This was a fantastic story! I have always adored Julianne Hough but to listen to her beautifully written, she is one of many talents. It was an incredible story! Highly recommend.

Everything We Never Knew by Julianne Hough & Ellen Goodlett
Narrated by Julianne Hough
Publisher: RBmedia, Recorded Books
Genre: General Fiction (Adult)
Published: August 13, 2024

Everything We Never Knew by Julianne Hough & Ellen Goodlett is the book I didn’t know I was looking for! This story of discovering your own power and the ability to heal was so powerful and wonderful!

I loved seeing Lexi transform and embrace her power. This was inspirational and was a moving story.

I loved the narration by the author. Hearing her tell this story in her own voice and words was such a gift!

I highly recommend Everything We Never Knew. This will be on the gift list this year because I want to share this story with everyone!

I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

I tried so very hard to stay engaged and just couldn’t. My mind kept wondering and I couldn’t comprehend what I was listening too. I really wanted to like this story but ultimately it wasn’t great.

I'm a bit torn on this one. It's maybe more of a 2.5. I like the premise of this, and I definitely think there are nuggets of wisdom to gain from the reading. It just feels like the author put every bad thing that can happen to a person in one story for shock value, maybe? There were parts that really had me intrigued, and I wanted to know more, but overall, it just missed the mark for me.

Lexi is an ordinary woman, a realtor , who has been experiencing anything but ordinary events. She is receiving a sales award when she feels like she’s drowning on stage. It’s all connected to a man in the audience whose son has drowned. And this isn’t the last time she’ll experience the feelings of others. It would seem she’s becoming an empath, and this story follows her extraordinary journey into a world both painful and frightening

The concept was so interesting to me but as hard as I tried I couldn't stay engaged and found myself missing half of what was going on. Thank you to netgalley and the publisher for the ARC!

I was drawn in by the cover and narrator/author but this just fell short for me. Was not very memorable and did not capture my interest or keep me engaged. Thank you to NetGalley and RBMedia for an early audio
2/5

I read a lot of book recommendations and emails from publishers. I kept seeing this book, so I wrongly figured it must be a great book. I had never heard of either of the authors. Well, I could not finish this audiobook. It was torture. I always try to hang in there with any book in case it just has a slow start or a couple bad chapters, but I just couldn’t keep going. As it turns out, the main author is a celebrity from a dancing show. There are so many talented authors out there that never get this sort of publicity and push from publishers, but if any sort of celebrity writes a book, they get the best of everything regardless of how bad their writing is. If I had known who the author was, I would have skipped the book until there was more feedback.

The concept of this book captivated me from the start. Lexi discovers she possesses the ability to sense others' emotions and occasionally glimpse their personal memories.

The initial chapters were engaging as Lexi navigated unfamiliar individuals and delved into their pasts. However, the bulk of the narrative focused on her internal struggles and processing past traumas, resembling a therapeutic journey. Some parts were perplexing, and I craved more interactions with strangers.

Nevertheless, the book had its merits. The dynamic friend group and Lexi's mentor were highlights for me. It offered plenty of contemplation and managed to hold my interest throughout.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC. I had such high hopes for this book. It sounded so interesting and started out strong and then kinda fell short. It has some super natural aspect that could have been great if done a little different.

Thank you to NetGallery and RB Media for the opportunity to read and review an advance reader copy of this audiobook.

In "Everything We Ever Knew," spirituality, energy, and healing take center stage as we follow Lexi, an ordinary woman leading an ordinary life. Suddenly, she begins to experience a profound shift within herself, encountering strange visions and sensations when in the presence of certain individuals. As Lexi embarks on a journey of self-discovery, she uncovers a unique gift that allows her to tap into the emotions of others and even catch glimpses of their private memories. While mastering this newfound ability, Lexi must also navigate skepticism from her husband and confront deep-seated issues hindering her path to success.

Narrated by the author herself, the audiobook benefits from her perfect voice for the story, capturing the emotional nuances of the characters with music marking transitions between chapters.

While the concept of the story is intriguing, I found it to be overly verbose at times, and I occasionally struggled to differentiate the other characters in Lexi's life.

2.5 ⭐️
I just couldn’t get into this book no matter how hard I tried. It wasn’t for me. Maybe it will be for you. It feels very new agey.

I wanted to read this book because it wasn't something I would normally pick up and because I have been a fan of Julianne Hough's. I'm really glad I got to listen to this audiobook. This will definitely be a heavy book for some people so make sure you check trigger warnings. I enjoyed the spiritual side to this book. It was interesting to learn more about it. I did enjoy Julianne Hough narrating this book. I do wish there would have been more of a story line to this book. I did like the relationship between Lexi and her mentor Bea. If you are someone that likes the spiritual world then this would probably be more interesting to you. I would recommend it for a spiritual person or someone wanting to learn more about it.

Thank you NetGalley and RBMedia for allowing me to listen to this ALC for my honest opinion.

*Listened to the audiobook.
**TW - Off-page miscarriage & SA

Lexi is going through a lot of heavy things in her life when she discovers she can see/feel people's aura & emotions. As she begins leaning towards spirituality/astrology(?), she learns what she has to do to heal herself while not caring what other people think.

Julianne Hough has such a beautiful voice for narration. Calming in a storytelling way, making you want to listen to what she has to say. Her voice fits the main character very well, I just wished she had changed her voice a bit more when reading the other characters' lines.

I genuinely enjoyed this book. The psychic aspect wasn't to hard to understand, therefore easy to follow. Loved the friend dynamic & Lexi's mentor; even her MIL.
I'd recommend this to people who enjoyed astrology/spiritual energy.

Thank you RBmedia & NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

Rating: ⭐️⭐️
Format: Audiobook
Speed: 1.25 - 1.5

Our story begins with the protagonist, Alexis, receiving an award for her real estate sales at a work party. During her speech, she notices a stranger surrounded by a mist-like cloud and hears a woman’s voice call out. Hours later, the stranger is dead. Similar and increasingly unusual experiences start happening to Lexi. She seeks help from a local healer and begins exploring spiritual medicine. Readers are taken on an emotional rollercoaster as Lexi confronts the past she has been avoiding her whole life to secure her future.

Highlights:
⭐️ Character growth. Lexi undergoes significant emotional development throughout the plot. It was refreshing to see her focus on repairing her relationship with her mother and on her own healing instead of everyone else’s.

Pitfalls:
❌ The plot felt bland. The writing was uninspired, with the majority of the story focusing on Lexi’s self-healing while she deals with conflicts with her husband.
❌ The narration was monotone and lacked emotional depth. The narrator’s voice was flat, lacking compassion or empathy, making it feel like a script reading. Emotions matter in audiobooks, even if no one can see you.
❌ Not a flaw of the book per se, but why is Julianne Hough’s name larger than Ellen Goodlett’s? I only noticed this later, but it seems suspicious. It feels like Julianne’s name was used to boost the book’s profile while Ellen did the actual writing. This is just a hunch, not a statement of fact.
❌ The ending felt abrupt and unsatisfying. There was no real closure.
Overall, I don’t have much to say because the book didn’t capture my interest. The summary is misleading; it suggests a more magical story than what’s delivered. The phrase “her husband is in danger” adds to the confusion. If I had paid more than $5 for this book, I would be quite disappointed.

Thank you to NetGalley and RBMedia for an early free release of this audiobook in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you NetGalley, Source Books, and RB Media for the advanced reader and listener copies, but I could not get into this one for the life of me. I just found it so odd, and right from the start. There just wasn't a flow to it that made sense. Perhaps it was the mash of elements (mystery, magical realism, spirituality and astrology) that just didn't work. I even tried slowly the audio down to a speed that wasn't my normal speed to see if that helped but it didn't. I like Julianne Hough as an actress, but as an co/author, I now have my hesitations. Only made it 21%, so chapter 8, before I set it aside. Maybe I'll come back around to give it a chance again but that seems unlikely.

This one just didn't do it for me. It was a bit all over the place. This girl has visions/sensations of a man drowning and realizes that she experienced something that happened in his life. This leads to her examining her beliefs and starting to become a healer because she can feel people's auras. During this journey, we also learn about a miscarriage and a past sexual assault which resulted in her clinging to her husband's family, and then this husband's mom also has some magical properties. I think I was supposed to be feeling the bond of sisterhood by the end, but I was just kind of confused as to how we ended up where we did.

On the positive side, it did hold my attention and I wanted to know what happened next, but I think that's because I was really hoping for some sort of overall explanation (which didn't happen).

I do not know much about Julianne Hough, other than being a dancer, knowing that she dated Ryan Seacrest, hearing about her divorce to a hockey player, and being raised as a Mormon.

I went into Everything We Never Knew with my eyes wide-open, not sure what to expect, but intrigued to both listen to this story and to hear Julianne Hough narrate the book. Julianne does a great job narrating. Because she both co-wrote and narrated the book, I felt like the story was, at times, about Ms. Hough, and I wondered if I was actually reading some sort of autobiography. Again, I really do not know anything about Ms. Hough. Julianne earns 4 stars for her narration. She has an easy voice to listen to.

The story. Hmmmm. The cover art and narrator (and author) drew me to this book. It was interesting. That is for sure. But I feel like it was missing something.

I am not into sci-fi, but I did not mind the book because of the "other" topics going on in the book. However, I kind of felt like the book was missing something. Maybe I just wanted more of the main character's personal story and more of a story between Lexi and Shane. Maybe I am just more drawn to romance and babies and needed something else. I do not know, but I do not think this book met its full potential. Either delve more into the sci-fi or the romance, but don't half both of them. Also, while Lexi found some peace by the end, I wanted more peace between the two main characters.

It was interesting enough and Julianne Hough did a great job with her narration.

Thank you to NetGalley and RB Media for the advanced audio copy in exchange for my honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

I received an advanced audiobook copy of Everything We Never Knew. It combines women's fiction and supernatural/speculative fiction. Having been a fan of Julianne Hough for many years, and having background of her own personal story, it has a lot of similar plot and themes.

It wasn’t your typical read and had a unique and unusual storyline, but it was fairly easy to follow as an audiobook, and an added bonus was that it is read by Julianne herself!

First off I feel lucky to have received this as an Audio book on Netgalley, I really liked that it was narrated by Julianne as I am a big fan of hers. This book was about energies and learning how to be okay with not understanding what someone else believes no matter your background. I’m not really knowledgeable on energies aside from basic feels you get from others so this was a bit much for me to take in though I feel like there was a ton of information within the story that helped me to understand about healers.

I do feel like there could have been more to the story line with our characters, yes we learned a Lexi but we were still missing so much like I really felt like there was going to me way more to the issues Lexi had with her family. I also feel like the husband could have been more in the story at the beginning especially with how important he was to the ending.

The parts where Lexi talked about her miscarriage and really opened up were beautiful and I feel very well written that as someone who has thankfully never dealt with that I could feel the pain she was expressing. Also I thought it was really cool how it was described about the healer and how they see vines or strings with each of the people that matter in that persons life attached to them, that really connected with me.