Author: Sarah Strohmeyer
Series: None
Publication Date: April 25, 2023
Publisher: Harper
Pages: 368
Obtained: publisher via Netgalley
Genre: Psychological Thriller
Rating: 4/5
Bottom Line: Behind the scenes look at reality tv with a bent
Grab, Just get it at the library, or Remove from your TBR list? Grab
Summary: Holly and Robert Barron are attractive young real-estate investors and contestants in a competition run by To the Manor Build, the nation’s most popular home renovation app. With millions in product endorsements and online followers at stake, they’re rehabbing a Vermont home they scored at a bargain price into a chic hilltop estate ideal for entertaining. It’s all camera-ready laughs and debates over herringbone tile until Holly and Robert go missing hours after their picture-perfect wedding—leaving behind a bloody trail. Suspicion falls quickly on Erika Turnbull, the Barrons’ twenty-something assistant—eager, efficient, and secretly in love with Robert. Did Erika let her misguided passion turn her into a murderer? So claim the townsfolk of Snowden, Vermont, who still haven’t forgiven her for a tragic accident back in high school. But Erika’s mother, Kim, is not about to let small-town gossip and a cop with an axe to grind destroy her daughter—again. With time running out and their own lives at risk, the mother-daughter duo set out to find what really happened to the Barrons. First, though, they’ll have to confront the vengeful former owner of Holly and Robert’s estate, ruthless reality-show producers, and a secret that might bring their own house down. ~amazon.com
Review: I do love a good HGTV show but I'm not really into home competition shows but Ms. Strohmeyer wrote one of my favorite books ever, Kindred Spirits, so I wanted to read her latest. Let me just start by saying I love reading books with unreliable and unlikable characters; We Love to Entertain fits. Holly and Robert are the golden couple of the home building competition, To the Manor Build, but are things what they seem? Are they really the "perfect" couple? Of course nothing is how it seems on tv. The story is told from Holly and Robert's assistant, Erika and her mom, the town clerk, Kim.
Erika is a bit infatuated with Robert because honestly he's got charisma oozing out of his pores and how can you not like Holly who spins the made herself into something from nothing cliché. Plus for Erika, she's still spinning from an accident in high school that made her close herself off to everyone and there's not a lot of jobs in Snowden, CT. She's in charge of their schedules, plus organizing all the deliveries for the house. It's the day of their wedding though that changes everything for her and others in her orbit.
Things quickly start to unravel for Erika and the show as Holly and Robert disappear.
I loved the pace of this book and how things unfold in the 2nd 1/2 of the novel. I'll definitely be grabbing Ms. Strohmeyer next novel.
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