3.5 Speak of the Devil is Rose Wilding's debut novel.
New Years Ave 1999. Seven women are gathered in a hotel room - along with the remains of a man. A man that all seven women have a connection to. Who killed him? Each women says they didn't. Does it matter? Will they be found out? Why are they all together? Why has he been killed?

It's this last question that brings us to know the seven and their connection to Jamie. Jamie - well, he's not a very nice man. Wasn't.

I found it a bit difficult in the beginning chapters to get a handle on and remember who was who. The eighth woman is the female detective running the case. As the book progresses we slowly learn about each of their relationships to Jamie - and each other. The women are all of different ages, so the book goes back and forth from 1964 to 2000, depending on who is 'speaking'. I think it's a big undertaking to have so many viewpoints. I found it to be very busy, and in the end, I hadn't bonded with any of them.

I think Wilding did a good job with constructing her antagonist. He was perfectly awful. I wasn't totally sold on the women and their situations though. Although they have been wounded, I was angry with more than one of them. I won't say why as I don't want to provide spoilers. But, no man is worth some of the choices made.

The answer to the questions above are answered by the last pages, but the ending was anticlimactic for me. It's a good debut, but it isn't a standout for me.

I listened to the audiobook narrated by Colleen Prendergast. She has a rich, full voice that is a treat to listen to. She enunciates well and is easy to understand. Her voice has movement and underlines the emotions and actions of the plot. An excellent performance. S

Speak of the Devil by Rose Wilding

This group of diverse women of various ages and backgrounds had been mysteriously invited to a room in a rundown hotel. They were of different ages and different situations in life. There were seven of them in the group. A man's severed head was revealed in the room's centre, and each of the women had been wronged, manipulated, cheated, or deceived by the dead man in the past. All had some connection with the murder victim, and some of the women had a connection with each other. It was apparent that none were sorry he was dead. The majority opinion was to cover up the crime to protect the unknown perpetrator rather than calling the police. The female detective had reasons to avoid a thorough investigation.

On the table, covered up, is the decapitated head of a man that they know all too well Jamie. In fact, he is the reason that all of these women know each other in the first place, he's done wrong by all of them in myriad ways. But who ultimately killed him? No one is confessing.

This was an intriguing story and a good premise, but somethings fell apart for me. I haven't put my finger on it yet. Narrated by Colleen Prendergast who brings life to this complex story with the many POV's and does good giving voice to everyone. I still recommend this book it is worth the read.

Thank you to NetGalley, MacMillan Audio and St. Martin's Press for a free copy of Speak of the Devil for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions in this review are my own.

*rounded up from 3.5 stars*

This is a very detailed plot with a huge cast of characters, and multiple timelines that flipped back and forth.
. All narrated by a single actor, with an accent. I think this would have been better reading in a physical form, this took a lot of attention to keep everyone and everything straight. At one point the detective made a reference to wishing she had a string board, and honestly, same. There was a good mix of characters, with a healthy dose of LBGTQ characters that make this a good Pride month read if you are more into thrillers than romance. This was a good debut novel and I will definitely be checking out her future books.

When a group of women find a severed head in their meeting spot, they panic. A normal reaction. Not so normal? Working to cover it up because each and every one of them had a reason to want him dead. Each woman’s story of her interaction with the man is sprinkled into the steady current timeline of the detective trying to solve the crime, with each story somehow connected to another seemingly unrelated story until you finally have the big picture.

A man's head is found in a hotel room, and there are seven women that could have been connected.

What a kick off - the first 2 chapters had me a bit overwhelmed with characters, but I was hooked! From there, unfortunately, the rest of the story fell flat for me. The characters were all too similar, and with the audiobook narration, it was very difficult to distinguish what was happening. Additionally, the audiobook chapters were all just the title of the book over and over, so there was no way to take a glance and re-center myself.

I think that there were too many characters with not enough distance between them to follow along, and by the time I had my spreadsheet of grievances completed, the book was over, and the big reveal was lackluster and seeming long overdue.

Thank you NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for sending this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.

This was a super interesting book and I had no clue who the guilty part was the entire time. Although there is a large cast of characters, each is fully formed and unique. It’s a dark and disturbing read but also discusses real world topics. If you read this one I would suggest skipping the audiobook just because it’s easier to keep track of the characters that way. I will say I did find the narrator great!

Many thanks to NetGalley, Minotaur Press, St Martin's Press and Macmillan Audio for gifting me both a digital and audio ARC of this intriguing novel by Rose Wilding and wonderfully narrated by Colleen Prendergast - 4 stars!

Seven women sit in a hotel room around the severed head of Jamie Spellman. All of the women had reason to want him dead, but who did it and why? The police are investigating and lives are at stake.

This book starts off with a gruesome premise of a severed head, and in the beginning there are so many characters and timeframes to keep track of. But it's worth it to stick it out - it's a good mystery with seven obvious suspects and one nasty dead man. As the book progresses, we learn why each woman has a particular reason to hate Jamie. It's also a statement of how society treats and values women and how some men can exploit that. This one may not be for everyone but it was a good read and I didn't guess the ending!

3.5/5!

Speak of the Devil is a fascinating premise revolving around one recently murdered man and seven women who are connected to him in different ways. Each of the women has a story to tell and Wilding smartly weaves their history throughout the story of the present day investigation. I loved getting to know each of the seven women, as well as the detective in charge of working the case. With all of the different POVs I did find it challenging to keep straight who was who at the beginning of the book. Over time however, it becomes easy to tell each of them apart (and thankfully each chapter is labeled just in case!).

All of these POVs revolve around our dead man, Jamie, who turns out to be pretty darn horrible. I enjoyed how Wilding examined society’s take on Jamie’s actions against these women and who was ultimately believed/not believed or painted in a good/bad light. The content of Speak of the Devil gets pretty dark at times and touches on many sensitive topics, so I encourage everyone to check the content warnings available on Storygraph.

The pacing is slow burn with a solid amount of tension throughout on what will happen, the identity of the killer, and how the mystery will unravel. If I was to categorize this book, I would put it more in the mystery/contemporary fiction genres versus the thriller genre that it’s currently being marketed under.

Overall, Speak of the Devil is a very solid debut novel that leaves me intrigued by what Wilding will put out in the future!

A huge thank you to Minotaur Books for my gifted copy.

✨A WOMAN SCORNED✨

Speak of the Devil by Rose Wilding
𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞𝐬: Mystery/Thriller
𝐅𝐨𝐫𝐦𝐚𝐭: Audio
#DeepDiveThisBook

QUICK BITS
•Multiple POV
•Whodunnit
•Scorned women

READ IF YOU LIKE
The Change by Kirsten Miller

REVIEW
I thought this book was pure genius.

Great for those who loved The Change by Kristen Miller, as you find a group of women all wronged by the same man.

Coming together to share their stories...and instead find him there as well (his head anyway).

Although there are a bounty of POVs, I found this story still easily trackable, even if it did take me a minute sometimes to figure who each character was.

I loved how every chapter slowly revealed each characters connection to each other and the man who wronged them.

The amount of thought that as put into each of these characters and the unfolding plot was hard for me to even wrap my head around.

Who doesn't love a book where the women finally get the last word?

RATINGS
8 Characters
8 Atmosphere
10 Writing Style
10 Plot
7 Pace
9 Intrigue
9 Enjoyment
3 SOS Bonus
TOTAL= 61 + 3 = 64/14= 4.57

3.00/5.00 SOS Rating
--I loved all the surprises in this book, it was like an onion in which more and more was slowly revealed and the characters stories became more and more entwined.

4.50/5.00 Rounded Rating

A big thank-you to @minotaur_books and @netgalley for this ALC in exchange for an honest review. #netgalley #minotaurbooks

This was an interesting story and kept me on my toes! The biggest flaw, just for me, was the many different narrators/POVs. I do think it added a lot to the overall story understanding everyone’s motivations and stories, but it definitely made it hard to listen to and follow along. I listened to this on audio and I think that if I read it physically I would’ve enjoyed the story a bit more. Definitely one I’ll pick up and reread.

When seven women in a hotel room stand amid the severed head of a truly horrible man, you know that one of them did it. This book aims to reveal who but giving us flashbacks of just how awful this man was to these women.

It sounds like a great premise right? I was intrigued by that alone. However, this book failed to deliver for me. First of all there are way too many POVs. One for each woman AND the detective. I was barely able to keep anyone straight. And not too long after I started the stories blurred together. Because there was way too much to follow, I felt like none of the characters got fleshed out enough for me to care about them.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for this ALC. Colleen Predergast's narration was probably the only thing I liked about this book.

𝘈𝘭𝘭 𝘰𝘧 𝘶𝘴 𝘬𝘯𝘦𝘸 𝘩𝘪𝘮. 𝘖𝘯𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘶𝘴 𝘬𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘦𝘥 𝘩𝘪𝘮...

Seven women all with a motive are brought to a hotel room where the head of a man that hurt them all is sitting on top of some bibles. They don’t know who killed him, but they know it was one of them.

This was a really interesting debut. I loved the synopsis when I requested it, and I found this take on revenge riveting. Wilding came up with a unique way to tell an eye for an eye story while making us feel for these women. I liked the multiple timelines in this story and how we saw what Jamie did to each of these women in the past and how they were handling his murder in the future. I felt myself drawn to some of the stories more than others, but overall felt the book was done really well.

One issue I had with this book was that there were a lot of characters to keep track of. We get each of the seven women’s stories along with the detective’s making it a lot to keep track of. I listened along to the ALC while I read the eARC which was helpful to keep track of whose story I was listening to at that time. This book would have been perfect for a full cast narration, and it really would have benefited from it.

I was very impressed that this book was a review, and I look forward to seeing what Wilding comes up with next. Thank you Minotaur Books, St. Martin’s Press, Macmillan Audio, and NetGalley for advanced copies in exchange for my honest review.

I was every intrigued by the premise of this one. There are A LOT of POVs (7 women and the detective), and it took me a minute to figure out who was who, but once I did, I really was invested in the story. Some of the characters felt better fleshed out than the others but the backgrounds and the connections were interesting. The deceased was really easy to hate, he was truly an awful person and wronged all the women in various ways. The feminist revenge was a needed intervention. While I enjoyed the narration, I think the multiple POVs did make the audiobook harder to follow. Thank you so much to Macmillan Audio for the ALC, and Minotaur books for the ARC of this one.

1999-New Year’s Eve. A group of 7 women meet in their “usual place” and find the head of the man they are all connected by. One of them did it. Which one? They all had a reason. He was a jerk. He was pretty horrible. I wanted to find out but the further I got into the book the more trouble I had keeping track of the 7 women and exactly which was which. How was this one related to Jamie again? It was tiresome to keep notes. Each woman had chapters dedicated to her that should have made them easy to differentiate, but no.

**3.5-stars rounded up**

Speak of the Devil is a creative work of Crime Fiction told in a bit of an unconventional way. I'll admit, the first couple sentences of the synopsis are what sold me on picking this one up. I needed nothing further. Yes, please. You had me at 'severed head'...

In fact, this story does begin with a severed head in a dingy hotel room. Seven women, all very different, but all somehow connected to the man to whom the head once belonged, are gathered around it. They all had their own reasons for wanting him dead, yet none of them own up to the crime.

Can they figure out who is guilty before the authorities decide for them?

First off, I found this extremely interesting, the content and topics explored. However, I also found the construction of the story to be a bit jarring. There are a lot of characters and you get all of their perspectives. The narrative jumps around a lot, not only via perspective, but also in time.

With this being said, I found the individual perspectives compelling. As you read how each of the women are connected to the murdered man, Jamie, and you come to understand the different experiences that they each had with him, the true portrait of who Jamie was becomes clear.

The way he treated these women. His narcissism, abusive, violent and derogatory behaviors landed him in the spot he ultimately found himself in, headless. But we can't just go around decapitating men who use, abuse, gaslight and disregard us, can we?

While I did have some moments where I had to really search my brain to remember some previous connection, or fact, overall, I did enjoy this one. There was a lot of great social commentary of the treatment of women who have been victimized; whether they are believed, or painted as somehow responsible for the evil things that have happened to them.

As a revenge story, I feel quite satisfied with this one and am definitely interested in picking up future work from this author. This got dark and I appreciate Wilding's commitment to taking it there.

I would recommend this one to Readers who enjoy a lot of deep character work and social commentary in their Crime Fiction. Additionally, I would recommend the audiobook. I enjoyed the narration style quite a bit.

Thank you so much to the publisher, Minotaur Books and Macmillan Audio, for providing me with copies to read and review. This has left me with quite a bit to think about!

An overall good Murder mystery.

Lots of possible killers and the story will keep you guessing until the very end.

Told from multiple POV’s, discovering along the way all the bad things that the victim did.

I’m not adverse to this type of story set up however there was a lot of down time in this storyline where you were being told about past activities and after the first one or two times, it became very repetitive. Yep, we get it, this guy was a total loser. Having to wait til the very end to know who did it almost didn’t even matter by then. The reader has already signed off on the murder well before. It almost didn’t matter who did it.

But the end was actually really good and it made me forgive some of the really boring parts I had to go through to get there.

An ok revenge read.

The narration was very good. Good pacing and interesting voices for characters. Very easy to tell them apart

Seven women, inextricably linked by one man, must figure out which of them killed him in order to protect one another in this electrifying debut thriller.

The premise of the book had me hooked from the start and kicked off just as crazy as I thought it would. If you love whodunit stories that keep you guessing the whole way through with multiple POVs, this is the book for you!

I do think I might have enjoyed the story more if I read it versus listening to it -- or if there were multiple narrators for so many different characters. I love multiple POV books, but found the audiobook a little hard to get into.

This book begins with seven women sitting around a severed head. If that doesn't catch your interest, I don't know what will.

Despite the gory beginning, overall this book was not gory.

Jamie Spellman is the man behind the head. He wasn't a good man.

As the book goes on, we get to know each of the seven women, their connection to Jamie and how he treated them. They all had reason to murder him. But who did it?

This one is a bit of a slow burn, but it starts to pick up as you go along. We do find out who the killer is and it wasn't a surprise.

Many thanks to NetGalley, St. Martin’s Press/Minotaur and MacMillan Audio for both an ARC and ALC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you NetGalley, Macmillan Audio, and Rose Wilding for the advanced listening copy of Speak of the Devil in exchange for my honest review.

I unfortunately decided to DNF this one about 20% in. I could not keep any of the characters or their storylines straight, and to be frank I honestly do not care which one of them committed the murder because it sounded like the guy had it coming 😂

As always, NetGalley is the only consumer site I will review this on as I don't typically review or rate books I DNF.

3.75 out 0f 5 stars

Thank you to Netalley and Macmillan Audio for allowing me to listen to this in exchange for an honest review

New Years 1999- Seven women sit in a room with the decapitated head of a man that each one had very complicated relationships with. Now they must work together to figure out which one of them is the guilty party before they all go down.

The mystery was pretty good in this even though I think they guilty party is very easy to figure out. For me where this book really shone was the character studies of the women and of the absolutely horrific victim. I read a lot of books but the victim in this had to be one of the most horrible characters I have read in a long time. The topics discussed in this are very dark and I think that will pull you in and keep your interest and the narrator Colleen Prendergast was wonderful. Each character had their own distinct voice.

The story begins on New Year’s Eve, in 1999 with seven women in a hotel room sitting in a semicircle with a severed head in their midst. The head belongs to Jamie Spellman a man who is no stranger to any of them. Each of these women has been wronged by him in some way and they have been plotting to get their revenge but decapitating him wasn’t quite what they had planned. None of them is aware of who amongst them is responsible for the same but each of them harbors suspicions of who it might be. However, they are not interested in outing the culprit and focus on covering up the crime and protecting one another.
As the narrative progresses we get to know more about each of these women, how their stories intersect with the deceased, the events that led to their being in the hotel room with Jamie’s decapitated head, and what transpires in the two weeks following that fateful night as the women try to maintain their innocence. Complicating matters further is the fact that the investigator in charge of the case has a history with one of the women in question.
Narrated from multiple perspectives (in the third-person), Speak of the Devil by Rose Wilding is a well-crafted, immersive read. The narrative moves fast and at no point did I lose interest in the narrative. I enjoyed trying to figure out who the culprit could be (It’s not too hard, but I thoroughly enjoyed the build-up to the end!). What makes this story interesting is that Jamie was truly a despicable character and not only at no point do you feel sorry for what happened to him, you also can’t fault these women for wanting him dead. The novel does venture into dark territory, touching upon themes of rape, police negligence in investigating crimes against women, gaslighting, manipulation, abuse, gender politics and transphobia among others. Not all the characters are explored in equal depth but I did like the diverse cast of characters and how skillfully the author weaves their distinct backstories into the narrative. The ending was a tad abrupt but overall, I enjoyed this novel and look forward to reading more from this author in the future.
Many thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for the DRC of this novel. All opinions expressed in this review are my own.
I paired my reading with audio narration by Colleen Prendergast which certainly elevated my experience with this novel. The narrator does an impressive job of voicing the characters, setting the mood and bringing the story to life. Many thanks to Macmillan Audio for the ALC. I would not hesitate to recommend the novel, the audiobook or pairing both for an intense immersion reading experience.
Expected Date of Publication: June 13, 2023