The Sex Tourist is a difficult book to review. The base story involves teen twins Lily and Valerie who live with their mother in Hungary, dad lives in England. The book is two parts, part one is Lily’s diary, ending with her death. Part two is Valerie’s reaction and actions after her twin is determined to have committed suicide, a conclusion Valerie doubts is true.
The first half of the book is at times interesting, unsurprising, and bland. Lily’s experiences are horrific, yet she comes through remarkably unscarred, which seemed unlikely. The first half of the book ends with her jotting down a few words prior to heading out to what she claims will be her last appointment as a call girl.
The second half of the book is more a thriller as Valerie works to determine if Lily was actually murdered, and if so, who did it and how to bring that person to justice. It was much faster paced, but full of overused genre tropes and cliches. Some of the later chapters are written in second person, which is at best lazy and annoying writing. The reader is not doing the actions described in the book, the characters are, and writing in the second person weakens the book. Changes in POV can be effective when done well, but in this case they just don’t add anything to the story.
The epilogue to the book is a cliche unto itself and served to do nothing more than ruin the story. The cop out excuses on who the killer was, what his alleged skill set, how he was disposing bodies, etc. show nothing more than an inability to creatively solve these issues. Ending the book before the epilogue would be perfectly acceptable under the circumstances, as we can assume our protagonist solved her issues and moved on with her life.

3 1/2 Stars.....A very, very different read for me.

I didn't like the flow of the story but I was compelled to continue....I couldn't put it down, I was intrigued to find out what happened next. Any author that can do that even though I'm not connected to or interested in the characters, is a great feat.

Budapest - Lillian and Vivian, sixteen year old twins

The first half of the book is bits and pieces taken from Lillian's diary and told in her POV. It gives us the setting, intro to the main characters, as well as reasons and circumstances for some of the choices made.

The second half is told in Vivian's POV and mimic Lillian's diary-style format. I am still not a fan of this style of writing. At times I did find it confusing, especially when Paul was speaking.

The story behind these characters is somewhat interesting. It's not a romance but there is sex. There is also a mystery to be solved but the way it was done wasn't quite believable....maybe I'm just being cynical. There is enough there to keep a reader interested, it just wasn't my thing.

Definitely different than what I usually read but it was fun. Looking forward to more books from this author

Convoluted and repetitive, The Sex Tourist is told from alternating points of view and oddly used second person narrative. It takes an interesting blurb and turns it into a meandering menagerie of every element of fiction, i.e. chick-lit, erotica, mystery, and romance. Unfortunately, it does not succeed. The exposition is obvious and explained numerous times by multiple characters. While the characters are sympathetic, the narrative is emotionless and unappealing. The mystery surrounding the sisters is implausible and rife with coincidence. I think there is a worthwhile story there, but to have to dig through the lackluster plot and unbelievable circumstances is not worth the trouble.

I want to thank Olivia Wild and Netgalley for giving me this book for my honest review.
Review By Stephanie
This is the first book I have read from Olivia Wild and I have to say this was a good book. I was a little confused with the different POVs and the time frame jumping in the beginning but once I got into a reading grove I was able to follow along nicely.
In this graphic tale about this prostitution industry you will get the full view of what it is truly like. I mean you will get the FULL view… hahaha Olivia Wild head nothing back in this book! The thing that really blew me away with this book was the important message within the sexy thriller. I wanted to devour this book but I really forced myself to take my time and really read and absorb every word.
So grab a blanket, coffee/wine and your kindle and start reading The Sex Tourist.