Kill Yours, Kill Mine
by Katherine Kovacic
#onehundredandsixthbookof2024 #arc #killyourskillmine

CW: death, murder, domestic violence and abuse, gaslighting and isolation, grief

From NetGalley: Mia’s grief counselling practice, The Pleiades, is named for the seven sisters from Greek mythology who were the companions of the Goddess of the Hunt—and who, in some stories, die of grief or are killed to be saved from attackers.
Mia has been gathering broken women together for a radical form of group therapy. Amy. Gabrielle. Katy. Brooke. Olivia. Five women crippled with grief by the murders of their sisters—and seething with rage that the partners who killed them all walk free. She just needs one more. When Mia meets Naomi, she knows she has found the perfect candidate, but Naomi is resistant. She only needs to meet the others before she realizes that they, too, are consumed with desire for hands-on revenge. Under Mia’s guidance, the women devise a plan to heal themselves. They’ll take back their lives from the men who took their sisters. The premise is satisfyingly simple: I’ll kill yours if you kill mine...

My thoughts: Oooh, women getting revenge on men is one of my favorite tropes, and especially when you make it Hitchcockian. This riff on Strangers on a Train is really fantastic. I wish the women had been a tad more fleshed out in the beginning—it was a little hard to remember who was getting revenge for who. But by the end, I was really all in and needed to know that the women would be okay. And it’s a little ambiguous. I’m dying to know what happens next for these women and the detective who is trailing them but not knowing why her spidey sense is tingling. I really loved this book and would happily read more by the author. I enjoy the cover as well.

Thank you to @poisonedpenpress and @netgalley for the advance copy. (Available now, pub date was 11/5/24)

This isn’t the first book I’ve read with a “Strangers on a Train” reference, but I think it might be my favorite one yet.

Mia the psychologist has a unique group therapy session in her Australian practice composed exclusively of women whose sisters were killed by their partners; & as if that isn’t bad enough, for various reasons every single one of those men received paltry sentences or no repercussions at all.

When Naomi joins the group, Mia lays out her plan for “the cure” to their grief, & the life of every woman there begins to change…

The complexity of the setup paired with the variety of characters & settings kept me furiously turning pages & taking copious notes on the different assignments each woman was given. These women came from all walks of life but were united in a common purpose, & the emotion put into the work by the author was masterful & satisfying.

Thank you very much to NetGalley & Poisoned Pen Press for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Kill yours, kill mine by Katherine kovacic

Thank you Netgalley and poisoned pen press from this wonderful ARC in exchange of an honest review.

I thought a lot about this book after finishing it. There are things that in general would have made me rate a bit lower than 4 stars but this book has won my heart. First of all the main theme is a bit cliched. Even when I had not read the blurb and I didn't think much about title (or else I would have figured it out already) the first 5 pages gave me the idea what was going to happen in the book. Then the typical cop thing who is very smart to connect the dots with smallest clue possible. And then it was too easy for everyone to conveniently commit a crime without leaving a single clue behind.


But but but even hear me out here, then I thoroughly enjoyed the whole book. The characters ain't fleshed out and yet I liked them all. I even cheered for them. Yeah even the cop. Coz all were women, some strong, some naive, all emotional but they supported each other and that's what made the book a must read for me.

In my opinion, we tend to forget mystery thriller books faster than others as we solve the mystery, we lose the interest. But this book I will remember for a very long time.

Thank you very much Katherine kovacic for writing this book.

Very interesting premise, very well executed. Mia is a therapist who does individual sessions but she uses this platform to vet patients who would be perfect for her group therapy session. This consists of a group of women who lost a sister to domestic violence. All of the killers, for one reason or another, faced little to no consequences for their abhorrent behavior and so, a system of "I'll do yours if you do mine" is born. It's brilliant and "unputdownable".

Thank you to the author and publisher for gifting me a copy. It is my pleasure to share my honest opinion.

I really wanted to love this book. The plot and characters were well done, however towards the end of the book I found myself getting bored.

An interesting thriller, this is well paced and the plot is interesting and keeps you turning the pages. I would recommend it as a light read - I did find the ending to be somewhat underwhelming

This “thriller” wasn’t really thrilling, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. This story was so compelling that it didn’t actually need the elements of a thriller that the author attempted to employ; and it managed to still keep my attention. It is clear that Katherine Kovacic wanted to make a point and I think the reader receives the message loud and clear. I enjoyed the nod to Hitchcock, and watching how Kovacic approached her take on a classic was interesting.

If the story itself hadn’t gripped me, the characters would have been enough to keep me fully invested. Although they were not all fully fleshed out; the ones that we really got to know made me want to root for them the whole way. There wasn’t a ton of character growth, but I also don’t think that was the point.

I do not know enough about Australia to have much context, but Kovacic did a great job of laying out the setting in a way that I was still able to visualize clearly. I’m sure readers who live in, or have visited Australia will get even more.

The book starts out a little slow while we are getting the set up, but once it gets going it will have you hooked. As someone who enjoys a good anti-hero and is ALWAYS here for justified female rage… I had a good time with this read.

A fun quick read perfect for this time when we need female rage. Well written and perfect pace. Thanks for the opportunity.

I loved the intention and ambition of this book, I always appreciate a revenge story, and being inspired by real-life statistics of intimate partner violence is incredibly relatable. Unfortunately, the execution fell flat for me.

Kill Yours, Kill Mine is Strangers on a Train on steroids, as six women and their therapist come together to take revenge on the terrible men who have killed each of their sisters and basically gotten away with it. A complicated entanglement of pairs of the women - one as primary, one as backup - is crafted with different disposal methods and intentionally crafted alibis for the connected woman. As a project manager, I am often thinking about logistics and details, so on the one hand I really appreciated the thought and maneuvering that went into the schemes. However, it was done without much artfulness. There is zero character development here, and really how could there be when there are six woman and their respective murders to cover in 300 pages? In fact it felt that all of the women were essentially the same person. Once they completed their mission, we basically didn't hear from them at all. Even before that, I didn't really feel an emotional connection to them or their sisters, and my rage at the perpetrators was implicit because of what they'd been part of, but in a disconnected way. As someone who cries at the drop of a hat, this book elicited few emotions from me because it felt very surface and perfunctory. I think there is a line to strike between being overly emotionally manipulative - which some of these intimate partner violence-focused books are - and not being emotional enough. The exploration of how this kind of violence can sneak up on people in relationships is apt (and what I think something like It Ends With Us purports to do while instead romanticizing it) so I appreciated that. But overall, the reverse engineering of the story from an idea just didn't work for me.

Three stars for this psychological thriller.
Kill Yours, Kill mine is Strangers on a Train on steroids. Why have two people killing each other’s enemies when you can have a group of five bereaved sisters doing the same?
I’m giving this book three stars because it interested me enough that I never considered a DNF, it also didn’t blow me away. The parts of the book with the revenge killings were tense and well written but the plot around these times was a little slow paced and disconnected . I didn’t feel much connection or get much of a sense of the group members. The theme was fleshed out but the characters felt a bit indistinguishable and two dimensional. It felt like a collection of revenge themed short stories rather than one central plot.

I would read another book by this author, but if it’s a Strangers on a Train themed book you are looking for, others have done it better.

Thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for a chance to review an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review

I did not expect to be obsessed with this book. It was so freaking good! Kept me on the edge of my seat and I couldn’t stop reading!! 5 stars!!

I liked the concept and beginning of the book, but I couldn't really connect with the writing and characters later on. Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for sending the ARC!

Amazing plot. 💡 Perfect for all of us that are sick and tired of reading about women getting killed. It is about time that a few men gets it in books as well. A smart, thoughtful revenge plan is a delightful read. And it was a very nice story that kept me pulled in throughout the whole book. I am just sorry it is over.

More instagram posts is on the way.

I read this book the week of the US federal election and the timing couldn’t have been better. I was in need of a woman’s resistance kind of read and this book delivered. Loved the Hitchcock connection and the depiction of powerful women. I was prepared to not be fully satisfied by the ending and it also delivered!! Congratulations on the great read Katherine Kovacic - looking forward to the next one - which I think we will need sooner rather than later!!! Thank you for the opportunity to review this book in exchange for the review.

📚 PUBLICATION WEEK BOOK REVIEW 📚

Kill Yours, Kill Mine
By Katherine Kovacic
Publication Date: November 5, 2024
Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press

📚MY RATING: ⭐⭐⭐✨
(Rounded Up To 4⭐)

📚MY REVIEW:

Kill Yours, Kill Mine was a fun and clever read about a group of women who decide, after joining a trauma support group, to implement vigilante justice on behalf of their loved ones who died at the hands of abusive significant others who were ultimately able to get away with their crimes.

I really feel the need to just come out and say this straight away: if you've read Kill for Me, Kill for You (KFMKFY) -- well, this book is going to read incredibly familiar. I probably would have enjoyed this one a lot more if I wouldn't have read Kill For Me, Kill For You. To be clear, this was a great book and a fun read -- but it was like reading KFMKFY all over again, multiplied by 6. And without the really cool and unexpected twisty ending in KFMKFY. It obviously wasn't the same storyline verbatim, but it was similar enough that I wasn't able to enjoy this one as much as I'd hoped to.

This book was really well-written and I enjoyed each of the characters. The plans involved in each part of the vigilante justice were unique, and quite clever. I don't want to take away from this author's work, because I think there are a lot of readers who will really love this book and be so intrigued by its premise. If you've not read KFMKFY, I think you'll really love this one. But I just have to be honest about the significant similarities and how it impacted my enjoyment of this read.

[Maybe it goes without saying, but a trigger warning also feels necessary with regard to domestic violence and physical abuse.]

Thank you to NetGalley, Poisoned Pen Press, and the author for the gifted advanced e-copy of this book in exchange for my honest review!

#KillYoursKillMine #KatherineKovacic #PoisonedPenPress #NetGalley #NetGalleyReviews #ARC #thrillerreads #thrillerlover #thrilleraddict #booklovers #bookaddict #bookreviews #bookrecs #bookrecommendations

Thank you NetGalley for this arc. This is another author I had not heard of. I absolutely loved the ending of this one and agreed with women behaving badly!

This is NOT Kill for You, Kill for Me by Steve Cavanagh, which I wanted to keep calling it.

Though the premise is not too dissimilar. It also reminds me a bit of The Collective by Alison Gaylin, so if you’ve read and liked either of those, you’ll likely enjoy this one.

I love a story about vigilante justice, especially when females are at the center of it.

This was an intriguing unique read that I enjoyed! The pacing is good and the characters are entertaining. If you enjoy thrillers I would recommend this! Special Thank You to Katherine Kovacic,Poisoned Pen Press and NetGalley for allowing me to read a complimentary copy prior to publication in exchange for an honest review.

A group of women on the hunt for revenge? Sign me up! A group of women who are sisters who have been murdered and possibly looking for support or dare I say revenge!? I really enjoyed this read. Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC of this book.

Kill Yours, Kill Mine by @katherine.kovacic @poisonedpenpress

A story about revenge! Who doesn’t love good ‘ol’ revenge? Six women meet for group therapy. The therapy is for women who’ve lost a loved one at the hands of another man. They’re angry and want to their justice served cold, if you know what I mean. I love these kinds of tales and this was no different!
4 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Thank you so much to @katherine.kovacic @poisonedpenpress for the opportunity.