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3.04 AVERAGE
3.04 AVERAGE
NYT bestselling author Andrea Bartz returns following [b:We Were Never Here|56084054|We Were Never Here|Andrea Bartz|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1627923495l/56084054._SY75_.jpg|87356696] with her latest, edgy, seductive, and creepy romantic suspense, THE SPARE ROOM. Things turn heated and deadly when a young woman stays with a friend and her husband in their isolated alluring mansion.
Kelly Doyle's life (age 34) is not going so well. During the lockdown in Philly, she is trapped in her apartment with Mike, the man who just called off their wedding.
Fortunately, she has found her childhood friend, Sabrina Lamont (introvert) —who is now a glamorous NYT bestselling romance author with a handsome, high-powered husband, Nathan (extrovert), with a high-ranking government job—a power couple.
They have a spare room in their Virginia mansion and offered for her to stay with them temporarily. She did not have Sabrina's number three weeks earlier, and they followed one another on IG.
Located an hour outside DC, Tanglewood Estates with tall gates surrounding each mansion, blocking out the outside world and a lush pool. AT 327 Tanglewood Drive is a stately mansion with tall windows overlooking a cemetery next door.
Kelly arrives with her cat Virgo. Soon Kelly secretly finds herself falling for both of her dazzling hosts—until one night, a wild and unexpected threesome leads the couple to open their marriage for her. Something forbidden and wild. She may never go back.
UNTIL she discovers their prior partner is missing. Someone left a mysterious note on the gate: LEAVE.
This Gothic-vibe locked room is creepy, atmospheric, and dangerous. There are videos. An ex that is now missing. The woman in the Polaroids.
Deadly, dangerous, a nightmare, a toxic friendship. Can this couple be trusted? What is their end game? Kelly ignores the red flags, the power plays, gaslighting, and the betrayals.
THE SPARE ROOM is challenging to describe. A strange erotic romantic suspense (not my thing) crosses a Gothic whodunit murder mystery rolled into a domestic suspense popcorn semi-thriller for entertainment, with a ton of disbelief.
Thanks to #RandomHouse for a gifted ARC via #NetGalley for review purposes. I have no doubt Brittany Pressley will take this one to another level for the audiobook.
Blog review posted @
JudithDCollins.com
@JudithDCollins | #JDCMustReadBooks
My Rating: 3.5 Stars
June 2023 Must-Read Books
Kelly Doyle's life (age 34) is not going so well. During the lockdown in Philly, she is trapped in her apartment with Mike, the man who just called off their wedding.
Fortunately, she has found her childhood friend, Sabrina Lamont (introvert) —who is now a glamorous NYT bestselling romance author with a handsome, high-powered husband, Nathan (extrovert), with a high-ranking government job—a power couple.
They have a spare room in their Virginia mansion and offered for her to stay with them temporarily. She did not have Sabrina's number three weeks earlier, and they followed one another on IG.
Located an hour outside DC, Tanglewood Estates with tall gates surrounding each mansion, blocking out the outside world and a lush pool. AT 327 Tanglewood Drive is a stately mansion with tall windows overlooking a cemetery next door.
Kelly arrives with her cat Virgo. Soon Kelly secretly finds herself falling for both of her dazzling hosts—until one night, a wild and unexpected threesome leads the couple to open their marriage for her. Something forbidden and wild. She may never go back.
UNTIL she discovers their prior partner is missing. Someone left a mysterious note on the gate: LEAVE.
This Gothic-vibe locked room is creepy, atmospheric, and dangerous. There are videos. An ex that is now missing. The woman in the Polaroids.
Deadly, dangerous, a nightmare, a toxic friendship. Can this couple be trusted? What is their end game? Kelly ignores the red flags, the power plays, gaslighting, and the betrayals.
THE SPARE ROOM is challenging to describe. A strange erotic romantic suspense (not my thing) crosses a Gothic whodunit murder mystery rolled into a domestic suspense popcorn semi-thriller for entertainment, with a ton of disbelief.
Thanks to #RandomHouse for a gifted ARC via #NetGalley for review purposes. I have no doubt Brittany Pressley will take this one to another level for the audiobook.
Blog review posted @
JudithDCollins.com
@JudithDCollins | #JDCMustReadBooks
My Rating: 3.5 Stars
June 2023 Must-Read Books
The first 60% of this book was a chore. I empathize with Kelly's anxiousness (I also have anxiety), but I was so frustrated by her constant self-destructive tendencies. How did all of these 30 somethings make it this far in life without learning basic communication skills?! The description of the book also makes it seem like the romance would be overtly spicy af, but it wasn't. It was like a PG-13 sex scene.
Once we got to the actual thriller part of the book, I was invested, and I had to keep reading to see how everything played out. It's clear that the author is talented at writing thriller/ mysteries - I just wish the whole book had more of that.
⭐️⭐️: while the characters are mostly unlikeable and don't seem real, they do develop by the end of the book. The twist was unexpected, and I enjoyed the last third of the book, but I almost stopped reading several times.
Once we got to the actual thriller part of the book, I was invested, and I had to keep reading to see how everything played out. It's clear that the author is talented at writing thriller/ mysteries - I just wish the whole book had more of that.
⭐️⭐️: while the characters are mostly unlikeable and don't seem real, they do develop by the end of the book. The twist was unexpected, and I enjoyed the last third of the book, but I almost stopped reading several times.
Big Thanks to Random House - Ballantine Books and NetGalley for gifting me an ARC of The Spare Room to read and review.
I am a massive Andrea Bartz fan - We Were Never Here is one of my favorite thrillers, ever. I was so excited to hear about her upcoming book, and to get an ARC! From the press I read I knew that this was a new direction, and I welcome that with authors - I love watching them stretch and try new things.
There was a lot in this that I enjoyed - the twists and turns, especially in the last third of the book. Unfortunately, other pieces fell a bit flat to me - I never got as invested as I wanted to in Kelly, and particularly in her relationship with Nathan and Sabrina. It felt like things moved quite fast and weren't as earned to feel authentic.
While this may not have been my favorite of Bartz's, I still tore through it and was guessing until the last page. And I remain so excited to see what she writes next.
I am a massive Andrea Bartz fan - We Were Never Here is one of my favorite thrillers, ever. I was so excited to hear about her upcoming book, and to get an ARC! From the press I read I knew that this was a new direction, and I welcome that with authors - I love watching them stretch and try new things.
There was a lot in this that I enjoyed - the twists and turns, especially in the last third of the book. Unfortunately, other pieces fell a bit flat to me - I never got as invested as I wanted to in Kelly, and particularly in her relationship with Nathan and Sabrina. It felt like things moved quite fast and weren't as earned to feel authentic.
While this may not have been my favorite of Bartz's, I still tore through it and was guessing until the last page. And I remain so excited to see what she writes next.
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
2.5 maybe a 3 if it wasn’t marketed as a thriller it was more of a romance drama. This book was okay it was one of the first ones in a while that I didn’t really care to finish Mainly because of how frustrating the main character, Kelly, is it was hard being in her head.
but at the same time the set up was intriguing and I wanted to know what it was leading too. I finished it and found the ending unexpected but not in a good way. Not the thriller I was looking for.
Spoilers
I really enjoyed the first third of this book had a fun sexy set up of a happily married couple inviting a friend to stay with them and it leading to a threesome/ thrupple. It was interesting and so was the romantic drama that was included with her ex and thier new found relationship. Although it was really hard to get behind Kelly as a narrator she was pretty insufferable. I think that was part of the design but with how quickly she dove head first and was obsessive with relationships and no self identity it was hard to image she’s a 35 year old woman and now a like 19 year old. Where she goes from being DEVASTATED about how things fumbled with her ex and watching all thier future plans go down the drain to hopping in bed with her new friends in a threesome effectively cheating on him then just forgetting about him like he was chopped liver in what felt like maybe two weeks the time line wasn’t fully clear. Then not only did she jsut become sexually involved with this couple but jealous and very emotionally/ emotionally attached. Feeling like the odd man out and feeling entitled to know all of their marital history often times way over stepping boundaries because she MUST know. When she had been with them for like what I think was max a month and they’d been married for almost 15 years like she needed to cool it. Obviously she didn’t deserve to be lied to but it was obnoxious for her to take on this high and mighty that she was a member of the relationship and needed to know everything right away that they new when they just weren’t at that stage yet. Like similarly when you start dating jsut one person you may need to date them for a few months before you get past the fun honey moon stage and into the deepest secrets and trauma it’s the same for when you date a married couple who each come with thier own baggage and thier collective. Idk I guess it showed the messiness well of how these entanglements can go when you join way later and as a rebound. But what was crazy was after their ex mysteriously came back into the picture and she was acting all jealous and entitled to all their attention while being rude to Elizabeth and trying to figure out what this meant for Kelly. Like that’s when I started to really dislike her like according to the story they thought this woman had died cuz she been missing for a month as was a domestic abuse survivor on the run and instead of showing any empathy towards anyone involved it was all just jealousy and selfishness.
Then beyond an insufferable lead/ narrator to get to the actual story line it was meh the ending was like shooting out things and seeing if it sticks. It was so many twists and turns which are unexpected (Megan being Elizabeth’s ex, mike being the killer, Elizabeth being a scam artist ) where sure it wasn’t expected but it wasn’t a well set up twist to the story because these were al background characters that were discussed maybe in a few 10s of pages like all the time was spent on Kelly, Sabrina and Nathan and then for none of them to really matter or be important in the crux of the story. It’s like the whole story and plot jsut happen to them and they just react none of the main characters drive any of the story lines. Feels like a wast of time developing these characters and thier relationship for 75 % if the book for that. Liek the interesting characters that are alk dark and twisty and wind up bing drivers if the plot don’t get any real development and jsut randomly put in and connected. The sorry line between “Megan” and Elizabeth was far more interesting with very interesting characters and I’m sad it was only mentioned I. The last 25 % of the book. It would’ve been really cool to have like the multiple storylines happening at once. Also there were no traceable hints or clues that Megan and Elizabeth were connected like by the end the dots were connected Megan saying she recently lost her job and was living with family friends in the neighborhood was The clue but it was jsut a throw away background story to a character that was mentioned a couple of times I didn’t really think it was worth noting and by the time we found out that Elizabeth family was from the neighborhood and they weren’t a safe spot for her to go to because they liked her ex but that wasn’t brought up till a long time Megan had been forgotten. I almost didn’t even know who Megan was when the surprise was dropped that that was her ex it was like and on the camera it was Megan! And I was like who? And needed the detail of leaving birthday flowers to make connections. Now for the big plot failure. When Elizabeth was murdered and the story finally started getting thrilling and was set up as a who done it where it seems like an inside job and all characters had motive I wa alike okay this is interesting but then was pretty much squashed out cuz Kelly has horrible cognitive thinking skills and just pined it on Nathan because she found the murder weapon in his office and jumped to the conclusion that he knew she was pregant and killed her which makes no since because he was the only who always wanted a family but Sabrina wanst able to do why would he kill his chance of being a father ?? And she also like thought it was suspicious that Sabrina would hide th at from Nathan because Kelly is incapable of empathy like it must be that Sabrina is a secretive person and possibly a murderer not that she’s trying to protect the person she loves form getting news that would absolutely devastate him. Then they do the cover up put it al on Nathan even tho it had so many holes and I though we were setting up to Sabrina being the murderer because Megan like warned her that she thought Sabrina left bruises on Elizabeth and honing to the time she been controlling and how she was mad about the fact that Elizabeth was pregnant so I thought that’s where it was leading. THEN guess who the killer is Kelly’s ex boyfriend who has been a background character since the book started he was only featured in memories and texts / phone calls. I didn’t even realize he knew the address of where she was staying. I thought he was jsut a plot device character to get Kelly in the spot where she moved in with the couple. Then the stricter ties together all these “clues” that were only meaningful when the writer added meaning to them in that scene. It was all jsut throw away details like the door bell ringing while her and Nathan were having her birthday make out sesh like how is that a good clue that Michael new where she was ??? It was hardly even addressed during the scene. Then there was not enough set up to even know Michael was all that upset over their break up or going through depression or having an anger streak enough to make him turn into a murderer she said he could get angry when things didn’t go his way but described it as a todler temper tantrum so I wouldn’t connect that to like oh he’s a violent man vengeful ex. She made Nathan sound much more dangerous than she vet made michael. Just a very disappointing ending to an already slow burn book.
Although rant over clearly I was captivated enough to read the whole book and think a lot about it so I did find her writing style interesting I jsut wish there was more development of Megan, Elizabeth and Michael throughout the book especially if they were gonna drive the climax of the book also would’ve kept the book more interesting throughout it to have a perspective change into one of these characters cuz the Kelly and lamants story line was very repetitive she totally obsessed with them finds some tiny thing that makes her realize she didn’t really know these complete strangers and now doesn’t trust them then forgive them and is obsessed with them and over and over again.
but at the same time the set up was intriguing and I wanted to know what it was leading too. I finished it and found the ending unexpected but not in a good way. Not the thriller I was looking for.
Spoilers
I really enjoyed the first third of this book had a fun sexy set up of a happily married couple inviting a friend to stay with them and it leading to a threesome/ thrupple. It was interesting and so was the romantic drama that was included with her ex and thier new found relationship. Although it was really hard to get behind Kelly as a narrator she was pretty insufferable. I think that was part of the design but with how quickly she dove head first and was obsessive with relationships and no self identity it was hard to image she’s a 35 year old woman and now a like 19 year old. Where she goes from being DEVASTATED about how things fumbled with her ex and watching all thier future plans go down the drain to hopping in bed with her new friends in a threesome effectively cheating on him then just forgetting about him like he was chopped liver in what felt like maybe two weeks the time line wasn’t fully clear. Then not only did she jsut become sexually involved with this couple but jealous and very emotionally/ emotionally attached. Feeling like the odd man out and feeling entitled to know all of their marital history often times way over stepping boundaries because she MUST know. When she had been with them for like what I think was max a month and they’d been married for almost 15 years like she needed to cool it. Obviously she didn’t deserve to be lied to but it was obnoxious for her to take on this high and mighty that she was a member of the relationship and needed to know everything right away that they new when they just weren’t at that stage yet. Like similarly when you start dating jsut one person you may need to date them for a few months before you get past the fun honey moon stage and into the deepest secrets and trauma it’s the same for when you date a married couple who each come with thier own baggage and thier collective. Idk I guess it showed the messiness well of how these entanglements can go when you join way later and as a rebound. But what was crazy was after their ex mysteriously came back into the picture and she was acting all jealous and entitled to all their attention while being rude to Elizabeth and trying to figure out what this meant for Kelly. Like that’s when I started to really dislike her like according to the story they thought this woman had died cuz she been missing for a month as was a domestic abuse survivor on the run and instead of showing any empathy towards anyone involved it was all just jealousy and selfishness.
Then beyond an insufferable lead/ narrator to get to the actual story line it was meh the ending was like shooting out things and seeing if it sticks. It was so many twists and turns which are unexpected (Megan being Elizabeth’s ex, mike being the killer, Elizabeth being a scam artist ) where sure it wasn’t expected but it wasn’t a well set up twist to the story because these were al background characters that were discussed maybe in a few 10s of pages like all the time was spent on Kelly, Sabrina and Nathan and then for none of them to really matter or be important in the crux of the story. It’s like the whole story and plot jsut happen to them and they just react none of the main characters drive any of the story lines. Feels like a wast of time developing these characters and thier relationship for 75 % if the book for that. Liek the interesting characters that are alk dark and twisty and wind up bing drivers if the plot don’t get any real development and jsut randomly put in and connected. The sorry line between “Megan” and Elizabeth was far more interesting with very interesting characters and I’m sad it was only mentioned I. The last 25 % of the book. It would’ve been really cool to have like the multiple storylines happening at once. Also there were no traceable hints or clues that Megan and Elizabeth were connected like by the end the dots were connected Megan saying she recently lost her job and was living with family friends in the neighborhood was The clue but it was jsut a throw away background story to a character that was mentioned a couple of times I didn’t really think it was worth noting and by the time we found out that Elizabeth family was from the neighborhood and they weren’t a safe spot for her to go to because they liked her ex but that wasn’t brought up till a long time Megan had been forgotten. I almost didn’t even know who Megan was when the surprise was dropped that that was her ex it was like and on the camera it was Megan! And I was like who? And needed the detail of leaving birthday flowers to make connections. Now for the big plot failure. When Elizabeth was murdered and the story finally started getting thrilling and was set up as a who done it where it seems like an inside job and all characters had motive I wa alike okay this is interesting but then was pretty much squashed out cuz Kelly has horrible cognitive thinking skills and just pined it on Nathan because she found the murder weapon in his office and jumped to the conclusion that he knew she was pregant and killed her which makes no since because he was the only who always wanted a family but Sabrina wanst able to do why would he kill his chance of being a father ?? And she also like thought it was suspicious that Sabrina would hide th at from Nathan because Kelly is incapable of empathy like it must be that Sabrina is a secretive person and possibly a murderer not that she’s trying to protect the person she loves form getting news that would absolutely devastate him. Then they do the cover up put it al on Nathan even tho it had so many holes and I though we were setting up to Sabrina being the murderer because Megan like warned her that she thought Sabrina left bruises on Elizabeth and honing to the time she been controlling and how she was mad about the fact that Elizabeth was pregnant so I thought that’s where it was leading. THEN guess who the killer is Kelly’s ex boyfriend who has been a background character since the book started he was only featured in memories and texts / phone calls. I didn’t even realize he knew the address of where she was staying. I thought he was jsut a plot device character to get Kelly in the spot where she moved in with the couple. Then the stricter ties together all these “clues” that were only meaningful when the writer added meaning to them in that scene. It was all jsut throw away details like the door bell ringing while her and Nathan were having her birthday make out sesh like how is that a good clue that Michael new where she was ??? It was hardly even addressed during the scene. Then there was not enough set up to even know Michael was all that upset over their break up or going through depression or having an anger streak enough to make him turn into a murderer she said he could get angry when things didn’t go his way but described it as a todler temper tantrum so I wouldn’t connect that to like oh he’s a violent man vengeful ex. She made Nathan sound much more dangerous than she vet made michael. Just a very disappointing ending to an already slow burn book.
Although rant over clearly I was captivated enough to read the whole book and think a lot about it so I did find her writing style interesting I jsut wish there was more development of Megan, Elizabeth and Michael throughout the book especially if they were gonna drive the climax of the book also would’ve kept the book more interesting throughout it to have a perspective change into one of these characters cuz the Kelly and lamants story line was very repetitive she totally obsessed with them finds some tiny thing that makes her realize she didn’t really know these complete strangers and now doesn’t trust them then forgive them and is obsessed with them and over and over again.
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
N/A
Loveable characters:
N/A
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes