There's a certain thing that occurs in the "psychological thriller" genre, it's a little thing I like to call "same story, different words." It's as if certain authors take a couple of good action/thriller flicks, mix that with a few good "thriller" type books, add in a tough as nails, toe the line, detective (lawyer,journalist,ex-cop, private investigator) that is going to solve the case. There's always some issue, mostly a shitty relationship or infidelity, maybe they can't get pregnant, or they are grieving a loss. Something to make them more human and the ultimate main character. That all being said, this book, much better than the ones that have become so familiar that they are all the same and you know the entire story without having read the book. Yarbrough gets major kudos, this is not only well written but I didn't want to give up reading it 3 chapters in. Exciting, unique, and chock full of suspense!

3.5/5

LOVED our main character and definitely hope for more in a series featuring her. In general, I find investigative journalist MCs in mysteries to be really fun. The fact that she was a strong trans woman was just the icing on top of the cake.

I do think this particular one had a few too many POVs for my liking, but I found the mystery in this one to be fun and the building sense of knowing what the characters do not yet know was more thrilling to me than not knowing and getting smacked in the face with the solved mystery.

Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this book for my honest review. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and the main character Colette. Well written and taught me more about the LGBTQ community and the negativity society places on humans others consider “different”. At the end of the book, there is a teaser for the author’s next book in what will be a series involving Colette again. I have to admit I am torn about this because as much as I enjoyed the book, there is one character that I found extremely annoying and unrealistic…”over the top”. People do not act or speak like this all of the time in their daily lives in my experience and I almost DNF’ed this book 5% in because of this character. Thankfully, I pushed past it and they weren’t primary to the story but I would definitely take this into consideration before reading another sadly.

This story features a proud and sassy trans woman journalist plus a very gay cast.

The whodunnit is known fairly early, but the real intrigue is who everyone is and how they all fit together in this vibrant, sometimes seedy, but very sexually charged story.

There are a fair amount of sex scenes, but they are all FTB and not gratuitous.

I enjoyed the story and found it a smooth, fast-paced read with a lot of POVs and dynamic plot twists. I wanted Collette to have more on-page time. It appears this is the beginning of a series, so I’ll have to look for subsequent releases.

I enjoyed this book but I wish it was more of a mystery. It kind of fell flat for me because of the killer being revealed early on.