WOW ... What A Ride!

Many thanks to NetGalley and Bookouture for a free ARC of this book.

After reading these two books by Carey Baldwin, this writer is now one of my go-to authors. The Marriage Secret blew me away. 


"Just because you don't mean any harm to anyone doesn't mean they don't mean any harm to you. I want what you have, and I'm coming for it." From these lines in the first couple of pages, the narrative grabs the reader by the throat and doesn't let you breathe until the end. 

Immediately before her wedding, Mia confided a great secret to her husband about something that happened when she was sixteen. He still wanted to marry her and said he'd keep her secret. What she didn't know then was he intended to use it to control and coerce her. As the book progresses, we discover that hubby, Zach Bancroft, has major issues, and he abuses his wife psychologically and emotionally. Also turns out, he doesn't treat his mother much better. His was a character I hated with venom, which takes extraordinarily good writing to achieve while still being able to tolerate reading. Mia, I loved. Sometimes, I disliked her choices, but I could well understand them. The world building, characterisation, and plot were all done excellently, and I read this book in one sitting. I stayed up until midnight devouring the action. I could not put this read down. Here are some lines I loved ...

"His voice could've flash frozen a side of beef ..."

And ...

"Only right now those lucky stars were hiding behind the clouds."

And ...

"...that's what a cold-hearted murderer would've done. Too bad her heart wasn't yet frozen solid."


At the three-quarter point, a twist rocked me that I just did not see coming. And, impossible though it seemed at the time, the tension ratcheted up even more. The next big twist, I had kinda wondered if that might happen, but it was thrilling nonetheless, and I loved the way it was portrayed. That came at the 90% point, and the final confrontation and reasons, well ... I simply could never have guessed the what or the who. I can't say more without giving away major spoilers. Suffice it to say, The Marriage Secret gets a solid and enthusiastic five stars from me. You have to go and read this book!


***

NOTE ON RATINGS: I consider a 3-star rating a positive review. Picky about which books I give 5 stars to, I reserve this highest rating for the stories I find stunning and which moved me.

5 STARS: IT WAS AMAZING! I COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN! — Highly Recommended.
4 STARS: I WOULD PULL AN ALL-NIGHTER — Go read this book.
3 STARS: IT WAS GOOD! — An okay read. Didn’t love it. Didn’t hate it.
2 STARS: I MAY HAVE LIKED A FEW THINGS —Lacking in some areas: writing, characterisation, and/or problematic plot lines.
1 STAR: NOT MY CUP OF TEA —Lots of issues with this book.

Thanks Netgalley and the Publisher. I enjoyed this, great characters and a really good storyline. Would recommend to others.

A clever, fast-paced thriller with a great twist you won't see coming! the support creates such an uncomfortable and tense atmosphere. totally binge worthy.

Okay so this man is vile. Controlling and evil and a liar. But he knows your secret and if you leave who knows what he would do. Well actually you do k ow what he will do and it’s not good.

Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

It appears to be a perfect marriage, but looks can be deceiving.

Holly starts to question her sanity, until she realizes her husband Zack may be playing a deadly game with her… and with others. He knows a secret about Holly, and controls her in exchange for keeping her secret safe, but Holly has other ideas about how to break free.

I couldn’t put this book down, on edge to see what would happen next. I thought I knew what would happen, then the twist at the end had me thinking WOW!!

I loved it. 5 stars!

Book Review 📚 ⭐️⭐️⭐️ ⭐️

The Marriage Secret by Carey Baldwin
Book comes out Feb 10th

Zach and Holly seem like the perfect couple with a baby on the way but looks are very deceiving. Holly feels trapped because she told Zach a secret from her past that could destroy her future so what can she do? Does Zach have any secrets she can use against him?

I really enjoyed this book and the manipulation of Zach but the way the story/chapters are told are very choppy. Once you get sucked in, the next chapter is about something else and you felt left hanging wanting more details but they never came. I did not see the twist ending coming which was a great surprise! All in all it was a good book.
Thank you NetGalley #careybaldwinauthor @Bookouture for the arc!!! #elizabethreviewsbooks #bookreview #themarriagesecret #kindle #kindlepaperwhite

Holly is married to the man of her dreams, an OB/GYN, and is preparing for the birth of their first child, a daughter. But the day she goes into labor, her husband, Zachary, gets angry at her for leaving her shoes in the middle of the kitchen which he tripped on, causing himself to spill coffee in his hands. Freezing her out while she is in labor and shutting down the alarms on the machines when they sounded, Holly eventually has a c-section.

What follows is a series of controlling situations: Holly allegedly taking too many pain pills, but not remembering, police being called because she fears her daughter has been kidnapped, a mother in law who has stated that she believes her son all the time over anyone else, a husband having a secret affair with one of his medical students. There is revenge and lost hope. Lie upon lie is perpetuated.

As I read this book, there were a lot of gaps. This is the first book to read by Baldwin so I don’t know if the choppy, gap filled writing is typical. For instance, when the police detective is talking to Holly and Zachary about her 9-1-1 call reporting her daughter being kidnapped, it was like the chapter was written in reverse. You don’t figure out the “why” she thought the baby was kidnapped until most of the chapter was done. I found myself trying to like just one of the characters, but found Zachary to be ridiculously unlikeable and Holly to be too dependent on her husband due to a secret she told him that happened when she was 16. She treated her relationship with him like she was so lucky to have a doctor love her enough to marry her and worship her when she did something so terrible as a teenager. Then the supporting cast of characters, like his mother and the other woman, again put him on a pedestal and Holly was nothing more that what you scoop out of the kitty litter. ⭐️⭐️⭐️

#netgalley #arc #themarriagesecret #careybaldwin #bookouture

This was a solid 4 star novel. The plot was good and had some original elements, and the characters were decently written.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this free arc in exchange for a fair and honest review!

What shocks me is how evil people can be towards those they claim to care for. It makes me really wonder what it takes to create that much hate in someone.
As has been said, on the surface, things look so good. And as always, there are terrible, life changing secrets that send to set the course of their lives. The gorgeous, rich doctor, his pretty wife and adorable daughter live near their best friends, when the husband is killed in a terrible car wreck. Their perfect lives start showing some cracks and others end up dead. As she tries to find a way out and to protect her daughter, other revelations are made and the climax is violent.
The final denouement reveals all sorts of secrets and double and triple crosses. Fast read.

This is my first read by this author and interesting premise but the writing style felt a bit rocky because the chapter would end with a cliffhanger and then completely start somewhere else. I was getting toward the end with a lot of loose ends which was explained at the very epilogue which made me feel kind of like it didn’t make any sense. There were many twists and turns and you’re guessing is the husband the culprit and then you get a sense everyone is a suspect. Not sure it was believable even for a fiction story. It was engaging enough and wanted to see what happens at end but not so satisfying.

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher’s for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest opinion.

3.5 stars

A true domestic thriller with great twists. My only downfall was that I felt like it was a little drawn out. The beginning starts strong and initially hooks you. It’s the middle of the book when I started losing interest. It ultimately picked back up towards the ending of the book when the twists came to fruition but by that point, I was just semi unengaged to really be shocked.

A solid women's psychological thriller that keeps readers engaged in every turn of the page.
The Marriage Secret is the first book I've read by the author Carey Baldwin. This is by far the best psychological thriller I've pored over this year. This is my favorite genre and the author hit the nail in the head in all the right places. The plots and twists are satisfying in every way.

Holly Bancroft has it all - a handsome, loving, and successful husband, all the nice and pretty things she did not want for anything, and a baby girl on the way. Secretly, another woman is plotting a devious plan to take away all that Holly has. Zach, the husband, is the head of the OB-GYN department at a major hospital in Phoenix, Arizona. He may look like the doting husband on the outside but he is a monster and pure evil behind closed doors.

Zach is a controlling, pathological liar that does things to make Holly look like she's losing her mind. Blame it all on the baby brain. From the ransom note to "forgetting" the baby monitor in the freezer, to canceling access to her bank accounts and credit and debit cards to taking her baby away twice without warning. Holly and Zach have leverage against each other. One is a secret to keep them together, the other is a secret to separate them forever.

I read the dedication — For You The Reader Whether this is the first of my books you’ve read or one of many, I’m honored. I've never had a book dedicated to me before, the reader. I've decided that I'm going to like this author even before I started reading the first page.

This has the elements of a philandering husband and gaslighting to make the wife seem insane so she will lose custody of her child story. However, in this book, Holly, is a strong female protagonist and she knows that she is being lied to. Zach likes to flatter. But when Holly does something that Zach does not approve of he gives her the silent treatment then lavishes her with gifts or an expensive trip to Tahiti to make up for how he treated her so coldly. This type of dynamic between couples creates major cognitive dissonance, especially towards the husband's behavior.

There are also a lot of women-helping-other-women elements in the book. I've recently joined the local Women's Chamber in my state and our mission is to raise women in leadership and business. In the book, I like the portrayal of women's friendship and how Holly has battled inner conflict on how she had acted when one of her friends lost her husband.

This book is a must-read for everybody, especially women. We can learn a lot from Holly, her friends, her best friend Tamara, Frances, Zach's mom, her long-time friends, and the women Zach had affairs with. Now more than ever, we women should help each other and side with each other. Be there for each other.

"The way Tamara had carried herself, with such grace, after Tom died, even though her heart had been breaking, made Holly admire her. She realized she should’ve told Tamara that, but she’d been preoccupied with her pregnancy, and Tamara was so strong she didn’t seem to need anyone’s approval." - The Marriage Secret by Carey Baldwin.

This is very sad, I wish more women will support other women and be vocal about it.

"People are so wrapped up in themselves they don't pay that much attention." - The Marriage Secret by Carey Baldwin

And this one goes out to everybody. Nowadays, especially during this pandemic, the ME attitude is more pronounced. Let's pause and go back to our reality. Let's check on how our family, our mom, our dads, our brothers, and sisters are doing. Let's ask how our friends are doing. Our colleagues at work.

I could go on and on. I encourage you, the reader, to pick up this book and start reading.

I consider the book to be something that everyone should read. I would definitely read it again.

*Thank you so much to publisher Bookouture and NetGalley for providing me an advance reader copy of the ebook in exchange for an honest and unbiased review.

First book I have read by this author and liked the style of writing. I enjoyed the book but felt like I was attracted to it from numerous wow rated reviews. In my opinion it was a good read but not a wow.

4.5 stars. This was a easy and fast paced read that I couldn’t put down. The twist at the end was so surprising. I definitely didn’t see that coming. I was routing for Holly the whole time. Zack was such a jerk. Thanks NetGalley for this advanced copy of this book. I will be recommending this to all my thriller lovers.

This is a page turner! In this domestic thriller, Holly and Zach are married and have just had their first child, Jolene. No spoilers! This book hooked me from the beginning. I look forward to reading more from this clever writer.

They always say that you can never really know what goes on inside a marriage. Holly seems to have everything - a devoted husband, married to a doctor, perfect home life and a baby on the way. But like real life, nothing is ever as perfect as it seems. The cracks star to show when baby Jolene is born, husband Zach becomes less than the perfect husband and Holly begins to feel her life is falling apart.

This is an excellent read, a psychological thriller that includes domestic abuse - mental rather than physical - with a controlling husband whose moods change alarmingly if he is caught out in a lie, or people don’t give him the respect he believes he deserves. Holly is an interesting character, who comes across as quite naive to start with but who is fierce where daughter Jolene is concerned. I did get a bit frustrated with her at the beginning, but as the story went on, her character developed really well. This was fast paced, with twists and turns that had me holding my breath at times and an ending I didn’t see coming. Well worth the read.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this book.

The Marriage Secret is a domestic thriller. This book is definitely a quick read.

Holly lives a perfect life with her adoring husband, Zach, who is a handsome doctor. But things are not at all what they seem. Preparing to go to the hospital to deliver their first child, Zach changes on a dime and goes from loving to abusive. In the delivery room Zach gives Holly the silent treatment due to an incident that occurs as they are leaving for the hospital. During contractions he fiddles with the IV and causes her to need a C-section. The control, manipulation and abuse escalate when she returns home and he takes the baby to his mother's house unknown to Holly. The mind games, abuse and control Zach uses over Holly get worse over the next six months. Slowly but surely Holly decides she needs to get away from Zach. She will get the upper hand, she thinks, until everything starts to unravel. Holly will try to keep her daughter safe as she puts a plan into action.

This story has many twists and turns. You will need a scorecard to keep track of who is on which side as no one is as honest as they appear.

Found this book difficult to get into and all most gave up glad that I persevered and fond myself imerssed in the story,A strong storyline with an unusual theme with twists and turns throughout a good read thoroughly recommended edge of the seat thriller.

Holly is stuck in a controlling marriage with her husband Zach. She is tired of pretending that everything is perfect and she is ready for a divorce – except Zach knows her secret. That is until Zach becomes a suspect for murder, and Holly provides his alibi. Now she has leverage.

WOW. This book was entertaining, and my jaw literally dropped when I realized what happened. I haven’t read a psychological thriller this good in a very long time. This is EXACTLY what all thrillers should aim to do. For me this is on the same level as Verity. Would highly recommend to all.

Thank you to NetGalley and Bookouture for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Carey Baldwin writes one heck of a thriller in "The Marriage Secret". Zach, at first glance, seems like the perfect husband and his wife tries her best to think so too. He is an ObGyn and her first inkling that he is not what he seems is on the day she delivers their daughter. Zach is angry that she left her shoes in the kitchen causing him to trip...so angry that while she is suffering thru labor he does some seemingly cruel things...Then there is a note. Things get worse, but with the help of her friend Tamara whose own husband tragically was killed in a car accident, she may just make it out of this mess. However, life is a twisty mess and things get more and more interesting.
This was a really engaging book. Nothing is as it seems. I figured out a few things as the book progressed but the ending sneaks up on you. If you like a good mystery, thrilling plot, and really ugly relationship mysteries this book will keep you up all night. Thanks to #The MarriageSecret#NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this page-turner!