High school graduation just around the corner. The two were finalizing their plans to leave home and start college together.

But when Eliza tragically dies Margot is crushed, and must prepare to begin her college life alone. After suffering the first sad and lonely year, Lucy befriends Margot, inviting her to move in with her friends off-campus in a ramshackle house owned by one of the fraternities. Eliza jumps at the chance for a new beginning!

But maybe the past isn’t ready to let you go….

If you enjoy university/college themed thrillers this will be a perfect match. As usual, I failed to read the blurb and just read the book based simply on the author's reputation. And must say, for a 'young-ish’ themed book it held my attention throughout! The characters were well portrayed with a sense of maturity. (Well other than the mandatory partying and binge drinking of course)😉

Anyhoo….another great release from Stacy Willingham!

A buddy read with Susanne!🍻🤓📚

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martins Press

This book was simply just amazing. Each Stacy Willingham I read becomes my new favorite. I was immediately captivated from page 1. The mystery of Lucy drew me in and kept me hooked. I absolutely never would have guessed the twist ending, Seriously friends, you need to pick this one up when it releases January 16, 2024!!! Could not recommend enough. Another job well done, Stacy.

Major thanks to Stacy, Netgalley, and St. Martin's Press for proving me an eARC in exchange for my honest review.

4.25! So many unexpected plot twists that I never could have predicted. That seems to be Willingham’s specialty and I love it. She is great at writing such dislikable characters in a way that makes you still care to see what happens to them. Would be an instant 5-stars but the beginning was a taaaad slow for me. Completely worth the ride, though.