trigger warning
<spoiler> kidnapping, child neglect, mental illness, trauma, grief. gun violence</spoiler>

The Gemini Thief snatchehes three boys in June, holds them for 13 months and then releases them.
Last year, Thea's cousin Aulus went missing, but the police are not linking him to the case. He would be the fourth person, he disappeared a day too late to fit into this.
Then a body is found. It appear the Gemini Thief changed his MO and now kills the boys.

To get it out of the way: I had some issues with the ebook file. My eReader didn't like it so I read on my netbook, which is why it took me so long to finally get around to it. The parts that contain the Elizabeth letters didn't load properly, and it took a ridiculous long time to read it.
I mention this because this might influence my opinion of the book and you can take my review with a grain of salt.

Also, the version I read looked not finished and I don't know how big the difference between what I've read and what you'd get if you'd buy the finished book are.

So, we have two plots: Thea's story that begins the day they found the body of one of the snatched children and something called the Elizabeth letters, written by Aulus and adressed to a Elizabeth. An author's note at the back tells us that Elizabeth was kidnapped and rescued a few months after that. There seems to be no further connection.
Having never before heard of this case, I don't think it's a good idea to take a real case and avoid making an in-plot connection to the recipient of the letters. A simple side note to someone remembering listening to news about this case would have been enough.

The tag line of this novel is that everybody could be the Gemini Thief. You might think you know your friends and relatives, but do you?
On this thought, for most of the book you think Thea's father is responsible for everything. It doesn't help that he lied to his daughter for nine years about taking solo camping trips and building a castle instead - because he had a vision and God told him to.
This feels forced to me, based on my experiences with delusional parents it would be more logical to convince your kid of your mission than hiding something this big. It feels like a thing the plot needed, not a natural decision the characters would make.

Because the Gemini Thief has been active for a decade, Thea thinks she can trust her friends, who, like her, are teenagers and would have been to young at the start of all of this.
The confusion coming with the fear you can't trust any of the adult people in your life was made quite real for me, and the irrational behavior Thea showed also felt like something that would happen.
I really hate it when irrational behaviour of protagonists is shrugged off with"well it's YA and teenagers are stupid".

The sister of Thea's boyfriend, Dana, kind of remembered me of Deborah from Dexter, or at least the version at the start of the series. Admittedly with less cussing, because you know, YA novel.

A YA thriller is nothing I read for a perfect plot, I come here for the atmosphere and a thrilling read, and I got that. The ending and especially the motivation for the Gemini Thief fell flat for me, and I think that if there are major differences between the edition I read and the finished version would be there. It really felt rushed.
Or it might be done on purpose to show how quickly things can change, what do I know?

I recieved a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

There was something enchanting and intriguing about The June Boys. There was also something dull and disappointing.

The concept of a mysterious person religiously kidnapping children is something that immediately had me interested in this new release by Court Stevens. It spoke to a dark and ongoing story - something with depth and background and suspense. But the execution just wasn't there.

Our main characters, Thea, her friends and her family were overall pretty dull. Yes, her father had this weird quirky thing with a castle. Which, I honestly still don't get. But, there was no depth to the odd father-figure, or any other, character.

The story itself was interesting. I enjoyed the twists and the conjecture of whodunnit. But the story was nowhere close to a thrilling story. Even the sections of the story where we encounter the perspective of the captive boys was - underwhelming.

And then there was the ending. Which honestly, while I didn't straight-up hate it, just felt incredibly out-of-left-field.

Thank you FFBC for letting me be a part of the book tour. Thank you Netgalley and FFBC tours for providing me with an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

The June Boys was an emotional rollercoaster for me. The book was masterfully crafted keeping you at the edge of your seats. It was a fantastic thriller with the mystery of the identity of the kidnapper a secret until the end. The book is in a non-linear format with the POVs of Thea and Aulus mixed together. It is confusing in the beginning but after continuing for a while it started making more sense. I was hooked from the beginning, a lot of strange characters who all are likely candidates for the kidnapper. The story is fascinating and heartbreaking at the same time. Aulus broke my heart, his letters were sad and sometimes hopeless. It makes you wonder how he managed to survive the ordeals. The twists and turns will keep you hooked and surprise you when the climax happens. I was unable to figure out who the kidnapper was and there were a lot of choices that were possible. Overall I think readers should give it a chance and once you get past the format you will be intrigued by the story. The characters were interesting mix and the way Thea dedicated her life and how she put on hold her dreams to find Aulus is truly admirable. Her doubts and questions regarding the people around her make things even more interesting. I gave the book 5 stars. I think the mystery and the thriller aspect of the book were on point. The writing is good, keeps you guessing till the end. The psychological impact of the kidnapping of the victims and the family were well described. The dark and twisted nature of the crime is so well crafted. I definitely recommend checking the book out and give the book a chance to tell you the story with its unconventional format. I enjoyed the format immensely and I think it makes the story stand out more.

This was an interesting read. I wasn’t sure what to expect and was slightly disappointed by the lack of character development in side characters. I kept wanting to know more about Tank and Gladys.

I did enjoy the last 20% of the book more as the pace ramped up and the stakes were much higher.

The ending was slightly less believable than I’d hoped but a good surprise.

One thing I wish had been addressed was how Tank (a high school student and valedictorian) could smoke so freely. It seemed very...odd. And there was no mention of the dangers of that etc. for a YA novel I think we have to be careful what it looks like we’re endorsing.

“The FBI found a body in Baxter, Tennessee, this morning. Juvenile. Male. Dumped on the side of the highway and phones in by a motorist who had to pee and couldn’t wait.” Could it be the first death among The June Boys? Could it also be narrator Thea’s cousin Aulus?

Called the Thief, a kidnapper snatches three boys in Tennessee on June 1st every other year. The victims are held for 13 months in an underground bunker. Then, they are left alive on the side of the highway. This year, four boys are taken and one is murdered...so far. Why is the Thief changing his m.o. and why now, eight years and 14 kidnapped boys later?

The pacing of The June Boys seemed odd. The conclusion was rather farfetched. Unfortunately, not one of my favorites and not recommended. 2 stars.

Thanks to Thomas Nelson and NetGalley for a copy in exchange for my honest review.

The Gemini Thief is a serial kidnapper who has been holding three boys captive for one month, from June 1 to June 30 of the following year, for ten years. These boys are called the June Boys, for thirteen months they are observed, fed, hidden and generally released alive without anything having happened to them.

The problem is that the kidnapping thief this year, took one more boy, Aulus, who is the cousin of Thea our heroine who will do everything to find the culprit and save the June Boys.

I really liked that plot very much. Thea is afraid to ask herself some questions but despite everything she tries and sometimes she discovers that those around her are not necessarily honest with her.

Nick is the first to ask her the disturbing question.

“Could the Gemini Thief be your father?

I really like Thea a lot, I find her a remarkable strength of character. She also discovers herself because her world is turned upside down by the absence of Aulus but thanks to that she was able to meet Nick, her boyfriend.

Gladys, Tank, Aulus and Thea form a team, so the three remaining characters became even more united after the disappearance of Aulus.

I liked the investigation of Nick and Thea, seeing the workings of their brains and trying to find the culprit myself.

I confess that I succeeded before them, it just missed the motive.

I love Courtney Stevens’ books and this one is no exception. The characters are interesting, the plot is thrilling and the ending is full of…

Quick word: A thrilling thriller to read urgently.

<b><i>“The Gemini Thief could be anyone.”</b></i>

<b>representation: black side characters, ermmm i think that's it

[trigger warnings are listed at the bottom of this review and may contain spoilers]</b>

✧·ﾟ: ✧·ﾟ: 2 . 5 s t a r s :·ﾟ✧:·ﾟ✧

I received an e-arc from netgalley, but since hearing that the arc is quite different to the finished copy, I decided to wait and listen to the audiobook and I'm glad I did. I really enjoyed the female narrator, but the male narrator who was supposed to be narrating a teenagers voice sounded like a 45 year old man, which was weird. I also can't imagine how reading the ARC would have gone, seeing people having so many issues with the formatting of it and how jumbled the content seemed to be, however, the finished copy was still super confusing because of one main thing. There's two parts to the story, the first part being the main character Thea's narration of what happens when her and her friends try to investigate the kidnappings and find her missing cousin, and then there's letters placed sporadically throughout the novel from the perspective of her missing cousin, and in these letters, a character called Tank appears and he's also in the main story as well, so it seems that he's in two places at once which is impossible and hard to comprehend. Basically, even though we see letters throughout the entire book, these letters only take place towards the end of the main story, if that makes sense. So Tank isn't actually in two places at once. He's in the main story in the beginning, and then involved in the letters towards the end of the story. I have no idea if what I just wrote made any sense at all haha but hopefully that clears things up for some readers who are currently super confused like I was!

The mystery itself of who the Gemini Thief actually was, I thought was done really well! It had me on the edge of my seat and constantly guessing and I kept changing my mind on who I thought it was!

Buuuuuut that's where the positives end for me unfortunately. I didn't really enjoy any other aspect of it. It was confusing, the characters overall seemed quite flat and one-dimensional and I found myself not really connecting to any aspect of the story. Quite disappointing, but A+ for the mystery aspect!

<b>trigger warnings: captivity, starvation, kidnapping, guns, gunshot wounds, blood, family members being imprisoned. </b>

<i>Thank you to NetGalley & Thomas Nelson for the review copy!</i>

I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. Thank you Thomas Nelson for a review copy.

This book was a bit of a wild ride. I felt like the beginning and end were fast, hard on everything. Then it was dragging in the middle some. Everything slowed down like they didn't know what to do or happen. I was a bit thrown off by the duel timelines and people showing up in both. It did keep me guessing till the end who the kidnapper was. Overall I felt like there were too many people to keep up within Thee lives and who was who. It got confusing and all the adults started to blend together after a while of reading the book. The world needed a bit more building on or flushed out. It was an enjoyable read but also not a book for everyone.

In the June Boys we follow the main character Thea as she tries to find clues as to what happened to her cousin Aulus who she believes has been kidnapped by The Gemini Thief. Every year or two on June 1st a group of 3-4 boys are kidnapped and then released the following June 30th. These boys are known as The June Boys. At the same time we are following Thea we are also getting letters that are written by Aulus talking about his captivity.

Thea is helped by her boyfriend Nick along with her and Aulus’s two best friends Tank and Gladys. I absolutely loved the friendships in this book and how they all supported each other and we’re there for each other. I also enjoyed the mystery of trying to find out who the Gemini Thief was. Courtney gave just enough clues to figure it out which I had by about 2/3rds of the way thru but not the why, which was saved till the end. Thea's dad, who seems to be a little off, also plays a large role in this book. He has been building a castle for the past 10 years, which Thea has just found out about. At times it felt like the castle was another character in the story and I loved that.

Overall I really enjoyed this book. I had a somewhat hard time getting into it because I was a little confused, we were following two timelines and it took awhile till this was addressed. We were also introduced to characters without knowing who they were but then gradually the people fell into place. Once both of those things were cleared up it became easier to follow. By the second half of the book I was hooked and I needed to know what was going to happen. I felt the story wrapped up nicely but would have liked just a little more in the epilogue. If you are looking for a fun and unique YA Thriller then I would definitely check out The June Boys. This book was my first by Courtney Stevens and it will not be my last. I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

This was such a slow starting book that I had to DNF it. I try not to do this, especially if I plan to leave a review. There were issues with the writing, in terms of consistency with plot and what people knew about the mystery. I also was not sure about the formatting or the pacing. Just not for me.
Thank you for the eARC and hopefully the finished version will address some of these problems.
#TheJuneBoys #Netgalley

DNF at page 112

I'm honestly facing the same issue most other readers are facing. I absolutely haye the way the story is structured. I don't mind the writing style or the slow paced plot but form page one it seems that we're thrown in the middle of something and it's so....confusing? Uneasy? I couldn't connection much to the characters because it literally felt like I should have already known them.

I had such huge expectations but I'm sad that it didn't work out.

The list of facts:


-The Gemini Thief has been kidnapping boys for almost a decade.

-The kidnappings occur every June.

-The boys are kept for thirteen months until their release.

-Thea's cousin, Aulus McClaghen, was taken by the Gemini Thief.


What Thea suspects:

-The Gemini Thief is someone she knows in her hometown.


The question is....who?


The June Boys by Court Stevens was just the kind of thriller that absolutely engulfs me. While the case of the missing boys opens the book, Stevens had a masterful way of increasing the suspense of the story, chapter by chapter, until you're practically racing to the end. What I loved about Stevens' writing was that she was able to do this through her atmosphere. Sometimes thrillers tend to increase the tension by adding gore or elements of horror. Instead, Stevens cultivated an atmosphere built on Thea's quest to find her cousin and the Elizabeth Letters written by one of the June Boys.


Additionally, the nonlinear narrative heightened my zest to know who was behind the June kidnappings and, even more so, why? As the book progressed, Stevens' deliberately chosen narrative makes you compelled to know more about each character rather than having readers hone in on a singular protagonist. This expanse on the thriller genre was an excellent statement about taking a further look at those around you and realizing that even though we might know people for years, we will never truly know what they are capable of....until June.


If you're looking for a compelling narrative with a half built castle, a small town mystery, and a clock that silently ticks behind you, I'd highly recommend The June Boys by Court Stevens.

I absolutely loved two of Courtney C Stevens other works, Dresscodes for small towns and Four Three Two One, so I kinda freaked out when I was approved for this ARC!
I knew going into this one that it would be very different from the other two books I read. But for some reason it still surprised me!
I kinda struggled with reading the beginning of this book. The kidnapping of Aulus has happened a year ago and one of the other boys who was also kidnapped has been found dead. So we start kinda in the middle of the story. There were quite some characters introduced and their relation to certain people, in a short period
of time.
But once I got into the story, and got the characters straight, it definitely got better!
The main story we read from Thea´s perspective, were she, her two best friends, and her boyfriend try to solve the mystery around Aulus´s disappearance of the year before. But in between this story we also get letters from Aulus to someone. This part made the story so interesting. Because you do get some inside in his kidnapping story. But also these letters describe moments that haven´t happened yet in the main time line. So you keep wondering how we get from one situation to the other. This is definitely one of the reasons why I just had to keep reading the book!
I did get a bit worried when I had 100 pages of the book left. At this point I was convinced we knew who the kidnapper was, and everything pointed at it being true. We just didn’t know why. But since there were still 100 pages left, I thought Stevens would go and blame someone else, and I was worried it wouldn´t be as convincing.
In the end it did make sense, but I wasn’t too happy with the ending, but discussing that will give spoilers!

I have a little dilemma with this book. I have read a few chapters of if and really loved it so far. It is intriguing and Im really enjoying the writing style. However, I have heard there are major changes in the final copy compared with the advanced reader copy. This makes me have a lot of trepidation to finish the ARC. I am enjoying the book so much that I think I would rather stop reading my ARC and just pick up a finished copy. I appreciate the author and publisher for sharing this e-ARC with me and I'm very excited to pick up a finished copy to finish the story.

Thea’s cousin Aulus is missing and she’s sure he’s been taken by the Gemini Thief. A serial kidnapper who takes and holds boys captive for just over a year. When her boyfriend asks her if she would turn in the culprit if she knew who they were, the answer is obvious – of course she would. But as they dig deeper into the mystery, a few too many clues point to her own father. A father she loves, but knows all too well just how secretive he can be.

Told in alternating chapters between the captive lives of Aulus and the other June Boys, and Thea’s desperate hunt for the kidnapper, this was a unique and harrowing story. The kidnapper’s identity wasn’t the only big reveal in The June Boys and I loved trying to piece together the puzzle throughout the book. I really appreciated the inclusion of Aulus’s story, which was narrated via letters he was writing, while held by the kidnapper. It gave the story such a tense feel, knowing how the boys were trying to survive and the way their time was running out.

The E-ARC was a little hard to read as I assume the finished copy will have images showing the letters, and these images broke up the text in the e-book, causing some of the paragraphs to be a little jumbled up. In saying that, I think the images will really lend something to the finished copy though.

The characters in The June Boys were fantastic and really made the book (something that I find is sometimes lacking in mystery novels). Thea’s relationships with not only her boyfriend but best friend, cousin and other friends had me just as invested in their plight as the kidnapped boys.

I’d highly recommend this one if you’re a fan of YA thrillers and mysteries!

I really enjoyed this book. The pace was fast and I really had no idea how it would end. I finished well into the night, just couldn't put it down. I had to know who the Gemini Thief was. The ending did not dissapoint. there were several twists near the end that i really did not see coming.
The characters are honestly flawed, but it a good way. It made them all seem more human. It also made it really hard to figure out who was taking the boys. I usually can figure out how a book is going to end, at least a little. I truly did not see this ending coming. I really loved the fact that this wasn't like every other thriller/mystery out there. It has a very unique plot and I found it very entertaining. I can't wait to see what comes next from the author.

This is hard to write a review. I actually had to Dnf The June Boys because of the formating, after about 25% I couldn't handle it anymore. So I jump ahead and read the big reveal and I guess I couldn't have guess it, it was a nice choice for the Gemini Thief. I'll try to read it once I had the hardcover and update my review at that time.

Thank you for providing me with an early copy.

Like many readers have stated the formatting in this book, is not good. For me it took away from the reading experience (not the authors fault).

If you like fast paced mystery/thrillers you may not enjoy this, it definitely more of a slow burn. The characters are just OK, and the ending lacked some spark.

Sometimes authors will add extra passages from characters, (example a comic series the character is writing on a blog), in my opinion that extra passage has to be exceptionally good in order for me to read each one/care about it at all. In this book it was the Elizabeth letters. I did not think it added anything to the story and most of the time I just skipped over it (the formatting didn't help these letters succeed at all).

While this wasn't my favorite book I would still recommend to others and give this author another go.

I very much enjoyed this! The author’s writing style is distinctive and unique and I felt that it fit the story well. The characters were well-developed and gave me something to root for. The book holds a special place in my heart because it’s set in TN and mentions my hometown and my current city, and I’ve NEVER seen either of these tiny towns in a book before 😂 I really appreciated the suspense at the end but I didn’t feel much of it throughout the novel as a whole, which is what knocked it down a star for me.

Thea's cousin, Aulus, disappeared a year ago. The police said runaway, but Thea knew better. Aul was take by the Gemini Thief/Welder. Thea, her boyfriend, Nick, her best friend, Gladys, and friend, Tank, decided that they would study the case and find Aul. The Gemini Thief started taking boys in 2001. One June 1st, three boys disappear. They're kept in an underground bunker until June 30th of the following year and then released. The boys didn't see their captor's face because they wore a welders mask. There is a dormant year or two and then it starts over. The boys taken became known as June Boys. Things change that year when a child was found dead and dumped off the road. This boy had a key chain in his mouth. There were only two keys like that made. Thea had one. Aul had the other. Thea's father had given them the keys. This changes everything and Thea needs to start looking into her dad and everyone around her.

"The Gemini Thief could be anyone. Your father, your mother, your best friend's crazy uncle."

Thea's father had been going to Canada for the past ten years. But that was a lie. He was actually building a castle after being told by a higher power that he needed to. None of it made sense and he became obsessive about finishing it. He makes a good suspect, especially when Thea and Nick find a receipt from the night the boy was dumped. Nick's sister, Dana, is an FBI agent and she's involved in the case. While she doesn't tell the kids everything, she does share some details with them. She sees all the research they've done and they know the case well.

The book takes place late May into June. Some chapters are "Dear Elizabeth" letters that Aul is writing. The Welder left them and the boys have no food or water. They realized that the Welder isn't coming back and they are going to die underground somewhere and never be found.

The June Boys is a pretty dark book that makes you realize that you don't know everyone around you. Who can you trust? People aren't all good or all bad.

I gave this book 4 stars. Thank you to the publisher for my copy for review.

Warnings for kidnapping, death of a child, absent parents, mental issues, starving and dehydration, talk of suicide.