The Opportunist is a great psychological thriller about full of family drama. It's enticing from the first page and you won't want to put it down. Alana is forced to go back home when her father starts dating a much young woman. Her brothers are suspicious and want her help to protect their father and his money. Alana is forced to confront her past and the secrets her family keeps. This book is riddled with family drama and secrets that will keep you guessing till the end!

I really enjoyed this book, which I would classify as a domestic suspense, in which we watch a rich family try to figure out what the heck is going on behind the scenes and try to outsmart each other when it seems that everyone is keeping secrets from each other.

Wow - what a ride from start to finish! Just when you think you've got everything figured out -WHAM! The author throws a twist in there that complicates things. And what's the most interesting thing is that they're probable twists - not something completely out of left field, but something that could totally happen, if you could have figured it out.

And the ending really blew me away. I was absolutely floored! Great job by the author really laying out the framework for an amazing twist ending that left my jaw on the floor. Bravo!

The characters are also really well done, from the siblings a the heart of the novel, to the new, young girlfriend - to the trophy girlfriend who has more to her than first appears. It was like watching an episode of a reality show on Bravo, with characters that you liked, and some characters that you just couldn't stand. And some the you just couldn't figure out - dun dun dun!

Needless to say, I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a great weekend read or a twisty domestic suspense that takes you into world of the insanely rich and privileged.

I really enjoyed reading this one! It was a quick and enjoyable read, but didn’t have that extra oomph that I was looking for.

This book was not for me, I could not finish it. I felt that the writing style and characters were hard to connect with and follow and I didn’t really care for what I read of the plot.

Alana has been estranged from her Uber-wealthy family for years and years but she's made a full, albeit challenging life with her daughter Lily who has Duchene's muscular dystrophy. So when her brother Martin shows up, she's intrigued by his proposal that she offer the much younger woman their father plans to marry millions to leave him before the wedding. This sets up a twisty novel that's got some big surprises ahead. Turns out Alana and Kelly bond a bit when Alana goes to her father's private island but Kelly doesn't bite on the offer, enraging Martin and her other brother Teddy. There are big secrets on the island, including the fate of their sister Lillian and the reason Alana left. This moves back and forth a bit in time and Friedman drops clues that you will remember when more is revealed. I found myself rooting for Alana, wondering about Kelly, annoyed by Martin, and so on. And the privilege = the island, the yacht! I have to admit I didn't expect much from this when I started it- I expected it to be trope-y - but wow- it's a page turner and the surprises , right up to the last page, were terrific. Thanks to the publisher for the ARC. Great read.

This book was interesting and had a satisfying twist. However, some of the content was quite unpalatable. Definitely gives Succession and Knives Out vibes.

I struggled in the first half of this book, the characters lacked depth and I had trouble connecting with them. The book picks up about 40% of the way in and I ended up glad I stuck it out. I actually did not see the plot twist coming and I found it so satisfying/vindicating.

⭐️: 2.5/5

Alana is surprised to hear from her estranged brothers when they come looking for her help breaking up the relationship and impending marriage of their father and his much, much younger nurse-turned-fiancée, Kelly. The favor that Alana agrees to ends up being much easier said than done, when in the course of helping her brothers remove Kelly from the picture, some other pieces of their family’s dark history are brought forward once again.

If I had to choose three words to describe this book, I’d say “stiff”, “unpolished”, and “emotionless”. It’s unfortunate, because the premise and honestly the whole story was such a good concept, and if executed better, could have been an amazing and really clever book. However, as it was written, it was a prime example of telling not showing when it comes to…literally every aspect of the book. The character development was definitely treated as an afterthought, and the narrative was very “this happened then this happened then this happened” with little emotion or nuance inserted between the telling of the events. The dialogue was particularly difficult to follow, because there were long strings of quoted conversations between characters, but no denotation of who was saying what, just alternating quotes. This is sometimes an effective dialogue technique in books, in order to cut down on the “he said”, “she replied” words that you have to read, but in this case, it made it really hard to follow. The writing style really could have benefitted from extensive editing, because it struggled to convey emotion and read a little bit like a middle school short story, if you know what I mean. All my critiques were very disappointing to me, because the story in a more polished form would have been a top tier psychological, family thriller. But as it is, it was a little bit of a rough read.

Thanks to @netgalley and @_mira_books_ for this eARC in exchange for my honest review!!

Alana doesn’t want anything to do with her estranged, wealthy father or her brothers. When her father starts dating his nurse, forty eight years younger than him, she goes back to assist in stopping their relationship from proceeding further.

I sped through this suspenseful read in one day. I didn’t even pull a quote to share with my review because I was so deeply involved with the story. It feels like a bit of cat and mouse story, but there’s so much more going on. It is pretty hard to shock me with books, but I was pleasantly taken unaware with the ending.

The Opportunist comes out 12/6.

I loved this novel! Gripping and clever (and in parts, grim) like a Canadian-tinged succession. Delighted to include this title in the November edition of Novel Encounters, my regular column highlighting the month’s most anticipated fiction, for the Books section of Zoomer magazine. (see column and mini-review at link)

This was an unexpected surprise! For some reason I thought it would be a lighter thriller but boy was I wrong! Filled with amazing twists and turns this book will be talked about a lot when it releases!

Thanks to the publisher for my copy - all opinions are my own.

I loved the premise of this book - messed up rich family dynamics, with an aging father who is about to marry what appears to be his gold-digging younger nurse, putting everyone's inheritances at risk. Sibling dynamics that are equally as screwy with an estranged sister that is pulled back into the family web to try to stop this disaster from happening.

I really enjoyed the messy and many totally unlikable characters, just as much as I enjoyed the few seemingly normal characters. The book is really well paced, and I liked the peeling off of layers to the story as new details emerged which just completely changed the game on what was happening within this family and who you are rooting for to win.

I did struggle a bit with the end and the final reveals - while I love a good twist, this one came a LITTLE from left field and just made not quite enough sense in the bigger picture. A few too many details revealed earlier in the book just didn't necessarily jive with the details revealed in the end of the book and that took me out of the story just a touch.

Overall a fun and easy read, perfect escapism reading for a snowy cold day!

This book had a lot of twists and turns and an unpredictable ending! I love how it kept me guessing and intrigued to the end

Imagine Knives Out - humor + Succession - media and you have this book.

There are a series of reveals that makes each child worse than the one before. Everyone wants something from someone.......but who is the real bad guy.

This is a true PAGE TURNER. I finished this book on a plane and basically sat with my mouth wide open for a solid half hour because the final twist was just that good.

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

I liked this book. It seemed to be pretty straightforward but I liked the twists it took to make it a little more interesting than I thought it was going to be. The only problem is I hated most of the characters, which I know was the point but it also made it harder for me to want to finish it.

The pacing felt a bit slow but in this case it actually worked ,because it made the story feel a bit more real , and the characters life like, plus it helped show which ones was not likeable at all, and made you think twice about trusting them. And let's not for get the dark evil secrets that some of them kept. Which also made you feel like in the end they got what they deserved.

When a young, 20-something nurse starts dating her patient, a families elderly Dad, all claws come out in this thriller. This book jumps straight into the drama with Kelly, the young “gold digger”, engaged to marry Ed, the children’s father. I thought this was going to be a book more along the lines of “The Parent Trap”, with a soon to be step mother, that siblings can’t wait to be rid of… but jokes on me, let’s just say everyone was an opportunist in the darkest of ways.

The chapters were short, they went back in forth between the past and the present in order to help develop the characters. I felt at times things were rushed and wished for more information, thus leaving me feeling a little meh in parts. There were no shortage of twists to keep things interesting enough, definitely an entire plot I never saw coming and left me sick to my stomach.

Is money the root of all evil or are some people just plain evil ?

This was the perfect popcorn thriller/ palate cleanser. The characters at devious and over the top, but I flew through this in two days. There are some fun reveals and I thought the author treated the main characters daughters disability with care. Good caper!

Loved this! Who doesn't love to read about a despicable, dysfunctional uber-wealthy family. An elderly man's grown adult children are on a mission to stop him from marrying his MUCH younger nurse. This enjoyable treat had red herrings and twists I didn't see coming. Couldn't put it down!

Which one of the Shropshires is the biggest opportunist and liar?

The choices are Kelly, Martin, Alana, Teddy, and Ed - the father.

What will they do to keep their father's fortune when Kelly the 28-year-old nurse to their father is going to marry him? They know she only wants his money.

We meet all these characters on Ed Shropshire's West Coast Island retreat and ponder about which character is more devious than the other.

THE OPPORTUNIST is a bit confusing as it goes back and forth in time, but the wicked characters don't change in either time frame.

There unfortunately are some disturbing, shocking things revealed about a few of the characters that I never saw coming but are the "meat" and reason for what happens.

Could we say the worst "character" is money - the root of all evil?

I say yes, but I also picked out a character that I thought was the worst.

They all are despicable, but there was one in particular for me.

As the book came to a close, another surprise popped up, and I had to change my mind.

I will be curious which character you will choose as the most devious and cunning when you read this book. 4/5

This book was given to me by the publisher via Net Galley for an honest review.