This story starts with a tragic accident and a small family learning to live with the loss. They own a bookstore in their tiny town and it feels like they will be ok until strange things start to happen to Meg and Lily. Ominous references to Meg's father's band from long ago that supposedly contained secret messages of satanic practices that all came from the one hit song from the old band. Meg thinks her reclusive father is paranoid. Lily thinks her mom is hiding more than a book she wrote as a teen. And. possibly the whole town is out to get them. Missing fingers and chanted numbers escalate to kidnapping and murder in this un-put-downable thrill ride. As it turns out, everyone is watching!

Whoa, this was a crazy intense read! I don’t want to give anything away but wow I really enjoyed this one. It started out with bang…and tragedy…the main characters don’t get a break until the very end… and really, I’m still thinking about it and wondering about them.

The world can be a scary place, and it is unbelievable how easily people will read something and believe it. Or they blindly follow along and just assume what they are following is the truth… This is a paranoid, cultish, totally engaging read!

This is the first book that I have read by author Alison Gaylin and it was a thriller that kept me wanting to know more!

Meg and Justin Russo were driving their daughter Lily to Ithaca College when a bunch of skinheads swerved into their car causing Meg to lose control of the car. Justin is killed in the crash.

As mother and daughter try to rebuild their lives, strange things begin to happen. They quickly figure out that the fantasy book that Meg wrote as a teenager and her musician father's song "Pearly Gates" are at the center of conspiracy theories circulating about their family.

Was Justin's death an accident or something more sinister? Are they in danger?

Thanks to NetGalley and Harper Audio for the advanced digital copy of the audiobook for my review.

I highly recommend this title and the audiobook was very well done by Jennifer Pickens.

So many things are frightening that aren't monsters and made up creatures, chief among them are our fellow humans. Antisemitism, conspiracy theories, cults, stalking, self mutilation, murder, and wildly unchecked mental illness all in this book and more believable and scarier than most boogeyman stories.

This was well-paced book, intelligent, and taut, with realistic characters and reactions to extreme circumstances. It creeped me out while also keeping me immersed, unable to put it down. I'd recommend this to any fan of thrillers.

This was one audiobook I couldn't stop listening to. WE ARE WATCHING was fantastic! I had never read/listened to a plot line with conspiracy theories, online cults, and deepfake videos all rolled into one creepy story. I love suspense and Alison Gaylin brought a whole cast of characters in with secrets that haunt the main characters, Lily and her mother Meg after Lily's dad Justin dies in a car accident. The main characters have no one to trust from beginning to end and i was left still questioning whoI would trust in the story. Thank you NetGalley!

This was a great audiobook and just what I was looking for. The narrator was good and tensions were high throughout the book so I flew through it in about 24 hours. I am somewhat choosy about thrillers because I don’t like murdery plots so I was very excited to jump into this fresh and blood free plot.

Meg Russo published a book when she was 15 and many years later the events in the book start happening in real life. A group of conspiracy theorists are convinced she’s the spawn of a devil worshipper and responsible for all the bad things happening in the world. There were definitely moments in the book that I rolled my eyes but props to Alison Gaylin for creating such a creepy and unfortunately somewhat believable story.

There are not words to describe how much I disliked this book.

We Are Watching is my second Alison Gaylin novel, and I truly expected to like it based on its premise and my previous enjoyment of The Collective. The book follows Meg and her daughter, Lily, in the months after her husband's sudden and unexpected death in a car accident. In the throes of their grief, Meg and Lily begin noticing strange things happening around them, including unusual visitors to Meg's bookstore and odd comments being left on the bookstore's social media pages. The two women are unsettled by the events and, with the help of others in their small New York town, piece together that the people so hellbent on intimidating—and even harming—them belong to a group of individuals obsessed with a conspiracy about the end of the world, which they believe Meg prophesied in a young adult novel she wrote thirty years prior. To make matters worse, Meg's father was once a member of a band accused of having ties to Satanism.

I love thrillers, and I love weird conspiracy theories, so this should have been right up my alley, but I was genuinely miserable the entire time. I've read through the 4- and 5-star reviews of this book hoping they would enlighten me to something I had missed or help me see the story in a new light, but all they did was convince me I must have read a different book entirely. Unlike seemingly everyone else, I didn't care for the pacing. The book started off with a bang, but then it felt like very little actually happened until the end. When things did happen, such as Meg's bookstore being vandalized and a severed finger being left inside, they required such a ridiculous degree of suspension of disbelief that I couldn't make myself care. At no point was I invested in the characters or their fates. On top of that, the "twist" was glaringly obvious to me, so I couldn't even convince myself I was at least interested in learning how that played out.

If I hadn't felt compelled to finish at least the majority of this because I received an ARC, I would've DNF'd within the first hour.

Thank you to NetGalley and HarperAudio for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

After a car accident kills her husband, Meg starts wondering if the accident was caused for another reason. Did it have to do with a book she wrote when she was a teenager that some people believe is a prediction of the end times? Why are she and her daughter being followed and her bookstore vandalized? I did feel it was repetitive at times but it did keep me entranced. Jennifer Pickens did a good job as narrator.

3.5 stars.

✨I really enjoyed the fast pace of this book and the plot that was centered around a conspiracy theory cult. What I struggled with was the plausibility of the narrative. I think it just required too much suspension of belief for this reader.

✨ With that said, it was an entertaining read, and I did enjoy it. I was on the edge of my seat for sure.

✨I paired the audio version of this book with the print and did enjoy this immersive style of reading. The audiobook narration by Jennifer Pickens @jenwrenpickens was really engaging and held my attention throughout.

Alison Gaylin does an incredible job of diving deep into specific, dark, subjects and creating the most tense atmosphere where the reader can’t get enough information fast enough. As she used the dark web in The Collective, this book explores issues of satanic practices, conspiracy theories, and ill uses of social media to keep the pages turning. I was literally on the edge of my seat the entire time trying to guess what was really going on and I was wrong every time.

The tension was brought to life with the great performance by Jennifer Pickens

I love Gaylin but there was too many plot lines to follow in this story. The conspiracy part took away from the rest of the story. I did have a great pace but it wasn't enough for me to save the story with so many distractions and unnecessary details.

I loved the daughter, mother, grandfather storylines and how they twined together. Also enjoyed the sadly realistic cult online followers and in-person attacks. I couldn’t put this down and it’s one I won’t soon forget. Loved the ending!!

The tone and pacing of We Are Watching was well done. I felt the suspense the characters were feeling as well as the anticipation and anxiety. However, the synopsis felt pretty far fetched for me and I found myself frustrated with the storyline and characters.

Meg Russo and her husband are driving their daughter, Lily to college when they get in to a fatal car accident that claims Justin's life. 3 months later, Meg and Lily are being targeted by a group of conspiracy theorists who are obsessed with a novel Meg wrote when she was a teenager. The believe it portends the end of the world and if they can "kill the demon" COVID will end.
Quick read, very suspenseful.

*Special thanks to NetGalley and HarperAudio for this digital audio e-arc.*

Thank you for the opportunity. Here is my video review. https://youtu.be/5EohfqWD94Y?si=xaK_jhwotGvO-Bxq

Title: We Are Watching
Author: Alison Gaylin
Format: 🎧
Narrator: Jennifer Pickens
Publisher: HarperAudio Adult/Harper Audio
Genre: Mystery Thriller. Cults
Pub Date: January 28, 2025 –
should have been 12/12/ 2022
My Rating: 4.3 Stars
Pages: 336

Wolves are out there! Waiting for doomsday on 12.12.22, led by the Bronze Lord. They have a mantra: “They are watching. They are armed. They will triumph.”
But are these people real, or are they the figment of a delusional old ex-rock star’s imagination.

Story starts when Meg (Magnolia) Russo and her husband Justin driving their 18-year-old daughter, Lily to Ithaca College. Both Meg and Justin are excited about Lily’s choice as they meet in Ithaca. Meg was attending Cornell and Justin Ithaca College. They met their senior year when Meg took a class on the other side of town
(As a High School Counselor and College advisor I visited both of the colleges they are completely different and yes are on the opposite side of town – both on hills facing one another!)

Back to story- Meg is driving and is rattled by another car filled with skinheads taking photos of Lily. Meg over react and loses control of the car. Justin had unfastened his seat belt to get something from the back seat and is the accident is thrown from the car.

The accident takes Justin’s life; both Lily and Meg are traumatized. Lily takes a gap year,
Even with therapy they both continued to deal with the ache of losing him.

Lily turns to pot and Meg decides to reopen her bookstore “The Secret Garden’ which she and Justin owner and loved.
On re-opening day, a female customer makes a scene, dropping books in the children’s section then making a scene for other customers to witness. She shows her fingers: one gone, three left, meaning Justin. The three left behind are her father, Nathan, daughter Lily, and herself.
We learn more about Meg’s father and things get stranger and stranger.

This is author, Alison Gaylin's fourteenth novel. I have read and loved the others I read.
The profanity didn’t seem as excessive in the others. In this case, I wish I could have bleeped out most of it –however – this story had me hooked!
Additionally narrator Jennifer Pickers was great in performing the characters!!

Things are indeed bizarre, and they get strange and then stranger. I love thrillers and there is also a desire to try to figure out whodunit – in this case who are the "finger missing 12 12 2022 bad guys.” I did have my suspicious but sure didn’t have details.

I know I am weird- I have a low tolerance for profanity but find reading an off-the wall story about cult groups an entertaining read.

Want to thank NetGalley, Harper Audio Audio/Harper Audio and William Morrow for granted me this early audiobook.
Publishing Release Date scheduled for January 28, 2025.

4.5 ⭐️ rounded to 5

The action starts right away and just keeps going with this thriller. Conspiracy theories, big and small, are no longer the denizen of crazed paranoid tinfoil hat wearing people. There are so many conspiracy theories out there and with the internet, especially the influence of social media, these theories can spread far and wide in real life just as portrayed Gaylin’s novel. But at the core of it, the question is who can you trust? How do you know that people are who they say they are, and aren’t pushing ulterior motives?

It is truly interesting to dive down the rabbit hole of a conspiracy theory. This book was like a deep dive into this world. Truly terrifying how willing people are to not just believe what they are told but will also aggressively push the agenda of the theory. All of the characters had their quirks but most seemed to be true trustworthy friends on the surface level. Dig a little deeper and things start to go nuts.

There are plenty of twists and turns and betrayals throughout, enough to keep you on your toes and to leave you wondering what will happen next. The perspective switches amongst multiple character, which really gives a robust picture of the overall plot. Although there were parts that seemed to push the boundaries of believability, overall this was a terrifying tale because it seemed not to be far off from reality, which is a terrifying thought.

I thought the author did a great job developing characters that were multidimensional and whose actions rang true to their character. The premise was terrifying to anyone with a family, and the feeling of terror was maintained throughout the novel. I listened to the audiobook, and I really enjoyed the narrator’s performance. The ending was not predictable, and there were shocks and surprises all throughout. This was one worth reading!