When she was sixteen years old, Angela Wong—one of the most popular girls in school—disappeared without a trace. Nobody ever suspected that her best friend, Georgina Shaw, now an executive and rising star at her Seattle pharmaceutical company, was involved in any way. Certainly not Kaiser Brody, who was close with both girls back in high school.
But fourteen years later, Angela Wong’s remains are discovered in the woods near Geo’s childhood home. And Kaiser—now a detective with Seattle PD—finally learns the truth: Angela was a victim of Calvin James. The same Calvin James who murdered at least three other women.
To the authorities, Calvin is a serial killer. But to Geo, he’s something else entirely. Back in high school, Calvin was Geo’s first love. Turbulent and often volatile, their relationship bordered on obsession from the moment they met right up until the night Angela was killed.
For fourteen years, Geo knew what happened to Angela and told no one. For fourteen years, she carried the secret of Angela’s death until Geo was arrested and sent to prison.
While everyone thinks they finally know the truth, there are dark secrets buried deep. And what happened that fateful night is more complex and more chilling than anyone really knows. Now the obsessive past catches up with the deadly present when new bodies begin to turn up, killed in the exact same manner as Angela Wong.
How far will someone go to bury her secrets and hide her grief? How long can you get away with a lie? How long can you live with it?
I’m so happy other readers put this book on my radar and told me it would be a read for me. I’m usually careful with choosing to read a hyped book, which I definitely think is the case here, but I have to agree that yes, it really is an outstanding novel. I was a bit surprised too that it was an ’emotionally chilling’ psychological thriller and that it turned out to be such a page-turner that I read it in two days.
We meet Geo – short for Georgina – in the present, while she’s standing trial, testifying against Angela’s murderer. The harsh truth is that Geo kept her mouth shut for fourteen years about what she knew had happened to her friend. Of course I felt like she got everything she deserves, the crime is obvious, she lied to her friend’s parents, she let them hope for news about their daughter, and let everyone search for Angela for fourteen long years and yet… it’s not that simple. Through snippets in the present and the past I really got to know Geo and both in present and past she seems like a good person. Her friendship with her best friend Angela was sincere and in the present she honestly cares for her friend Cat, so where did this go wrong, how could she do this?
The story and Geo’s character really grabbed me from the get go. The revelations and events leading up to her murder were dark and gritty and it also calls for trigger warnings. That sense of foreboding keeps growing stronger and while you know Angela’s body was found, I simply couldn’t imagine it would actually be happening or why as Angela was such a bubbly person.
Calvin James is bad news, that’s pretty obvious, he’s someone that I would take a big detour for so why is she still protecting him now by not telling the police he’s been trying to contact her? Dead bodies are piling up again and still she doesn’t say anything. I couldn’t fathom a logical explanation for this at all. No matter how hard I sympathised with her, I felt she was so wrong here and couldn’t redeem her choice.
Hillier made Geo a very likeable character with quite a tragic backstory, one that forgives her for some stupid choices she made, but is it enough to keep forgiving her for what she’s doing in the present? I was wondering how far she was going to push it.
I really liked the entire novel but my favorite part was close to the end where there was a fantastic twist and even when I figured it out right the moment before the lid was blown off, Jennifer Hillier kept the twists coming and wrong-footed me completely with how this would end. It became even more thought-provoking when looking at the choices she made and deciding for myself if Geo’s a good or a bad person. Obviously she’s a bit of both but maybe everybody will lean more toward one side or another. 4.5 well-deserved stars that I’m rounding up for Goodreads and Amazon.
I received a free copy of this novel from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for my honest opinion.
Inge …
Lovely review ♥♥♥♥
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Thank you darling!
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I’m intrigued, I love your review. 🙂 🙂 🙂
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Oh thank you Lili, it is worth reading if you believe me 🙂
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Awesome review!
I’m the same with hyped books, always a bit wary.
Haven’t seen a bad review about this one tho, so defo interested.
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Thank you Norrie. It’s written in a very captivating way, definitely worth reading.
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Great review. I’m always the same when a book has received a lot of hype prior to publication. It’s brilliant for marketing but I sometimes prefer it when I discover a brilliant book that hasn’t been over hyped. I’ll be checking this book out though.
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Same here, it happened to me a few times before and that feeling that you know this is going to be a book that you’ll be hearing of again is great but everyone is reading their ARC’s so fast… I’m reading another hyped up book now, Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle and I think it’s going to be a similar story 😉
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Agree with everything you said – the ending was a shocker!
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I loved the ending, making me rethink what I thought of her.. difficult 🙂
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Great review! I really enjoyed it as well!
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Thank you so much Amanda, I’m happy to hear we felt the same way about this !
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Ahh how great that you loved it! I tend to get disappointed when it comes to hyped books! Great review, Inge!
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Thank you Nikola. We haven’t heard the last of this one, I’m sure. You can always take a chance and see if this one can change how you experience a hyped book :-).
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I’ll add it to my TBR!
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I enjoyed this too and loved your review! It was original and so well written… and that tension! You captured it all!
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Oww thank you so much Jennifer. I’m happy to see I got my feelings across so clearly 😉
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Fabulous review glad you loved it! I thoroughly enjoyed this book as well!💕
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Thank youuuuuu ! I’m happy to hear we both enjoyed it!
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Right?! I am so thrilled you loved this. Your review is spot on ❤ This was such a great read and Hillier will be staying on my radar for sure.
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How could I not love this :-). Thanks so much because you really made me want to read it!
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Aw, I love hearing this! It makes my day ❤
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Fabulous review!! You really captured the book. ❤ This is one of my favorite books this year…I didn’t expect to love it like I did, but wow! Hillier is fantastic!
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Thank you Stephanie!! She really is a great writer, great backstory, surprise ending, what’s not to love 🙂
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You’re welcome! She really is; she has several novels that I want to read-they all look very dark and crazy suspenseful! I think she’s going to become a new favorite author!! 😉 ❤
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Brilliant review, I’m excited to read this one, it’s on my TBR for next month 😊
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Oh and here I thought I was the last one to read it :-). I hope you’ll like it as much as I did and I’ll be looking out for your review ;-)!
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I really enjoyed this one too! Awesome review!! 🙂
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Ah thank you Dee! I have yet to come across the first reader who didn’t really like this novel 🙂
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So happy you loved this one too! The ending was great and I loved the prison scenes!
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Yes the prison scenes were perfect to hook you right from the start! Thanks Annie!
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So glad that you enjoyed this one. That final twist was excellent! Great review Inge.
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I did not expect that! I still don’t know if I can get behind Geo’s choice either ;-). Thank you Diana!
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Fab review! I definitely need to get a copy of this one ASAP.
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Ha, one rec for another :-). Thank you Yvo.. I hope you’ll get approved for this!
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It’s not on NG anymore but I’m hoping I can get a copy soon! 😉 Yay for mutual recs. ❤
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Fabulous review Inge!
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Thank you! I really really liked this one 🙂
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Stellar review! So glad you loved this one. It was such a creepy and dark read. I can’t wait to read more of her stuff!
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Thank you! Me too, I really want more!
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This sounds like the kind of book I would want to get my hands on 😍 thanks for the review!
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