After one too many unpleasant encounters with the opposite sex, Millie Masters sets up an escort hotline for women feel unsafe walking home alone at night. That is the extent of her services until her own sister is assaulted and her business takes a more sinister approach: murder. Millie soon becomes the serial killer women have always needed. Such a fun take on revenge with dark humor.

DNF @ 20%. I could not get into this book and found the FMC to be very whiny. I don’t like to give lower than 2 star ratings, just because I didn’t like it doesn’t mean this isn’t a good book or that someone else won’t enjoy it. This book just wasn’t for me.

Wow! This novel had to be hard to write. This is a deeply funny and very dark and astonishingly clever gem of a story. And that is all hard to do with the main character becoming a serial killer. But you know only against villains…mostly. The humor made LOL and the friendship and dedication to her sister? No notes. Thank you NetGalley for the preview in exchange for my honest review. If you have a dark sense of humor or even just a little witty please pick this up!

I’m beginning to think vigilante women seeking justice against deranged men is my new favorite trope. If you agree this is the perfect read for you.

I was SHOCKED to read this was a debut because it is just so masterfully crafted. I could not get enough of Millie and Nina and I really hope there is more of them to come.

Although this is lighthearted and fun to read, please just trigger warnings for sexual assault, self harming and well murder.

Over the last few years I have become a fan of The Finlay Donovan series from Elle Cosimano and who can count out the revenge set by Layne Fargo in They Never Learn, this could be their love child.

I don’t want to say too much and spoil anything, you’ll just have to sacrifice the next 5 hours of your life diving in just like I did.

Don’t forget to grab a glass (or bottle) of wine. 🍷

Thanks to NetGalley for the eARC
5 ⭐️

I knew going in I was going to love this book justice for victims with lots of dark humor thrown in...what's not to love?!
Millie runs a hotline for women to call when they find themselves in a dangerous situation with a man. However when she realizes some of these men need to be stopped, for good, Millie moves to a more permanent solution. You can't help but love Millie and any woman can relate to many of the feelings laid out in "How to Kill a Guy in Ten Ways". If you enjoyed Finlay Donovan, you'll enjoy this book by Eve Kellman.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book in advance of publication.

“Things are not going to plan, but I’m only a quitter when it comes to work, hobbies, relationships, diets and most friendships. Not murder. So we will roll with what we have.”

Special thanks to the author & NetGalley.com for the Advanced Reader Copy 🥰

Ok talk about a rollercoaster ride. I think the rating I was going to give was everything from 1⭐️ to 5⭐️ throughout reading. Our FMC Millie is a lot to unpack, at least for me. There were times I wanted to punch her, times I wanted to hug her and times I wanted to just tell her to take a deep breath. At the beginning of the story, her interactions with her “friends” had me making a note of “ok, then why hang out with them if you dislike them so much”.. but the way her relationship and friendship blossoms with Nina is very important to what my final rating ended up being. Without giving too much away, the way Millie protects her sister feels extremely realistic however there are points throughout the story where you question whether you agree or disagree with Millie’s morals while protecting Katie. All in all, a great 4 ⭐️ with a plot that felt new, fresh and unique. Would def recommend to the right person!

I love women empowerment type thrillers. I was really rooting for the main character, and loved how she was helping people. The twists and story were so exciting

"How to Kill a Guy in Ten Ways" is a darkly hilarious and socially relevant book about vigilante justice, led by Millie Masters, who is committed to protect women from predatory men. She starts this hotline, Message M, to help out girls who feel unsafe, but things escalate real quick when she decides murder might be the best solution to deal with repeat offenders. Kellman did amazing job with combining comedy and important social commentary, with Millie's relentless pursuit of justice.

But in spite of its intriguing premise, the book has trouble keeping up with the pace, especially in the middle when the story gets overtaken by a lot of detail and too many characters. The story's overall impact is diminished by its recurrent themes and dull middle sections.

Even while Millie has a fascinating personality, her critical and aloof attitude make it hard to like her, especially with her interactions with her sister and closest friend. However, the book is successful in depicting Millie's slow spiral into obsession and provides a nuanced view of her complicated mental state. As readers are dragged farther into her world of unclear morals and revenge, the novel becomes more tense as her sanity slowly unravels.

This was really interesting read, I would recommend it for readers who like unconventional books with strong female characters.

Delivers exactly what it promises! Sort of stomach-churning to be in Millie’s head but in the best way. A big recommend for people disappointed by the execution of Promising Young Woman.

At first, I was hesitant to read a book about a serial killer. However, I loved this. A revenge fiction story that was feminist and thrilling and dark and twisted, but also,,,, surprisingly funny? What a fantastic debut! I was super impressed by this book, and I'll definitely be waiting impatiently to see what Eve Kellman writes next!

This was a refreshing plot and based on how it shaped out, I feel like it came straight out of my own brain. I've always kind of wished for a book where the main character didn't back out after all of the bad and fall in love with the love interest who miraculously forgave her. Having this end the way it did was unique and interesting and brings up a lot of good book discussion questions on morality and doing bad for good reasons. Obviously the main character did bad for a bad reason at the end, but there's an optimistic spin on it and I appreciate how she stuck through with it and came out the other side.

I requested this book on NetGalley because it was categorized as humor and as mystery/thriller. It is neither of these things. It is instead the tale of a narcissistic female serial killer who, while meting out her sense of vigilante(?) justice, also manages to kill and otherwise harm innocents to protect herself from the consequences of her actions.

Millie, our protagonist, had a horrific childhood and is having a not very important adulthood, until her younger sister is raped and Millie decides to take action. She starts with an anonymous helpline for women and ends with murdering numerous men whom she believes - rightly or wrongly - have harmed or will harm women.

Millie's story is not funny in any way. She is not funny in any way. Her actions erase most sympathy a reader might feel about her past and the book overall falls flat and just feels really sad. Sad that Millie's mother sucks, sad that a hotline like hers is needed, sad that she isn't really sad about all of the things she does. Sad that she allows good men to fall for the sake of her own continued existence and freedom. I only did not DNF this book because I was hoping to see some ending other than the one Millie got.

One star. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a complimentary ARC of this book. These opinions are my own.

Thank you to Avon and NetGalley for providing me a copy to review.

I feel like thrillers with female serial killer leads are having a ~moment~ right now. If that is your thing, I think you'll absolutely love this. It was interesting to witness Millie's spiral.

For me personally, the book fell a little flat. It's hard to discuss exactly why without getting a bit into spoiler territory, so if you're like me and enjoy going in completely blind you might want to stop reading. You have been warned.

The book was very well done, but I had a hard time picking it up and somewhat had to force myself to read because I disliked Millie so much that I had a hard time caring about the plot. I know that not everyone will feel this way, and honestly I hope I'm the only one! I would argue that Millie being dislikable is the point, and that the author did a fantastic job of flushing her out. However, because she was so dislikable, the book kind of dragged. I wasn't a huge fan of her thoughts, so pages and pages of her just thinking were hard to get through. Although there were plenty of side characters, Millie is so self absorbed that none of them actually got a chance to feel developed. Again, all these "issues" are also signs of how well the author built up Millie in a way that shows her believable spiral into full serial killer. It just made the book feel almost boring even though so much was happening.

Overall, this was masterfully done, and while I didn't dislike it, I can't quite say that I enjoyed reading it. But I know that many out there will enjoy it, and I hope it finds its readers!

This one was so much fun to read! If you like women giving out vigilante justice to deserving men, you need to check this one out.
Now some truth: Millie was kind of an unlikeable (at least to me) but hilarious narrator. She was very judgemental, and she came off a bit narcissistic... but I mean she's a serial unaliver so... maybe she is. That being said, I get her reasons. She was also giving me a ton of f**king anxiety. Girl was KILLING me with some of the terrible decisions she made.
Thank goodness for Nina, the epitome of ride or die. She's one of my favorite side characters ever. Let's all strive to be a Nina.
I 100% recommend this one. It made me feel all the emotions. I was shocked, I was sad, I was anxious, and I also laughed like crazy. I just loved this one.

Thank you for allowing me to preview this title. I wasn't able to get into it. The pacing was far too slow for me. I loved the author's writing style and would try her books in the future, this one, however, was just not my cup of tea. Best wishes and much success!!

Big thanks too NetGalley and the publisher for giving me access to this book early. Thriller: check, funny: check. Although this book did have some serious topics, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I’m a sucker for thriller and humor title is what got my attention and I’m so glad I requested early access.

While I enjoyed the humor and overall concept, this book fell flat for me. I felt as if some things were unnecessary to the story but other things were missing. The story started to really drag and feel repetitive in the middle so I barely was able to force myself to finish.

The concept of a female vigilante serial killer is such a unique and interesting storyline that held a lot of promise. However, this one fell flat for me. While the last 100 pages or so were enjoyable, the rest was slow and barely held my attention. There was no depth to the plot or characters, and the main character I honestly found frustrating. I liked her best friend's character, Nina, however. She was the only character I grew any kind of feelings for - the rest were simply there. There were several unnecessary elements thrown into the mix, and I found myself just wanting to get the book over with. This is advertised to have humor, but I didn’t find it humorous at all. The ending was solid, but a bit unbelievable and felt somewhat incomplete. I was so excited for this one and it simply didn’t live up to my expectations.

A bit of humor, a bit of satire, and some serious situations all come together in an offbeat tale of vigilante justice that goes to extremes. I definitely rooted for her, her mission a good one - but yea, like most emotion-driven behaviors things go a bit crazy for a while. A fun read, but watch for triggers.

This book was trying way too hard and fell flat on its face. It went from vigilante justice to spree serial killer. And aside from the blurred plot, the story was completely unorganized and therefore confusing at every turn. I wanted to enjoy a clever, comical murder mystery, but this certainly is not one.