Ooof, this book was not what I was expecting. The story of this book was all over the place and was more of a smut read than a thriller read. This book is a domestic thriller involving prestigious families, black voodoo magic, a female female romance, and just a whole host of unlikable characters. If you want to hear my full review, I have a Spoiler Reading Vlog on my Youtube Channel: https://youtu.be/kAcnHv7hMts

I wasn't familiar with the author before reading this, but I enjoyed this book and tore through it in a day. Hated the twist!

This just wasn't as good as her previous thrillers. The characters were unlikeable and the plot was uninteresting. The reveal was lackluster for me. Maybe I'll enjoy her next one better.

This book has it all, the perfect hot steamy setting of Savannah, sexy beautiful people, lies, deceit, secrets, betrayal and mysterious characters

Sarah takes her reader into the world of wealth, greed, infidelity, and voodoo set in the high society of Savannah, Georgia. In her third novel Pinborough introduced us to Keisha a 22 year old former cocktail waitress married to one of Savannah's wealthiest. Quickly she becomes the talk of the town. Marcie Maddox in particular starts to envy her beauty when she starts suspecting her husband maybe having an affair with her. Marcie starts to befriend Keisha in an attempt to extract information and confirm that there's more to Keisha than meets the eye. The two women soon find out that they both are followed by a dark twisted past that comes to haunt them time after time affecting even those around them.

I was a huge fan of Behind Her Eyes. Because of that success, I was compelled to request Dead to Her. BHE was a book that was polarizing in the book community because It did have an element of supernatural that made the ending such a twist of faith. In this book, Pinborough added a dash of paranormal that influenced the ending a by a tad bit. This book was 100 pages too long and still felt like there was information missing. With every chapter read something new arose and a new element was introduced. At about 85% through I was getting exhausted of reading it and just wanted it to end. It does feel as if the book was written by a different author. From the beginning to the middle right until the end, it felt like 3 different authors.

The book kept my attention going for the most part. As you know thrillers can do. The writing was ok. At about the middle there were themes of voodoo and rituals that made the book turn from a thriller to the scene of a horror film. As the book progresses however, it started to become impatient with the enormous amounts of characters. Why, WHY, WHY is this a theme now? The past three new books I've read had a cast of characters that made me less interested in the story because it's hard to connect with so many people. Dear authors stop doing this. You are exhausting your reader and when twists come, no one is surprised because it had to be one of the 2348320 people mentioned. Another flaw that I found distracting was the introduction of characters without explaining who they were. It was as if she forgot to let her reader know and we don't find out until the very end more or less who is who.

This book didn't surprise me, left me a bit confused, and certainly let me down. I was expecting more from this author and expecting a nice twist at the end. Although there was a couple of twists, it just became on jumble confusing mess. Thank you to HarperCollins for providing me a copy of this book though netgalley in an exchange for an honest review.

Review will be up on IG on 2/16/2020 and will be up on my website 2/17/2020

*I received a complimentary copy of this book from Random House Publishing Group through NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.*

I’m not an expert on Voodoo practices or beliefs, but my gut feeling is that this didn’t seem like a fair representation of the Voodoo religion. I got an overall negative tone from this book about Voodoo beliefs. Another thing that ruined my reading experience was how truly awful all the characters were. Unlikable characters don’t necessarily make for a bad book (cough, cough The Secret History) but the awfulness of the characters paired with the over the top writing made it a little difficult to get through.

Some of the twists were predictable, while others were mildly surprising but not shocking. This painted an interesting picture of upper class society in Savannah, but I didn’t find this book to be especially unique. This just didn’t do it for me…

I would recommend Behind Her Eyes by this author if you’re looking for a psychological suspense thriller with surprising twists.

The description of Dead to Her obviously interested me. I often like books about the rich behaving badly, and they definitely did that in Dead to Her, to the point of ridiculousness. It just wan’t the fun, delicious sort of bad behavior I find so satisfying. The story revolved around Marcie, a 35-year old second wife of a managing partner in a Savannah law firm. Marcie had a past that she’d hidden from everyone. A past that I didn’t think was all that surprising, but was what kept Marcie always a little fearful. Marcie, who’s husband, Jason, was nearly 20 years older than her, literally had NO friends her own age. She hung out exclusively with women old enough to be her mother and then some. She flip flopped on her feelings every single chapter. To me, she was a hot mess and not in a fun way. Then there was Keisha, the hot young new wife of Jason’s partner, William. William, 65 and a recent widower, surprised everyone after returning from a trip to London with Keisha, a gorgeous, very young black woman. Keisha was the only one in the story who wanted to have any fun, but she was also a bit crazy, with a ghost of a young boy haunting her life.

The book took place in the present, but to me felt more like a demented episode of Mad Men. Women spent their days gossiping, exercising, shopping, drinking or doing a little charity work, always being on hand at home to keep their husbands happy. In the end, everything about Dead to Her felt just a little bit too clichéd.

Marcie came from nothing and wanted it all! It took time for this second wife to make her mark and climb the social ladder. She had a sexy husband, Jason who she acquired after an affair leading to an ugly divorce and he was about to be the owner of a company ensuring her status as the youngest wife of the elite. This was until Keisha showed up on the arm of the newly widowed William. Keisha was now a 2nd wife and younger and wilder than Marcie. Marcie couldn’t stand the look Jason gave Keisha. It was a look that she remembered him using on her in the very beginning.
The story weaves old creole magic, secrets of the past and present and good old fashioned revenge into a web of lies and deceit. It took awhile for the pieces to all come together right down to the last page!
Thank you Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest review!

Every time I read a Sarah Pinborough book I get excited for the twists and turns. She knows how to put you through the loop and make you question everything you just read, and this one didn’t disappoint!

This book was a roller coaster to say the least. I'm giving this book two out of five stars because of the very unlikable characters, the cluster of events going on, some being too far fetched for my liking, and just the whole "generic" thriller story/plot. I also guessed the person behind everything right when William was put into the hospital. Way too obvious in my opinion. The writing style was also below average. I do have three reading vlogs up on my channel, where viewers can watch and read along with me and discuss the book. Really sucks that I disliked it because the cover is gorgeous.

http://www.youtube.com/bethjune327

Marcie Maddox is Jason's second wife. She's younger than most of the elite set she associates with in Savannah, Georgia. That all changes when Jason's boss, William Radford IV brings home his own second wife. Keisha is even younger than Marcie. She's English, irreverent, and strikingly beautiful. Jason's been distracted lately, but he seems to have no problem focusing on Keisha. Suddenly Marcie finds herself feeling second best, and she doesn't like it one bit.

I hate to say it, but this book really just wasn't for me. The writing felt cheesy and stilted, and for most of the book, I just couldn't get into the plot. It had a slow start--we're introduced to Keisha, who has obviously married the much older "Billy" for his money, and we learn that Jason (and Marcie) have secrets of their own. But we don't get to learn any of these secrets, and so the plot is just a drawn out introduction to everyone, with constant teasing to these supposedly explosive secrets. I just felt like yelling, "get on with it already!"

Then things do finally move on, but they take some outrageous turns that felt a bit melodramatic and, at times, completely unbelievable. This is a really strange, weird read. There's voodoo and black magic, a lesbian storyline, and some very odd, often unlikable characters. I really wasn't invested in anyone. And while I am typically really excited for a lesbian plotline, this one felt forced, and the LGBTIA treatment of the characters was often pretty despicable: a gay party-planning couple is treated really derogatory and mocked, as well as portrayed in really stereotypical fashion, while lesbians are called "dykes" and just not really shown any respect at all. Ugh. Maybe I was being over-sensitive, but I wasn't impressed.

The book picks up a bit near the end, and there are a few good twists, but overall, not enough to redeem it for me. Others seem to enjoy this one, so take my review with a grain of salt, but this was a 2.5-star read for me.

Hmmm, let me say I was really looking forward to this book.
I have to give this two stars.
I’m really a little confused by this books message. By the story.
Because this is not a thriller. This is an adult contemporary with a ridiculous side plot that doesn’t even entertain you. And I’m still not sure of it’s purpose.
The characters, all of them, were detestable. Which left me with no interest in finding out how the book concluded.

Sarah Pinborough continues to be one of my favorite authors and this book is no exception. This one was a little different from her others but I really enjoyed it. I did feel that it started off a little slow but by the end I could not put the book down. There were a lot of characters introduced early on and it was a lot to keep track of but once we started learning more about each character it was easier to keep them straight. This book was filled with a lot of very unlikable characters and my feelings for them kept shifting throughout the story. One minute I would feel bad for someone and the next and I'd be like ok you had that coming. It was a really fun ride! I would recommend anyone who enjoys a good suspense/mystery type story to check this one out.

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

Unfortunately I will not be finishing this book. I really appreciate being given an advanced copy of this but sadly this book was not for me. I strongly disliked the characters in here and found this read like an episode of The Real Housewives. This sadly was just not a book for me.

This story line may not be original, second wife becomes suspicious when her husband starts paying attention to another woman, but there are a couple of unique twists in this version. Sarah Pinborough throws the reader into a world of easy living and women who will do most anything to keep their life just as it is. She stirs the pot by adding in some less than likeable characters who must make some decisions that will either keep the status quo, or blow up everything they are trying to protect. It's enough drama to keep you guessing as these women set the scene for murder.

I had a hard time deciding if I was going to give this book 3 or 4 stars... I ended on choosing 3.5.

I’m not going to tell you anything about it, you can read the description blurb, but other than that it is better to go into this blind.

Lots of twists in this book, as well as some interesting characters. I really didn’t like most of the characters except one, but that didn’t stop me from reading and trying to figure out what was going on. It was an enjoyable read. If you like thrillers with lots of twists and turns, give it a chance - you might love it! Seems people either love or hate it, and I fall in the middle.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher, William Morrow, for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

This is a sordid tale of revenge and mystery. I didn’t care for any of the characters but still enjoyed the read. Thank you publisher and netgalley for this arc in exchange of an honest review..

Weird. It started out ok with a twist to who was actually going to have an affair. The middle was very slowing and dragging so I ended up skipping a lot. Once we got into voo doo etc, I was lost.

This thriller is similar to Pinborough's first novel, Behind Her Eyes, in that there is suspense and unease from the beginning. What's going to happen and to who? There are enough breadcrumbs to indicate several people that could be the eventual victim as well as who could be the eventual criminal. Every new chapter reveals a new and more disturbing layer of this society. There's a lot to love about how this book is written. It's captivating and enthralling and deliciously full of imagery. I have to admit, I guessed who the "bad guy" was, but I was still so impressed with how it all unfolded and every twist and turn it took. Additionally, there is more than one queer person in this novel which is always a good thing in my book.

4.5/5.0*

‘Revenge is best served cold, but in the steamy Savannah heat, blood runs so hot that this Summer it might just boil over into murder.’

DEAD TO ME reminds me of the soap operas I would watch with my Mom back in the day, watching the drama unfold for an hour or two in the afternoons.

There is Drama-ah-plenty in this book, with lies, sex, money, greed, corruption, and let us not forget – murder - much like in GENERAL HOSPITAL and ONE LIFE TO LIVE, Moms favorites Soaps.

If you’re expecting to go into DEAD TO ME loving and empathizing with many of the characters, don’t, you will be very disappointed.

Pinborough does an excellent job of revealing while at the same time hiding each character’s shortcomings, bringing few to light in a way that will have you the reader, deciding for yourselves, who to trust, who to believe – No one? Perhaps.

You will just have to read the book and figure out the truth behind the lies, which, in my opinion, was half the fun. ;)

Thank you, NetGalley and HarperCollins Publishing, for providing me with and advance eBook of DEAD TO HER in exchange for an honest review.