JESS JUST READS

A BOOK REVIEW BLOG

You Are Not Alone by Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen

Shay Miller has three strikes against her: no job, no apartment, no love in her life. But when she witnesses a perfectly normal looking young woman about her age make the chilling decision to leap in front of an ongoing subway train, Shay realizes she could end up in the same spiral. She is intrigued by a group of women who seem to have it all together, and they invite her with the promise: “You are not alone.” Why not align herself with the glamorous and seductive Moore sisters, Cassandra and Jane? They seem to have beaten back their demons, and made a life on their own terms – a life most people can only ever envy. They are everything Shay aspires to be, and they seem to have the keys to getting exactly what they want.

As Shay is pulled deeper and deeper under the spell of the Moore sisters, she finds her life getting better and better. But what price does she have to pay? What do Cassandra and Jane want from her? And what secrets do they, and Shay, have that will come to a deadly confrontation?

You are not alone: Is it a promise? Or a threat?

You Are Not Alone is the third psychological thriller novel by duo Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen, this time exploring a dangerous friendship between a group of women.

Thirty-one-year-old temp worker/data analyst Shay is lonely and insecure, secretly in love with her roommate, and craving a strong connection with at least one other person. When she witnesses a young nurse jump in front of a train, it sets in motion a series of events that have the potential to derail her life.

Set in New York City, Greer and Sarah explore female friendship and toxic human relationships, introducing us to a group of 6 women who are determined to manipulate Shay and sabotage her life.

“In the days that followed, Daphne picked up the phone a half dozen times to call the police. But she always hung up before dialling. She kept experiencing the sensation of James’ hands closing around her throat while she lay there, unmoving.”

The premise and plot are a little absurd and ridiculous, but that doesn’t matter. You Are Not Alone is a juicy, engaging thriller that will entice all readers. The alternating POV is a common thread in Greer & Sarah’s novels, and I think it works quite well in this latest instalment. This stylistic technique means the reader gets both sides of the story, and it allows for a faster pace and increased tension.

Another stylistic technique that Greer and Sarah use with each book is the intermittent use of flashbacks. Over time, we come to understand how the six women met and what drives them to target other people. Slowly, we realise what they have planned for Shay.

“I wonder if Amanda was one of them. Witnessing near-constant suffering and death must be overwhelming. Another article I read showed nurses are 23 percent more likely to commit suicide than women in general.”

Shay trusts easily. When she meets and befriends Cassandra and Jane Moore, her life seems to change for the better. But she’s a little naive — sometimes unrealistically so — and the women appear to be setting her up for a crime she didn’t commit.

Shay is also incredibly observant. Her mind is trained to notice inconsistencies, and facts that don’t add up. Statistics are littered throughout the novel and whilst they don’t feel altogether necessary, they do add to Shay’s characterisation to make her obsession with numbers and facts a little more believable.

“The sisters weave toward the door — waving at an acquaintance, sliding their champagne glass onto an empty table, dodging a man who steps in front of them with a smile, never stopping but never giving the impression they’re rushing out of the gallery. Why now, so many days after Amanda’s death, is Shay moving the necklace?”

I did feel that there were too many characters in the book. There’s Shay, Valerie, Cassandra and Jane, but there’s also Daphne? And Stacey? and Beth? And then of course there’s the deceased Amanda, and all the secrets she took to the grave with her. I think the long list of core characters made for a convoluted narration at times, and evidently there wasn’t enough depth to the characters. More could’ve been done — or a couple of characters could’ve merged — to make for a clearer story.

Recommended for fans of thriller, suspense and crime novels. The audience for this book definitely skews female, aged 20+

Thank you to the publisher for mailing me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

You Are Not Alone
Greer Hendricks & Sarah Pekkanen
March 2020
Pan Macmillan Publishers

Saint X by Alexis Schaitkin

Claire is only seven years old when her college-age sister Alison vanishes from the luxury resort on the Caribbean island of Saint X on the last night of her family’s vacation. Several days later Alison’s naked body is found in a remote spot on a nearby cay, and two local men, employees at the resort, are arrested. But the evidence is slim, the timeline against it, and the men are soon released. It’s national tabloid news, a lurid mystery that will go unsolved, but for Claire’s family there is only the sad return home to broken lives.

Years later, riding in a New York City taxicab, Claire recognizes the name on the cabbie’s licence, Clive Richardson – her driver is one of the men originally suspected of murdering her sister. The fateful encounter sets her on an obsessive pursuit of the truth, not only what happened on the night of Alison’s death, but the no less elusive question of exactly who was this sister she was barely old enough to know: a beautiful, changeable, provocative girl of eighteen at a turbulent moment of identity formation. As Claire doggedly shadows Clive, hoping to gain his trust, waiting for the slip that will uncover the truth, an unlikely intimacy develops between them, two people whose lives were forever marked by a tragedy.

Saint X by Alexis Schaitkin is a haunting crime novel about a young girl’s mysterious death and how the unsolved case still torments her sister eighteen years later. The book explores grief, family, sisterhood, and illustrates how our perceptions of someone — or our understanding of them — can be inherently misguided.

Claire was seven years old when her sister Alison died on a family holiday to the Caribbean. Her body was found in a nearby cay, but the crime remains unsolved. She’s haunted by the mystery, and she soon becomes obsessed with who her sister was, and what happened to her on that final night of their family holiday.

“The island is turned upside down with searching. Members of the civil service are given days off to join the search. Prop planes loaned from a larger island nearby scan the shallow seas. The lagoon into which, mere days ago, Alison watched the blond boy hit golf balls is trawled to no avail.”

Saint X plays with the concept of voyeurism. Claire thinks she knows her sister — she thinks she understands her. Until she dies, and she realises she never really knew her at all. When she’s older, she starts reading Alison’s diary from the time she died and Claire realises how complex and complicated her sister was.

The novel is multi-layered; it’s not just about Alison’s death. It’s also about social dynamics and human relationships.

Saint X explores Claire’s obsession with her dead sister, and how oblivious she is to her own obsession. The book also explores white privilege and wealth, because the two men who were suspected of killing her were both men of colour. We come to understand how their lives were affected after they were falsely accused of murdering Alison. Life was not kind to them in the wake of their interactions with Alison.

“The eleven-year gap between Alison and me is notable, and requires some explanation. I was not an accident, nor had my parents been trying for years to conceive again…those were her exact words: ‘We decided to have you.’ As if they had known, when they chose to have another child, that the child would be me.”

The pace of the novel is incredibly slow — snail’s pace. Claire weaves in and out of stories really abruptly, but also over-explains and indulges the reader in excessive description. Most of the time, this felt unnecessary and it just felt like Alexis was trying to prolong the story. It’s actually kind of incredible how there’ll be a chapter where nothing really happens and Alexis has managed to draw that out over thousands of words.

Saint X does a fantastic job of highlighting the media and the general public’s obsession with true crime and the murder of young women. After Alison’s death, the media feed off the mystery and there is even a true-crime documentary series created about the mystery. It doesn’t help Claire’s family cope with the tragedy and it doesn’t help the two men suspected of her murder move on with their lives.

“At some point, my father must have taken the rolls of film from our vacation to be developed, because a few months after our move to Pasadena I found the photographs in his home office, in the back of his desk drawer.”

Whilst engrossing at first, Saint X flounders throughout. Truthfully, I don’t think that the ending to this novel is explosive or thrilling enough to warrant such a slow-paced story. If I’m being perfectly honest, I thought this book was okay, but not amazing.

Crime readers will be disappointed with this. Literary readers will probably love the deep characterisation and the slow burn of the plot. I’m not sure any reader will feel satisfied with the ending.

Thank you to the publisher for mailing me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

Saint X
Alexis Schaitkin
March 2020
Pan Macmillan Publishers

The Holdout by Graham Moore

One juror changed the verdict. What if she was wrong? ‘Ten years ago we made a decision together…’

Fifteen-year-old Jessica Silver, heiress to a billion-dollar fortune, vanishes on her way home from school. Her teacher, Bobby Nock, is the prime suspect. It’s an open and shut case for the prosecution, and a quick conviction seems all but guaranteed.

Until Maya Seale, a young woman on the jury, persuades the rest of the jurors to vote not guilty: a controversial decision that will change all of their lives forever.

Ten years later, one of the jurors is found dead, and Maya is the prime suspect.

The real killer could be any of the other ten jurors. Is Maya being forced to pay the price for her decision all those years ago?

The Holdout by Graham Moore is a legal thriller that moves between two storylines and two different time periods — present day, and 2009.

Eleven years ago, Maya Seale convinced the rest of the people on her jury that the man accused of killing fifteen-year-old Jessica Silver — African-American high school teacher Bobby Nock — was actually innocent. When they let him go free, what resulted was ten years of targeted hate, disbelief and shock from the public.

In the present day storyline, one of the jurors — Rick — brings all of the jurors back together for a Netflix true crime television show. He says he has new evidence that will prove the man they thought was innocent actually did kill Jessica Silver. Maya starts to doubt the decisions she made in 2009.

“Nineteen years old at the time of the trial, Lila Rosales had been the youngest member of the jury. She had been in beauty school back then, and Maya had once marvelled at how much effort it must have taken to prepare her immaculately made-up face every morning. Now, Lila looked worn.”

Wrapped in legal investigations, The Holdout is gripping and keeps hold of its reader until the very end. It explores the U.S justice system and racism in America, building tension with each passing chapter.

Structurally, the book soars above its competition. The flashbacks are placed at opportune moments to ensure the pacing or the tension never wavers, and the plotting allows for an engaged and entertained reader. The Holdout will please all readers.

The chapters move between different characters, allowing readers to get a full glimpse at the past events that defined them all, and how their ‘not guilty’ verdict changed the course of each of their futures.

“She knew that he was looking for anything in her appearance — an unexplained bruise, a tear in her blouse — that could be of use later. There wasn’t much for him to work with. Maya was disappointingly presentable.”

Media scrutiny is a huge element to this book. After Maya and her fellow jurors help release Bobby Nock, they’re subjected to the wrath of the disbelieving public and media. Some of them struggle to find work, and even one decade later, Maya’s name is recognisable to strangers.

The characterisation for each of the core cast is multi-layered and complex. Maya, who is now a criminal defence lawyer, has moments of doubt over her decisions a decade earlier, but ultimately, she still feels confident that Bobby Nock is an innocent man and somebody else is responsible for the disappearance of Jessica Silver.

Each character is flawed, so when Rick ends up dead in Maya’s hotel room, all of them could’ve done it. Quite a few of the jury had things to gain from Rick’s death.

“Lined by tall bushes and lit only by infrequent street-lamps, the hidden staircase to the next hill provided decent cover. She could see a bigger, better-lit street up ahead, at the top. She wasn’t being followed. What roaming camera crew had found her car, they could stake it out for weeks.”

With sharp, unexpected twists and unforeseen secrets revealed throughout the book, The Holdout is unique enough to entertain even the most disinterested of audiences.

Recommended for readers of crime, thriller and mystery novels. The premise is unique and the characters three-dimensional — the crimes themselves will have you guessing until the final chapter.

Thank you to the publisher for mailing me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

The Holdout
Graham Moore
March 2020
Hachette Book Publishers

Charlotte Pass by Lee Christine

When ski patroller Vanessa Bell discovers human bones high on Mount Stillwell at Charlotte Pass ski resort, Detective Sergeant Pierce Ryder of the Sydney Homicide Squad is called in to lead the investigative team.

Arriving in the isolated, snowed-in village with Winterfest celebrations underway, Ryder soon determines that the bones are those of Celia Delaney, a young woman who disappeared from the ski resort in 1964 during the biggest winter storm in Australian alpine history.

When a second murder takes place, Ryder suspects that the deaths are related, and that the person responsible is still in the village. Amid the escalating tension, Ryder is desperate to make an arrest before the stakes rise even higher.

Set within the stunning Snowy Mountains, this intriguing mystery uncovers deadly, long-buried secrets in the valleys and mountains of this iconic area.

After publishing six romantic suspense novels, Charlotte Pass is Lee Christine’s first crime novel, set deep within the Snowy Mountains and spanning 55 years from 1964 to 2019.

In 1964, the young Celia Delaney goes missing on Mount Stillwell and in 2019, local ski patroller Vanessa Bell discovers her bones. The Sydney-based Detective Pierce Ryder arrives to investigate and what results is a fast-paced, break-neck search to discover who murdered Celia Delaney 55 years ago.

Setting is a strong character in the book, taking readers on a journey through the isolated Snowy Mountains region of Mount Stillwell. You could feel the cold, secluded atmosphere as you read each page. Lee Christine is really skilled at capturing a setting and making the reader feel like they’re really there. What a nice escape this book has been, away from the extreme weather conditions we’ve been experiencing here in Australia.

“The estimate Vanessa had given Ryder turned out to be spot on. In the daylight, he could see where the groomer had worked the day before, smoothing out the snow for the tube run some fifty metres from where she had discovered the bones, down the slope from the snow fences.”

Charlotte Pass is a fascinating read, a truly fabulous crime novel that had me guessing until the final page.

Lee builds tension and suspense with an intriguing premise and engaging characters. Clues are given sparingly and subtly, so by the end of the novel you feel like there are multiple people who could’ve possibly killed Celia five decades earlier. The resolution is not as foreseeable as some crime novels.

Vanessa and Ryder are strong protagonists — gutsy, brash, but also compassionate and understanding, sympathetic and empathetic. Ryder has never really recovered from a family tragedy years earlier, and until now, Vanessa has been functioning on her own without any real need for a significant other.

Both of these characters find something in the other that they didn’t even realise they needed.

“Libby and Detective Ryder were of the same mind when it came to the snow. Libby wasn’t here because of her love of the mountains. She’d followed a boyfriend to Charlotte Pass. A week after she’d taken the job at the kids’ club, he’d broken up with her. Libby now spent most of her time trying to avoid him.”

Romance builds between Vanessa and Detective Ryder, adding another layer of complication to the ensuing investigation. Readers will love the crime and thriller elements of the book, but there are moments of romance injected into Charlotte Pass at intermittent moments and so Lee Christine’s fans will be pleased to know she hasn’t completely strayed from her previous works.

Charlotte Pass features a large cast of dynamic characters — including the setting — but Lee crafts them all with such vivid detail and description that readers will have no issue following the story and engaging with the plot.

The conclusion of the novel is satisfying and realistic, and not predictable. Lee wrapped up the story really well, and I think her existing fanbase will rather enjoy this new direction she’s taking with her work.

“A Tiffany cigarette case wouldn’t have been an easy thing to get your hands on back in 1964, especially for a young dental nurse from Newcastle and her musician husband. They hadn’t exactly been rolling in money, according to a statement Lewicki had taken from Nigel. If not for his gigs, they wouldn’t have even been at Charlotte Pass.”

I think the cover does the book a disservice — it’s designed similar to a lot of historical fiction and romance fiction books. And whilst this may have been a deliberate choice to maintain interest from Lee’s existing fans, I think it may deter crime fiction readers from picking up the book because they won’t realise that it falls within the crime genre.

Atmospheric, suspenseful, and a really enticing read for all ages. Charlotte Pass is recommended for fans of crime fiction, mysteries, and psychological thrillers.

Thank you to the publisher for mailing me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

Charlotte Pass
Lee Christine
February 2020
Allen & Unwin Publishers

The Museum of Desire by Jonathan Kellerman

ONE WILD PARTY. FOUR COUNTS OF MURDER.

A mansion in Beverly Hills is leased out to host an event wild enough to herald the end of days.

The next day there isn’t a living soul to be seen.

But in the driveway sits a super-stretch limo, unlocked, with four bodies inside it. Nothing links the victims together. Each has been killed in a different way.

Now it’s up to brilliant psychologist Alex Delware and LAPD Lieutenant Milo Sturgis to begin their grisliest and most baffling case yet.

As they struggle to make sense of the mass slaying, they will be forced to confront a level of evil that nothing can prepare them for.

The Museum of Desire by Jonathan Kellerman is complex crime fiction that investigates five victims found in a chauffeur car in the backyard of a rental mansion, with no solid connection between any of them.

Jonathan Kellerman is skilled at presenting a unique premise and crime scene, and drawing the reader in without giving too much away. I was swept up in the misery and truly couldn’t guess the killer; I found myself surprised by the twists of the novel. There are enough clues laid down that make the killer plausible, but not too many that you can guess the character. That’s really hard to accomplish in crime fiction.

There were many layers to the crime — the five victims who, in the first instance, don’t seem to have a connection with each other, and also the significance of the Beverley Hills rental property where their bodies were found. Kellerman weaves through each complexity with appropriate pacing and attention, so the reader doesn’t feel too overwhelmed with how quickly the plot is moving.

“Mary Jane Huralnik, fifty-nine years old. Much younger than I’d thought. She’d looked elderly for a decade of progressively sadder mug shots. No felony arrests but plenty of misdemeanours up and down the state over a thirty-year period.”

Whilst the premise and the crime are intriguing and will interest readers, there are too many players involved for the storyline to be succinct and easy to follow.

Firstly, there are two main detectives and five victims. After the first few chapters, I started mistaking the victims for each other and couldn’t keep track of who was who. And for each victim, there was a family member or two being interviewed, a suspect or two, and then eventually we get to a convoluted conclusion regarding the culprit.

Whilst I found the conclusion surprising and satisfying, it was also very complex and messy and hard to understand, even for a seasoned crime reader.

“Nothing remotely nasty in either woman’s background. Perfect driving record for McGann’s five-year-old Nissan Sentra, Bauer had gotten a few speeding tickets in her Porsche Panamera GTS. The 101 North. Heading home in a hurry.”

What lets this book down is its complete lack of prose or internal monologue. The book is 99% dialogue, and even in a crime book that’s too much. I got no real sense of the detectives’ personalities or their state of mind, particularly the protagonist Alex Delaware.

The book is written in first person, and yet, there was no voice. There were no emotions or thoughts, it was just dialogue and action and when there are five victims, even that gets confusing at times. Truthfully, I felt the writing was really weak. The crime is interesting, and the pacing is well down, but the writing lacks any voice or characterisation. Kellerman just moves through the motions of a crime story without any real depth or care for the characters and their development.

“Nothing on knife-attack victim Contessa Welles but the computer was more than happy to tell me who owned the house on Clearwater.”

People who read crime novels and only crime novels? They’ll love this. It’s all about the plot and procedure and plot and procedure, and, more plot. But people who dip in and out of crime like me? People who are also looking for some depth to the characters? Maybe skip this one.

Thank you to the publisher for mailing me a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

The Museum of Desire
Jonathan Kellerman
February 2020
Penguin Random House Publishers