Buckle your seatbelt it is one hell of a ride. This book is delightfully sick, sadistic, perverted and twisted.
I love author JP Delaney. Delaney is a master at writing a book that is unpredictable and unique. His plots are full of twist and turns keeping the reader interested.
Loved the first book, The Girl Before and this most current book is also great.

Claire is a struggling actress looking to make some money so she can continue working on her acting skills and work on getting her green card. Claire uses her acting skills as a decoy for a law firm. All Claire has to do is follow the requests of the wife, meet with the husband, see if he tries to pick her up and then she gets her cash. One night she is sent to see if Patrick will fall for her and try to sleep with her, he does not. Hours later, his wife ends up murdered. Now comes the mystery of who killed Stella? Clair is questioned by the police and is then asked to assist them in finding out who the killer is. Patrick is the prime suspect and Claire is more than up for the challenge of working her acting skills to try to get inside his head and make him say something that will reveal his guilt. The problem is, Claire and the police did not anticipate a love interest to develop. Is Claire seeing the real Patrick or is she seeing Patrick with rose colored lenses? Did Claire have more to do with the murder than we first thought? Are Patrick and Claire really in love? What a mind game this book is! I am a massive JP Delaney fan after this one!!

Thank you to Random House Publishing-Ballantine and NetGalley who provided me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I loved this book! I thought I was going to have it figured out, but I didn’t. The ending ended up shocking me, which is hard to do. What a unique story, I loved it.

I was very underwhelmed by J.P. Delaney's previous novel, The Girl Before, but maybe it helped me manage my expectations. Believe Me is, in tone and style, not dissimilar to his prior book, but I am found it to be a little more clever and more twisty. Claire is an enigmatic character, and I never knew whether anything she said could be trusted, but I often like books with unreliable narrators, so I didn't mind this much. It did feel a little stagey, but given the fact that Claire was an actress, this may well have been strategic on the author's part. All in all, a gripping and satisfying holiday read.

This book, about Claire, an actress hired to catch man who killed his wife, caught me right from the start. Claire obviously has some mental health issues and the book shows her sense of alternating realities. Did he really do it – or did Claire? The end was a little bit of a letdown because there were some parts that I doubt the police would have allowed, but all in all this was an excellent book and one I will definitely recommend.

Believe me follows Claire, a British citizen looking for a greencard. She is an actress trying to make a name for herself in America. However, she has a hard time finding work. She finds a position as a decoy for divorce lawyers, trying to trap cheating husbands. Then one of the clients ends up dead and she is forced to work with the cops to help find the killer.

Believe Me is a complex thriller that had me going in a lot of different directions.... Claire was a captivating character. You could sympathize with her situation, though she made some very questionable decisions. I'm still not sure what to think of the ending! It's definitely got some sexy scenes as well, which were storyline driven.

I enjoyed this author's previous work and will definitely read again!

In the mood for twists and turns? This unreliable narrator will keep you guessing until the very end.

Claire, a struggling actress, is finding it difficult to get stable work in the U.S. without her green card. She illegally relocated, after an affair with a married co-worker ended badly. To make extra money, Claire does undercover work for a law firm that specializes in exposing unfaithful husbands to their wives. Claire just has to play her role and trap them in the act, something she is exceptionally good at. When a woman is violently murdered, the police suspect the clients husband Patrick, a charming and handsome academic. They enlist Claire's help to gain his trust and stop him before he can kill again...but this starring role might just be Claire's final act.

All the stars for this novel! J.P. Delaney delivers another exceptional read with the release of his second novel. Believe Me, is a psychological thriller in which a serial killer is utilizing Charles Baudelaire's dark and erotic poetry to act out his darkest desires. Claire agrees to play a role as victim in hopes of trapping a killer. This book had me hooked from the very first chapter and I did not want to put it down. This is an intricately woven tale in which everyone has secrets and may not be who you think they are. Be aware there is some material that may not appeal to every reader including violent murder, and some sexual material including sadomasochism and bondage. I felt the author did a great job incorporating the material in an appropriate way that was relevant to the context of the storyline. I absolutely loved this novel and highly recommend it for fans of dark psychological thrillers.

I was given an ARC of Believe Me from Net Galley in exchange for a honest review. Honestly, this book was very good. I almost read the book in one sitting. JO Delaney’s characters are so well developed. The story line is great. For fear of sending out spoilers, I do not want to go into details. All I will say is you keep changing your thoughts about the story and characters until the end and even then you still haven’t made up your mind. I highly recommend this book. Thank you Net Galley.

Rarely do I find a thriller that actually "thrills" me a engages me to the end, but this book did that!
As a former drama club member I enjoyed the way the story was told incorporating scene and stage directions; it made it very easy to visualize.
Claire, the protagonist of Believe Me is not in a word; believable. She's an English actress trying to make it in NYC who will do whatever it takes to finish her acting classes, get stage roles and get her green card. She's the definition of unreliable narrator as she goes undercover to help solve a murder and possibly catch a serial killer. I didn't like Claire, but I found myself intrigued by her and so I kept reading and I'm glad I did. Twists abound and I liked the way the author incorporated snippets of Charles Baudelaire's poems into the story too.

The only downside was the plot got a bit convoluted at parts.
4.5 stars, good strong female characters, made me think and had some brutal murder.

I enjoyed J.P. Delaney’s The Girl Before and appreciate the opportunity to read and review Believe Me. I love the writing style of this plot; the lead character Claire sees every action in her daily life as a movie, so various occasions in her day read exactly like a script. Claire is a struggling actress who doesn’t have her green card, so she takes quick cash jobs acting as a call girl in order to frame potentially cheating spouses.
One particularly unusual job involves a calm and collected man whose wife is determined to catch him cheating. There’s a murder and Claire finds herself playing the lead role of suspect. Lines blur between fact and fiction, real and acting, so the book keeps your attention and you never quite figure out exactly what’s going on. The ending left me flailing a bit, but I imagine I wasn’t following the breadcrumbs enough to pick up on the hints that led up to it.
All in all, I enjoyed this book and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it
(I received an advance copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an unbiased review. Thank you to Ballantine Books and NetGalley for making it available.)

I enjoyed reading "The Girl Before" by this author and was exited to read another book by this author. "Believe Me" did not disappoint. From the very beginning I tried and failed to guess how the story was going to end but there were so many twist and turns to this thriller I couldn't guess. The story line is quite engaging and well written and just when you think you know what is happening, you proven wrong. This is a book you will devour to the very end just because you will want to know just how this author will play out the climax! A great read.

Having read The Girl Before last year I was really looking forward to Believe Me and I was not let down. Suspense thrillers are obviously meant to keep you guessing but 90% of the time you read the clues and see the foreshadowing so you can usually figure out what's going on midway through the book but the ride is still fun getting to the ending. With this one I don't think I had any clue whatsoever how this was going to end.

Claire is very good at what she does and sometimes it seems just too good. As the husband of the victim, Patrick is naturally the prime suspect but then you see his softer side and you can't help but fall in love with him right along with Claire. Then the twists and turns start coming at you from all sides and you have no choice but to keep reading to learn what the heck is really going on.

For me this was a very quick read. I just had to know! I will say that although the ending was a shocker that fit with the story but I was a bit disappointed by it. After the ride we I went through to get there I expected a bigger splash.

If you love psychological suspense thrillers then this is a must for you. Hopefully like me, you won't be able to guess the ending so you'll be sucked in to the very end.

Spellbinding from beginning to end! I can't say much about the story without giving something away, so let me just say that it is well written - it's amazing what the author has done - and you will be kept 'on the edge of your seat' until the final chapter. Enjoy!!

Thanks to NetGalley for an ARC of this book. I kept seeing it on lists and am excited I received in in exchange for a fair and honest review.

I’ll try to do this with no spoilers....

First, I’m giving it a solid 3 Stars. There were bits I loved and bits I did not love.

Synopsis: Claire Wright is a British foster child turned struggling actress in the good ole NYC, trying to outstay her visa and go to acting school, but she can’t work without a green card, so she’s left working for a law firm that catches philandering husbands for rich wives. Claire is an excellent actress and is very good at what she does. When one of the wives that have hired Claire turns up dead, a sudden turn in events lands Claire with a detective and forensic psychologist that want her to continue her work on the husband, but for them now.

What I liked: The beginning. I loved how the story took off with how Claire convinces herself she’s these characters. And then when it turned to the opposite side, I still liked it at the beginning. I also liked the random bits that read like a screenplay. I thought that was a good touch, since Claire sees her life as a movie she’s playing a part in.


What I didn’t like: The end of part 2 and most of part 3. It got a little (perhaps a lot) muddled and I was just trying to finish to stay on top of it all and find out what happened. The characters were almost over the top at times and I couldn’t get a good grasp on the main character, which left me feeling unsettled.

What I loved: THE ENDING!!! I really thoroughly enjoyed it. It just really slowed down beforehand, but the slowing caught me way off guard.

It was like an excellent episode of Law & Order. I would recommend this book to a friend, with a disclaimer that the middle slows, but keep plowing through. Bravo!

A fun sexy thriller where you will be constantly wondering where the acting ends and the real people begin!

Having enjoyed reading THE GIRL BEFORE, I was looking forward to reading BELIEVE ME.
I read it in one day. The plot and main character drew me in and the twists kept me reading.
In THE GIRL BEFORE, I enjoyed the technique of alternating chapters between the two women. In BELIEVE ME, I think the technique of presenting some scenes as stagecraft might put some readers off. I found it to be a fresh and interesting approach, adding depth to the story.
Most importantly, the twists kept coming and I had to find out what happened next.
I’m now a fan of JP Delaney.

In Believe Me, the story focuses on Claire’s character who is an actress studying in America from the UK. She’s offered a role as an undercover agent trying to get Patrick to admit he killed Stella.
Claire is a struggling actor in need of money. Claire takes acting courses mastering her skills. Her job is to make others believe her act.

The story started off interesting and I’m curious about the outcome, but something is lacking. I was following along with the slow pace storyline until the mention of this book Les Fleurs du Mal. The references from this book were confusing. Then the author included translations of Baudelaire’s poems which were boring.

This story took an unconventional approach at solving a crime by hiring an actress to play many roles to earn the trust of one man who was thought to be the killer. Instead, I feel duped by the police investigation for the crime of Patrick’s wife. This method got carried away with explanations about this book and the poems that I began to lose interest.
A psychological thriller shouldn’t be this confusing. I usually enjoy trying to solve the crime and studying the motives of characters, but this is layer after layer of mistrust. I struggled with its delivery. I had very little interest in Claire and Patrick’s character. Nothing worked for me.

I was so drawn to the cover of this book. The cover and book description were so promising. Once Patrick’s character was introduced with his preachings about Baudelaire I started skimming.

I enjoyed Believe Me, yet at the same time it was more graphic than I expected. Another thriller by Delaney that is hard to put down!

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine for a digital galley of this novel.

Definitely a 4.5 read for me despite the graphic descriptions of the murder scenes left by a sexual serial killer. In all honesty, if you take away those brutal words you lose the entire purpose of the book but just be warned, if you feel you will be uncomfortable reading those descriptions you should give this book a miss.

This book, Believe Me, is a re-work of the novel The Decoy (published in 2001 by Tony Strong) while keeping the basic plot but making substantial changes. Believe Me is a psychological thriller that kept me off balance the entire way through. The main character is an actress and her ability to take on any role she chooses made me wonder exactly who Claire really was at any moment. When was she acting? What was Claire and what was her character? These were the same traits which made Claire so valuable to the police in their undercover operation. J. P. Delaney included a lot of acting lessons and techniques to show readers what a really good actress Claire was, he certainly convinced me. Another device to fill out the premise of an actor's life was in using dialog boxes; it is as if you are reading the script of a play. You will either like this technique or it will become bothersome but it is not used exclusively throughout the book. Because I believed the premise of Claire's abilities I lost my objectivity to tell whether she was acting a role or not. It was interesting but also somewhat disconcerting. I can certainly understand why readers might not finish reading the book. Luckily for me I pressed on and found myself surprised by multiple twists in the plot until I finally stopped trying to figure out how it was going to end. Then the ending turned out to be the least interesting part. Go figure.