The Wrong Good Deed by Caroline B. Cooney
Sorry to say but had to DNF. Interestingly, the synopsis says nothing about what this story has turned out to be about. I don’t know the expected audience for this book but I am around the age of the characters in this book and I am already well-informed about the atrocities of the Civil Rights era. This book seemed almost like a a history lesson of the 60’s for young people. Would not have requested this book if the synopsis has been more informative.

Clemmie and Muffin are neighbors in a senior living community in North Carolina. They are at Sunday church service at Trinity Hill Church, when Muffin sees someone from her past. Her fifty years gone by past. She panics and runs from the church. Clemmie is confused by this extreme reaction. Muffin tells her about the traumatic events from her past, but Clemmie still thinks this is a bit extreme.

Clemmie soon realizes Muffin was right to be afraid. But she has her own secrets. Can she help Muffin but keep her own secrets from coming out? It seems several from the community also have secrets.

This is told in a dual timeline of 50 years ago and now. IT deals with many social issues such as white supremacy, racism, desegregation during the 1960s. In the current day timeline, we see isolation and loneliness of the senior citizens.

The was a lot of suspense leading up throughout, but the ending left me unsatisfied.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

The Wrong Good Deed is my first Caroline B. Cooney book and it won't be my last. I loved the bravery shown by the author in showcasing older women. I say brave because it's not often done, I can't think of many books I've read with this premise, and Cooney did it so well.

Overall I felt the pacing of the book made it a quick read, that was easy to captive and fast to finish.

Thank you Poisoned Pen Press and NetGalley for access to this ARC.

EXCERPT: Their libraries had been separate? Their book collections had been separate?
Clemmie had known about separate schools and segregated restaurants, but she had never pictured libraries refusing readers. She had even forgotten the noun coloredbecause it's usage had been eclipsed over the years by African American and now Black. She thought of Gale. Given her age, she must have been insulted and hurt by people like Tommy's family. Clemmie didn't want to think about it. She preferred civilised thoughts about civilised people, and now Muffin was going to tell a story about savagery.
Whose? Her husband's? Her in-laws'?
Or Muffin's own?

ABOUT 'THE WRONG GOOD DEED': 1964: Christaphine is twenty years old, newly married, and determined to make a home and a life for her and her husband, Tommy. But when Christaphine discovers Tommy and his friends on the verge of committing a horrible crime, she does what she has to do to stop them. Afterwards, she knows she can't ever go home again--so she disappears.

50 years later: When Clemmie's neighbor, Muffin, drags her from Sunday morning service at Trinity Hill Church, convinced that the man she's just spotted across the aisle is a dangerous figure from her past, at first Clemmie thinks she's being dramatic. But as Muffin reveals to Clemmie what happened in the middle of a field in South Carolina five decades ago, Clemmie realizes her friend has been keeping dark secrets--just as Clemmie herself has. And the secrets that belong to both women are not the kind that can be revealed without dire consequences...

MY THOUGHTS: I Loved The Wrong Good Deed, and read it in one sitting. It is peopled by wonderfully realistic characters, particularly Clemmie whom I took a real shine to, caught up in an intriguing storyline.

I didn't realise, when I picked this up, that it followed on from another of this author's books, Before She Was Helen, which I haven't yet read. Despite feeling that I was missing out on things I ought to have known about Clemmie's background, I still adored this read.

I like that the characters are older; that the author is honest about the family relationships of the elderly; that she deals honestly with the vagaries of aging (pun intended); and that friendships are based on different criteria to when we were younger.

Although Clemmie is the main character, this is Muffin's story. And what a story it is! I was glued to the page and would brook no interruption to my reading!

Caroline B Cooney has woven a realistic historical drama full of secrets into the current lives of members of a retirement community. I'm off now to read Before She Was Helen, and I hope to read more from Clemmie in the future. And I will be looking for more titles by this author.

⭐⭐⭐⭐.8 (0.2 of a star deducted because nowhere does it say that The Wrong Good Deed follows on from Before She Was Helen and, believe me, I looked!)

#TheWrongGoodDeed #NetGalley

I: #authorcarolinebcooney @poisonedpenpress

T: @caroline.b.cooney @PPPress

#contemporaryfiction #crime #familydrama #friendship #historicalfiction #murdermystery #mystery

THE AUTHOR: Caroline Cooney knew in sixth grade that she wanted to be a writer when "the best teacher I ever had in my life" made writing her main focus. "He used to rip off covers from The New Yorker and pass them around and make us write a short story on whichever cover we got. I started writing then and never stopped!"
When her children were young, Caroline started writing books for young people -- with remarkable results. She began to sell stories to Seventeen magazine and soon after began writing books. Suspense novels are her favorites to read and write. "In a suspense novel, you can count on action."
To keep her stories realistic, Caroline visits many schools outside of her area, learning more about teenagers all the time. She often organizes what she calls a "plotting game," in which students work together to create plots for stories. Caroline lives in Westbrook, Connecticut and when she's not writing she volunteers at a hospital, plays piano for the school musicals and daydreams!

DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Poisoned Pen Press via Netgalley for providing a digital ARC of The Wrong Good Deed by Caroline B. Cooney for review. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own personal opinions.

I wish some of these books came with a cover that explained that a book precedes it. I felt like I was missing something the whole time. I loved the suspense and tension, but felt like the ending was a little rushed. I think the topics covered are important and I appreciated this angle. I especially appreciated the characters age and gender. I found there was a lot of internal dialogue, which sometimes is helpful, but not in this case. I loved the premise of this book.

I really enjoyed the first book with Helen/Clemmie. I was so looking forward to this one. This time I didn’t feel the tension or enjoy the characters as much. The background we keep flashing back to was not as interesting as I wanted it to be. The main character wasn’t as much fun. The ending was a little disappointing and cringy, especially in the dialogue. There was just something missing. What was not missing was the church. Did the first book center so much on church and the bible? Was it her whole life last time? I must not have focused on it last time if it did. I hope to get the quirky-but-not-annoying characters back in the next book.

This was a very quick and enjoyable read. I thought the author did a great job with character development although I was a little disappointed about the lack of Clemmie’s back story until I realized this is book 2 and she already had her book. So I will have to go back to read that and satisfy my curiosity. I do wish there was a little more of a divide between past/present and different character voices because at times it was hard to follow. This book tackles some tough topics without pulling any punches. Included for trigger warning, racism, racial motivated violence/murder, ageism, dementia, murder. This book takes place in the 1960’s and present day and focusing around a woman named Muffin who realizes that no matter how hard you try you can’t truly leave your past behind your. I gave this one 3.5 stars rounded up for having a cast of older narrators as I don’t think I see as much of that as I should.

Clemmie has secrets, but she doesn't realize that maybe her friends in the retirement community of Sun City might have secrets of their own. She takes her friend Muffin, who is church shopping, to church when Muffin says that they need to leave now, she's seen someone from her past and she doesn't want him to see her.. Soon, Muffin is worried that her past is catching up to her, and she confides in Clemmie that she used to be Christaphine Nearing and fled the town of Ferris, SC and her husband decades ago after preventing a horrific crime.

I didn't know going into this book that it was going to be another Clemmie novel and I was pleasantly surprised (I'm a huge fan of Caroline B Cooney from back in the 90s when she wrote YA horror for Point) to find myself back with Clemmie in Sun City. Clemmie is such an interesting character, holding onto her fake identity even into her 70s. She's a mix of selfish and selfless, driving all her neighbors around to the grocery store and appointments, while at the same time is exhausted by their neediness. I get it--I was exhausted by a few of them, too. I'm also enjoying this uptick of books that star senior citizens in genres I already love, especially mainstream mystery and thriller.
This is a good follow up novel to Before She was Helen and I highly recommend picking it up if you enjoyed that book.

I really wanted to like this book but I just couldnt get into it. The story is written in two different time periods and touches on subjects of racism, white supremecy and desegregation which I have no interest in reading and did not realize was part of the book when I requested it.

I absolutely loved Face on the Milk Carton as a young person and was eager to jump back into a Caroline B Cooney book. This one works much better if you've read Before She Was Helen but I'm not sure that you necessarily have to to fully understand the story. I absolutely love Clemmie and, from what I could gather, it sounds like there's a third book to be written and I, for one, can't wait to get back to Sun City!

I’m a fan of Cooney's YA books, but this is the first adult book of hers that I've read. And it's amazing.
Clemmie and Muffin, two women in their 70s, are good friends and live in the same retirement community. One Sunday at church, Muffin insists they leave early, because she's spotted a dangerous man from her past. She tells Clemmie that she ran away, changed her name, and re-invented herself in the 1960s, after preventing her husband and three of his friends from committing a racially-motivated crime. Now she's afraid that her wrong good deed may be a threat her life.
It turns out that both Clemmie and Muffin have run from their pasts, and when one of them is killed, the other is left to untangle the moral and ethical results of decisions made years ago, and for all the right reasons.

When clemy and muffin make a med dash out of church it is because muffin has seen a face from her past past she has been running from since 1964 and although she has been pretty successful at evading any danger from back then the pressure to find her will ramp up in the form of their cook RoseSephanie. Many years before she went by a different name and was married to a man named Tommy from a well-known family and they were well known for more than just their financial stability but also the way of making people disappear and it seems like the role cook is blaming the family for her nephew Mika going missing she also believes Christonia knows where her nephews Barbie is buried the only problem is no one knows where Christiania and that she is now going by muffin. When muffin wind‘s up dead her friend Clemmy who knows the whole story tells the police about a local man who muffin new in her prior life but did he do it or someone else? This was such a great book and one I found so interesting I love when I get a good book that I know is a five-star read and that is definitely The Wrong Good Deed this book says a lot about how what we don’t know it’s scarier than the things we do I loved it and highly recommend that I am definitely going to look for more books by this author this was such a great idea for a book and so greatly executed I love love love this book! I received it from NetGalley and the publisher but I am leaving this review voluntarily please forgive any mistakes as I am blind and dictate my review.

Welcome back to the retirement community of Sun City. Once again, Clemmie finds herself in the midst of a mystery. When her good friend, Muffin, sees a man she’s afraid of at church, Clemmie has no idea what she’s about to learn about Muffin’s past. On the way home Clemmie stops to help a couple girls that got themselves in a pickle, but her help wasn’t appreciated. When Clemmie hears Muffin’s story she’s overwhelmed and just wants some peace and quiet in her life, especially since she has secrets of her own that are weighing heavily on her. When she meets the man Muffin is afraid of, she’s confused, he’s so kind, but is he really? When a devastating accident takes place it leaves Clemmie reeling and questioning what she really knows and just why some good deeds turn out to be deadly! Clooney writes a good cozy mystery set in a retirement community filled with cast of delightful characters. Looking forward to Clemmie’s next “case”! Thank you to Sourcebooks, Inc. and NetGalley for an ARC of this book.

I thoroughly enjoyed Before She Was Helen, Caroline Clooney's first mystery featuring Clemmie, a sharp-minded 70-something who has been hiding under a false identity for more than 50 years to escape the ongoing dangers of a long-ago crime. This second Clemmie story is equally entertaining. Clemmie is startled to discover that Minnie, another resident of her small retirement community, is also hiding from danger -- and now the danger has found her. Clemmie and Minnie join forces to evade the threat, and the quick thinking and shrewd scheming of these two carry the story to the satisfying end. I don't know how much longer Clemmie can continue running into deadly threats in a little retirement community, but this story and the first one are jewels of entertainment in themselves.

I wanted to love this book but it turned out to be disappointingly average. The character development was great but the story was lacking

Well this was just a hot mess.

I have many fond memories of reading Caroline B Cooney thrillers in my youth. But I haven’t read her in years so I’ve been looking forward to reading this for months. But unfortunately this just did not go well???

First off, the main character in this book is apparently featured in another book, which I’m presuming provides her backstory. I didn’t know that going in and haven’t read that book. So one of my biggest complaints about this is that her backstory was often referenced but never covered in this book. Which was frustrating.

And that means *technically* this is a sequel. Which would’ve been nice to know. Because I read this as a stand-alone it just felt like it was … missing something. (Another book perhaps?)

The ending was also super frustrating. The twist made ~most of this book a red herring and actually irrelevant to the overall story. So the background we did get didn’t end up mattering at all in the grand scheme of things.

And the whole ~irrelevant plot line ended up feeling like it was also trying to cover too much? I read most of this book in a day and still got characters and backstories mixed up.

Mostly I found this book confusing and not a very thrilling thriller. And the ending was just disappointing and didn’t feel like a satisfying conclusion to this story.

I do think the historical bits were interesting and well done though. It was a nice little commentary on civil rights and how the world changed but the people didn’t. I thought that arc was the best bit of the book.

So. Unfortunately this just didn’t work for me. I still have fond memories of Cooney’s other books but I wish I would’ve just skipped this one.

Anyway. Thank you to NetGalley & Poisoned Pen Press for allowing me to read this in exchange for an honest review.

In The Wrong Good Deed, Caroline Cooney’s main characters are two 70-year-old women living in Sun City Retirement Community. The author weaves in themes of aging, loneliness, depression, and isolation among this age group. Muffin and Clemmie are best friends and think they know everything about each other, but they both harbor secrets from the past. The excitement begins one Sunday at Church when Muffin spots a feared figure from long ago.

The story is written in two time periods, the present and the1960’s when Muffin was a happily married woman in her 20's. This book is a mystery but also an expose. The author delves into a clear and poignant look at the racism, white supremacy, and desegregation. The book is a quick read at 288 pages, but it provides entertainment and deep content for any reader.

Muffin's past - from 50 years ago- come back to haunt and threaten her when she catches sight of someone she's feared all those years. Now living in a retirement community, she enlists the help of her friend Clemmie who has issues in her own past. They both tell the story of what happened but this is really about Muffin. I would have liked to know more about Clemmie (she's more of a foil than a character). Thanks to Netgalley for the ArC.

I really enjoyed The Wrong Good Deed. I found the story very compelling and would be an interesting book for a book club to discuss. With just one small thread being pulled, secrets that have been hidden for 50 years become exposed. I think the question about guilt was a particularly interesting topic to explore. All of the characters were intriguing and the author made learning their secrets gripping. The story is fast paced and I read this in one sitting. I enjoyed the setting a retirement community in the south and the element chance affecting the lives of the residents. The story played into the aspect of how a simple decision can have big implications.

Thank you NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for the copy in exchange for my honest review.

This book is hard to review because it is connected to Before She Was Helen but nowhere in the description or marketing for this book was that mentioned. Had I read Before She Was Helen first, maybe I would have enjoyed this book. Readers need to know that The Wrong Good Deed is not a standalone novel. This is important because I assume, that had I read the first book, I would have all of my questions answered. Instead I am left feeling like I read a novella and half of another who's pages got mixed up. The book alternates between Clemmie and Muffin's stories. They are friends now through their Sun City community but their histories are not connected.

Clemmie's story is incomplete and left me with several questions so I will just focus on Muffin's. Muffin is at church one morning and sees someone from her past. In a panic she leaves with Clemmie and her story goes forward from there. Muffin felt like a real person, deeply flawed and all. You feel her fear and I really was invested in how she would work through this problem before her-yet the ending was not satisfying whatsoever. There are themes of racism, drug abuse, infidelity, murder, and more. There was so much potential and I get what the author was trying to do but all in all it just felt incomplete. (regardless of Clemmie's story tying to Before She Was Helen)

Thank you NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for the eARC.