𝐀𝐮𝐝𝐢𝐨𝐛𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐑𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰
4 🌟
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𝐓𝐫𝐨𝐩𝐞𝐬 :
•multi POV
•dual timeline (past and present)
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Peer pressure is a bitch. Blakely character I HATED from the jump, the sad little rich girl, blah, blah, blah! Gace probably had the most fucking common sense in the entire group as an adult. The audiobook production is great. I like how each character has a different narrator so you could tell them apart. I would have given this story 5 stars, but I hated the ending!
𝙽𝚘𝚠 𝚕𝚒𝚟𝚎!
Thank you, Netgalley, and Brilliance Audio for the audiobook for my honest review.

I have such mixed feelings about this one..

To start with we have a dual timeline situation. In the past There are four girl friends at summer camp who tell a lie that spirals out of control into extreme consequences.

Flash forward to the future, the girls have all grown up into adults who are living separate lives, who find themselves reuniting under the pretence of receiving a letter implicating them in their past involvement in said lie.

First let me mention to check your triggers before reading as the book contains dark subject matter such as SA of a minor, non graphic attempted harm of infants, eating disorders, murder and castration.

The plot itself has potential to be really good. I liked the pretence under which the girls find themselves reunited as adults and then the reveal as to why they’re really there. I feel if the author stuck to that story line she could have gone great places with it.

What I had a problem with:

Firstly I feel the author googled eating disorders and ran with it. I feel like it was completely unnecessary and irrelevant to the overall plot and there wasn’t enough time spent getting educated on this subject, the characters experience felt inauthentic.

Secondly one of the girls exhibited extremely dark behaviour but I don’t think we get any real background information as to how and why she came to be this way, other than she did it because she could.

Thirdly the ending felt incomplete. We got a vague explanation as to the twist unfolding itself and yet we didn’t get a follow up on what happened to any of the characters themselves. I understand leaving an open ending for readers interpretation but this didn’t feel like that, it felt like the author decided to just close her laptop and stop writing.

There didn’t seem to be any closure for any of the characters including the tennis teachers wife or her sons.

This book was just a bit bizarre for me. I’m not sure if the author tried to include many twists and Different character POV and failed to merge them cohesively together but there was just something off about this book. I feel it could have benefited from a lot more editing.

To end on a positive, I thought that the audiobook narrators did a good job on the narration.
Publish date: July 23rd 2024

Thank you to Brilliance Publishing and Lucinda Berry for the ALC!

Narrated by - Narrated by Bailey Carr; Stephanie Nemeth-Parker; Susannah Jones; Jane Oppenheimer; Carly Robins

Super fast paced and edgy!
I love the back and forth of timelines, it was done right. Both portions super entertaining and constantly feeding my curiosity.

My first Lucinda Berry book but it wont be my last.

This was a wild ride! First of all Ms Berry’s mind is so twisted. Never would I have guessed this would turn out the way it did. I will say in the very beginning i was a tad bit confused with all of the girls and the other POV but i quickly adapted.

I like how this author showed how privileged yt girls/women can just accuse a black man of something so heinous and just everyone goes along with it. Something that has happened before in the past.

Although I didn’t get the ending that I wanted it was so juicy and unpredictable I can’t be too mad.

Unfortunately this one is not for me. I found the ages of the girls to be super cringe for my taste, just because I haven't been that age in a long time. I also found that the book had some triggers for me (eating disorder), so at the 35% mark, I unfortunately had to stop. I've heard such good things about this author, and for those who are into YA suspense/thriller, they would really enjoy this one, which is why I rated it three stars. I definitely want to pick up another by this author and give her another chance!