Set alternately in the present and the 1980s, I Would Die for You is a quick paced mystery that never really resonated with me. The flashbacks seemed a weak retelling of Almost Famous from the point of view of the groupies. The present day plot was a formulaic “my childContinue Reading
Calla has terrible nightmares that she must save her younger brothers from a bloody end. Dre is two years younger but seems to have his ducks in a row. Jamie, who is only sixteen, is busy trying to fight, or charm, his way out of every self imposed bad situation.Continue Reading
The Eyes Are the Best Part begins as a family memoir. Ji-won is devastated by her father leaving their family for his mistress. Ji-won’s mother is alternately despondent and hopeful of a reunion. One day, the mother makes fish and insists that Ji-won eat the fisheyes for luck. Ji-won thenContinue Reading
The Guest is the latest novel by the author of Behind Closed Doors and a slew of other domestic suspense stories. This one is about a married couple, Iris and Gabriel, who have two challenges in their life. The husband recently found a boy dying after an accident whose lastContinue Reading
I’m not sure what I was expecting when I picked up Gone Tonight…but it certainly wasn’t what I got. And that’s a good thing. The book describes the relationship of mom Ruth and daughter Catherine. Ruth has just been diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s disease at forty-two. Unfortunately, recent nursingContinue Reading
Even in suburban Ireland, stay-at-home wives with young children hide behind their Instagram filters while their real home life falls apart. Ciara and Lauren are neighbors—but certainly not friends. Lauren’s life is chaotic but is based on love. Ciara, an important, at least in her own mind, Instagram influencer, hasContinue Reading
Dread is a hard emotion to spark within a book. But The Spite House does it intensely throughout. Eric Ross is a father to two girls: 18-year-old Dess and 7-year-old Stacy. They are on the run from an unnamed tragedy when he sees an intriguing help wanted ad in ruralContinue Reading
The Prisoner is Amelie, who wakes up imprisoned in an unknown location. Are her captors looking for easy money by asking her new husband’s family for ransom in exchange for her release? Or is something even darker happening here? Even with the short plot summary that I provided; you shouldContinue Reading
What could be more appropriate as we quickly approach the holiday season than a book about family. In Last Stop on the 6, Angela left her extended Italian American family ten years ago vowing to never return. But after being guilted into returning for her brother’s wedding, she discovers (a)Continue Reading
In the Substitute, Chrissie Tate is a wife to Michael and a mother to their three-year-old, Holly. She is also a drama queen. Chrissie’s marriage is happy. But she can’t stop grieving for her dead mother. Even though years have passed. She frantically worries about protecting her young daughter—from falls,Continue Reading
How many books do we need about a seemingly perfect family hiding a spider’s nest of secrets behind their flawless, but fragile, facade? At least one more. The Perfect Family gets the trope right. The less you know about the plot, the bigger the twists! Thomas and Viv are livingContinue Reading
Abby opens a You have a Match link on a DNA ancestry site. What would you do if your DNA test locates a completely unknown older sister? Would you rejoice? Or would you obsess over why your parents never mentioned a sister before? Abby decides to sneak off to summerContinue Reading
A wife hiding a shocking secret. A husband who wants to leave, but can’t. A son who believes he is a wolf being raised by bears. A homeless woman living, undetected, in The Wrong Family’s house. Can she unmask the family’s mystery? Yum, I ate up this intriguing domestic suspenseContinue Reading
Nic is the only member of her family that still believes her mother did not just walk away from them. She doesn’t believe the note left behind in her mother’s hotel room that says “Don’t Look for Me”. Molly, Nic’s mother, has many reasons to run. Five years ago, sheContinue Reading
A fire breaks out in a home. Natalie, The Second Wife, escapes without injury. But her fourteen-year-old stepdaughter, Jade, has to be rescued by firemen. After awakening from a brief coma, Jade tells her father, Alex, she was hiding in her closet. But she wasn’t fleeing the fire. She saysContinue Reading
Sylvie and her daughter are back in southern France to sell the family’s house now owned by Sylvie and her sister Camille. The house has been abandoned for ten long years. Something has happened in the house in the past. A fire, perhaps? A child’s death? Has The Heatwave passedContinue Reading