Vanessa takes a job as deputy police chief of Seaside, Washington. Her life is a bit in shambles but she is doing the best she can with her new job and trying to find some sort of rhythm with her kids. A dead body turns up at the famous amusement park, Wonderland. With a dead body and missing employees…things are really looking strange…and not just with Wonderland.

This was a great thriller. I loved how Hillier pulled me in all different directions with my theories. I also enjoyed Vanessa as a character. She wasn’t the typical good or bad character…she had some morally grey aspects which I really enjoyed and found more realistic in a way. I love multiple POVs and the narrator did an excellent job.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for an audiobook ARC.

@jenniferhillierbooks is definitely an author whose books I’m going to gravitate towards. When I saw Wonderland as an audiobook on @netgalley it was a no brainer decision to request it. At the time I had no clue that Wonderland actually came out in print back in 2015. Hillier’s popularity has risen such that @macmillan.audio decided to go to her backlog Wonderland and record it in audiobook form. How awesome is that?

Wonderland is a thriller set in a small Washington town where a popular amusement park is located. Vanessa Castro has moved to escape personal tragedy (her husband’s death) and professional scandal to protect her children.

Little does she know that Wonderland amusement park has its own plethora of scandals that will start to implode when on the first day of her new job as Deputy Chief of Police a dead body mysteriously appears on the premises.

This one definitely has quite a few twists and turns and that ferris wheel 🎡 scene at the very beginning had me so nervous!!

While it’s not as good as Things We Do In the Dark, I’d still highly recommend checking out this Jennifer Hillier backlog in audio form. The narrator does a great job and a good thriller can be hard to find (this is definitely a good one!).

Wow. I had heard good things about this book but it exceeded my expectations! The twists, the turns, the creepy dolls…. Oh my! I thought I had it figured out but twists at the very end threw me. The narrator was great and very easy to listen to. I thought the story line was engaging and gripped me from the very beginning. This was a very enjoyable book!!

This all came apart at the end for me. The strong beginning became a hot stew of plots upon subplots and villains upon villains. Wonderland is set in the small town of Seaside, where Vanessa Castro returns after a family tragedy (and a scandal, and a secret beneath the scandal) to work as the Deputy Police Chief. She quickly learns that the town's biggest attraction, an amusement park named Wonderland has a dysfunctional hold on the town, allowing decades of scandals to be swept under the rug. When a body is found at the park and Vanessa is tasked with the investigation, her outsider perspective and big-city cop instincts may just help her unravel that mystery and a few others, decades in the making. While I liked the premise, and had some interest in the characters, toward the end, it all became a little too convoluted with the belated inclusion on more and more red herrings in a way that just seemed to prolong the book and leave the author with no choice but to explain in narrative what she didn't have the characters reveal gradually in other ways. By the end, I was a little more frustrated than I was satisfied. But I will say this, if the goal was to present a somewhat eerie portrayal of how a place that should have been about "amusement" had a corrosive and sinister underbelly, then I suppose that was achieved. Still, it had more than one twist too many for my liking.

Note: This is a new audiobook of a book first released in 2015, I think the narration style for me was a little too flat, sounding more like a newscast than the narration of fiction. Since most of the characters' voices had the same flat, almost expressionless affect, it was difficult to get a sense of them from their voice alone. The narrator's voice had a white noise quality that sometimes caused my mind to wander as she read.

Loved this story! It had me hooked from the very beginning. The setting of a theme park as the main location for a story was such an interesting and intriguing idea. I was riveted to hear about the inner workings of the park, its employees, and what lies beyond the shiny surface. I really enjoyed the multi POV. It didn’t distract from the story, but added to the mystery and intrigue of who the killer could be. I kept changing my mind trying to decide who it was and who was helping them get away with it. This book kept me on my toes and guessing as a good murder mystery should!

Jennifer Hillier never disappoints. Her writing is always gripping and edge of your seat amazing. Literally just finished the book and let me just say I need more! Amazing story and gripping from the beginning! Loved it!

If anxiety thru an audiobook was a book it would be this one. The Narration was spectacular. I don't think it would have been nearly as good without the Narration.

Wonderland is the park full of fun and happiness during the day, but at night it turns into something else. When a corpse is found the police must intervene. But that’s not all - a worker is now missing as well.

Vanessa moved back to Seaside to get away from her husbands suicide and her ex’s drug charges. Now as deputy chief she has to figure out what is going on in wonderland. As she keeps digging more and more indiscretions come to light. Wonderland might now be the place everyone thinks it is.

I loved this audiobook so much! The narrator was amazing and I loved the plot of this book. Definitely take a listen!

A good solid read and giving it three stars...the story kept me interested to know what was going to happen next. I did feel slightly overwhelmed with the amount of character names to remember and I kept forgetting who was who.

Jennifer Hillier NEVER fails to send a shiver down my spine. She's done it again in this, "Wonderland."

Set amidst a small touristy town, Wonderland is the sought after theme park. With people travelling near and far to see their creepy clown muesem or ride their large ferris wheel. Despite a disturbing past, and town law enforcement set on protecting its financial waterfall, the new deputy police chief is set on properly investigating the missing Wonder Wheel free climber.

Chilling and disturbing, Hillier takes everyone's clown nightmare and thrusts us into this whirlwind of a read. Once again, she's got me sleeping with one eye open and keeping the lights on.

This book is a... wild ride. The audiobook was done very well, and I was hooked the entire time. The characters in this book are so. messed. up. Just when you think things couldn't get worse.. they do. I especially enjoyed the creepy amusement park setting. I was only able to guess one part towards the end, but there were other twists I wasn't expecting. This is my second Jennifer Hillier book and this one takes first place so far.

A very creepy, twisty read - highly recommend the audio!

This old amusement park definitely fit the creepy, atmospheric setting criteria.

Overall, I liked this one. Lots of characters to suspect and many to actively dislike overall. I didn't guess every twist and turn, which I always consider a win with a thriller. I was definitely invested in finding out what happened at the end.

Please check TW on this one.

A huge thank you to the author and the publisher for providing an e-ARC via Netgalley. This does not affect my opinion regarding the book.

This audio version of Wonderland is actually just a re-release of a novel which had previously been released in print. However, I absolutely LOVED this book. It's centered around an amusement park where things just seem to be going wrong. Missing people, some shady business deals, hook-ups, you name it. It's got the police woman's daughter getting a job there, while her mom is busy working on some case in the same area. Talk about stress! I've only recently discovered Jennifer Hillier but I've really enjoyed her work and would love to continue exploring her backlist.

3.5 stars.
My least fave of Jennifer's unfortunately; all of her other books have been 4.5 or 5 stars for me, mostly 5! I was hoping this one would be way creepier and more atmospheric to the setting because I was super interested in the amusement park setting; I found the vibes to be minimal. I also guessed the twists, which makes it less fun for me. Overall, it was just average.

So good! Thrilling and wild. I didn’t know what was coming next which is exactly what I’m looking for in a thriller!

I was so excited to receive the audio book. I had purchased the actual physical book awhile ago and just hadn't gotten around to it. I can officially say had this not been an audio book I probably would have DNF the book.
I love a good what happened who done it style book and add in creepy clowns and an amusement park BONUS. or so I thought.
This book starts off with a omg what moment and that's about the only one. I appreciate what I think Jennifer was going for with adding some spice but honestly it would have been a better book without it or with more of it. Pick a lane spice or no spice but dashing some horrible spice is cringey.

The premise of this book is based around a park, a scorned lover, a can't think for myself guy, and a woman just figuring stuff out. Vanessa Castro has returned to Seaside as Deputy Chief just in time for a body to appear and a boy to go missing. Vanessa learns quickly that what happens in the town is controlled by Wonderland park. Vanessa isn't going to go along with that thinking and proceeds to investigate.

It is an ok story with ok characters. It could have been great but fell short.

I did enjoy the narrator and it was the only reason I finished it

I really loved it! This is a thriller that will definitely stick with me. I’m a sucker for a crime book and one set at a 1980sesque cult like amusement park- sign me right up! I liked the pace, the characters, and the twists. I’ve really got nothing bad to say here. I would definitely recommend.

I also have plans to read Little Secrets, Creep, and Freak by Jennifer Hillier since they feature some of the same characters.

Edge of your seat thriller in a super creepy setting. Make sure to check trigger warnings prior to readings. I struggled with some aspects of this book which is why I gave it a 4/5 (the dynamic of an older woman sleeping with barely legal teen boys was an ick factor). Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to listen to this audiobook for an honest review.

From my blog: Always With a Book

I have been a fan of Jennifer Hillier’s books for quite some time and so I was thrilled to see that they had finally released this earlier book of hers on audio. It was originally only released as an e-book and I had never gotten around to reading it. Now this is one of her backlist books I can cross off my list!

Like most of her books, this one was just as creepy and twisted as I would expect. This is the second or third thriller I have read set in an amusement park and I have to say, I wasn’t really a fan of them to begin with and now I definitely will not be heading to one anytime soon!

This book grabbed me from the get-go and I was unable to put it down, finishing it in one day. I loved the characters, especially Dectective Vanessa Castro. She’s new in town and wants to do right, but definitely has a few secrets of her own. And that’s not it as far as the secrets go…it seems that everyone has their own fair share of secrets. And most interesting of all is the relationship between Wonderland and the police. Will this impede the current investigation?

This book has so many twists and turns and the creep factor is off the charts. It kept me on edge all the way through and I had no idea where it was heading. I love Jennifer Hillier’s writing and this one was no exception!


Audio thoughts: This was such a great book to listen to…the creep factor alone had me on edge and I thought the narrator, Eunice Wong, did a great job bringing the story to life. Her pacing and intonation were spot on and she infused just the right amount of suspense into her voice as needed.

*received for free from netgalley for honest review* This was a pretty great mystery/thriller to read right before summer, would be a great beach read for sure!