Category: Thriller

Title: Everyone Here Is Lying
Author: Shari Lapena
Genre: Thriller, Contemporary
Publisher: Penguin Random House Canada
Source: Publisher
Format: Paperback
Release Date: July 25, 2023
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

Welcome to Stanhope! A safe neighborhood. A place for families.

William Wooler is a family man, on the surface. But he’s been having an affair, an affair that ended horribly this afternoon at a motel up the road. So when he returns to his house, devastated and angry, to find his difficult nine-year-old daughter, Avery, unexpectedly home from school, William loses his temper.

Hours later, Avery’s family declares her missing.

Suddenly Stanhope doesn’t feel so safe. And William isn’t the only one on his street who’s hiding a lie. As witnesses come forward with information that may or may not be true, Avery’s neighbors become increasingly unhinged.

Who took Avery Wooler?

Nothing will prepare you for the truth.

Review:

William Wooler has been having an affair, but his mistress ends it one afternoon. He goes home and finds his difficult nine-year-old daughter home alone, when she should still be at school. They have an argument and William loses his temper and slaps her. He storms out of the house after apologizing. However, a little while later, William is called home because Avery has disappeared. Everyone on their street is a suspect, and everyone has secrets.

This was another awesome fast-paced Shari Lapena thriller. It was told through small scenes that alternated between all the characters which gave some insight into what everyone was thinking. It was still hard to figure out who was behind her disappearance because they were all guilty of something in their lives. The story took a surprising twist that I didn’t see coming. The ending was great and satisfying!

Everyone Here Is Lying is a fast-paced thriller!

Thank you Penguin Random House Canada for providing a copy of this book. 

Content warnings: murder, child abuse, mentions of drug abuse, mentions of sexual assault

Have you read Everyone Here Is Lying? What did you think of it?

Title: Yellowface
Author: R.F. Kuang
Genre: Contemporary, Thriller
Publisher: HarperCollins Canada
Source: Publisher
Format: Paperback arc
Release Date: May 16, 2023
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

What’s the harm in a pseudonym? New York Times bestselling sensation Juniper Song is not who she says she is, she didn’t write the book she claims she wrote, and she is most certainly not Asian American–in this chilling and hilariously cutting novel from R. F. Kuang.

Authors June Hayward and Athena Liu were supposed to be twin rising stars: same year at Yale, same debut year in publishing. But Athena’s a cross-genre literary darling, and June didn’t even get a paperback release. Nobody wants stories about basic white girls, June thinks.

So when June witnesses Athena’s death in a freak accident, she acts on impulse: she steals Athena’s just-finished masterpiece, an experimental novel about the unsung contributions of Chinese laborers to the British and French war efforts during World War I.

So what if June edits Athena’s novel and sends it to her agent as her own work? So what if she lets her new publisher rebrand her as Juniper Song–complete with an ambiguously ethnic author photo? Doesn’t this piece of history deserve to be told, whoever the teller? That’s what June claims, and the New York Times bestseller list seems to agree.

But June can’t get away from Athena’s shadow, and emerging evidence threatens to bring June’s (stolen) success down around her. As June races to protect her secret, she discovers exactly how far she will go to keep what she thinks she deserves.

With its totally immersive first-person voice, Yellowface takes on questions of diversity, racism, and cultural appropriation not only in the publishing industry but the persistent erasure of Asian-American voices and history by Western white society. R. F. Kuang’s novel is timely, razor-sharp, and eminently readable.

Review:

June Hayward and Athena Liu went to Yale together and became authors, debuting in the same year. Athena became an award-winning author, while June’s debut didn’t even get a second publication in paperback. When Athena dies in a freak accident in front of June, June takes the secret manuscript Athena has just completed. June can tell immediately this manuscript about Chinese laborers in WWI is a masterpiece, so she edits it a little and sends it to her agent under her own name. Her publisher rebrands her as June Song and publishes the book. However, people start to see similarities between Athena’s work and June’s new novel. People on social media starts asking questions about why June wrote about a heritage that does not belong to her. June has to fight against this criticism while protecting her secret from the looming ghost of Athena. 

This book was amazing. It is an intriguing look at publishing, with references to real events that have happened in the industry. There was a lot more to the plot than was in the synopsis, but I don’t want to give anything away. One important point this story makes is about censorship and who has the right to tell a story. June was a white woman who published a book about Chinese heritage (though she didn’t write it) and at the same time the author of Yellowface is a Chinese-American woman who has written a book with a white woman as the main character. I loved the irony of that. Of course, authors don’t need to experience everything that they write about (murder mystery writers aren’t murderers), but there are exceptions to that. Though censorship can be problematic, it is more problematic to take the place of someone’s voice to tell their own cultural story. 

I highly recommend Yellowface for writers and anyone interested in publishing!

Thank you HarperCollins Canada for sending me a copy of this book. 

Content warnings: racism, cyberbullying, gaslighting, sudden death, choking, mentions of suicide, death of parent, broken bones

What to read next:

Babel by R.F. Kuang

Have you read Yellowface? What did you think of it?

Title: How to Kill Men and Get Away With It
Author: Katy Brent
Genre: Contemporary, Thriller
Publisher: HarperCollins Canada
Source: Publisher via NetGalley
Format: Ebook
Release Date: April 11, 2023
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

Meet Kitty Collins.

FRIEND. LOVER. KILLER.

He was following me. That guy from the nightclub who wouldn’t leave me alone.

I hadn’t intended to kill him of course. But I wasn’t displeased when I did and, despite the mess I made, I appeared to get away with it.

That’s where my addiction started…

I’ve got a taste for revenge and quite frankly, I’m killing it.

A deliciously dark, hilariously twisted story about friendship, love, and murder. Fans of My Sister the Serial Killer, How to Kill Your Family and Killing Eve will love this wickedly clever novel!

Review:

Kitty Collins is a social media influencer and an heiress to her family’s abattoir. One night after leaving a club with her friends, a guy from the club follows her home. He’s angry that she rejected him, and he dies in a freak accident. Now that Kitty’s had a taste of revenge, she wants to avenge every girl who’s been attacked by a guy. Kitty goes searching for the awful men who target young women on dating apps, but when she takes it too far, she has to be careful that she doesn’t get caught. 

This was such a fun and twisty story. I’m sure almost every woman has had an interaction with a man that made her uncomfortable, or worse. Kitty specifically targeted the men who were preying on women, and she used creative ways of disposing of them. By killing these men, she was saving many women from being attacked by them in the future. She was carrying out justice, though if she got caught, she would be in trouble. Even though she had become a serial killer, I kept hoping that she wouldn’t get caught, because she was really helping all women who could potentially be attacked by these men. 

How to Kill Men and Get Away With It is a funny and suspenseful thriller!

Thank you HarperCollins Canada for providing a digital copy of this book. 

Content warnings: murder, rape (off page and described), assault, animal abuse, animal death, slaughterhouse, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, drug overdose

What to read next:

My Sister, The Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite

Have you read How to Kill Men and Get Away With It? What did you think of it?