Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

What a wild ride! I couldn't put this book down and it kept me guessing the entire time! Even once I thought I knew what was happening, bam! Another twist.

The story starts with a news editor who is about to reluctantly head to California on a business trip. She isn't enthused about having to go away again just because she is single. At the same time in the same town, a woman plots her escape from her abusive boyfriend. They end up on the same plane, sitting next to each other. And exactly what I thought would happen...nope, not even close!

As the story progresses, other characters take turns telling the story as the plot moves forward. The characters are real and flawed, and some are s0 perfectly terrible!

I can't say much without more spoilers, but this isn't at all about a boring business trip! I'm not sure why I'm not hearing more about this book, but it is my favorite of the year so far!

This book was a pleasant surprise.
I thoroughly enjoyed it, as it was a quick read and a good time.

This book reminded me of The Kind Worth Killing, in some ways. Two strangers on a mission to do something bad. very bad. I love that this will be available on Kindle Unlimited in January. I hope thriller readers pick this up and give a read because it was a great one!

The Business Trip, Jessie Garcia
Why did I wait SO long to read this book???
This story is told from several view points and trying to figure out how they all tie together was the fun the entire time I was reading the book.
Jasmine: in the middle of the night, Jasmine leaves her trailer park, abusive boyfriend, Glenn, with a one way ticket to Denver.
Stephanie: a classy business, news station professional. She's also headed to Denver for conference. Her own personal life has just been lonely since the divorce of her husband and her grown children never wanting to spend time with her.
The first 60% of this book was so good and engaging. I just couldn’t figure out where it was all going and it kept me guessing the entire time. I didn’t want to stop reading. Once the story started to unravel, it got a little ridiculous and I quickly lost my interest. And in my opinion, the people she took down with her, weren’t deserving of what she did to them. But i did really enjoy the ending and didn’t see any of that coming!
⭐️⭐️⭐️

Wow! This title had me guessing at every turn. I could not stop reading! When we had certain male character point of views, it had my blood boiling. I was so disgusted by their inner thoughts, but that just means the author really lets the reader get into these characters heads. Amazing storytelling and would definitely read more from this author!

The Business Trip
A Novel
by Jessie Garcia
. (This review is based on an ARC sent to me by Net Galley)

The two main women characters in the book Jasmine and Stephanie who don’t know each other but end up in the same row on a flight. Stephanie is headed to business conference and Jasmine is fleeing an abusive relationship.
Ater that flight both women vanish and both are mentioned in text messages about the same man Trent McCarthy. He is at the same conference as Stepahanie and is looking to hook up with an attractive woman.

After a few days, they text their friends the same exact messages about the same man—soon, the messages become stranger and more erratic.
Twist on twist nothing is as it seems and the plot takes you into the mind of a mastermind manipulator.

The premise is two women sit next to each other on a plane. Stephanie is a successful business woman on her way to a conference. Jasmine is a woman running away from an abusive boyfriend and looking to start a new life. They begin talking to each other. Jasmine quickly becomes jealous of Stephanie's life and starts to think about stealing cash or credit cards from Stephanie. Jasmine's plan becomes reality. The story is then told with each chapter told by the main characters. Stephanie has a close neighbor Tom who is cat sitting for her as well as her boss and friends from work.
Jasmine has a good friend who helped her get away from her abusive relationship as well as an old friend from her high school days. The beginning and middle of the book kept me reading far into the night. You really start to care about these characters. As I don't want to give away the ending, I can say it was a twist.

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for giving me the opportunity to read this ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

4.5 ⭐️

This is a thriller that literally keeps you guessing from page one all the way to the last page. Just when I thought I knew what was going on I really had no idea.

I love thrillers that make me gasp out loud and this one did multiple times. I ate it up.

Okay, hear me out…. I did enjoy this book, but the numerous, and I mean NUMEROUS narrators were incredibly distracting. Which at times felt unnecessary for the story’s progression. The plot and twist could have been much more impactful if told from just a few perspectives, which would have allowed for better character development and more effective scene building. Instead, it felt like I was constantly trying to keep track of too many characters, making it hard to fully appreciate the story’s direction. I also wished for a deeper connection with the two main characters, Stephanie and Jasmine. While we did get a brief look into Jasmine’s life that helped build empathy for her, a key moment from her past was glossed over, but this could have provided significant insight into her character. That said, it was still an engaging mystery full of deception and wildly unhinged characters.

*Thank you to Jessie Garcia, St. Martin's Press and Netgalley for the digital copy. I am freely leaving my honest review.

I could kind of see where it was headed, but the details were insane. I have never thought of this scenario before, but you can bet that’s ALL I’m going to think about when I’m going to the airport!!!
I thought some of the writing was a bit cheesy, like in one sentence someone actually says “the jig is up” and I laughed. lol no one ever says that.
The characters felt like real people, but turned up to 11.
Overall I liked it and I think if you like thrillers would have fun reading it too. :)

3.5 stars

I loved the premise and finished the book in two days, which is why I rounded it to 4 stars.
There are plenty of twists, and the author did a great job with her main characters. Toward the end, I couldn't stand Jasmine, so I think the characterization and bringing the character to life was splendid.

--> But, what ruined the experience for me are the repetitions. It would have been a smoother read without some parts repeated.

Thank you, NetGalley and Jessie Garcia, for the free e-ARC.

Stephanie and Jasmine are two complete strangers who meet on the same plane; Stephanie is on a business trip and Jasmine is fleeing an abusive relationship. A few days pass after the flight when each woman sends the same message to their friends about the same man…and then they both vanish.

THE BUSINESS TRIP is this author’s debut psychological thriller and it’s quite a ride! It’s a fun, easy, and compelling story with lots of secrets and deception. The audiobook narration features a full cast narration, which was really well done. It’s written in a style that I think readers of Frieda McFadden would love.

I went into this story entirely blind so was unsure of what was to come. It’s a quick and gripping popcorn thriller type story. The story is well paced, starting off at a nice pace and speeding up as the story progresses. The second half gets a bit convoluted with many details that border on repetitive which slows the pacing but still kept me gripped. There are many twists that kept me guessing, right up until the last page. The characters are shallow and not very likable but their narration tells a whole story that’s easy to binge.

<i>I would like to thank Netgalley and the publisher, St. Martin’s Press, of this advanced digital copy for the opportunity to read this novel in exchange for an honest review! All opinions expressed are my own.</i>

You first meet Jasmine and feel sympathy for her and her circumstances. She is on a flight to Denver to start her life over. She meets Stephanie on the plane, who is on her way to a conference in San Diego. Both women send messages to friends/family letting them know they have met a guy and are now heading to Atlanta for romance, then they disappear. All is not what it seems.

The story was interesting, but I struggled with the alternating POVs. Each chapter is written in the POV of various characters, and there is a rehashing of the events, which became a little redundant. Overall, the story moves along, and you think you might have it figured out. The twist at the end was a good wrap-up.

Thank you for NetGalley, St. Martin's Press, and Jessie Garcia for the eARC.

The business trip was on of the best thrillers of 2025. Has so many twist that you don't see coming. I would give this 5 of out 5 stars.

Jasmine Littleton is pretty sure that if she doesn’t figure out a way to escape her life in Wisconsin, her boyfriend Glenn is going to kill her. He had seemed wonderful at first, showering her with affection and attention, but he’d slowly taken over her life, curtailing her independence and physically harming her when she resisted. With the help of her co-worker and childhood friend Anna, she’s hatched a plan to flee the state by plane.

Stephanie Monroe is a television news director somewhat reluctantly en route to yet another professional conference in San Diego. Being the divorced mother of an adult son, she’s considered to have the most flexible schedule of all the employees at her TV station, so is constantly sent out on work trips by her bosses. It seems churlish to complain, as jetting around for work is many people’s idea of glamour and fun, but Stephanie longs for a real vacation getaway.

A chance meeting between Jasmine and Stephanie will spark an idea. Jasmine, whose first taste of freedom has been delicious, is understandably still fearful of the unknown:

QUOTE
As we descended through the clouds and into the range of Denver, I looked down and saw snow-capped mountains and sprawling suburban areas, and I began to feel scared. Where would I go? What would I do? I knew no one, and I had no place to sleep that night.

The hazy plan I had dreamed of for a year was all in front of me: get to Colorado, figure it out. But the plan that had just twinkled at the edges of my psyche during my conversation with Stephanie began to dance again. It was like one of those giant blow-up, vinyl creatures you see at car dealership openings, where the arms and legs move around wildly and the body dips and lifts in all sorts of awkward movements, bolstered by a fan of some sort. That’s how I felt. A little out of control but buoyed by air.
END QUOTE

This encounter and the subsequent plans it encourages will lead to a harrowing experience for more than one person, as both women seemingly go off the grid. The narrative fractures as their concerned friends begin trying to contact them and ask questions. Only infrequent texts come back in response, but one thing soon becomes clear: a man named Trent McCarthy is involved in whatever choices the women are now making.

Trent is a news director from Atlanta, and just all-around one of the most awful people you can meet who isn’t (yet) an actual criminal. There’s no denying that he has charm, but he also has a huge sense of narcissism and entitlement, even when beset by illness:

QUOTE
Who gets sick and sits around like a loser on NFL Sunday? I thought of my buds at the bar, laughing and whooping it up, maybe playing the retro video games the place also had. It was a good spot to meet chicks too. Fuck, fuck, fuck. I barely ate the rest of the day and hit the bathroom a few too many times. I found myself dozing on the couch.

By 8:30 p.m., I even contemplated texting my secretary to say I needed a sick day Monday, but I never took sick days, priding myself on how steely I was. All those wimps who used every sick day they had and then complained about not having more. Nope, not me. I would go in come hell or high water.
END QUOTE

Trent is admittedly a womanizer, but would he ever stoop to actually physically harming a woman? As Jasmine and Stephanie’s increasingly frantic friends investigate their connection with him, a reckoning will be had. No one is quite what they seem, as betrayal and murder enter the picture, changing both women’s lives forever.

I greatly admired the tight pacing and clever construction of Jessie Garcia’s debut novel. She writes her flawed characters so compellingly that it’s impossible to not understand their motivations for doing underhanded things, even if we ultimately can’t excuse them. I was actually a little mad at how sympathetic she made me towards someone who’s almost inexcusably awful!

The twists are also presented with excellent timing, ratcheting up the suspense as readers try to unravel the mystery alongside Jasmine and Stephanie’s increasingly bewildered friends and co-workers. I did feel pretty badly for Stephanie and Diana at the end, but sometimes likeable people do terrible things, and sometimes terrible things happen to innocent people. It was some consolation though that everyone else gets their just desserts.

This was a bit confusing with the use of multiple POVs and trying to keep up with who everyone was. I did like the story but it just felt like too much work to try to keep everything straight and really enjoy it.

I wasn’t expecting the big twist at the end and was surprised when all was revealed. Some of the characters were really unlikeable as they should have been so that was nice.

Two women meet on a flight to Denver, one heading to a work convention, the other looking to create a new life; both disappear, leaving friends and colleagues frantic and baffled.
This was a fun read. It started out really intriguing, but didn't finish as strong, though, as it seemed that the author was trying too hard with the twists.
Thanks to #netgalley and #stmartinspress for this #arc of #thebusinesstrip in exchange for an honest review.

This was such a fast paced thriller! I loved all the different points of view (there are several) and how quick it made this one. You bounce back and forth from person to person until it creates the whole picture. I really liked how it connected, even it the plausibility was a bit stretched, it still was a nice twist. The unlikable characters were truly unlikable, like want to punch them in the face unlikable, so it made it easy to side with certain people.

I truly cannot believe this was a debut novel for Jessie Garcia, I will immediately be adding more from them in the future. I stayed invested and couldn't wait to see how this one unfolded. Thank you NetGalley, St. Martin's Press, and Jessie Garcia for allowing me early access to this one! It is on Kindle Unlimited (which is where I read it since it was after pub day. Let's get those authors paid!) to definitely check it out!

The Business Trip is Jessie Garcia’s Debut Novel and it is written quite well. While reading the book, I was intrigued…continuously wanting to know what was going to happen next. When I thought I had the storyline figured out (which was several times), I discovered that I was very wrong. The plot contains so many twists and turns. At times, it kept me on edge and I wanted to stay up to read “one more chapter”...which turned into a late night and many chapters later. You should definitely expect the unexpected. You should definitely expect your jaw to drop at least once.

Do I recommend this book to thriller junkies? Absolutely! Will I read Jessie Garcia’s next book? Without a doubt!

There is Stephanie and there is Jasmine…and they are not the same person. However, they have absolutely more in common than either expected. Stephanie is on a flight headed to a Business Trip and Jasmine is attempting to flee an abusive relationship. A couple of days after Stephanie’s conference has begun, she and Jasmine text their friends the exact same message referencing a man named Trent McCarthy. The texting becomes erratic and then the messages completely stop. Their friends have determined that something is wrong and have notified law enforcement. Who exactly is Trent McCarthy? Is he dangerous? Are Stephanie and Jasmine missing? Are they in danger? Why have they stopped communicating? How was everything orchestrated? So many questions and so little time. The search clock is on and you might just be surprised to find out the conclusion.

This was a twisty thriller of a book with a lot of characters to keep track of. Samantha and Jasmine meet on a plane. Jasmine is feeing an abusive ex and Samantha is going to a work conference. Soon, both women disappear and the only thing they have in common is that they each texted their friends about a new man they just met named Trent McCarthy. But who is he? As details about his life are revealed, things become stranger and stranger. This was an enjoyable ride. 3.5 stars rounded up.

This was an excellent debut thriller with twists to the very end. I raced through this book to the satisfying conclusion. This book offers different points of view, and I really enjoyed the back and forth in the novel. Overall, I think that was an excellent debut. I could not put this book down and if you like thrillers that keep you on the edge of your seat, I think you will enjoy this as well.