[arc review]
Thank you to NetGalley for providing an arc in exchange for an honest review.
The Trap releases August 1, 2023

I am OBSESSED! Wow, this is the best thriller I read this year so far! Let me tell you, this is my first book from the author and I love her writing style! Smart, heart pounding, elaborate crime fiction with lots of references to true crime. I did not see the plot coming, yaaaay. Enjoyed the short crisp chapters, without cringy inner monologues. I connected with the two badass female detectives from the get go. Would love to read more stories featuring them, like a future series! Another plus....its funny, nice palette cleansers throughout the story!
Thank you NetGalles for the ARC!

Thanks @netgalley for read number 54 of 2023. I have some mixed feelings on this book. I’ve loved all of @cathryanhoward’s books that I’ve read, and this book is as fast-paced with as many twists as her previous ones. It’s as things all come together in the end that I struggled a bit. I’m still somewhat unclear on how part of the storyline was figured out, and the twist at the end, almost seems a bit much for me. It’s a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ book for holding my attention, but with a couple of areas that I wished were a bit more flushed out. Have others read this? What did you think?

A young woman accepts a ride from a man in the middle of the night in a desolate area of Ireland. Catherine Ryan Howard begins The Trap with heart stopping tension and fear. Is he a nice stranger offering a ride, or is he the horrifying monster she hopes he is who took her sister and is accepting her bait?! The author references a time in Ireland when several women tragically went missing and the cases were never solved. This story starts with a fictional Lucy, whose life is unbearable not knowing what happened to her sister. There are several missing young women so the Garda create a task force called Operation Tide. Are all the cases connected? The tale is told in multiple POVs, including Detective Pope, Angela, a civilian volunteer in the Missing Person Unit, and the killer. Chapters by the killer are creepy and chilling. The author keeps you on the edge of your seat with unexpected twists and turns and a very clever ending. The Trap is a great read for readers of mysteries and thrillers! With thanks to Netgalley and Blackstone Publishing for this ARC. My opinions are my own.

The premise is fantastic but this moved a little too slow for me in the beginning. I stuck with it because of so many fabulous reviews and I'm glad I did. Once I hit around 50% it really picked up. The ending was really good. It's hard to surprise me but that got me.

This book is written from several perspectives, not my favorite style, but it seriously works in this case. It broadens the viewpoints and helps to break a bit of tension…yes! Lots of tension and suspense!
It is very well written and a chiller- had my stomach in knots a few times!
Highly recommend for suspense/mystery thrill lovers

I absolutely loved this. It gave me a lot of tana french vibes and it worked so well. The gritty ambiance matched the moodiness of the setting and plot. I can’t wait to read more from this author.

Thanks to Blackstone Publishing for an advanced review copy.

I was nervous going into this book because it was my most anticipated book of the year. I can just go ahead and identify myself as a CRH fangirl. This is my seventh read from Catherine Ryan Howard and.... I'm happy to report it might even be my favorite! That is saying a lot considering I've given all of her books 4-5 stars. I loved everything about this. She layers a compelling mystery with genuine tense thrills. I also loved the commentary on our consumption of true crime as a society. The writing was fantastic as usual with relatable characters I could root for. I was genuinely shocked at one point. Like completely floored which is so unusual for me these days. Typically, I see twists coming from a mile away, but I threw my iPad onto the couch in complete shock at one point and stared at this book like it was a white-hot poker in my hands because she GOT ME. Definitely worth it. Add it to your preorder list. Pub: 8/1 in the US.

Wheewwwwww. <i>What.</i>

Full disclosure before I dive in, I received this book from NetGalley and Blackstone Publishing in exchange for an honest review. And that's what I'm going to deliver!

😳😳😳😳😳

Catherine Ryan Howard is one of my favourite authors, and <i>The Trap</i> is a banger. If the ending had been a smidge more satisfying, I think I would have enjoyed it that much more and bumped it up to a solid five stars.

<i>The Trap</i> alternates POVs. Between Lucy, who is doing increasingly dangerous things whilst searching for her missing sister, an unnamed killer, who compares hunting women to scaling Everest, another unnamed character who I won't discuss for spoilery reasons, and Angela, an aspiring Guard with the Gardai and probably the most likeable character of the bunch. Not hard, given one of them is a sociopath, but still. She's a treat.

From the synopsis, you've probably gathered that Lucy goes out in the night, trying to lure her sister's kidnapper to pick her up in his car and thereby lead her to the truth she's desperately searching for. What happened to Nicki? What happened to all the women who've vanished into the night, their phones broken skeletons on the ground, their memories blighted by the agony of not knowing?

I have very complicated feelings about this book, and about the ending. I won't discuss because Catherine Ryan Howard pulls a major wtf moment that could have gone wrong at the hands of a less skilled author. But what I <i>will</i> say is that I always grow sickened and very exhausted reading about women in distress, women being raped or held or cut into pieces. I remember feeling the same reading the brilliant [book:Exiles|60784359] - the final novel in the Falk series by Jane Harper. I just wanted the woman to prevail. I wanted her to turn around, stab the guy in the crotch and step away from the cliff of her own mortality. I just wanted a better end.

And it's very hard to find that in these books. Because of course, it's not based in reality. Women go missing. Women are murdered in untold numbers. While jogging. While going to the shops. While walking down a laneway. While being married. While working. While having sex. While vacationing. While driving. While daring to be happy, spoiled, selfish, angry. While having an opinion. While existing. Women are murdered and murdered and murdered, and I think I am just absolutely sick of it.

So while <i>The Trap</i> was ridiculously good, and while Catherine Ryan Howard is exceedingly talented, sometimes, the reality of the world in which we live - brought to raw and depressing light by her Acknowledgements and explanation for the Vanishing Triangle that inspired the book - is too much for me to bear.

Still, I highly recommend this for any thriller fans. You won't be disappointed.

Whoa the beginning is absolutely insane, and it just keeps going full throttle from there! The pacing is strong, just enough procedural woven in to let you catch your breath. Well crafted twists and turns, keeps you guessing. I think there are places where the character development lacks a little something, but it is all forgiven by the plot and pace!

This book was a good read , it had the usual, suspense, intrigue, action, murder, and a great who done it! The storyline was interesting and flowed nicely! I would recommend reading this book as it was well worth reading but it wasn't one of my top favorites! Still a decent read! Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for sharing this book with me!

Thank you to Blackstone Publishing for sending me an arc in exchange for review.


This is probably one of the most interesting thrillers I’ve ever read. The different povs. It was fast paced however the timeline kind of confused me a bit with the writing but in the end I ended up really enjoying this.

There were too many perspectives in this twisty story for me. I found the timelines confusing and had a hard time keeping the overlapping stories straight. This could be in part because of the formatting of the ARC, where stories blended together from one paragraph to the next with no warning. Also, what was happening with that ending? It needed a bit more of a wrap up for me...

I did not realize what I was getting into with this book. The synopsis was so clever and strange that I had to read it, but it was darker and more disturbing to me than the suspense/mysteries I usually read. Hard to shake off and let go off -- which makes this a well-written, plotted, and genuinely disturbing story. Yikes! I can't share more without giving too much away, but definitely read this is you enjoy more dark, twisted mysteries, and if you enjoy being inside the mind of a killer. Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC. #TheTrap #NetGalley

Lucy O’Sullivan is on a mission to find her sister Nicki who went missing… at any cost. Nicki, along with several other women in the area, has gone missing with absolutely no trace and the Gardai has a man in question but no real leads. So Lucy decides to take the case on in her own way by dangerously seeking out the man who is behind the kidnappings. She starts going out late at night to try and get approached by him hoping he will lead her to her sister. Detective Denise Pope is on the case and pairs up with Angela from the Missing Persons Unit who happened upon a major clue in the investigation. Throughout the novel, there are additional excerpts told in the killers voice. So the reader is privy to his thoughts and actions. This was such a crazy, edge of your seat, unputdownable read! I loved everything about this novel: the plot, the characters and the excellent writing. I highly recommend this five star read!

Wow! I think I fell into a trap by not seeing the last shocking twists of the book until they hit me in the face! Catherine Ryan Howard writes unputdownable, highly heart-throbbing, and smart psychological thrillers that keep you on the edge of your seat. The short and captivating chapters, well-executed mystery, and strong heroines who risk their lives to catch the psychopath are the main strengths of this book that kept my eyes and hands glued to the pages for hours, canceling my entire schedule to fix my entire attention to this wild ride!

There’s a psychopath riding his car in the middle of the night to lure women into his car. "Tana Meehan, Nicki O' Sullivan, and Jennifer Gold are the missing women. They disappeared in December, June, and then December again from Kildare town, Dublin city center, and the Enniskerry Road, around 10 p.m., around midnight, and in broad daylight just after three.

When Jennifer disappears, the three cases are linked, and Operation Tide is established.

Nicki’s sister, Lucy Sullivan, looks for the man who captivated her sister by using herself as prey, lurking around the place she’s taken in the middle of the night. She can do anything to bring her sister back home, including teaming up with a notorious anchor man.

Angela, who works as a civilian paper-pusher in the Missing Person Unit, finally has a chance to work with Detective Denise Pope after her recent discovery from a thrift store, which leads them to an important clue about the missing women cases.

Tana Meehan’s husband, Roland Kearns, is one of the suspects in their investigation. But there’s no reason to think that he may be involved in the other missing women cases.

One of the other narrators of this book, along with these women, is the killer. He is married, living a double life, and thinks hunting women in the middle of the night is as exciting as climbing Mount Everest. The narration parts that belong to him are definitely irritating, making your blood run cold!

The entire characters’ stories intercede at the conclusion in a very satisfying and dark-twisty way.

I devoured this book in one sitting. It’s riveting and luring. You may also catch smart references to the author’s previous books as well. I absolutely recommend it if you’re keen on reading something fascinatingly mind-blowing.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Blackstone Publishing for sharing this digital reviewer copy with me in exchange for my honest thoughts.

Thank you Blackstone and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review. IYKYK, my reviews are ALWAYS honest.

RING THE ALARM!!! IT'S A BANGER ALERT!!!!🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨

Writing: 4.5/5 | Plot: 5/5 | Ending: 5/5

SYNOPSIS

Missing women and a serial killer on the loose.

MY OPINION

OOOHHHWEEEEE THIS WAS A BANGER!!!!! If you loved [book:The Nothing Man|51166217], I'll bet my right arm (it's stronger than my left btw) that you will like this too. This had my fave parts of The Nothing Man combined with a lil police procedural and citizens gone rogue. Tbh there's something for everyone in this book.

Lots of books are labelled thrillers, but they often lack the thrills. This had my butt cheeks clenched IMMEDIATELY. While some povs are tamer than others, the plot quickly progresses as we get closer and closer to solving the mystery. What impressed me the most were the twists. Talk about original... And yes, they were foreshadowed and no, they weren't OTT! It doesn't get much better than that. Oh and the ending???? Perfection. Chefs kiss. I think some people might feel differently, but I absolutely DESPISE an epilogue that feels like an email from your mom recounting the previous week's events. I really don't give AF is Suzy opened a bakery, I want to be left asking for MORE. And this ending certainly will.

While the characters may not be particularly well-developed, the pace and unfolding mystery keep you otherwise occupied. I've only read two of Catherine Ryan Howard's books, but I found this to be her funniest. Loved the tongue-in-cheek humour. It felt like she had fun writing it, which made it an all the more enjoyable read. My fave POV was definitely the unnamed baddie... I hate that I wanted to know more about him 😂

All in all, READ IT. This is definitely the best thriller I've read this year. Like I said, it has something for everyone, and the humour keeps it from being uber depressing. No melodrama, no annoying, whiny inner monologues, no long-ass similes describing the mundane. Just bangerliciousness. I wish this was going to be a series... I want more crime-fighting adventures from Denise and Angela! Congrats, Catherine, on a FANTASTIC thriller. I hope this gets the hype it deserves. And I won't be put out if it becomes a movie either...... Just sayin'

PROS AND CONS

Pros: fast-paced, truly a thriller, original twists that truly had me shook, fantastic ending that leaves you wanting more, loved the humour, multi-povs that were all interesting and distinct

Cons: characters could've been a tad more flushed out but this is still a banger regardless

Set in Ireland where young women have disappeared, but not all the families of the victims feel their loved ones are being equally searched for. The sister of one of the missing is placing herself as bait to see if she can finally get some answers. We have several POV’s including that of the serial killer himself as he confesses his crimes to his latest victim.

I’m still recovering from the ending. CRH has a great way of coming up with something that is outrageous yet plausible. I really don’t want to spoil anything, so I’ll leave it there.

There is a great self deprecating reference to The Nothing Man and a nod to The Liar’s Girl with a sweet little update. The Liar’s Girl is a favorite of mine so I was happy to see that! The Trap has the same dark and disturbing atmosphere with many scary and tense moments. If you like to read the very best thrillers, don’t miss any of Catherine Ryan Howard’s novels. I always recommend listening to her books on audio if you can because she has wonderful Irish narrators to bring authenticity to the setting. Thank you to @netgalley @blackstonepublishing @cathryanhoward for an early digital copy. Another outstanding read!

Pub date: August 17, 2023
Pages: 352

Imagine what lengths you would go to if your sister were to go missing. That is the premise of the latest book, The Trap, by Catherine Ryan Howard. This book was a fast read for me. I really like how all her books take place in Ireland. If you are looking for a fast-paced, propulsive book, look no further. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for and advanced e-reader copy.

Catherine Ryan Howard is an other that never disappoints and this thriller continues her fine reputation.
Lucy is looking for the man who took her sister. She hitchhikes at night and is sad when her ride is not the man.

She is committed to finding out. There are a well written group of characters, all of whom are involved - or apathetically not.

Twists and turns and a book you can't put down.

Interesting, gripping read. enjoyed the multiple perspectives and the twist, though was a bit confused at the end, but maybe I just wanted things to be fully wrapped up, but a clever original version of missing women and the man who kidnaps them 4.5