This psychological thriller has so many twists and turns that kept me engaged until the very end. The suspense and anticipation leading up to the big reveal kept me at the edge of my seat.

The characters weren’t very likeable but the unraveling and the big secret finally coming out was actually fun to read, who doesn’t enjoy some friend and family drama right?

3.75 ★

Thank you Leah Mercer, Bookouture & NetGalley for an e-ARC copy.

#TheSummerReunion #NetGalley

A group of college friends gather for a long weekend in France for a reunion 2o years after they took the same trip for graduation. On the surface they seem to have been close friends and classmates but as the story moves on told from the varying perspectives of the female roommates we learn of simmering feuds. jealousy and anger among the group. Although there are two sets of couples among the group, it becomes increasingly obvious there are signs of anger, secrets and even infidelity. As storm thrashes the country side, two people are locked into a underground wine cellar. As the storm rages outside, we see the how those on the outside begin to unravel as long hidden secrets begin to come to light and dangerous plans are laid.

This was a great thriller and was a quick read! It would be perfect to read lounging around the pool.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for allowing me to read this arc in exchange for an honest review!

The Summer Reunion will definitely have readers hooked and ready to keep reading even after you tell yourself, "This is my last chapter tonight." This is a story of a group of very complicated friends with lots of secrets, lies and misinformation between them. Just when you think you have someone figured out, you're proven wrong and left wondering, WHAT THE HECK!! While I was absolutely intruded with the plot and story line, I personally had a hard time connecting with any of the characters and didn't really ever develop that attachment to any of them that I look for in a book. I would put this book on your list if you're a fan of suspense thrillers that will keep you guessing!

Six friends on holiday, reuniting after years apart and trying to rekindle the friendships of old. It will be a weekend of reminiscing, fun and laughter as the friends and their families reconnect. But it’s also a weekend of secrets, some they thought were long buried. With a raging storm, they are cut off from the rest of the village but with the wine flowing, will the secrets stay hidden? It’s a great psychological thriller with some good twists thrown in. The plot moves at pace and keeps you entertained to the end. Thank you to NetGalley, Bookouture and the author for the chance to review.

Thanks to NetGalley and Bookouture for this Advanced Reader’s Copy of The Summer Reunion by Leah Mercer due to be published September 6, 2024.
Old friends reunite at a beautiful villa in France for a weekend away. All of them, it seems, have secrets they are keeping. A huge storm sets in, people are locked in cellars, and others are missing – not the beautiful weekend they all imagined. But are they safe from outsiders and each other?
So many secrets, lies, and twists in this one it was hard to keep up. Seems like every friend, husband, wife, daughter, sister, had secrets that they were hiding from someone. It was wonderful to see how it played out in the end – kept me enthralled and on the edge of my seat!
A great thriller from Leah Mercer!
#NetGalley #LeahMercer #Bookouture #TheSummerReunion

My first book by Leah Mercer and what a read it was….. 5 star rating!!

Ellie decides to invite her old university friends for a summer weekend reunion in a villa they rented 20 years prior when celebrating finishing university. Ellie is now married to Safet who she met while at university, and they have a 14 year old daughter, Victoria and their soon to be adopted son, 9 year old Ahmed. Jules and Harry arrive, who were also dating at university and are also now married, with Harry’s twin girls, who were a product of Harry having an affair, and Jules is desperately trying to parent her two stubborn 15 year old step daughters. Lastly Vannie arrives with her girlfriend Nicola who she met recently. Despite their old friend, Frederick, telling Ellie he wouldn’t be able to make it, he also turns up, much to Jules’s dismay, as the last time they saw each other was when he hot footed it out of her bed on the last night of the university finishing celebration without a single word or backward glance. On the face of it everyone is excited to catch up with each other and see how their lives have turned out, but when a storm hits the villa on the second day of the reunion, and then Ahmed goes missing, things dramatically change in the villa, and it isn’t just the weather that is volatile. When Ellie, Frederick and Jules go searching for Ahmed, Frederick and Jules find themselves locked into the villa’s wine cellar and Ellie and Vannie are desperate to find the key as the torrential rain has caused floods and water off the nearby fields is pouring into the cellar where Frederick and Jules are trapped. Whilst this is all going on Jules and Harrys daughter, Ivy, turns up to the villa with a huge secret of her own and is also frantic to get her mum out of danger. As the storm shows no sign of abating and the water level in the cellar continues to rise, every person at the villa seems to have secrets and lies which are starting to unravel. Will Jules and Frederick be able to be saved? And if so, with everything finally out in the open, everyone will be leading dramatically different lives to what they were when they arrived at the villa for the reunion.

This was such a good read. I have to admit that the beginning was a little slow, but I understand it was scene setting and it didn’t take long for me to be hooked. I can honestly say I didn’t really like any of the characters, two were particularly abhorrent, however this dislike didn’t ruin my enjoyment of the storyline. I loved the different point of views, and I stayed up way too late on a good few nights as I was finding it difficult to put the book down!

Overall, a fantastic, twisted web of lies and deceit and wholly deserving of a 5 star rating. I would definitely recommend this to anyone who enjoys psychological thrillers and look forward to seeing what Leah Mercer writes next.

Thank you to NetGalley, Leah Mercer and Bookouture for my advanced reading copy. Out 6th September 2024.

When Ellie plans a small reunion with some of her college friends and their families, everyone thinks the weekend will be just what they need - some relaxing time away from the stresses of their every day lives, relationships, and work. But the villa where the friends return to is the same place where life changing lies and secrets were buried 20 years ago. And some will do whatever it takes to make sure their secrets don't come to light.

At first, everything is fine, a little tension here and there, but then Frederick appears, throwing fuel on the fire because some people don't want him there. He has recently discovered some shocking news and he needs to sort it out, but the one person who can help him clarify the situation, Jules, wants nothing to do with him. Jules' best friend Vannie, who has been like a sister to Jules, has also been keeping secrets and is trying to figure out how to keep them from coming to light, knowing the truth will destroy everything.

When a storm hits and Jules and Frederick are trapped in an underground wine cellar, the race is on to free them - while someone would rather they stay locked inside and drown as the storm water begins filling the cellar.

How far will the guests go to keep their secrets from coming out? With a tangled web of lies, deceit, and blackmail, this was a fun summer read. Some of the plot was predictable but other times I was surprised. The characters were developed well and the writing made me feel badly for some and hate others.

Overall it was an enjoyable read.

I received and ARC copy of The Summer Reunion in exchange for my honest review. Thank you to Bookouture for access to this ARC. #TheSummerReunion #NetGalley

This was a great read, I loved the suspense of the story, I knew that it would all break into chaos after lies that were
held onto many years started to come out and splinter the group, with a husband and best friend at the center of
betrayal ..
Really great read, loved it.

The premise immediately drew me in. Friends from college all gathered one weekend to visit a villa they haven’t been to since college. Secrets are exposed! Will they all make it out?

I would not consider this story twisty or edge of your seat thriller like I normally enjoy. It seemed slower paced and not very thrilling to say the least. The story was well fleshed out as were the characters. It fell a little flat for me. I initially couldn’t wait to get to the ending because I HAD to know everyone’s secrets and who locked Jules and Frederick in the cellar. When everything was exposed it was a bit like…. Oh that’s it then?

All in all, it was a quick read.

Would I call this "absolutely gripping page-turner filled with secrets and heart-pounding suspense" like the promo describes? Hmm.. no. It was definitely entertaining, but a little bit predictable and at no point did I think any of the characters were in genuine danger. If you are a fan of a quick-paced thriller like Freida McFadden, you are likely to enjoy this as a bit of entertainment.

Six friends reunite with their children for the ultimate French getaway, but when someone from their past shows up at the door, everyone is shocked. This newcomer's past is riddled with secrets, and it's only a matter of time before it all starts spilling out. And when he and one of the friends get trapped in a wine cellar during a storm, it's a race against time to get them out to safety before it completely floods.

Bonus points to this one for being a quick read - I finished the entire thing in an afternoon which was a welcome palate cleanser to a lot of the longer books I've been reading recently. There were some good twists in here that I didn't necessarily see coming, but I can't say anything about this truly made my heart race. It was pretty standard for a thriller and just an overall solid 3 star read.

Six old friends come together to reunite after twenty years, Jules and Harry with twins and 15-year-old daughter Ivy, Ellie, Safet and their adopted son from Syria named Ahmend, they have a daughter Victoria. Also joining them are Vannie and Nicola. They are holidaying in a remote French villa they had stayed in together twenty years ago. Then to add to the mix Frederick arrives, another friend from a long time ago.

To make the atmosphere more enticing for the story, it is set in amongst a raging storm, and communication is cut off due to a lack of signal, what could go wrong? The group has not been there long when Sayet has disappears and two of the others become trapped in a cellar with water leaking into it and rising at a rapid rate. But is this just a terrible random incident or has someone instigated this set of circumstances?

As time progresses secrets are unveiled and soon it is revealed that several of their lives may have been vastly different if it was not for the selfish antics of others. The story is told by alternating POV’s which presents us with different perspectives and keeps you guessing as to who has created all this drama and why.

Quite a few twists along they way to keep the reader engaged and a satisfying ending all make this a recommended book.

Thank you to Netgalley the author and publisher for an ARC, all opinions are my own.

One word.....YES! A MUST read, fast paced thriller! This was such a good read and it had me on the edge of my seat from the beginning. This thriller was full of twist and turns.

I love a book that is so good you can't stop thinking about it and rush through your daily routine so you can pick it back up and start reading again. This is THAT book.

Going back to a destination from your past with a group of friends can be risky, and if you all have secrets from each other it is definitely a bad idea. This is what happens when six friends take a holiday together back to a French Villa they had once visited. Each of the friends is keeping a secret about one of the others and when two of them get locked in a wine cellar together and a storm causes the cellar to fill with raging waters all the secrets start tumbling out. The aftermath leaves no one unaffected.

This twisty domestic thriller will have you guessing through the entire book as to what each of the characters secrets are. This was well written and will keep your interest throughout.

Thanks to Netgalley and Bookouture for the advanced copy of this book

This was a great page turner, told from multiple points of view. I got right into it and loved it, read it in a day, I just couldn’t stop reading!

The book is told from Ellie, Jules, and Vannie’s characters perspectives in alternating chapters, although arguably the book has six main characters, including Harry, Safet and Frederick. The six of them all having known each other since their university days and whilst not all of them have stayed close over the years, their lives are all still inextricably linked.

There is Ellie and Safet, married and have been together since their university days. They have two children and at first appear as if they are very content in their comfortable lives. Then we have Jules and Harry, also married and have been together since university days. On the surface they appear to have a marriage that everyone would want, but it becomes clear from the beginning that looks can be deceiving when it comes to this couple and that Harry has already strayed before. Vannie and Jules are firm friends, but Ellie has always felt a bit like an outsider when it comes to the females group friendship.

As each chapter is told from a different character’s perspective, what I found really interesting was to read how one character perceived the others to be. Then when you read that character’s chapter it’s found not to be the case at all. It put in stark contrast how everyone is putting on a bit of a front and trying to show the best versions of themselves. It made me think that at some point throughout the book peoples mask will surely start to slip….

They all visit a villa in France for a reunion, the same villa they all visited over twenty years ago at the end of university. Throughout the book there is mention of something that happened in the past when they visited the villa. I found myself eagerly reading through the chapters trying to figure out what had happened in the past that everyone was so eager to keep secret.

Each chapter, a little snippet of information about the characters inter-relationships is revealed. Nothing is really as it seems. The book is like a jigsaw, there are a lot of pieces but it’s only as you move through the story that you start to see how the pieces fit together.

As one lie turns into another and another, it’s difficult to know where the truth begins and the lies end. This book kept me guessing throughout, with a fair share of twists and turns throughout. This book really has something for everyone, drama, intrigue, suspense, heartbreak, the list goes on. I think this book would appeal to a very wide range of audiences.

Wow what did I just read!!! This book was such a page turner it had me gripped from the very first page!!!

Thank you NetGalley and publisher for this arc!

WOW! What a great book! This book had me on the edge of my seat the entire time. Had me guessing! That plot twist got me! lol what a great read!

This is a fun and twisty thriller that readers will love. Overall, the plot could have been a tiny bit more interesting, but the twists at the end make up for most of those concerns. I found myself entertained and excited to finish this book. I love unreliable characters and hidden secrets and this certainly did not disappoint.

Fans of Freida McFadden will love it and this deserves to be given the same amount of hype and attention as her novels. I can’t wait to read the rest of Leah Mercer’s books. Thank you to NetGalley and Bookouture for the digital ARC of this book!

Thank you Bookouture and NetGalley for an early copy of The Summer Reunion. The cover is eye catching, very fast reading, Vannie was so warped but eventually you found out why. Secrets truly hurt and can definitely spiral out of control. I loved the characters, the plot, the way it was wrapped up. This was a Fantastic read, thank you again.