Thank you Flatiron Books for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

So.

I hated some parts of it so much that I wanted to DNF it and throw it in the lake (I read it while I was on the boat).

However, the ending was I hated some parts of it so much that I wanted to DNF it and throw it in the lake - at least to me - and I will not spoil that for anyone unless you aren’t going to pick up this book. The ending seriously saved this from being a 1.5/2 star book for me.

Also, in my opinion, this is not a thriller. Much more of a domestic drama with SMALL suspenseful elements. However, I do agree this has Stepford Wives with the gender shift vibes.

In the end, I did enjoy The Whisper Network more than this one. I will definitely still pick up the next book Chandler Baker writes, I just hope I don’t feel like throwing that one in the lake.

This wonderful, heartbreaking, inspiring, and enlightening collection of essays will sit on my shelf forever.

We didn’t survive a pandemic for a summer of dud releases.

This is a first - I was excited for someone to die just so the plot would actually move. Did it move that much? No. 

I normally enjoy character driven books, but for some reason this family of characters just couldn’t grab my attention and keep it. While I can see why people are giving it five stars, I just can’t do that. 
 
Some thoughts:

I was set on giving this 3 stars before maybe the last 40 pages and now I’m giving it 3.5.

The only thing that helped me want to pick this book back up was that I was having a bad day at work and I need to do something besides glare at Microsoft Teams.

We get it - Mick Riva is a bad dad. That was repetitive.

How many filler chapters do we need about characters that don’t matter?

Nina deserved better. Sure the ending was kind of a good ending for her, but for what she did, she deserved just a little bit more.

I didn’t hate it. It’s a good book to pick up for the summer, but with the way late sprint releases are going for me, I’m worried that this summer may be a summer of overhyped releases. 

Recommendations:
Pick up for a vacation or an atmospheric read.
For the atmosphere, I recommend listening to The Beach Boys while reading this. 

Will I still pick up the next book Taylor Jenkins Reid writes? Absolutely!

After loving the first book in this series, I was all the more excited to pick this one up and enjoy it even more. 

Sadly, it fell short for me as I am not a huge fan of mysteries/thrillers that focus on police corruption. I also found that sometimes I didn't want to pick this one up, but I wanted to finish it out because I do love the characters.  

I do think that this second book did capture the role of the Police in Chicago. I would not be surprised if there is something like this (police teaming up with the mob in the city) is still happening. 

I also enjoyed that more of Mace's dogs played bigger roles in the plot. I love the inclusion of all of them besides Vira, plus we got a new pup! Hi, Bill! 

I still recommend picking up this series and I'm hoping, fingers crossed, that there will be a third. This book (and series) is a great "cozy-ish" mystery to pick up. Not too much drama but enough to keep you interest. 

I cannot stop thinking about much this book disappointed me. In just a matter of hours I’ve taken my rating from a 3.5/4 to a 3 and now I’m settling on a 2.

After reading (and loving) The Silent Patient, I was hoping that this one would be another five star read.

Sadly it fell short. Believe it or not - a mystery/ thriller can have too many red herrings. Try five, and this is coming from someone who usually loves red herrings in a thriller.

I was disappointed with the lack of plot building around the college campus society, ‘The Maidens’ because I think that could’ve been a great turn of events within the plot. Specially with the Ancient Greek connection of ‘The Maidens’ with the main character Mariana. 

Overall: The Maidens was overhyped and underdelivered for me. Maybe check this one out from the library or find a copy in a LFL. Also seemed like an attempt to try to do what Donna Tartt did with The Secret History and that attempt failed. 

I do recommend picking it up for a quick vacation read and also recommend maybe trying to listen to Part 1 on audio like I did. Thanks Celadon and Libro.fm for the audiobook as an ALC.