This is my favorite thus far of Mary Kay Andrew's books. I couldn't put it down. Thank God I'm retired and have a patient husband! After reading the first chapter, I wasn't sure if I would like it, but it immediately picked up and hooked me. Living in Florida, I could relate to Drue's beach cottage as if I were there. Please write a series with these characters. Excellent!

I needed a light, fun read with a summer cover during this cold spell! Mary Kay Andrews is always an Author I can count on for a good romance. This time she threw in two mysteries. Well done!

Drue, has recently lost her mom, and moved to the opposite coast to work for her absent father and his new wife...who was a friend of Drue’s in high school. Father is a successful lawyer, the kind that has his face plastered all over billboards. A woman comes into the office, claiming injustice for her murdered daughter...blaming Drue’s dad. She moves into her grandparents home and finds clippings and agile of a missing woman from 1975. And so the mysteries begin.

Characters are flawed, but grow on you. Storyline is easy to follow and descriptive. Enjoyed this delightful summer read, now if only the weather would cooperate.

I received an ARC of this book. Opinion is my own.

****will post to Amazon on pub date.

Oh Mary Kay Andrews, you are my new favorite beach book author. I really liked my first Mary Kay Andrews book, High Tide Club, and I really loved her new book Sunset Beach. I enjoy a great setting as much as I love great characters. This book puts you right into St Pete, Florida. I had no idea this was the setting until I started reading the book. It made me crave Chattaway burgers at 7 in the morning and I learned that Mastry's bar on Central has probably always been a dive bar and hasn't changed in years. I can picture the beach cottage on Sunset Beach and the law office in an old bungalow near downtown. I also enjoyed all of the characters. They are flawed but can do more than they expect. The crime solving in the novel kept me interested throughout the book. I can't wait to read another Mary Kay Andrews book. Thank you NetGalley for an ARC copy in exchange for an honest review.

At first I was not sure about this book but it quickly grabbed my attention. I loved the beach setting and I enjoyed the characters and story line. Definitely a book I can recommend to my customers

Drue's mother has just died after a long illness. Drue is out of work and has a bum knee. She is unsure what her future holds. Then her father shows up to offer a job and tell her about a home she has inherited. In spite of long held anger at her father, she moves across the state of Florida to start a new life.

This is a story about relationships. Not all of them are good ones. There are family relationships and work relationships. Drue seemed to have emotional problems with all of them.

Drue's stepmother is a woman who was a good friend when they were in middle school. And her stepmother is the office manager at the family law firm. She is not Drue's greatest fan.

I am not her greatest fan either.

Although she is supposed to be 36 years old, she acts more like a spoiled teenager toward her father and stepmother. She was a waitress, is now an intake phone employee and yet begins to investigate a two year old murder. I felt that many of the choices she made were made with little consideration for reality.

She is a well defined character. Ms Andrews is a master at well developed characters. Even secondary characters are fully described and recognizable. Even though I understood and felt I knew them, there were no characters who I really liked.

I am certain that if Drue were more appealing to me, I would have been more invested in the book. Her actions seemed to drive the plot in unrealistic directions.

I am a mystery fan and this was as much a mystery as chick lit. That was a part of the book which held my interest.

I received this book from the publisher through NetGalley. I am voluntarily writing this review and all opinions are completely my own.

Ok so I thought this would be kind of a beachy read. Ya I was wrong but that's ok.
It's a romance kind of mystery book. I really enjoyed the pacing if the story. I will definitely be reading more from this author.

This was a really good story. Long but good. the father that shows up at the mother's funeral turns out to be not a bad Dad. The flighty kiteboarder with the bum knee turns out to be a good worker and the one that seems to be a friend turns out to be a sociopath. I love Mary Kay Andrews books..

A great cozy mystery and romance.- my favorite combination. Unusual in that the protagonist is over the age of 30! Drue is surprised when her Dad show up at her Mothers funeral. She has not seen him since she was 15. He is a successful attorney and offers her a job and informs her that she has inherited her grandparents beach home.. At first she says no but after losing her job as a waitress she moves back to the town she grew -up in and goes to work for him . There are a lot of surprises and twists. as she takes on the roll of investigating an old murder. The good guys are hard to identify and some dark family secrets are uncovered.

3.5 stars rounded up to 4. First I'd like to thank St. Martin's Press for an advanced copy of Mary Kay Andrews' latest, Sunset Beach. The title grabbed me as a nice beach read, so I accepted the offer. I couldn't have been more wrong. While the story takes place in a beach town in Florida, it is more of a mystery involving two cases. One is decades old, and the other a more recent case. Both cases involve the main character Drue, who comes to live at her late grandparents home after an injury stalls her extreme sports career.
This was a quick and enjoyable read with a good story line that kept me turning the pages for more!

Thank you Netgalley for the ARC copy. Sunset Beach was not your typical Mary Kay Andrews book. Drue is a spunky character who finds her way at the end of the story. A sometimes intriguing story of family dynamics and a who dunnit of past and presence. I thought characters could have been a little deeper and the storyline a little more detailed at time. It’s a great beach story and one that will make you want to find your own beach house to renovate

Thanks to Netgalley for providing me with a digital copy of this book for my honest opinions and review.

The Queen of the Beach Read returns back to her old roots with this mysterious gem! Set in the south, Sunset Beach 🏖 made me long for warm weather and a beach chair on the sand. As usual, Andrews’ characters are rich in discription and are people who I feel I know at the end of the story. The same can be said of her descriptions of the cottage in this novel. It’s a place I longed to visit—pink mermaid bath tub and all!
The twists and turns of this novel kept me guess right up until the end! The blend of the past storyline coupled along side the current was a nice touch and wasn’t confusing at all. With so many mysteries and thrillers out there to choose from, Sunset Beach is a refreshing change that blends mystery with traditional Beach reads. Fans of MKA will not be disappointed! I highly recommend it! 4 1/2 stars

What a wonderful beachy read! I was not wanting to take a break from this one. It's filled with suspense and mystery as well as a great story to fill the pages.
Drue heads back to the opposite coast of Florida, where her younger years were based, reunites with her Dad after her Mom's death. She brings the scorned child attitude to the relationship but proves over time, to herself and her Dad, that each of them has grown into a different person than they remember.
Lots of great twists and turns, back story, and wonderful charecters. Their is so much more to this story, but I don't want to give too much away before you read it! A great weekend read to add to your "to be read" pile.

This is the first time I have read anything by this author and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I would definitely read other titles by her.

A beach read that is so much more! Mary Kay Andrews does it again with Sunset Beach! This is a perfect beach read - there's love, romance, and intrigue. It's more than your formulaic rom com. Leading lady Drue is one you'd want to see more from. Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an unbiased review.

This will make the quintessential beach read for this summer! Of course I couldn’t wait until the summer to crack open a new book by the lovely Mary Kay Andrews i had to read it! This was wonderful like all of her other books!! Recommending to every woman that loves her toes in the sand to read this!!

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for allowing me to read this novel in exchange for an honest review.

Drue. I love Drue! Who doesn't love Mary Kay Andrews? She's the quintessential southern writer and as a southerner myself, my patrons wait on baited breath for her titles. This one, like her others, did not disappoint. I love the theme of family and self-discovery she weaves through her stories. It was a true vacation!

Change of pace for this author in this story. Not like her previous novels but still very enjoyable. Will certainly recommend. Great Southern writer.

Dru Campbell was at her mother’s funeral when she spotted her father, Brice. He and her mother had divorced when Dru was younger. Now Brice was a successful attorney and married to his 3rd wife, one of Dru’s former high school friends. Dru’s career as a kite boarder had ended when she was in an accident. She had been working as a bartender in Ft. Lauderdale. Her dad told her that she had inherited her grandparents house on the beach in Sunset Beach on the Gulf coast of Florida. He also offered her a job at his law firm if she moved to the house.

Once Dru began her new job, she had difficulty with the work and also with her stepmother Wendy, the office manager. One day an older woman appeared in the office with her granddaughter demanding to speak with Brice about her late daughter, Jazmin’s case. Dru discovered that the older woman was having difficulty caring for her granddaughter who had medical problems. Brice had gotten a settlement for her Jazmin’s death but the money was in trust until the granddaughter reached 18. Dru did some checking and discovered that the murder may have occurred when Jazmin had ended her shift at a resort rather than while she was working as the resort claimed. So Dru set out to find justice for Jazmin and her famaily.

While Dru was renovating her late grandparents’ cottage, she discovered police files from a missing person’s case from the 1980s. Colleen Hicks, a married woman with an abusive husband, had disappeared without a trace. In a series of flashback chapters we met Colleen and discover that she had been having an affair with Dru’s father before she died. Brice was a policeman in St. Petersburg and married to Dru’s mother. He was also attending law school part time. They met when Brice and his then partner, Jimmy Zee, had responded to a domestic abuse call from Colleen. After 6 months the affair ended and Colleen disappeared.

So two mysteries have to be solved: whether Jazmin was working when she was killed and what happened to Colleen. Dru found the solutions to both of the mysteries and may have found a new career as a private detective.

This is a fun beach read. It takes place in Florida, the beach capital of the US.

Sunset Beach was an enjoyable read. The premise of the story is that Drue, a woman in her mid 30's, relocates her life to work for her long estranged dad after a series of unfortunate events including the death of her mom and a serious kite boarding accident that pretty much ends her ability to pursue her life-long passion. Her dad is a lawyer who is currently married to one of Drue's former friends/enemies from high school who also happens to be her direct supervisor. As the story progresses, Drue ends up trying to solve the murder of a young woman who worked at a seedy hotel who left behind a young daughter. Drew believes that her dad didn't get enough of a settlement for the family and ends up being a natural as a detective as she pursues the truth. Along the way, Drue also ends up trying to solve the disappearance of another woman who disappeared many years ago who was involved with her dad. All in all, the story moved at a pretty good clip and I enjoyed the gradual development of the characters. I think that I would have liked a bit more of a build up in the romance department but truly enjoyed this read.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of Sunset Beach. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Wow! I thought this novel would be good, but I was wrong-- it was even better! I loved the characters, the volatile relationships, and the determination of Drue (the persistent amateur investigating main character). Pleasantly surprised by the unpredictable results of many concurrent plots, I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book and will gladly read this author again!

Thank you to NetGalley and Mary Kay Andrews for the ARC!