Reviews with content warning for Toxic relationship - The Replacement Wife

Reviews tagging 'Toxic relationship'

The Replacement Wife by Darby Kane

6 reviews

julesreadsalot's review

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dark mysterious medium-paced

3.0

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minimicropup's review against another edition

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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

2.5

Narration: 👎

Okay, except for the male voices. Narrator tried to deepen their voice too much and came off extremely cartoonish.

Atmosphere: 👎

Claustrophobic, confusing, very in the MC’s mind (suitable for the plot).
Imagination Smasher: This author committed a major offence…they let imagination bloom then stomped on it. Easily could have included location and unique house details earlier in the story because for whatever reason in my mind ALL THE CHARACTERS WERE IN A LAS VEGAS SUBURB WHEN THE AUTHOR DID THAT AND THAT IS NOT WHERE THEY WERE THE WHOLE TIME, NOT EVEN CLOSE.

Main POV: 👍

Our MC comes across as sweet, patient, self-doubting, and caring. They recently experienced unexpected trauma at work and are doing their best to cope while their support network expects some quick-fix. They have a good sense of self, but recent events involving their brother-in-law and his string of Dateline NBC worthy relationships have led them to doubt their safety around him. They view his latest girlfriend as a potential victim and are making it their life’s mission to save her.

Cred Rating: 👎

Plausible interpersonal dynamics. People are guilt-parenting, getting gaslighted by loved ones, intruded on by family with no boundaries, and staying in toxic relationships. The ending was a fail to me. Villain droning on about their plan… a far-fetched long-con with a shaky motive.

Show’n’Tell: 👎

Telling, and I want it to stop because it’s too over-the-top. I GET IT. Like someone showing a green crayon but getting sidetracked over it not really being green because it’s called seagreen, so maybe it’s blue, even though it looks green, because the sea is blue, but maybe sea green doesn’t mean blue.

Growls and Howls: 🐺

-OTT “Men” vs “Women” trope

-Off-plot guilt-parenting of a 6 year old: kid whipping a ball against the house so everyone lives with a headache and tension bc he wont stop when they ask. They let him torment the cats so they have to hide. When he’s being bossy it gets chuckles.

-Lazy cliffhangers via dialog delays. A question is asked but we get a paragraph of how the character feels and reminding us of very recent plot points before we hear the answer to the question. Or the 6-year old interrupts and they just go quiet instead of redirecting him.

-On a similar note: spoon-feeding of recurring plot points. Did the author think their readers took month long breaks between chapters?

Reading Journey: 😶

Straight road with many sudden sharp turns. Why did they build it this way? Are we there yet?

Potential Good Match if you like stories with:

-Gaslighting

-Family drama centred around emotional incest and trauma bonding

-Semi-unreliable narrator (all the men think she’s nuts but she’s pretty sure she’s not trope)

-Whodunnits

-Amateur sleuthing

-Deep in the MC’s every thought narratives

-Infuriating husband trope

-villain monologues and “scooby doo mystery” type conclusions

Vibes: 🤪😤😑

Content Heads-Up: Depictions of workplace violence involving a firearm.

Format: Audible

Content Warnings

jasmine256's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

3.0

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ellynicholem's review

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dark tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No

2.25

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colleensreadingadventures's review

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dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

2.75

Actual Stars 2.5-3

I’ve heard such great things about Darby Kane’s Pretty Little Wife. So I was ecstatic to win The Replacement Wife on Bookstagram from my friend Kate @communikatetions.

Unfortunately after actually reading it, I think this might not have been the best book to start with.

Elisa is getting over a serious tragedy that took place almost a year ago now. She is a wife and mother to a young child, so for everyone’s sake she is slowly trying put her life back together. It hasn’t been easy but she’s feeling semi back to normal. That is until she finds evidence that her brother-in-law Josh might not be the man she thought he was, he might in all actuality be a murderer.

Sure Josh has had some bad luck with women. His wife died from a home accident and his recent fiancé went missing with no trace several months ago. But Elisa always thought of Josh as a good guy. He truly mourned losing his significant others. That is until she finds evidence that his wife’s death might not have been an accident after all. And his missing fiancé might not have left on her own because of pre-wedding jitters. And now there are even more women popping out of the woodwork.

Josh brings home his newest girlfriend Rachel. Elisa’s concern for Rachel, that she might not be safe with Josh leads her to dig into his past. This starts a snow ball effect and causes serious conflict with Josh, Rachel and within her small family. Things spiral out of control as Elisa starts to suffer from a mysterious illness and she begins to question if everything she thought she learned is real. Is she being pulled under from her past trauma and Josh is actually perfectly innocent or is he the sinister predator Elisa believes him to be?

Unfortunately I had quite a few problems with the story.

I felt The Replacement Wife was all over the place. First of all there were way too many women popping up for it to be believable. One in particular didn’t click with the story and just confused me. There also was quite a bit of gaslighting and gaslighting is not always a favorite for me, but If done right it can actually add to a plot. That was not the case here and it did not work out, I hate to say it but I feel like it was done kind of sloppily.

Also if I had Elisa’s husband, we would have been divorced by the end of the book…WTF!! Harris acts like his brother Josh is a paragon of virtue when he knows perfectly well he is not. He knows his brother had some issues in the past but he turns a blind eye. The person he is supposed to hear out is his wife Elisa, which he does not. He shows her zero support, making her second guess herself!

Elisa put way to much trust and effort into helping Rachel. She voiced her concerns to Rachel and if she chose not to listen, hey she’s a big girl let her deal with the possible serial killer boyfriend on her own. You warned her no need to stress yourself out. Especially considering the way Rachel was acting.

The way that Josh and Rachel together and singularly showed up unannounced and uninvited pretty much everyday, sometimes multiple times a day into Rachel’s home, just letting themselves in and then including themselves at the dinner table drove me nuts! I don’t know that I would call that a story flaw, it just irked me. If I were Elisa I would be posted at my front door with my taser, someone would be getting zapped! 😂

I didn’t understand Elisa and Harris’ little boy’s behavior issues. It was raised in a manner that I thought it might be an actual part of the plot or a good reason to be included. I was throwing some crazy theories around in my head. But then nothing, I guess it was just filler or I really missed something. Maybe it was just me. 🤷‍♀️

Ok….I think I ranted about my dislikes quite a bit and you probably get the gist I wasn’t overly thrilled with it. I do feel like The Replacement Wife had the potential to be a really good story with some tweaking. And there are some redeeming qualities.

I appreciated the aspects of Elisa’s trauma. How it can change a person’s life both mentally and physically, their perceptions and interactions with others. I really felt for her and how she had to decipher if she was looking at things correctly because of her experience.

I really didn’t know if Josh was truly the bad guy. It was obvious he was a bad guy to some degree but I wasn’t sure to what extent. So I was definitely kept guessing about him and other aspects.

While I don’t think The Replacement Wife was for me, I do think Darby Kane is obviously a talented writer and I look forward to reading more of her work.

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kaylasbookgram's review

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mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Diverse cast of characters? No

5.0

What would you do if you believed a member of your family was a killer? Maybe even a serial killer?

This is the nightmare Elisa is living. But no one will take her concerns seriously.

I absolutely loved this book with all the twists and suspense. I loved that I wasn’t fully sure who the “bad guy” was until the end because it kept pointing to a few different characters. This was my first Darby Lane book and I can’t wait to read more of her work.

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