Sandie Jones has a knack for quick paced domestic dramas and thrillers. The Guilt Trip is no different! While the main character is a bit frustrating at times, there are enough twists and drama to keep you reading, without any loll to make you sit this one aside. A solid three stars.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for my advanced copy in exchange for my honest review.

So, I liked the story overall, although some of the characters (like Ali, Rach and Noah) all seemed like they were in a telenovella. There was just so much going on, it felt like reading a daytime soap opera. There were moments of brilliance in the story though, like when <spoiler>Rachel looks out her bedroom window into the pool, sees two people going at it, and runs down to catch her husband red-handed but it was Will, not Jack</spoiler>. I enjoyed it but it could have been so much better given the story premise.

I received an e-ARC of this book by the author and publishing via Netgalley. This does not affect my opinion regarding the book. You can check out my goodreads review here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3973406435

The Guilt Trip follows a group of six friends to Portugal for the wedding of Ali & Will. Will’s brother, Jack is there with his wife, Rachel. Their friends Noah & his wife, Paige round out the group. Shortly after arriving, secrets begin to come to light, rumors are spread & ultimately the reader is left to try to figure out fact from fiction. The guilt trip is attributed to more than one friend for more than one reason and persists to the last page. A fast-paced ride that illuminates, loyalty, betrayal and what friendship really means. Thanks #NetGalley and #StMartinsPress for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

What a twisty mess of relationships this book is! I will admit, I was a little hesitant going in because the cover and synopsis had very similar vibes to The Guest List, which storyline has already been a little overdone, but I did find The Guilt Trip had some extra elements that made it it's own story.

All of the characters sucked, in one way or another. Except Will, he was the star of this book. They all had super obvious faults that added to the absolute mess of relationships this book had to offer. Ultimately, it was fairly obvious, in my opinion, whodunit, but I still found it very surprising how it all played out in the end. I found a lot of the bulk of the book very repetitive, with Rachel circling constantly on her thoughts and emotions that were just the same over and over, which is why I'm not rating it higher. It needed a little less Rachel whining and a little more drama. There were some original thoughts for sure, but it did have similar vibes to other storylines I've read like this one. I enjoyed it's setting of Portugal, though! This was definitely more of a slow burn mystery than a thriller.

Thank you NetGalley, author Sandie Jones, and Macmillan Audio publishing for giving me a free arc audio copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
3 stars
This is my second book by this author. The first book I read by this author was "The Other Woman" and I absolutely loved it!
Six friends will take a trip together for a wedding ,but will the secrets each of them has brought with them on the trip come to light?
While this book is marketed as a thriller, I just did not feel this story qualified as one. This book has more of a feel as a contemporary fiction with lots of drama such as one might fine watch a daytime TV soap opera. I could find none of the characters likeable. Each was selfish, shallow, and down right deceitful. I felt removed from these characters. I could not find that I could relate to any of the characters, which made it feel like I was an outsider looking in. Most of the first half of the book was filled with Rachel’s inner thoughts and suspicions, her dialogue and interactions with the other characters and how unhappy these couples were in their marriage. It was redundant. The second half was just a big secret reveal by each of the characters with a very quick wrap up. The writing and the pacing kept me wondering how much more drama was going to be introduced, so I had to keep reading until the very end. The scenes I did enjoy was the wedding venue and the restaurant! It was well detailed and beautiful. I would not say I would recommend this book to fans of thrillers, but I might recommend this book to those who love marriage/couple dramas. I would like to read another book by this author in the future.

Phenomenal thriller by the incomparable Sandie Jones! I was rocked by the ending; I never saw it coming!

Enjoyable! It was a bit confusing at times, but overall I really liked the storyline and twist at the end. I was convinced I had figured it out on page 10, but I was in for a treat! Would recommend.

3 destination wedding stars

Three couples head off to Portugal for one couple’s wedding ceremony. I did have trouble keeping all six characters straight. The prospective groom and his brother are two of the characters.

Then there’s Rachel and Noah who have been best friends since university days. They tell everyone that they’ve only ever been friends, but it’s obvious they really care for each other. Are they being honest with themselves?

There are secrets, lies, misunderstandings, and infidelity all swirling around in this one and I wasn’t sure what to believe.

The bride, Ali, has a lot of secrets in her closet and she’s been acting strangely with Rachel’s husband Jack. What’s going on there? And can anything she says be trusted?

One of my favorite parts of this book was the setting, I would love to visit Portugal someday, although I think I will admire some of the views from a distance.

This one has a tense ending that I’m still puzzling through.

I really wanted to love this book, and I did until about 60% of the way through it, when the incident that the description mentioned still hadn't happened. I was expecting more of a crime thriller, with twists and turns, but the crime itself didn't happen until 90% of the way through the book. So it was a lot of feelings and ruminating on feelings, and anguishing over what to do. There were many times I wanted to jump in the book and shake the main character for being so wishy-washy and so easily emotionally manipulated by others.

I loved the story and the premise, but I did not love the execution of it.

My Review:⭐️⭐️⭐️.5/ 5 stars
This is a thriller that revolves around 6 friends and a wedding destination weekend in Portugal. Jack/Rachel and Paige/Noah are friends - mostly because Rachel/Noah are best friends from University. Jack and Paige just had to go along with the ride - and now they are going to Jack’s brother’s wedding to Ali, a former associate of Jack (who is acting really weird about Ali). Naturally, Rachel thinks Jack and Ali are having an affair. She spends most of the wedding weekend trying to find more clues to their past while discovering new secrets about her own group of friends.

The story was ok overall. Reading it feels like I am in the middle of a very awkward dinner party where the hosts are fighting amongst each other. It got a bit confusing because even though Rachel is the narrator, you still don’t really know what’s going on in her head. This whole group of friends lie to each other so I am surprised they even are friends. The characters were all a little bit unlikeable so it was more difficult to care about what happened to them. I wished I liked this a lot more, but it was ok!

Thank you to Minotaur Books and netgalley for the advanced copy in exchange for my honest review!

Rachel can't help but question. She can't help but wonder. Is she right? Is she wrong? Maybe she's right and wrong?

Another great book From Sandie Jones!

I received this book as an ARC from NetGalley.

A destination wedding, what could go wrong?

Rachel and Noah have been best friends since college. Noah went away on a year sabbatical and Rachel meets and marries Jack. Noah meets Paige after he returns home and marries her. Jack's brother Will meets Ali and that is the wedding they are traveling to.

The arrive at a villa that is breathtaking beautiful, much to everyone's surprise since Will is known to be a little lax in accommodations. As the few days pass, secrets start to be revealed, assumptions made, and a horrific event happens at the wedding. Will they all be going home together?

This book was fantastic. As soon as I had something figured out - wrong!! It kept me guessing until the end. I cannot wait to read more by this author.

Three couples go to Portugal for the wedding of Will and Ali, one of the couples. There is a lot drama, lies and secrets between all the couples.
This book was all over the place for me. I didn't really like any of the characters. The 40 something women, Rachel and Paige, acted like catty teenagers. Ali is flirty and seems to lie about everything. At times Rachel seems half delusional and neurotic with her suspicions and conspiracy theories. .
The story has a lot of details and theories to keep track of and half the time I was feigning interest, because I didn't want to abandon it. I shook my head in confusion many times When it did finally come to a wrap it was quick and still left me confused and with questions.

I have really enjoyed other books by Sandie Jones so I was thrilled to see a new book by her. There is a lot going on-think soap opera drama. Destination wedding, who is lying, who is cheating, what is going on? This is a solid and entertaining beach read but not my favorite of her books.

Thx to Net Galley, Sandie Jones, and as always, a special thanks to St. Martins Press for this ARC.
This was my summer beach read and I enjoyed it. This is a combination ChickLit/Thriller. Story seemed to drag a little in parts, but the last quarter of the book is fast moving. I enjoyed the writing and the of the dynamics between the couples and the friends. I am always a Sandie Jones fan ! 4 stars..

Wow, what a wild ride! I received this ARC a little while back and quite honestly forgot what it was about by the time I got around to reading it, so I went into it pretty blind. Lots of drama, gossip, he said/she said, secrets, and lies….all over a destination wedding trip. There were so many times I thought I knew what was really going on and I was constantly revising my theories, only to find out the truth exactly when the author intended me to. I’ve never read any of Sandie Jones’ work before, but I’ll definitely be checking it out now. Thank you NetGalley and St Martin’s Press for the opportunity to review this book!

The Guilt Trip, by Sandie Jones, is more soap-opera fiction loaded with relationship drama,, less mystery/thriller, as the author previously penned. This destination wedding saga is ripe with gossip, miscommunication, lies and bad behavior.

Three couples head to Portugal for the wedding of Will and Ali. Will is the brother of Jack, the spouse of one of the two other couples and the reason the others have made the trip. Ali, Will’s fiancé, and former employee of Jack, seems to rub everyone the wrong way with her outlandish flirtation and often questionable behavior. All of these friends have histories, in one way or another; histories ripe with secrets that create problems a plenty on this celebratory weekend.

I loved the previous books by this author , but this newest release fell a bit flat for me. It focused more on the immature drama of a group of so-called friends, than an actual mystery, and was lacking in suspense. It tended toward the repetitive, circling the same plot points without actually moving the story forward in any significant way. As such, I struggled to stay invested and the novel felt far longer than it should have. I kept reading solely because I was curious to find out the resolution.

The latter half of the story definitely had several red herrings and kept me guessing, though ultimately, the offender wasn’t all that shocking. What was surprising, if not far-fetched, was the cataclysmic event towards the end of the story.

The Guilt Trip is aptly named and kept me turning the pages until its astonishing conclusion. It wasn’t, however, what I was expecting and that affected my enjoyment of the novel. I also felt that the slower pace and lack of propelling events, along with the implausible behaviors, kept me from staying as engaged as I hoped to be.

This might be my favorite book of summer 2021. Great mystery with well defined characters. Sandie Jones had me hooked from beginning to the end.

Sandie Jone's The Guilt Trip is pure pleasure reading. It is easy reading and it's a joy to read. Sometimes you just need to escape, and The Guilt Trip is the perfect "escape" to go on.

I couldn't put this book down and it was very hard to stop reading! In my book, that deserves a 5/5!

I can't wait to see what Sandie Jone's will write next.

Audiobook Review: When I started listening to this book I had already read the eBook version so I thought I knew what was going to happen. What I realized that by just reading and not actually hearing the words I missed some emotions and reactions of the characters. Clare Corbett, the narrator, did an amazing job of taking the thriller of a story and bringing it to life with her tone and cadence. My attention was easy to keep and I found myself looking for times to listen to more.

eBook Review: I love a good thriller. Sandie Jones wrote a book that pulled me in from the beginning, kept me turning pages, and loving every word she wrote. I loved the twists, the turns, the ups, and the downs. I followed the characters exactly where they wanted me to go, I may have missed some clues, but I still had many guesses as to what was going to happen next.

The beginning introduced a lot of characters in a short timeframe, and I have to admit that I had a hard time keeping them all straight, especially who was with who. As I continued to read, I realized that may have been done intentionally. It seemed each character had a tie to another character and it was fun to figure out who was doing what with who and when.

I enjoyed Sandie Jones’ book. The characters were twisted, fun, and relatable. This is a perfect, fun, twisted suspense, mystery, and thriller.