Reviews with content warning for Physical abuse - The Last Mrs. Parrish

A married parent with the ‘perfect’ family. They are a wealthy philanthropist dedicated to cystic fibrosis awareness and funding. They seem open-minded, docile, spoiled, and naïve due to loneliness.
A single adult in their 20s working in a real estate office while going for the long-con in a self-concocted scheme to infiltrate the philanthropist’s life, although we don’t know why. It could be revenge; it could be because they are completely unhinged.

Atmosphere 😒: Detached, uneasy, vindictive

Set mostly in a wealthy suburb near Manhattan, NY

Cred Rating 🤪: OTT

On the ‘juicy’ soap opera side of over-the-top. Not a story you want to go in overthinking or looking for meaningful commentary or symbolism from.

Growls and Howls 🐺:

I don’t mind OTT, but the SLOW OTT is hard to pull off, so although it was an interesting plot in theory, it fell apart in execution for me. I think it could have benefitted from some cuts because the slowness wasn’t contributing to the story, it was stalling it out. We have the story delivered through overreliance on hold-backs (“If only they knew what I was about to do”), overly descriptive scenes about the clothing and appearances of everyone, and a lot of MC internal monologue that involves reminding the reader of a goal or thought we are already are familiar with because it was previously revealed to us…sometimes multiple times!
There are some problematic tropes in this book, but I think that’s forgivable with OTT/soap opera type plots. It’s like angrily therapeutic. Someone plotting to steal your life and destroy you in the process? Wouldn’t it be nice to find out they self-destructed? Yes, we have women throwing themselves at a man’s feet, being toxic to other women, and using each other to further their own goals. However, this plot used severe physical, emotional, sexual, AND verbal abuse as a major revenge element. It felt icky. But, we also have stories glorifying female serial killers, so just go in to this one aware that it falls into that territory.

Oops 🙃⭐️: The Housemaid by Freida McFadden (April 26, 2022) is technically a retelling of this work (opinion varies as to whether it was plagiarism, inspiration, or coincidental). The plot and MCs are different between the two, but the plot devices are the same, hence why I would say re-telling (some of my fav books are, so it's not a dig). The main difference is Frieda McFadden’s work is not so deeply in the OTT realm and doesn't rely on the abuse as justice trope. Regardless of where you stand on the matter, The Last Mrs Parrish was first (Oct 17, 2017) and I recognize that I knew the plot elements going in because I read The Housemaid first, which diluted the twists for me. So, I’m going to rate this an extra star to account for that bias.

Reading Journey 🙄😬: Sitting through a play when you had high expectations for it. Slow, then repetitive, then even slower, then bam-bam-bam wrap-up. My applause is for finally getting to leave, not for the performance.

Mood Reading Match-Up:

Juicy, behind closed doors domestic thriller
B****, I’m gonna steal your life trope
Slow, scheming, long-con sociopathic mind
Guilty-pleasure soap opera revenge plots

Vibes: 😬😏😑

Content Heads-Up: Toxic friendships and relationships. Rape and sexual abuse (descriptive, on page). Physical, verbal, emotional abuse against spouses and children (on page).

Format: Kindle Unlimited

Content Warnings

twisted_luce's review against another edition

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medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

This book started well but overall I found it to be a bit “meh”
It plateaus quite quickly, I really hoped it would pick up the pace but when it did finally get into it, it was just OK and then over.

Side note - I couldn’t get past the plot hole that she tried on every pair of her knickers whilst she was picking the kids up. EVERY PAIR, as a reader we already know that this is a whole bedroom sized closet, so I could just imagine her frantically getting in and out of tons of pairs of pants like some sort of frenzied world record attempt.

Finally, a big “boooo” for the internalised misogyny- the idea that a woman deserves any kind of abusive treatment is not going to sit well. Granted the character was hideous but justice could have been served without horrific domestic abuse.

Content Warnings

np24's review against another edition

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dark sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

I really loved the first half of this book, then it took a sharp turn down for me when we switched perspectives, then picked up again at the end. I should have read reviews about it before I started it, because there were some trigger warnings I would have found useful before starting. The book took a turn I wasn’t expecting and stayed on that train for a very long time, but the effect of it all was good, the story was unique and held my attention, and fans of suspense will love it (but read the trigger warnings first!)

Content Warnings

chelseamayxxx's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.0

This is such a weird book and so much happens in it that you don’t really understand the plot of the story or what’s happening that much as it’s told from 2 people. I figured out that the husband was a narcissist bully who hated against women and children if there were girls. The 1st part of the story she is so obsessed with the family that it gets too much to read and the 2nd part of the story she is too scared to leave her abusive husband so the story did match up towards the end of the last 30 pages I would so. But this story takes so many twists and turns that is hard to enjoy this book. I got half way and wanted to give up reading this book but I was too addictive to finding out what finally happens in the story that I kept reading it sadly. The characters I absolutely hated them all though the book they were annoying and they kept moaning and winging about stuff that it gets too insufferable. Xxx

Content Warnings

shannonweiss's review against another edition

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dark emotional tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This book was very similar to The Housemaid, which is one of my favorite reads. I think that if I would have read this one first, the review would have been higher, but since it was similar it was not as suspenseful. Loved Daphne’s character and was rooting for her throughout the story.

Content Warnings

kimveach's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.75

Apparently, I have read too many domestic thrillers as I've seen this plot before. It's possible this book, published in 2017, was the first one to do it of the books I've read. Thankfully, it was quick to read.

Content Warnings

nicolesbookreviews's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

Content Warnings

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