The Wife Between Us: A Novel Hardcover – January 9, 2018

OMG! 5 Stars +++ THE WIFE BETWEEN US by creative, talented duo, Sarah Pekkanen, (journalist and author of seven previous novels—all of which Hendricks edited) and Greer Hendricks (a former Simon & Schuster editor -authorial debut), is worthy of all the "hype" surrounding the most-anticipated psychological suspense thriller novel of 2018, and "then some."From the stunning front cover, the first page—to the explosive, shocking conclusion. MIND-BENDING! Unreliable Narrator.The authors cleverly unravel the characters' intimate secrets and deception, until the raw truth revealed. Divided into Prologue, Part One, Two, Three, and the Epilogue. Do not miss a thing. The summary is spot-on. Do not assume anything. Get ready for a wild roller-coaster ride.The truth between the lies.Between the wives, there is a man named Richard. A charming, good-looking, successful hedge fund manager. We soon realize this man is not as he seems. You suspect he is a controlling, abusive, narcissist and a psycho, through the eyes of one woman. This woman must be the angry ex-wife.Vanessa was married to Richard. We are not sure what happened to their marriage. She has lost all her material possessions and works as a sales associate at Saks on the designer-label third floor. She depends on commissions.Richard got the house in Westchester and the Manhattan apartment. The cars, stocks, savings. She never put up a fight. She entered the marriage with nothing. She had not borne him children. She had been deceitful. She had not been a good wife.She is thankful she has a few suitcases filled with more exceptional clothing from her former lifestyle since she needs to look the part. She resides with her aunt bohemian artist, Charlotte. Her husband died years before. She had accepted a small lump sum payment she would use to help her aunt.Vanessa is hiding something from her past in Florida. (sounds like South Florida- Miami- important for us Floridians). A mysterious past which led her to New York."My husband kept me off-balance for years. He tried to erase me." The bride and groom cake topper.Currently, Vanessa is stalking a younger woman. Does this younger version of her former self-remind her of how her life began the downward spiral. The one, leaving her now single. Now her old friends, come into the store, and she waits on them. They pity her.Richard had kicked her out of the Westchester house. However was she happy, or sad about this decision? Who had controlled the demise of this marriage? Was she relieved to escape this man? Fortunate to be alive?She envisions him in the Mercedes with his new younger woman. The woman he left her for. It started before their divorce. She now drinks and takes pills to dull the pain.The other woman is Nellie. Vanessa has to stop her before she marries Richard. When she discovered they were engaged, she almost flipped. However, there is more here than meets the eye.Vanessa comes across as off balance; however, there are two sides to a coin. She and Richard were unsuccessful in their attempts to have a baby, even with fertility drugs.Readers learn about another younger woman’s relationship and how she met Richard. A young preschool teacher on a flight. Richard the caring and charming man sweeps her off her feet. Richard wants children.Vanessa wonders if the new bride has plans to quit work and devote herself to Richard as she had done. She is obsessed.There is also Maureen, Richard’s older sister. After his parents died when he was a teen, Maureen raised him. Does she know how crazy her brother is?“But as long as he is with her – the woman who blithely stepped up to become the new Mrs. Richard Thompson while I pretended to be oblivious – I will never have peace.”Nellie loves her pre-school teaching job and works nights as a waitress with a fun-loving roommate Sam. She is unsure she wants to get married. Unsure she wants to leave the city life for the suburbs and a man who seems controlling, but he loves her, right?Again, ASSUME nothing . . . Does Venessa want to protect her replacement from Richard, warn her, or is she just jealous? Don’t shoot the messenger.Intense, twisty, mind-blowing suspense. THE WIFE BETWEEN US is like a game of cat-and-mouse. Which person is manipulating the other? A tug of war. However, no one has the real facts. The reveal is brilliant.The fun part is trying to figure out this triangle. The secrets and motives from Florida and all the missing pieces – worth the wait! As twisty, riveting, spellbinding, and addictive as Gone Girl or The Girl on the Train. I liked it better.Sarah Pekkanen (one of my all-time favorite authors-have read all her books) and her talented editor for many years Greer Hendricks (impressive bio) — what a remarkable team!. Can only imagine the fun these two have writing together. No wonder TWBU has been picked up for the next blockbuster movie. I want a front row seat.Plus, think of all the deliciously good books to come in the future. Hear they are busy working on their second book (not a sequel).Firstly, when you view the cover and its title you think, “the wife between us.” Who could this person be? Could it be a husband and a soon to be bride with an ex-wife or a current wife between the couple? Or, could it be a wife- to- be, and an ex-wife #1 with the ex-wife #2 between them? Or all sorts of wild scenarios. Will there be a wife #3 and why don’t they all meet to compare notes?Trust me; there is nothing predictable here. Cleverly crafted (the editor/author), highly creative minds have outsmarted the reader.When you get to this point in the book, you will question: “What in the heck? What did I miss? Rewinding the pages. However, you did not miss anything. Hang on; the plot soon to be revealed. Do not put the book down. No way you can. Unputdownable.The secrets and lies of dating, marriage, divorce. Don’t settle for sloppy seconds. For fans of B.A. Paris Behind Closed Doors. Another book I am looking forward to reading: The Woman in the Window, Readers are receiving the "best" of the literary world's experience.A special thank you (a big huge & kiss), to Goodreads giveaway and St. Martin's Press for an advanced digital reading copy. I have pre-ordered the audiobook (this should be fantastic, performed by Julia Whelan (I adore), and pre-ordered the hardcover for my library!What a way to start 2018! Have a feeling this is going to be a year for the thriller novels turned movie.Looking forward to Sarah Pekkanen's The Ever After: A Novel Coming June 5, 2018, enthralling domestic drama, perfect for fans of Big Little Lies.JDCMustReadBooksBTW, I was wife #2, saved wife #1, and did I want to protect wife#3? Heck No. Figure it out on your own. Good riddance😊. I hear Wife #3 stays indoors with the blinds pulled and drugged out, to live with the psycho.

This book was pretty good. The twist was sort of difficult to comprehend and not very clear. I also wish chapters had the names of the characters perspectives in the heading so it was easier to keep track. Overall, I really enjoyed this book!

An easy read with several twists that keep you guessing. I would recommend this book to anyone. A must read!

I liked how this book kept me guessing down to the last moment. It’s an emotional read, so prepare yourself!

Maybe it's my ADHD brain but I got terribly confused and actually stopped reading..well, curiosity got the best of me so I picked it back up, determined to finish, and boy...it did not disappoint. Everything came into perspective and I'm finding my self wanting to reread so I can pickup extra details I may have missed the first go round.

I can't decide exactly how to rate this twisty, turney thriller, so I'm going with somewhere between 3.5 and 4 Stars.Some parts of it were fantastic and original, yet a few parts seemed almost identical to another book I've recently read.SUMMARYPart one of the book is told from a duel point of view.The first narrator is twenty-seven year old Nellie, an engaged woman in the weeks leading up to her wedding. She is ecstatic to have found the perfect man. Richard, nine years her senior, is wealthy, sophisticated and so very enthralled with her. Not only is he her protector, he is so incredibly thoughtful and romantic. He thinks of everything and always seems to be right there any time she needs him. Is he too good to be true? That's what her roommate Samantha is starting to think...The second narrator is Vanessa, a woman who is trying to recover from the demise of her marriage. Her husband Richard has left her for a younger woman. And somehow he ended up with all the money, the house, cars and all their friends. Vanessa is staying in her Aunts spare bedroom and working as a sales person at a large NYC department store where she used to shop. Starting to make a connection between the two narrators?As the book evolves, with a single point of view beginning in part two, the reader gets a front row seat to the deterioration of Vanessa and Richard's marriage, the fairytale (ish) engagement of Richard and Nellie and the complicated origins of the relationship between Vanessa's husband and her "replacement" (as Vanessa refers to her husband's fiancee). Just when you think you've got it all figured out, there is yet another twist.WHAT I LOVEDThe development of complex, interesting characters can make or break a book. This book has some very intriguing characters!! Every time I tried to categorize one of the characters, I would realize a couple chapters later that I was wrong and that character was not as easily defined as I had thought.I loved Nellie's pre-wedding life. She and Samantha were living such a 20-something year olds post college NYC adventure. It's what I wished I had the nerve to do at her age. In later years, they would laugh about the roaches in their apartment and how they had to work two jobs to stay afloat but remember those days as the time if their life. I think Samantha would have made an awesome roommate / bestie.I love Vanessa's Aunt Charlotte. Every one should get to have an 'Aunt Charlotte" in their life; a person who will love you and take you in no matter what has happened in your life. Richard's, sister, Maureen, was fascinating. I couldn't figure out exactly what her angle was until it was basically spelled out for me.Again with the NYC setting. It is such a great backdrop for a book. It adds a certain vitality.This book had some AMAZINGLY great twists!! The first big twist sucked me right in. Hook, line and sinker! And the final couple of twists were so darn worth the wait.WHAT I DIDN'T LOVEThere was one major issue which brought the book down a few points for me. I don't was to give away too much, but about half way through the book, there was a twist and plot line almost identical to another book I have recently read (and loved). Both books were published within weeks of each other so I can't accuse either author of 'borrowing' the plot from the other BUT I kept thinking, "I've already read this book but with a different title." Clearly I'm reading too many thrillers since I've felt that was about the last two books I've read. Kind of disappointing though. There was way more to this story than one shared plot line so it didn't ruin the whole story for me but those 50 or so pages dedicated to that plot line was almost offensive to me due the similarities.OVERALLWorth reading for the characters and the twists even if one part is pretty unoriginal.

Loved that this book had some unexpected twists. The writing kept me interested & book was well written. Worth the read.

I saw the reviews saying this made Gone Girl seem like childs play and that intrigued me. This sat in my TBR for months because it's not my usual genre. But man! I just blazed through this bad boy in 48 hours. I won't say it makes Gone Girl look like childs play, but it is up there, and possibly a little better than Gone Girl plot wise. Just incredible. Definitely read! You will think you have it figured out here and there, but I was floored by the last chapter. 10/10

A recommendation from a friend led me to this book, a first read from this author for me and I went in completely blind.The book is set in three parts, at the end of each I had whiplash trying to work out which way this story was going. It was pacy, twisty and totally confusing. It left you always questioning, at one point I began to doubt anything or anyone in the story was real!I definitely recommend going in blind like I did, avoiding any spoilers, to get the full impact of the story.I'm at a loss how to rate and review it , but I will definitely be recommending this book to friends.

Turgid read. A real struggle to wade through the mire of this book. The number of times the authors went on about a crate of ' Raveneau Wine ' made me feel like smashing a few bottles over their heads !! Did they write in separate rooms and just cut and paste this story together ? Chapter 37 makes no sense where the ex wife is hiding in wardrobe - don't bother buying this book just wait until it's remaindered or in your local charity shop where my copy will soon be heading.

The book did keep me interested enough to want to find out how it ended, however the ending was very disappointing, lots of things were hinted out throughout the book, but the ending was far too simple. I felt the authors had deliberately mislead the readers by hinting that there was some complicated back story that was going to come out at the end and explain why one of the main characters behaved the way he did, this was my reason for keeping on reading but the end felt very flat and left me thinking is that it.One of the main character changes personality part way through the book, which made it hard to believe that the three parts of the book were all part of the same story. At lot of her actions in the later parts of the book conflicted with how she was behaving in the first part. The book ends with an Epilogue which is totally unbelievable, and was not needed.By the end of the book I felt a little cheated as I felt the beginning of the book promised so much, but the ending was a real let down.

Fairly average story of a control freak mistreating his wife. I did not find it gripping until close to the end and did not find the "twist" at end to be very believable.

I had lost my reading mojo towards the end of last year, I hadn’t been picking my kindle up as often, and when I did I struggled to get in to the plot - I had lost count of the amount of books I was less than 10% in to and had given up on, until I stumbled across The Wife Between Us - it was by authors that I had not heard of before, was written in collaboration by 2 authors (which would usually have put me off) I was hooked from the very first chapter and I devoured it in less than 24 hours!The plot was so clever!Usually clever stories mean confusing plots - not in this case.Any reviews that claim books have “amazing plot twists” I usually see coming and am underwhelmed - not in this case.The book is in three parts, and each part is as pacy as the last. I almost got whiplash between the end of part one and the beginning of part 2 with a plot twist I had no idea was coming.I don’t want to go in to the plot because any independent reviews could reveal too much and ruin it - I am a firm believer that as a reader you are better going in to this book knowing as little about the book as possible.What I will tell you is that this is an absolute page turner with an intricate and suspenseful plot that has given me my reading mojo back! Yay!!I’ve already downloaded my next book….and yes - It is another collaboration book by Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanan.