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wordsofclover 's review for:

The Retreat by Sherri Smith
4.0

CW: Violence, sexual assault, sexual assault of a child, addiction issues, mental health issues.

I received this book in exchange for an honest review from Titan Books.

When former child actress Katie Manning decides to go on a special retreat with her two college friends and her soon-to-be sister-in-law, she thinks that the weekend is going to be a bit of yoga not taken seriously, and more hiding from her problems. But when Katie wakes up covered in blood and a knife in her bed, and another guest is missing, she begins to have doubts about herself.

This was a nice meaty thriller that I really enjoyed spending some time with. The characters in this book really intrigued me and watching them during the retreat and how they reacted to different situations truly fascinated me. I never really knew what they would do because what they did so was generally quite shocking and there were some wtf moments as well.

I didn't really have a favourite character, they were all fairly awful people, and seemed to be more so as the book went on. I did enjoy getting separate POVs for each character and seeing hw they all thought about each other as well as the story gathered steam.

I will say there were some bits in this thriller that were fairly predictable and I thought the reasoning of the character who was the 'baddie' in the end was a bit weird. But I did enjoy the road to getting there, and I liked that it was a bit dramatic and intense.

The last line in the last chapter of this book would have been a perfect ending. I definitely don't think there was a need for an epilogue with this one.