Thank you to @netgalley @stmartinspress, @librofm and @macmillian.audio for the ARC and audios!

This is the second book by Hawkins that I have read and have enjoyed. Taking place between 2 timelines (1974 and present day), we head to Villa Aestas in Orvieto Italy. Between the two timelines, we see different minds creating their art, but what kind of thriller would this be if chaos didnt start?

I enjoyed the chaos, and the mystery surrounding the Villa. There were something’s that if I figured out for myself, and a couple things I would have liked more details on. But overall I really enjoyed it. I ended up switching back and forth form the kindle to the audio while I was on vacation which made it more enjoyable.

I have read 3 of Rachel Hawkins’ books now and have enjoyed them all. I liked the history of the villa being a main plot point as well as the dual time lines. In the beginning it was difficult to remember all the relationships but as the story progressed it became easier. The ending seemed like it wrapped up a little too nicely but still a fun thriller ride!

📚: The Villa by Rachel Hawkins (@ladyhawkins)
⭐️: 4/5

The Villa is a gothic thriller taking place at Villa Aestas (as it’s called in the current day) in Orvieto, Italy. With dual then-and-now narratives, we hear of the villa’s dark past in 1974 with five artists (musicians, writers, and the like) and its equally unsettling current day summer renters, best friends Chess and Emily. As the book opens, we realize throughout the plot that houses remember - and this villa has a lot to remember.

A highly anticipated 2023 release, The Villa is fast paced and gripping, with a twist at the end that’s kept me thinking. I could not put The Villa down, and it’s by far my favorite Rachel Hawkins book yet.

Big thanks to @stmartinspress via @netgalley for the digital ARC in return for an honest review, The Villa is out this week on January 3rd. #gifted

The Villa is a dual timeline story about Mari and Emily, and their time at Villa Aestas outside of Oriveto, Italy.
Emily is an author in the middle of a divorce having difficulty writing the next installment to her popular cozy mystery series. When her friend Chess invites her to Villa Aestas for the summer, she jumps at the opportunity to find her inspiration again.
Mari, her sister Lara and her boyfriend Pierce are invited to Villa Aestas in the summer of 1974 by Lara's boyfriend, rockstar Noel. During that summer, a horrific murder is committed. Mari leaves Villa Aestas having written one of the most popular horror novels.
Emily is inspired by the story of Villa Aestas and decides to investigate what really happened that summer.
I have enjoyed all of Rachel Hawkin's thrillers, and The Villa was no different. There was tension and I didn't guess the twists. I look forward to reading whatever Rachel Hawkin's comes out with next.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Rachel Hawkins for providing me with a complimentary digital ARC for The Villa coming out January 3, 2023. The honest opinions expressed in this review are my own.

Emily and Chess were best friends when they were kids. But by their 30s, their bond has been weakened by leading their separate lives. When Chess suggests a girls trip to Italy, Emily takes the opportunity to reconnect with her old best friend.

Villa Aestas in Orvieto is a high-end vacation destination now. However, in 1974, it was known as Villa Rosato. A popular rock star, Noel Gordon, rented it for the summer. Noel invites newcomer musician, Pierce Sheldon to join him, as well as Pierce’s girlfriend, Mari, and her stepsister, Lara. This vacation sets in motion a chain of events that leads to Mari writing one of the most iconic horror novels and Lara composing an award-winning album. But it also ends in Pierce’s brutal murder.

As Emily delves into the villa’s dark history, she discovers there’s more to the story of that summer of 1974. Maybe Pierce’s murder wasn’t just a tale of rock & roll gone wrong, but that something more evil might have happened––and that there might be clues hidden in the celebrated works of Mari and Lara. 

As Emily gets closer to the truth, she senses more tension developing between her and Chess. Secrets from the past surface and betrayals from the present emerge. There may be another victim in the Villa before summer ends.

This book was inspired by the music of Fleetwood Mac, the Manson murders, and the summer the Shelleys spent with Lord Byron at a Lake Geneva castle.

This was the first book I’ve read by Rachel Hawkins. I’ve listened to the Wife Upstairs and really enjoyed it. I loved this book! I thought it was well-written and fun. I love psychological thrillers that are concise. I love stories about writers and book publishing. I think Emily and Chess’ story was more interesting to me. There were some things at the end that I didn’t care for. I don’t like cheating plots. Mari and Lara had their moments that I enjoyed, but their end felt a little predictable to me. Even so, I loved the story and the inspiration behind it.

I would recommend this to anyone who enjoys thrillers about writers and secluded summer vacation spots!

Real Rating: 3.5 / 5 Stars

Sometimes I’m reading a book and I can’t help but think where the idea came from–where the genesis of the book started for the author. In this case, a rather famous handful of days when an intimate and libertine group of writers and philosophers spent during a handful of interminably rainy days near Geneva, Switzerland in 1816 in a home known as Villa Diodati is what immediately what jumped into my head, and the various tales and known facts of what happened at Villa Diodati among Lord Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Mary Godwin (the future Mary Shelley), John William Polidori (Shelley’s personal physician), and Mary’s stepsister, Claire Clairmont. Mary wrote the first draft of the novel that would become Frankenstein, Polidori wrote The Vampyre, Byron finished up works he had been stuck on, and Claire Clairmont entered into a very short affair with Byron that produced a child she had no means to care for (the child was raised by Byron and his family). Byron proclaimed to hate her and that she was to stay away, but she held onto her obsession with him for years and never married. Percy Bysshe Shelley died a mere six years after the events at Villa Diodati in a sailing accident after a good many years of being in poor health and suffering from severe depression.

So you can see where, when I start to read a book where one timeline is about two best friends who are staying in a villa one summer where, in the past, a group of artists (a writer and three musicians), who are all rather bohemian and fluid in their relationships, all went through a few weeks where a similar (but not same) set of events happened…I wonder if this is a case of coincidence or if the author knew of this tale, cocked her head and said, “If you rework this some, it would make a great idea for a book”.

The thing is: it really does make for a great book idea in the way Rachel Hawkins plotted out the story. This story of covetousness, selfishness, predation, not asking but just taking, male entitlement, female silence, being forced into corners, mental illness, creation, destruction, and Faustian deals.

The problem is: predictability. I knew where this book was going and how it was likely going to end before I hit the 20% mark. I knew what was going on between the best friends in the present timeline, and I knew what was going on and how it was pretty much going to end in the past timeline. So while the writing was entertaining and engaging enough to keep me reading, the enjoyment of reading the book was affected by the book being so predictable. And that begs a follow-up criticism: I can’t be the only one who found it that predictable, which means it’s not just me that’s going to be disappointed by that fact.

Do I still recommend it? Sure. It’s a fun read. I won’t tell you to run out and buy it right now or that you absolutely must read it, but if you happen to like these type of books, why not give it a whirl?

Thanks go out to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for granting me early access to this title in exchange for a fair and honest review.

File Under: Crime Fiction/General Fiction/Psychological Fiction/Suspense Mystery/Women’s Fiction

I tend to really enjoy Rachel Hawkins’ thrillers, and while I definitely enjoyed this one too, it’s SO different from her others – and from most other books I’ve read to date.

A book within a book, this story covers a woman’s divorce and vacation escape with her best friend where they stay at a villa in Italy. Only, once there, Emily dives into the history of the famous murder that occurred there 30 years ago. While digging through the past, she discovers one of the individuals who had been involved, Mari, wrote one of the most famous horror novels to date – and within these pages are apparently hints to what truly happened there all those years ago.

Emily settles in and finds her love of writing again while discovering the truth of the past and writing a tell-all while simultaneously battling her ex-husband and her so-called best friend.

There are a lot of parallels to draw between the past and the present, and it’s easy to get lost in the drama between the characters in both time periods in this story, but sometimes getting lost is the best part.

This is the third book I've read by Rachel Hawkins and I enjoyed it! It follows two best friends who travel to a villa in Italy to spend time together and each write their next book. The villa has a complicated past and the story takes you through the present day and then also flashbacks to the time before the murder happened. I was intrigued from the beginning and although there were some predictable parts, some of the story was still unexpected and fresh.

I received a copy free from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for my honest review.

There are so many authors writing psychological suspense these days that I sometimes feel burned out on the whole genre. Then there’s Rachel Hawkins, author of Reckless Girls and The Wife Upstairs, whose name on the cover practically guarantees a good time. I knew I’d rapidly devour her latest, The Villa, which offers up a female friendship/rivalry story with a pinch of Daisy Jones and the Six plus a soupçon of The Plot.

Emily is in her mid-thirties, a semi-successful author of cozy mysteries. She’s in the process of getting a divorce from her husband, who did not stand by her during a prolonged illness she suffered, but is still intent on receiving a portion of the proceeds from her work. The stress has given Emily a massive case of writer’s block, so when her best friend Chess (neé Jessica), a best-selling, Oprah-anointed author of self-help books, invites her to spend the summer with her at a rented villa in Italy, Emily eagerly takes her up on it.

Emily finds that despite her serene and beautiful surroundings, she’s still unable to work up much interest in the book she’s supposed to be writing; instead, she becomes obsessed with a notorious murder that took place in the villa back in the mid-1970s, when a rock star, a wannabe musician and two stepsisters were occupying the place. One of the women went on to write a successful gothic horror novel, and when Emily finds a copy of it, she realizes that what she really wants to do is investigate and write about what happened during that long-ago summer. Chess is supposed to be working on her next surefire hit book, but Emily can’t help but notice that Chess is acting very strangely, snooping around and peeking at Emily’s notes. Can she trust her longtime friend?

Dual timelines take the reader back to the mid-1970s, when the villa was the site of rock star debauchery, and then to the 2020s, as Emily and Chess warily circle each other. I was sure I knew where The Villa was going, but my instincts were wrong. Any author who can surprise me like that is a gem indeed.

Big points for being unique! I love Rachel Hawkins' writing style, and this had similar tension to the Wife Upstairs, which I also really enjoyed. I thought it was a cool story about friendship and relationships. I'm sure it will do well!

I received an ARC of this book from St. Martin's Press via NetGalley in exchange for my honest feedback. I enjoyed this book, and I think the blurb calling it "gothic suspense" is exactly on point (though the cover doesn't match this description, in my opinion). It was a little slow-moving but still kept my interest, especially when we started reading the chapters from Mari's point of view. I think Mari was a more likable and sympathetic character than Emily. Emily came across as a little too naive to be believable. I really enjoyed the reveals towards the end and how the 2 stories became parallel. I was a little confused about the very end, though - what exactly was the truth? And (trying to phrase this without spoilers) - did I miss it or did we never learn the second hiding place Emily found? I wish we had heard a bit more about the villa itself - what exactly did it look like? Overall this was a solid read and makes me interested in more from this author.

Would you enjoy vacationing in a villa that has a history of death? This is exactly what happens to Emily and Chess, two friends who have reconnected in their thirties and decide to go on a vacation together.

Emily and Chess are both writers. Emily writes cozy mysteries and Chess writes non-fiction self-help books. There is a history of competitiveness between the two women. Combined with the history of the house, the situation between the two women hits a pivotal moment that changes the course of their lives.

This is a story within a story and I was kept guessing at what was going to unfold as I read further. In the other story, Mari and her stepsister Lara are at odds over their romantic interests. Mari is a writer and her story is what guides Emily in the present storyline. Lara is a musician and her music plays a role as well.

I didn’t care too much for the characters, but Chess was absolutely my least favorite. The men in the story left much to be desired. More or less a group of losers playing music, using drugs and having sex with just about anything.

I enjoyed the story and the mystery of it and recommend for readers who also like mystery and aren’t turned off by the fast and loose lifestyle of the characters.

Many thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for allowing me to read an advance copy. I am happy to offer my honest review.

This is my third by Rachel Hawkins' other two books by her pen name Erin Sterling. I will say this was by far my favorite of the five I've read by her, I really liked how both timelines weaved together and enjoyed the different perspectives. I  was all in for the first 75% or so but then the ending felt rushed with too many questions and knocked a star off my rating. This is a solid, entertaining escape read, but don't look too closely at the holes in it!

This was SO much better than I was expecting after being disappointed in Reckless Girls. Even with a slow start, I had a hard time putting it down. Told through dual timelines and the perspectives of Mari and Emily, as they stay at the same Villa (known as the murder house) in Italy, many years apart.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a digital arc of this book that releases Jan 3,2023!

The Villa is not just one, but two incredible psychological thrillers rolled into separate stories, the first from the 1970's and the second from present day. Both are filled with mystery, death, puzzles and revenge. And the main character is the house itself because in the end, the house always remembers...

In 1974 Villa Rosato in Italy was rented by a group of musicians. Mara and Lara are stepsisters who tag along because Lara is seeing the host, famous rock star Noel Gordon and Mara is seeing up and coming song-writer Pierce. Mara is in love with Pierce and Lara sort of falls in and out of love easily, including an affair with Pierce which Mara chooses to overlook. This complication along with sex, drugs and making music become the setting for an almost inevitable disaster.

And what happens during their time together at The Villa is just that, a tragedy with one of them being murdered and one of them imprisoned. But for Mara and Lara their time together at the house will push both of them into stardom. Mara with a bestselling novel called Lilith Rising and Lara with an album titled Aestas which still haunts those who listen to it to this day. But even until both their deaths, they refused to ever discuss what happened at the house that summer.

Flash forward to best friends Emily and Chess. They have been friends since childhood. Even though their lives took them in separate directions with Emily marrying and becoming a cozy mystery writer of a series and Chess becoming a famous lifestyle guru, they remained in each other's lives. Emily is in the midst of a divorce as well as a year of horrible health issues and writer's block when Chess suggests they go away for a month to Italy. Chess is also supposed to be writing a book. Emily agrees.

When they get to Villa Aestas, Emily realizes that this is the house where horrible things had happened years ago. They had changed the name when Lara became famous to Villa Aestas after her best-selling album which they believe she wrote after the killing. While browsing the library Emily discovers a copy of Mara's famous novel, Lilith Rising. As she begins to read the story, she sees a resemblance as to what happened that summer years ago. Fascinated, she develops a theory and begins to explore the house for clues that her thinking might be correct. Emily's obsession with finding out the truth leads her to decide to start a book about her findings.

Chess realizes what Emily is doing. Their relationship begins to fracture and by the end of their time at Villa Aestas there will be another death and their lives will suddenly change forever. You see, houses really do remember.

The Villa is a well-written, mesmerizing story with a built in who done it and a shell-shocking ending you will not see coming.

Thank You #NetGalley #St.Martin'sPress #TheVilla #RachelHawkins for the advanced copy.

This was an okay read. There were aspects of this book that I really enjoyed. It was fast paced and was invested in the story and really enjoyed the dual timelines but I didn’t love how it ended.
I would rate it 3.5 but rounded it up to 4 stars

Closed out 2022 with this 5 star read!

Reckless Girls was a miss for me, but THIS, this was DEFINITELY for me.

I devoured this story (within a story) told between two time periods. I LOVED that we got a sneak peak into the "sex drugs and rock n roll" era and that it was equally told from the present as well.

Any book set in Italy could do no wrong in my opinion. I imagined this villa was gothic-chic with lots of horror lingering over it. I would have liked to hear more description of the villa, but perhaps it would have not been relevant.

Watching the two time period weave together was haunting and beautiful!

Thank you so much for this ARC!

I liked this a lot better than the previous work I read by the author. However, Chess was nigh on insufferable, so that was a lot to take. Overall, though, it was worth reading.

The Villa is very different from Rachel Hawkins previous books. The setting takes place in a very picturesque Italian village. The villa as a history of previous murders that have happened. The most notorious one taking place in the summer of 1974. When two best friends Chess and Emily rent the villa for the summer, Emily embarks on writing a true crime story about the people involved with 1974 murder and how the novel Lilith Rising came to be. I liked that it had the story of Mari, Lara, Pierce, Johnnie, and Noel intertwined with Emily. Emily saw the clues that Mari had left in her novel Lilith Rising to find the missing pages of Mari’s diary to find out what happened that fateful night. Even though you find out in the end that it was all fictional. This is the best one yet from Rachel Hawkins yet!

For this my last book of 2022 I did a blend of listening to the audio and reading on kindle. I liked the narrators and thought they brought their characters to life. I did have a harder time getting to Mari’s parts, but as I got further into the story those were actually the parts that had me more interested. I felt bad for Emily. She picked a poor husband and an even poorer BFF. I didn’t like Chess through the whole story and wondered why they were friends, especially by the end. This book wasn’t exactly the thriller I was expecting, but it was a suspenseful story told in dual timelines which I’ve always liked. This is the story of a Villa in Italy and two women who stayed there. Emily is surprised to hear a famous murder of a famous musician occurred in the villa Chess has for them to stay in that summer. But as Chess says someone has died everywhere. But the more Emily learns the more interested she is.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/4873375427