The Baby Shower by S. E. Lynes
Blurb
She doesn’t know I’m there, watching her in the mirror.
She slides her hand under her blouse.
And then I see something impossible.
She isn’t pregnant…
She bursts into my life like a storm, and nothing is the same again.
She seems so perfect, with her lilting laugh and her beautiful face.
One by one, I watch as my friends fall under her spell.
Only I seem to suspect something.
Only I see that her smiles don’t reach her cold, furious eyes.
And when I’m accused of things I didn’t do, when my home is vandalized, I know she’s behind it.
But she only lets her mask slip when no one is looking, so if I say anything, I’ll look crazy.
So when the baby shower comes around I’m there, sitting on a velvet sofa in a posh hotel room, surrounded by balloons.
We share gifts, we pour small glasses of champagne, and she beams, her bump just visible under her bright red shirt.
But that afternoon, I finally learn the unbelievable truth.
There is no baby…
My Review
What was it all about
The Baby Shower by S. E. Lynes was about a cuckoo bird making its way into a set of four friends and trying to usurp the place of one of them. But things were not as they seemed. Only the main character saw the mask of the cuckoo bird slipping when no one was looking. And the baby shower was the place where she got to the truth.
How it made me feel
Already always feeling – an emotion that said I already knew where the story was going once the usurper was brought in.
Wishful – I kept wishing that the story wouldn’t go where it was going and that there would be a twist or two to change the entire plot line.
Hoodwinked – this was the only book where I read the reviews before I took it up. Unfortunately, the people whose reviews were put up in the critics section either were not thriller readers or were newbies to this genre.
The Good
I liked how the main character Jane was slowly pushed out of the group. The cleverness of Lexie, the cuckoo bird, and the stupidity of the best friend, Sophie, who got taken in by the shiny bauble and refused to believe someone who was known to her since years were well written.
Another factor that was used for the first time in a psych-thriller was male date rape. I liked the innovativeness of the author to weave it in. As the men had it so difficult to prove they were raped.
The Bad
I wanted my thrillers to be intelligent, not something that didn’t stimulate my neurons. This kept astonishing me at the way it followed the formula and didn’t think outside the box. Gimme something new.
OMG. The reviews that caused me to buy this book since it was only $0.99. One said – They wanted to quit my job just so they could keep reading – Wondered which book that was, not this one. I kept reading this book until my mind concluded there were more intelligent thrillers that deserved job loss.
I was taken in by another review that said they were an emotional wreck after reading the book – I kept waiting for that wreck to happen to me, but the formulaic story didn’t evoke any of mine. There was nothing emotional in this book.
Another said it hooked them in with twists – Were they reading the same book as I? There were hardly, any and those written in could be guessed miles away, in fact, from the first few chapters.
The Conclusion
This would be an exciting, enjoyable psychological thriller for someone who was starting new in this genre.
I don’t want to be harsh to any book, but if the money I spend on a book is equivalent to my monthly dose of one of my cardiac medications, then it better be worth the money spent.
Note to me – Don’t get taken in by the 5-star reviews or the ones put in with the blurb on Amazon. Read the one and two star reviews to know the truth about the book.
Book Links
Book Details
Publication Date: March 2022
I downloaded the digital version of the book from an online retail, and this is my journey down its pages, straight from the heart. STRICTLY HONEST and UNBIASED.
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