My SPOILER ALERT Book Reviews!

  I love Freida McFadden, and this was one of my favorite McFadden books. It was funny, it was thrilling, there was a great twist at the end that I didn't see coming, and there were enough breadcrumbs along the way that I should have seen it coming - exactly how a perfect psychological thriller should be.  Ward D tells the story of Amy Brenner's overnight shift at a psychiatric hospital, as a medical student. Amy is nervous because she's been having hallucinations for quite sometime and she worries that by morning, she could be mistaken as a patient and never gets to leave that place. Her friend Gabby, a fellow medical student who's already done her shift at Ward D, drops Amy off and tells her she'll pick her up in the morning.  Amy waits at the door of Ward D and runs into her ex-boyfriend, Cameron Berger, who's also a medical student for the same shift as her. Amy isn't excited about this because Cameron had dumped her to study for the board exam. They ar...

  This is the second book I've read by Jason Rekulak. The first one being Hidden Pictures , one of my favorite thrillers. I was hoping this book would have a similar effect, but it didn't live up to it. The book started out quite well, which made me really excited about where it was going to go, but in the end, it was just mediocre. The Last One at the Wedding  tells the story of Frank Szatowski and his strained relationship with his daughter Maggie. Frank lost his wife Colleen when Maggie was only 10, due to a fatal aneurysm. Frank is proud of raising her by himself (with the help of his sister Tammy). However, there was an arson incident at Maggie's place of work, and with Maggie acting suspicious, Frank accused her of being involved in the arson, causing a rift between their relationship for 3 years. At the beginning of the novel, Maggie calls Frank after the 3 years of silence to let him know that she's getting married and he's invited to the wedding. He's b...

  Wow this one is out there. I liked how unique the story is, but the twist is kind of weird. Not my favorite twist. Although the whole book is REALLY weird and I do like that. I loved the gothic style and the overall eeriness in the book. This was pretty good. The Empusium  tells the story of Mierczysław "Mieczyś" Wojnicz, who's a 24 year old student with a mild case of tuberculosis. He goes to the Empusium, a health resort that supposedly helps tuberculosis patients. The main sanatorium - the Kurhaus is full, so Mieczyś is staying at the guesthouse with several other men who are all waiting for a space to open up and transfer. The guesthouse is owned by Wilhelm Opitz. The first day, Mieczyś meets the wife of Wilhelm, Klara, who hands him his breakfast. A few hours later, Klara is found dead. This shakes Mieczyś up but doesn't seem to have much effect on others. Mieczyś hangs out with other guests at the guesthouse, often drinking a mysterious wine called Schwärmerei...

  Every Last Secret is a psychological thriller written by A. R. Torre. This was a very interesting story and I enjoyed reading it! Every Last Secret tells the story of two married couples that live next door to each other. First couple is Catherine (Cat) and William Winthorpe. They are wealthy and William is the owner of Winthorpe Technologies. Next is their neighbor, Matt and Neena Ryder. Neena works for William. Matt and Neena purchased the house next door that is a foreclosure - the original owners left quickly due to tax evasion. Cat doesn't like Neena right off the bat - she can tell Neena is not to be trusted. Neena was sexually abused by her father growing up. Matt who was a neighbor came to rescue and killed her father. They buried him in the backyard and got away with murder. Neena envies Cat's wealth and social status. Neena always wants to climb higher on the social ladder, using whatever means possible, usually by seducing men. She got involved with her last boss ...

  I'm NOT a fan of multiple POVs, timelines, tons of characters, etc. And that's why I struggled with this book. I feel like rarely do those books pay off. I don't like it when the mystery is simply trying to figure out who's related to who and how many names someone can have. To me, it feels like the author simply chooses to tell us a simple story in a complicated way to be mysterious. I don't know. This book was a letdown for me. The first half of the book is just an introduction of tons of different characters with not much reason to care about any of them. Anyway, I'm going to give you a synopsis based on the real timeline instead of how it was told in the book.  The Family Upstairs  tells the story of the Lambs family. Henry Lamb, Martina Lamb, and their children Henry (same name as his father) and Lucy all live in a mansion in Chelsea, as a wealthy family. Later, father Henry became quite ill and they aren't doing as well financially. A singer named Bi...

A highly intriguing, thought provoking, science fiction novel. Never Let Me Go is a dystopian novel written by Nobel Prize winning author, Kazuo Ishiguro. It has been adapted into a motion picture of the same name .  Never Let Me Go tells the story of a time when cloning is prevalent. Terminal illnesses like cancer are treatable by using organs donated from a person's clone. These clones keep "donating" their organs until they die. The main characters, Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy are clones. They stay at a boarding school called Hailsham. At Hailsham, the children spend a lot of time doing art. Later, Hailsham is shut down and we find out that Hailsham was an experiment ran by Miss Emily, who wanted to prove that the cloned children have souls, by presenting their artwork in the Gallery. Hailsham was shut down due to the Morningdale scandal, even though it had little to do with Hailsham. Morningdale was a cloning company that wanted to create superhumans - by creating clones ...

  Incidents Around the House is a horror story about a girl named Bela and her family. The author Josh Malerman has done a phenomenal job of setting up that creepy eerie feeling throughout the book.  Incidents Around the House tells the story of an 8 year old girl named Bela who is haunted by an entity she refers to as "Other Mommy". She lives in a house with her father Russ and mother Ursula. Other Mommy would appear in her room quite often and ask to enter her heart. Bela always tells her no, but Other Mommy is increasingly more demanding. Other Mommy becomes more and more omnipresent as Russ and Ursula's marriage deteriorates. They argue often and get drunk often. Ursula also cheats on Russ and often comes home late (or sometimes doesn't come home at all). Bela tells her parents about Other Mommy, and eventually gets their attention. They bring a woman, Lois Anthony, who says she can sense ghosts.  Lois tells them they need to get rid of Bela's innocence - tha...

  What a ride. This book here, is why I LOVE Freida McFadden. Her books are just FUN. I mean, I don't think it's some literary masterpiece or anything, but it's a guilty pleasure for sure.  The Tenant starts off quite innocently. The protagonist, Blake Porter, is celebrating his recent promotion when he got called into the boss's office. He's getting fired. His boss tells him he shouldn't have sold their current project to their biggest competitor. Blake claims he didn't, but his boss Wayne is so mad that he doesn't let Blake explain himself.  Blake comes home to his fiance Christa. Christa seems to be quite understanding. Christa works at a laundromat - they are facing some serious financial issues now Blake doesn't have a job. A few weeks pass, Blake can't get a job anywhere - his boss has told all potential employers what he did. Christa tells him she can help with the mortgage payments on their new giant place, but Blake feels awful about tha...

  This book is highly rated everywhere I can find, but I really didn't care for it that much. I found it kind of, boring. It also reminded me too much of other books, like a conglomeration of Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine , These Silent Woods , and  Keep It in the Family . I didn't feel like there was any twists either. Strange Sally Diamond tells the story of Sally, who's a little strange, hence the nickname, "Strange Sally Diamond". The book opens with Sally preparing to incinerate her father's body because he had died after a long illness and he had jokingly told her to take his body out with the garbage. When others learn about Thomas's passing, an investigation is started to make sure there was no foul play. Sally realizes normal people don't just handle a dead body themselves.   A long time family friend Angela comes and helps Sally with everything. Sally also discovers letters her father wrote her, which she shares with Angela. From these ...

  ARGHHHHH!!! This DID NOT LIVE UP TO EXPECTATIONS! I knew going in this was going to be an autobiographical account of one woman's journey escaping from a terrible situation in Iran. When I read a tragic autobiographical story, I'm READY to sympathize and feel good at the author's accomplishment at the end. However, to earn my sympathy, you need to 1. Not come across as a bitch. 2. Not make stupid mistakes yourself over and over again, and 3. Always be grateful towards the people that did help you, if they exist. This book completely, completely, failed at all 3. It's terrible. And it screams xenophobia. This book honestly needs to be rewritten. Not Without My Daughter tells the story of Betty Mahmoody, who was married to an Iranian American doctor, Sayyed Bozorg "Moody" Mahmoody. Moody acted fairly normal when they first started dating, and later getting married. However, he started having issues at work and was fired. He started battling with depression, an...

  Maybe Now is the final installment of the Maybe series from Colleen Hoover. This story focuses on Maggie and her new relationship with Jake, as well as a continuation of Sydney's relationship with Ridge, picking up where the first book left off at. The story starts with Maggie filling out paperwork for skydiving. As we learned from the first book, Maggie has a chronic illness of cystic fibrosis and diabetes, which means she has a much shorter life expectancy. After the breakup with Ridge, she's focusing on finishing a bucket list of items, which includes things like one night stand and skydiving.  The skydiving instructor is a name named Jake, who is a doctor by weekday. Jake is instantly attracted to Maggie. Despite knowing about her illness (from filling out the paperwork), he takes her out to dinner. At dinner, he asks her out, but she isn't ready to get back into a serious relationship, so she asks for a one night stand. Next morning, Maggie is disappointed to find Ja...

  Maybe Not is the companion short story for the first installment, Maybe Now. It centers more around the side characters of the first book, Warren and Bridgette. Colleen Hoover is just an amazing writer. Absolutely gifted. The writing is like smooth silk, romantic, funny, and satisfying. The book starts with Warren accidentally running into a new girl in his shower. They scream at each other. Warren finds out his roommate and best friend, Ridge, is letting a new girl Bridgette staying at their apartment since one of the roommates moved out. Even though their first encounter wasn't friendly, Warren is insanely attracted to Bridgette. Turns out, both of them love playing pranks, so each started playing pranks on the other. Bridgette works at Hooters, and the outfit does a number on Warren. Warren also overhears that Bridgette has starred in a porno before. This makes Warren watch every single porn he can get his hands on, in hopes of finding Bridgette's porn. This gets him nowhe...

  Can you believe I've never read a book by Colleen Hoover before? I mean, it's pretty crazy!! Colleen Hoover consistently tops the charts for most books sold, so I know she's insanely popular, but I guess I just haven't gotten around to it! I watched the movie, It Ends with Us , and thought it was pretty good, so at least I've been exposed to her work a little bit.  Maybe Someday is the first book in the Maybe series. A TV series is being produced for this as well. I don't typically read romance novels, so I wasn't sure how this was going to go for me, but I was hooked FAST. I INHALED this book. I don't think I ever stopped! Unlike the typical psychological thrillers I read, Colleen Hoover is VERY easy to follow. I don't have to take breaks to let my head "rest". I can go all day long! And it's so good! I would give this book 10 out 5 if I could. I see that this is not her most popular book by any means, so I feel like I'll be in f...

  I like the title of this book. The blue hour is the time when the sun has briefly set (or the time right before sunrise) when the sky is blue but the sun isn't there. It's very pretty, but it can trick you into wondering where the sun has gone.  The author titled the book The Blue Hour as a reference to the pretty things that aren't what they seem to be. The premise of this book is good. A well-known artist Vanessa Chapman has passed away. She left her art to Douglas Lennox, who owns a gallery. Her art is on display at the gallery, and someone notices one of the sculptures has a real human bone in it. Whose bone is it? The mystery starts here. However, the book gets unreasonably complicated. It's a lot of investment for a book with a mediocre story. Half the book is told through Vanessa's diaries. I'm not a big fan of using diaries as storytelling but it's not always a problem. This book just didn't feel like it told the story very well.  James Becker...

  I've been having a pretty good run with Shari Lapena books. I'm not intentionally trying to seek her books out but they all became available from Libby for me around the same time so I've been reading them one after another. I still have many of her books on my TBR to go, which I'm looking forward to. This book is once again set in the fictional town of Aylesford, just like the last one I read, Not a Happy Family.  Someone We know starts out with the harrowing hammer attack of a woman. We don't know who she is, we don't know who the attacker is, although it seems to be a male. Shortly after that, someone named Robert Pierce reports to the police that his wife is missing. He certainly seems like he has a lot to hide, but knowing this is a psychological thriller, we can pretty much rule him out as the killer. After some questioning, the police suggests that his wife Amanda simply walked away, which angers Robert. Robert's reaction paints him as a possibly vi...

  I freaking LOVED this book. Perhaps because I also grew up in a dysfunctional family and the treatments the children were getting from their father were just SO relatable! It got me thinking where I could find more books with this premise to read! I know there are so many books on dysfunctional families, but most of them are usually way out there, like, a member of the family is a serial killer, then we find out another member of the family is a serial killer, etc etc. Not relatable. (No one in my family is a serial killer, shocker!) This book isn't like that. This is way more believable. Not a Happy Family tells the story of the Merton family. The story starts on Easter Sunday, when Fred and Sheila Merton invite their children and their partners to their house for the holiday. Fred is a retired businessman who just sold his successful robotic business for a lot of money. They have 3 children. Oldest is Catherine, a dermatologist who's struggling to conceive. Her husband Ted ...

  This is a collaboration work by James Patterson and David Ellis. It was a fast paced, intense and twisty novel and I loved every second of it!  Lies He Told Me starts out with the story of David Bowers, celebrating his birthday with his wife, Marcie Bowers on the bridge where they first met. As they were chatting and having a good time, a car crashed through the bridge railings and plunged into the water. David, without hesitation, dove into the water after it.  Passersby recorded videos of his heroism and Marcie called 911. A rescue helicopter arrived and everyone's saved. David became a small town hero, even though he avoided the attention as much as possible. Did you notice the cover of the book?? It says "She's in love with a liar". "He" must refer to David right? Because you know, it's always the husband. But so far he sounds like an amazing guy! Next, the book tells us about Marcie. She grew up in the small town of Hemingway Grove, but left her h...

  This is one of those books that you know would stay with you for a long long time.  Allegedly tells the story of a child, Mary Beth Addison, who at the age of 9, allegedly killed an infant, Alyssa. Mary is put in a group home with other violent young children, and is mistreated. Mary is extremely intelligent and narrates the story with clarity. She tells us she's innocent, and she's going to get out of there by acing the SAT exam. Her mother Dawn Cooper, is self serving and abusive towards Mary too. She comes to visit Mary every two weeks, mostly to make herself look like a good mother. Mary has always insisted she's innocent and we believe her. She was given a plea deal, signed by her mother, who was her power-of-attorney due to Mary's age. Mary told us that she decided to do this for mom because her mom has done so much for her. She doesn't want her mom to have to go to jail. She even can prove she's innocent - she has the necklace that her mom shoved into A...