4.5 Rounded to 5

Whelp. I haven't had this much fun reading a book in a while. Dark. Violent and Dangerous Women. Yup this is my cup of coffee 😂

This was nowhere near what I thought when I requested this, but then that's what happens when you never read the synopsis 😂 I think this was better, for me anyway, going in blind. I was blown away with the direction this took and LOVED every second of it.

I had a very hard time putting this one down and can't recommend this one enough. This is definitely a FUN one for those who like to see those who deserve it, get their comeuppance...in a very unique way. 🐝🏌️‍♀️🪴

The dynamic between Harriet, Nessa and Jo was great! I love their humor and conversations. I was laughing a lot when they got going. This definitely makes for a great buddy read too. Go grab this, grab some friends, and have a blast.

I sincerely appreciate the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with a review copy. All opinions expressed herein are mine and mine alone.

Gosh, I don’t even know where to begin with this one. I started reading it shortly before the Supreme Court news broke, and it feels like this book could not have been released at a better time. Cleverly addressing important and timely women’s issues, The Change follows a trio of women of a certain age as they plot to take down the privileged men in the gated community of small town after several young girls go missing.

Fantasy novels are not my typical go-to read, but I couldn’t put this one down. It’s nearly 500 pages long, but reads like a fun conversation between friends. I adored all three women and appreciated the way in which their unique powers were used together for the good of the community. I especially loved Harriet and the way the author brought her personality and garden to life. In a time where women’s rights are under attack, it was refreshing to see this character throw caution to the wind and be her own woman.

The book balances darker themes of rape, misogyny and torture with dashes of romance, sarcasm, and humor that makes for a satisfying read. This book is going to be the talk of the summer. Get it. You won’t be disappointed.

you to NetGalley, William Morrow and Kirsten Miller for an advanced copy of this book.

I typically stay away from any hint of paranormal anything in books I read, however this book was getting excellent reviews and being called 'the book of the summer' so I had to join the hype. I am also interested in the Long Island serial killer case, which this book seemed somewhat inspired by. I'm glad I joined the hype.

I think The Change is well written and I enjoyed all the characters. I appreciated all the characters and their stories, which can be challenging when it alternates between 3 points of view. The story veered in a way I didn't quite expect (probably due to my LISK intrigue) but I enjoyed it nonetheless. Small details about Long Island were not quite factual (like, trains to Long Island originate at Penn Station, not Grand Central) but have no influence not he story.

I'll be recommending this to friends and family.

The Change by Kirsten Miller was a welcome and refreshing take on one plight of women. I really enjoyed the premise and the character development. It was thoughtful, perceptive, knowledgeable and at times hilarious. I hope these characters and their special talents will show up in future books. Thanks for the opportunity to read this lovely book.

This was easily one of the best books that I've read this year! It was refreshing, original, and kept my attention from start to finish.

Three middle-aged women are at a changing point in their lives. Nessa, raising two college aged daughters after her husband's death, has discovered that she can hear voices of the dead. She becomes an advocate for those who can no longer speak for themselves. Jo, an ambitious gym owner and mom, learns she has the ability to use her strength for a greater good. Then there's Harriet. She may be the most interesting of them all in my opinion. She's changing in so many ways. She has freed herself from worrying what others think and has taken an interest in gardening. Not your everyday type of gardening however. Harriet grows plants that can be used for a large variety of purposes and she's not afraid to use them when she feels necessary.

When the women discover the body of a teenage girl in a black garbage bag during a walk, they are called to action to use their special abilities to seek justice for this young girl and many other forgotten girls just like her.

I loved this book for a variety of reasons. First, can you say strong female voices all around? It was so nice to read a book where women felt empowered to make changes and stand up for what they believe in! Second, this book showcases how strong female friendships can be, regardless of how different the women may be. Third, I enjoyed how the mother-daughter relationships in this book are portrayed.

Beyond all the positive aspects in the portrayal of women, the book also had a strong plot that kept me turning pages. There were unexpected plot developments and at times I wasn't sure what was going to happen next. This is definitely a character driven novel that spotlights the disparities women often face in the real world. It accurately highlights how race and class play a pivotal part in how cases involving missing women are often handled.

Finally, this book sets out to make a statement! From the very clever title to the actions that the women take throughout the novel, nothing felt held back in this story.

If I had one criticism, it would be that almost all of the men were portrayed in in a very poor light. To me, this felt a little off balance. Other than that, I can't say I had any other complaints!

I would definitely recommend this book to others (especially women in the 40 plus age group)! I look forward to reading more from this author (and hope this will be the first installment in a series!).

Thanks to NetGalley and William Morrow for an advanced readers copy of this book to read and review.

Wow! This book blew me away, it’s been awhile since I read a book that enchanted, engrossed and just plain made me pump my arm up in the air! Kirsten Miller has turned into an auto buy author for me.
The three main pov’s are Harriett, Nessa and Jo. These ladies form the most amazing friendship/sisterhood that I’ve read in years! I could picture the movie in my head the whole time I read it, in one sitting! Laura Dern, Viola Davis and Nicole Kidman would be amazing in these roles! I sure hope someone is smart enough to buy the rights to this book…
This is a thriller, vengeance, revenge story at heart in my opinion. Each of these ladies are at the time in their lives where menopause comes into play, if you are over 45 you will feel like someone finally sees you in a book! The 3 each have a special gift, a witch, an individual that can see ghosts and a hot flashing bad ass super woman. They live on Mattauk where some shady rich men are doing evil things, young girls go missing and the police department just doesn’t care. They care and the story takes off.
I really hope you read this one, any age will be cheering these bad ass women on, they are amazing!
I hope they are featured in another book! We need more books like this one! 5 plus stars!!
Give it a go!

This was the ultimate female super hero story. I wasn't sure what to expect, but there is magic, a murder, and women coming into their own. I finished this book in less than a day it was so good. You will be pulled into the lives of 3 women, all very different but their lives were destined to cross. When the body of a young girl is found in a trash bag by the ocean it becomes a race to find the killer. Each of the women has something to overcome as they find their powers growing and they have to decide what they want out of life. This is a new author for me but I will definitely be looking for more from her.

Kirsten Miller’s The Change is my most recent read and I loved it. I thought about it all day at work yesterday and was counting the minutes until I could get back home and finish reading it.

The book is about women of a certain age. Oh the horror- mid life! That time when women begin to become invisible, when they are no longer thought of as beautiful or sex objects. But what Miller examines so well here is that it is the time when a woman is at her peak. She has confidence and she knows what she wants and she could care less about what other people think. She is at the peak of her powers so to speak. And in this book powers are literal. Each of the three women develops their own individual magic so to speak. Harriet has a way with plants- especially poisonous ones. Jo channels her hot flashes into the palms of her hands and can create electric fire. And Nessa can speak to the dead and it is through her gift that the three women discover there is a serial killer targeting young girls in their small coastal town.

I loved this book it has satire, mystery, humor and pathos and even a little romance. It’s The Witches of Eastwick meets The First Wives Club and it is so much fun! It also has a serious side that looks at the vulnerability of young women and the marginalization of women of a certain age, race and social class. This book makes you think and laugh and all within the parameters of a good mystery. This is a book about empowering women to find their individual strengths and about feminine sisterhood and I absolutely loved it. Thank you to @netgalley and @williammorrowbooks for this advanced ebook in exchange for an honest review.

3.5 rounded up.

I honest to god wanted to love this book. So many of my book friends raved over how much they adored this book. I went in expected it to be a five star read. Maybe that’s where I went wrong.

There was soooo much to love about this story. A witch, a medium, a protector. They were so awesome and badass. They each had backstory and character. I really enjoyed learning about these three women. I loved watching them fight against the men of this world, and anyone who says their struggles are not believable have clearly never lived as a woman. I would have loved a story that centered around them, doing what they do, that was maybe 100 pages shorter. .
This book lost me when it rambled about side characters who didn’t peak my interest. There were so many chapters explaining every side character’s back story and I really could have cared less. I would be so sucked into the plot and then it would be a chapter long about something sooo monotonous that I almost put the book down every time there was a flashback. This book is an example of why I am very wary of flashbacks. I craved to read about Jo and Nessa and yet I would find chapters about a random neighbor and fell out of love with the book.

This book is such a feminist powerhouse that it does hurt me to have negative thoughts about it. I wanted to stand on the roof and scream along with my sisters while reading this. I’ve lived these moments. I’ve had these men laugh in my face. I FELT it. But it was just too long and had me getting distracted from what I loved. The characters were strong and authentic, the story was intense and I didn’t know what would happen at the very end. I was VERY upset with the ending. It is always wonderful to see rich men get their just desserts. This story was satisfying. Just if it were up to me, it would have focused strictly on the main 3 women and the girls they tried to save, and less on people who didn’t make an impact on me whatsoever.

I wanted so badly to get into this book but I just could not. It’s also super long and I think that’s one of the reasons why I couldn’t.

What a unique fun book! Harriet, Jo and Nessa are forces to be reckoned with when they join in and team up to stop a serial killer in their small community. They each contribute a unique skill. Harriet with her green thumb, Jo with her strength, and Nessa who hears voices of the dead. They also use their strengthening changing powers to help women they meet along the way who have been hurt by toxic men. I enjoyed the unique characterization each woman brought to the story and their background that got them to this point in their life. It was an interesting mix of dark revenge/feminist fantasy full of twists and turns.

I did not expect to like this book and was totally surprised when I ended up really enjoying it. It was entertaining, surprising and suspenseful. Jo, Nessa and Harriett were well written, strong and powerful female characters. I liked seeing all their points of view and knowing what motivated them and their powers. I was initially put off because the book was described as fantasy, but it is definitely not what I was expecting. Thanks to NetGalley for the digital ARC.

Harriet, Jo, and Nessa are experiencing a change in their lives, physically, mentally and spiritually. This metamorphosis brings them together and will lead them down a path that is literally replete with the bodies of young ladies who may or may not have been murdered by a serial killer. Can they decipher their purpose in time to stop the next murder?

I thoroughly enjoyed The Change. It was provocative yet sagacious in its messaging but it also read like a really exquisite episode of your favorite melodrama. The mystery and suspense elements were well done, this book was hard to put down, and the fantasy elements were light so this is a great read for those looking to dip their feet into those genres. I highly recommend giving this book try. It was a gratifying experience. 4.25 Stars.

The Change was such a fun, twisty, witchy read I can’t wait for others to enjoy!

The story follows three women in their “later years” when they begin to discovery peculiar gifts they had inklings about but never really knew exactly what they were and for that matter; when they would be able to use them. Harriet has the power of horticulture and a connection to animals, but only begins to embrace them after she leaves her marketing job, gets a divorce and let’s her once perf for life slip away. Jo, a high powered hotel manager loses her job after standing up to wild sexual assaults against her female staff and Nessa has the power to speak to ghosts- the knowledge passed on by her late grandmother. Their gifts began calling them to action after several girls are found dead in their town and they must act to bring their assaulters to justice.

I loved that this story was very female driven, feminist and regularly touched on the idea that a powerful women has always been accused of witchcraft when she doesn’t conform to the boxes created by society for women. It was also very layered- even the side characters had deep backstories and there were plenty of twists to keep you reading at a great pace.

🧙‍♀️🧙‍♀️🧙‍♀️🧙‍♀️/ 🧙‍♀️🧙‍♀️🧙‍♀️🧙‍♀️🧙‍♀️

If you liked the witches of east wick, big little lies or even 9-5 (the movie) you’ll definitely enjoy this read!

Out now

I was interested in this book originally because of the awesome cover. Then I read the description and became very intrigued. I'm so happy I read this book, although I'll be the first to say it will not be for everyone. Three women who are going through menopause become friends. Instead of feeling like less of a woman as society alludes to, each realizes she has been given a "gift". Together, they dig into why several young girls have gone missing in their Long Island community and then found dead. What they uncover despite the odds against them makes them determined to not let any more young women suffer. Along the way, they empower their daughters and other women in the neighborhood to stop taking crap from the men in their lives.
This was a refreshing take on woman empowerment with just enough magical realism to make me smile. The author hit just the right notes to make this a fascinating read. Sometimes it was ugly and crude and laugh-out-loud funny, but so is life.
Thank you #Netgalley and #WilliamMorrow for providing me with an early ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

This was such a great read! After seeing all the hype, I knew I had to join in and read this book immediately and I'm so glad I did! This feminist revenge story has everything - witches, crime, social commentary, and even horticulture! It's a long book, but I was intrigued enough to keep reading. I really liked Miller's writing style and thought it worked well for this book. I liked how some of the writing felt lighter even as it was taking on some heavy topics. The murder mystery was interesting and I wanted our main characters to solve it and get their revenge! For most of the book, I was able to read it pretty quickly. Towards the end, I did think the plot unraveled a little too slowly and there were a couple things that I needed wrapped up more quickly.

While the I really liked the plot of the book and the writing style, the main characters stole the show for me! I loved Harriet, Nessa, and Jo. I thought they were three incredibly strong women and I loved how they were coming into their powers at a time when people didn't expect anything of them anymore. I loved the friendship that was formed and how they supported each other as they went through this stage of their lives. This book was so many different things, but I think each was handled so well! I would certainly recommend this book if you like genre-bending novels and feminist revenge stories (with witches)!

Rating: 3.75 stars

I have so much to say about The Change. My rating comes solely from the fact that I had trouble getting invested in this book. I spent much longer reading it than I thought I would and, while the writing was great, I was never particularly motivated to pick it up or read the next chapter.

With that being said, I think everyone needs to read this book. It left me furious from the very beginning in exactly the ways it was intended to. And what a time for it to be published—when women are being stripped of their rights to control of their own bodies at this very moment! The Change bluntly exposes the atrocities that powerful, rich, white men can get away with—a disturbing parallel to present day.

At the beginning of the story, I was angry and disturbed with what these men did to these girls. By the end, I was fuming. This book completely fired me up. Never have I felt so empowered by a novel. Not only does this story highlight the corruption of some men in the highest positions of power—and the lack of credit women get for the work they achieve, might I add—but just how easily people can justify their inhumane actions.

This is the feminist novel we needed and it couldn’t have come at a better time. Angry women who are motivated to make a change are incredibly powerful, and I absolutely loved the three icons leading this story and the power they symbolized. Thank you Kirsten Miller for bringing them to life!

Not at all what I was expecting. Three women, each with a special “talent” take on a world of scum bag men along with a dirty cop. Could have done without the lesbians.

Holy smash the patriarchy! This book features three super strong women characters, each with a different superpower. who unite to uncover a series of murders in their NY beach town. The novel is a mix of women's fiction, fantasy, and magical realism. I couldn't put it down. This would be an amazing book club read!

I loved parts of this book and the characters. Had such potential for brilliance but I feel like maybe it drug out too long in the middle and at some point I lost interest. I did end up finishing it and the end was okay.