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A review by lurker_stalker
The Wife Upstairs by Rachel Hawkins
1.0
I wanted to give a higher rating to this audiobook but I couldn't find anything redeeming about it. I know how harsh that sounds. But a Goodreads two stars rating is "It was ok" and this was not. It was not ok. By the time I got to 75% I was ready to launch my phone (reminder: audiobook) across the room and stomp on my headphones.
So what issues did I have with the book? Well, I will do my best to avoid any spoilers but some might get spoiler-adjacent.
Let's start with the narrators. There were three of them. One for each of the female POV characters and one for the male. The male narrator I'd heard before and enjoyed just fine. Eddie has a tiny portion of the book from his POV which was narrated in a pretty much emotionless, excruciatingly slow cadence. The narrator for Bea was meh. The narrator for Jane had that constant "I'm irritated with everything and breathe-too-heavily-and-too-often" thing happening that ended up being super annoying and distracting.
Now lets talk about the story. This is where it might be more information than you want so if you're still interested in maybe reading with your eyeballs to avoid the narration issues, be warned.
I'm usually fine with an unreliable narrator but this book has three of them. Yes, all three POV characters. Which might still be ok except so much of the book had my BS meter screaming off the charts. So many absolutely unbelievable twists that I eventually got to the point where I only wanted it to end.
I know I can be rough on books that push my ability to suspend disbelief too far but the combination of the narration, not being able to trust a single person telling a part of the story, and the total unbelievableness (yes, I'm using a pretend word because I need it) of most everything, I have to go with the one-star review.
I received the audiobook from the publisher and NetGalley.
So what issues did I have with the book? Well, I will do my best to avoid any spoilers but some might get spoiler-adjacent.
Let's start with the narrators. There were three of them. One for each of the female POV characters and one for the male. The male narrator I'd heard before and enjoyed just fine. Eddie has a tiny portion of the book from his POV which was narrated in a pretty much emotionless, excruciatingly slow cadence. The narrator for Bea was meh. The narrator for Jane had that constant "I'm irritated with everything and breathe-too-heavily-and-too-often" thing happening that ended up being super annoying and distracting.
Now lets talk about the story. This is where it might be more information than you want so if you're still interested in maybe reading with your eyeballs to avoid the narration issues, be warned.
I'm usually fine with an unreliable narrator but this book has three of them. Yes, all three POV characters. Which might still be ok except so much of the book had my BS meter screaming off the charts. So many absolutely unbelievable twists that I eventually got to the point where I only wanted it to end.
I know I can be rough on books that push my ability to suspend disbelief too far but the combination of the narration, not being able to trust a single person telling a part of the story, and the total unbelievableness (yes, I'm using a pretend word because I need it) of most everything, I have to go with the one-star review.
I received the audiobook from the publisher and NetGalley.