3.75 stars

My first book of the year did not disappoint - this book was so good!

Emily and Chess, two friends who have drifted apart, decide to reunite and go on a girls trip to Italy and stay at Villa Aestas, perviously known as Villa Rosato. The villa happens to be where a famous murder occurred in 1974 which led to a great horror novel and platinum album. While Emily and Chess take their time at the villa to work on their respective novels, a rivalry emerges between them, and many secrets about the murder along with their own lives begin to emerge.

I loved the intertwining of the story lines of past and present as well as multiple POVs. This added a lot to the story and made it really enjoyable to read. At first, I will admit, I was confused with the way it jumped back and forth, but I got used to the more I read the story. I did love Hawkins’ writing style, but just found it a little confusing the way it jumped timelines at times.

It was very slow at the beginning of the book and hard to get into. However, about halfway through, I was on the edge of my seat and couldn’t put it down because I wanted to see what would be revealed next! Some of the twists were predictable, however, I still found myself hooked by them.

As for the villa itself, I felt that it wasn’t as creepy and haunting as I had anticipated when reading the description. I felt a little let down but this, but still enjoyed it nonetheless.

Overall, this was a good book! If you’re looking for a quick, suspenseful read, I would definitely recommend this!

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.

The story was somewhat interesting but I never really got that invested into it. I could not connect with the characters at all. The cover is beautiful and I really enjoyed this author’s other books, but this one was not for me.

Chess and Emily have been best friends since childhood. Chess invites Emily to vacation with her in Italy for inspiration. They are both writers. Chess writes self help books and Emily writes cozy mysteries. The Italian villa is already booked and Chess just just needs to talk Emily into the trip. Emily needs the time away. Chess is enjoying stratospheric level stardom and success. Emily though, is struggling. She is in the middle of a divorce, her manuscript is due, and she has nothing written so far. To top that off, she is just starting to feel better after battling an unknown illness. Emily does agree to the girls trip. She quickly discovers that the villa Chess rented is where a murder occurred in the 70’s.

The story alternates between two different timelines. The Villa explores the past history of the house and it’s inhabitants and how the secrets of the house and what happened back then are influencing and affecting Chess and Emily today.

I thought the beginning was well paced, exciting, and intriguing. The book has a very atmospheric feel with its heavy gothic vibes. Very reminiscent of a Victoria Holt novel. The latter part of the book wasn’t as solid as far as pacing, but I like that there are some surprises especially one I really didn’t see coming. 3.5/5 stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

I received an advance copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

The Villa (eARC) — 4 ⭐️

𝐏𝐮𝐛𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐞: January 3rd

𝐑𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰: What a great book to start 2023! I liked the different perspectives and the multiple timelines. For some reason, reading about authors and books is one of my favorite things, so I was pleasantly surprised that some of the main characters were writers.

This story gave me Daisy Jones and the Six and Verity vibes, so if you enjoy reading TJR and CoHo’s stories, this book is for you!

𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐈 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞𝐝 —
🤩 Addicting Read
👩‍🏫 Ambitious MC
👀 Multiple POVs
😨 Twists and Turns
⏳ Multiple Timelines
✍️ Book about a Writer
🔍 Mystery
😧 Historical Thriller

𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐛𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐢𝐟 —
🧺 You enjoy picnics
🎸 You want to be friends with a famous musician
📝 You want to write self-help books
🚪 You enjoy finding hidden spots in houses
⚔️ You have a love/hate relationship with your BFF

𝐓𝐖: murder, infidelity, blood, child death, abortion, miscarriage, suicide

Thank you, NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press, for providing me an eARC copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I had really high hopes for this book but found I had a hard time getting into it. About half way through it finally grabbed me but the intertwining storylines at time left me with whiplash and confused. The characters seems to be lacking in their depth, or maybe there were just too many of them to expand on.
Overall I gave this a 3.25 stars. Not sure I would read it again.

Thank you NetGalley and St Martin’s Press for my review copy!

Since this book took place in Italy, I feel like it’s best to describe this book by using a pasta analogy:

Nothing is wrong with a plain bowl of pasta. right? BUT we can all agree that to make a pasta dish spectacular it needs sauce, cheese, spices, oil, veggies, and protein.

This read felt like a boring plate of plain pasta - bland, not exciting, and left A LOT to be desired.

I didn’t find anything overly problematic - I did think the friendship between Chess and Emily to be toxic and very unhealthy for both parties.

It also had super long chapters which are not my favorite. At all.

While I enjoyed the present timeline, the past “rock and roll” storyline was not my cup of tea,

The Villa was more of a mystery novel, than a thriller. It definitely had an element of “gothic suspense” which was somewhat interesting, but not a sub genre I gravitate towards.

Most of the “action” happened the last twenty percent, and what I THOUGHT was going to happen (which would have made the ending exciting!) didn’t happen and I was left EXTREMELY underwhelmed.

I didn’t hate reading this, just like I don’t hate a boring bowl of plain pasta. Would I recommend you order the same thing at Olive Garden? No.

SIMONE SAYS READ THIS IF YOU LIKE

creepy villas in Italy
dual timelines
toxic childhood friendships
< 300 page reads
a story within a story
books about authors

Thank you to @netgalley and @stmartinpress for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review

Childhood friends, Emily, and Chess, have weathered ups and downs, fame and misfortune, happiness and heartbreak in their decades long friendship. After one of their lunches to catch-up on each other's lives, Chess poses the idea they spend the summer at an Italian villa to reaffirm their bond and maybe get some work done on their individual projects. The story is intriguing and engaging though at times, a bit far flung. The mysterious murder that happened in 1974 quickly draws Emily into its intrigue and Chess is eager to cash in on the idea too. Will Chess and Emily’s friendship last the summer in the Italian Villa or will the villa’s history be the killing force behind another tragedy? Definitely a solid 4 stars with enough backstabbing and mystery to keep me questioning the characters all the way to the end.

Thank you to Netgalley, St. Martin’s Press, and Rachel Hawkins for allowing me to read an Advanced Reader Copy (ARC) of The Villa for an honest review.

I have to admit that when I first read the synopsis of this book, I was a little hesitant because of its gothic description. I’ve heard nothing but great things about Rachel Hawkins as an author and I’m so glad I gave it a chance! The book definitely did not have the same vibes as others gothic inspired books that I’ve read and exceeded my expectations by leaps and bounds. It has more of a Stevie Nicks and Manson Murder vibe that I really enjoyed. Kudos to Hawkin’s creativity and writing style!

The Villa follows two story lines: 1) Best friends, Emily and Tess, and 2) Popular singer and songwriter Noel Gordon and groupies.

Emily, just separated from her husband has lost her passion for writing and is desperately looking for ways to ignite the flame again. Tess, popular inspirational and self help writer plans to spend her summer in Italy and thinks that this trip is exactly what bff Emily needs to get out of her emotional slump. Tess coordinates and pays for the whole affair!

In 1974, Noel Gordon, acclaimed musician feels as if he’s lost his touch. He plans to spend his summer in Italy collaborating with new friend Pierce Sheldon. Accompanying them are Pierce’s girlfriend, Mari and her stepsister, Lara.

Both story lines take place in the same house and in the same city, Orvieto. The house was named Villa Rosato when inhabited by the notorious rock star and Villa Aestas when inhabited by Emily and Tess.

These storylines mirror each other in the following themes: friendship, seeking a fresh start, drama, infidelity, artistry, and murder. Will loyalty to friendship outweigh loyalty to love?

I highly recommend that you read The Villa the first chance you get in the new year! I have a feeling you won’t be able to put it down.

So I am not a new reader of Rachel Hawkins; this is probably my favorite one of hers yet! This was a unique approach of kept having two timelines for the villa in Italy timeline of the same villa in Italy. I love the dark history of the villa.
Emily struggles with writer's block while going through a messy divorce and recovering from her health scare. Her agent is hounding her for the next book in her cozy mystery series. While it seems her life is in a tail spinning, her best friend invites her to spend a month at an infamous Italian Villa.
Let's go back to the summer of 1974when a rockstar Noel Gordon invites Lara, her stepmother Mari and Mari's boyfriend Pierce to spend the summer at the same villa. Lara is hoping that she will be able to get closer to Noel. At the same time, Mari hopes her boyfriend's music career will take off with Noel. However, the summer of sex, drugs, and music will end in a murder.
Now I enjoyed the different twists and turns of the novel! One of the twists I could see coming, but the last chapter was AMAZING!!! I recommend this if you love a good suspenseful mystery!
I want to thank St. Martins Press and Netgalley for the opportunity to read and review this one!

I wanted to love this book but I didn’t. I found it to be extremely predictable and not terribly unique. I read it quickly hoping some big twist would occur but was disappointed when it never did.

Childhood besties Emily and Chess, have taken different paths in their adult lives, but they hope to reconnect during a Summer trip to Villa Aestas in Orvieto, Italy. Upon arrival Emily learns that the villa was the location of a horrible murder in the 70s which leads her on a true crime investigation of sorts and thoughts of turning it into a book. The story is told via two timelines, the present with Emily and Chess and then the flashbacks to the previous murder.

Having read Hawkins' last two books, I could tell that her style is alive and well in this book. I was more invested in the current timeline with Chess and Emily's frenemy game of cat and mouse. I never got fully invested in the 70s story. At less than 300 pages, the ending wrapped things up a little too quickly for my liking. I'll pretty much listen to anything Julia Whelan has a role in narrating, and she didn't disappoint here; Kimberly M. Wetherell and Shiromi Arserio did a good job as well.

Rating: 3 stars

Special thanks for @macmillan.audio @netgalley and @libro.fm for the ALC of The Villa for review purposes.

At a Villa in Italy in the summer of 1974, three musicians, a writer and a drug dealer collide in ways that will immediately and immeasurably dictate the rest of their lives. Nearly fifty years later best friends Emily and Chess, both writers of wildly different genres, arrive at the same Villa for a summer of inspirational writing. Both women are bound in ways neither of them fully know. From a variety of time and character perspectives, all the pieces of each mystery are pulled together. While quite twisty, I found most of the twists to be predictable. Regardless, this was still a fun ride to the end.

Emily & Chess are childhood best friends who have grown distant throughout adulthood, yet maintain an unbreakable bond. while Chess has risen to fame with her popular self-help books, Emily struggles to find her own writing inspiration as she battles through an ugly divorce that threatens to take much of her assets. so when Chess invites Emily to spend the summer in an Italian villa, she accepts the offer with pleasure.

upon arriving in Italy, Emily researches an infamous murder among rockstars that took place several decades ago in their current villa, leading to one of the greatest horror novels of all time, written by one of the survivors. Emily digs into this story & finds enlightening clues about the murder, reigniting her energy and passion to write something unlike anything she’s written before. but the more inspired she becomes, the more tension seems to grow in the villa, and Emily uncovers more secrets than she was prepared for.

this book grabbed my attention from the start, but unfortunately my interest waned the further along I read. the story alternates between the villa’s present-day guests & the guests from the past. i found myself much more entertained by the present-day perspective, & i thought the tension between Emily & Chess was well-written, with a clear alpha in the relationship. that being said, I guessed a big part of the ending & didn’t find much of the story elements to be overly surprising or shocking.

there’s also a huge part in the present-day ending that’s like a BFD that gets severely brushed over in my opinion…? without giving any spoilers, it’s just something that I would expect to have a bigger part in the book, whereas to me it seemed rushed w/ a super unrealistic & nonchalant solution. that being said, it’s a quick read that kept me interested enough to finish in a few sittings. there are lots of great reviews for this on Goodreads, so don’t let my thoughts deter you from checking it out!

thank you to @netgalley & @stmartinspress for my #advancedreaderscopy. pub date is tomorrow, 1/3/23!! 📚

Thanks to Netgalley, St. Martin’s Press, and Macmillan Audio for the ARC and audioARC of this!

Wow, I did not see the end of this coming at all. For such a small book, a lot was packed into it between the summer of the murder, the horror novel, and the present day. Definitely kept me wondering where it was going! For fans of books about writers behaving badly, true crime, and books in books, this gave me some subtle Verity vibes.

This was a fun, can't put down kind of read to start off the year! Dual timeline, suspense, and slow burn! It wasn't spooky nor did I really get the "gothic" vibes that it's being described as, but that might just be me.

Two lifelong friends and both become authors as adults. Chess is significantly more known than Emily. Emily seems to be losing everything from her husband to possibly her career. They decide to spend the summer in Italy at a villa that is known for a murder that happened in the 70's when five friends stayed there. Once in Italy, Emily becomes completely fascinated with the villa and the dark history it holds. Secrets began to unfold, including a secret that would directly affect her.

Thank you, NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the eARC in exchange for my honest review! All thoughts and opinions are my own!

I received this eARC from NetGalley and the publisher in return for an honest review.

The Villa is a great vacation read. A contemporary mystery thriller primarily set in Italy, but a parallel story from 1974 is interwoven. The two 2023 characters, Emily and Chess are childhood friends, now authors in their 30s. In 1974, we follow the story of two 19 year old stepsisters, Mari and Lara and the three men they live with in the Italian villa, a group of musicians and writers at varying levels of success. This thriller pays off as a page turner with a few twists at the end.

It can be fully appreciated solely as a thriller but there's also lots to discuss about women's friendships and self identity if that's of interest.

WOW! This was my first Rachel Hawkins book and I totally loved it! Best friends, both authors, head to Italy to spend the summer writing. Emily, in the process of a divorce, writes cozy mysteries and is stuck on finishing the tenth book in her series while Chess has made millions as a self-help guru. The house Chess has rented is a villa with a dark past. In 1974, a friend group of artists - writers and rockstars - stay for the summer hoping to find inspiration, what they find is tragedy. But out of tragedy, the two women create their masterpieces - just like Chess and Emily.

This is a twisty thriller with the feeling of a ghost story. The first line "Houses remember" really got me ready for this ride and it instantly made me think of another dark thriller where the house seems like it's also a main character - "Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again." IYKYK

The book bounces between the modern time with Emily and Chess back to 1974 with Mari and Lara. The similarities between the two groups and the two summers is striking at times, making you come up with different scenarios and conclusions. The author leads you to a different resolution (one I didn't see coming) and then in the last chapter bring out a whole different story. I definitely enjoyed this read and can't wait to try out more from this author. Thank you for the opportunity and privilege to read an advance reader copy.

After reading (and really enjoying) The Wife Upstairs a few years ago, I was excited to see Rachel Hawkins had a new book coming out…and the cover is absolutely stunning! (and most of my thriller books just aren’t this pretty).

This is a super super slow burn- a little too slow for me- and overall it was an ok book, but I wouldn’t really consider it a thriller, which was I think one of my main issues. It was missing the twists and jaw dropping moments, and any real action didn’t come until about 70% into the book. The two big surprises left me feeling underwhelmed and waiting for more to happen.

The chapters were extremely long and I felt like I was losing steam into some of them. There were also some news articles and interviews added in here & there but I didn’t feel like they added a whole lot.

The story flips between two timelines and POVS, which could have been super interesting but the past storyline left me a little uninterested (again, I just think because of the length of the chapters and not enough breaks).

I wasn’t really attached to any of the characters and actually ended up pretty frustrated with the main character and her actions in this one.

I will say the book was very well written and I had a pretty clear image of the characters and villa in my head. There were parts of the present storyline I enjoyed and those parts were sure a quicker read. I liked the musical aspect, and think it could be a good book if you go into not expecting major thrills.

I do wonder if I would have felt differently if I had listened to the audiobook. The narrator, Julia Whelon, is fantastic and has read so many audiobooks I enjoyed. So just a thought, if you’re interested in this book and love audios, that could be a great option!

What an interesting ride this one was! I really appreciated the multiple narrators for this one in terms of the past voice and the present, and bringing in some interviews and a podcast was a really neat way to do this true crime. I thought the present storyline was super predictable and a bit annoying given the FMC for that segment being so dense. I most appreciated hearing about what happened in the past story line. I didn't really understand the point of the ultimate ending and thought it took away a bit of the end. Overall though, I binged the heck out of it in a little over a day, so I would definitely recommend this one to folks who are looking for a really solid beach thriller.

Thanks to the publisher and netgalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I’m mixed on this one. I listened to the audio version and enjoyed the narrators, especially having the different narrators for each timeline. There were some parts of the storyline that felt obvious and some twists and turns. Parts of it were amazingly suspenseful but others slow. I’m still not sure I would recommend this one or not.