Member Reviews

Honestly the blurb of this sounded chaotic and that’s exactly what I needed. This was intricately done and while, yes, it’s a bit improbable- it was wonderfully paced and I couldn’t put it down

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Going into this book blind, and not knowing that it was a sequel; I thought it was decent as a stand alone. Many elements of the book were a large stretch of the imagination, and I found myself rolling my eyes quite a few times. I didn't enjoy it enough to go back and read the first book. It was just okay.

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I thoroughly enjoyed Two Dead Wives by Adele Parks. Kylie Gillingham is a complex character that I would love to have a bloody mary with. I would also like to work with DC Clements. Five stars!!

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I started this one, realized it was a sequel and I had the first book on my shelf, so I sent this one aside. When I finally picked it back up, I finished it pretty quickly. And I did enjoy this one a lot more than I liked the first book.

"It's always the husband. Trickier when there are two."

So in this book we know Kylie has been living a double life. She has a more domesticated life with Mark, where they are firmly middle class and she is the stepmom to his two boys. With Daan Kylie's life is very posh and she is living a glamorous life with the other 1%. We also know she has been taken and spent some of her abduction in an empty apartment in Daan's building. But where is she now?

There are a lot of povs here. We have Fiona, the best friend, Mark and Daan, the husbands, Oli, the oldest stepson and a mysterious woman who is recovering from cancer but has lost her memory and is being taken care of by her father. Plus we are in the days of COVID lockdown. this had a lot of moving parts but the story was interesting and moved much quicker than the first book. My bone to pick is with the ending, which didn't feel very realistic at all to the point of being kind of corny. Still worth the read.

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Stacie Jones wakes up after having brain surgery in a small seaside village under the care of her father Kenneth. She has no memory of her life before the surgery and is completely reliant on him and his care. But as time goes by, Stacie is slowly having flashes of memories of her earlier life. She is excited to have her memories returned but her father is not quite as thrilled about her uncovering her past. Meanwhile, in London, Kylie Gillingham, a woman living two separate lives, has disappeared and it is feared she has been murdered. Both of her husbands are potential suspects and DCI Clements and her partner Tanner are in a race against time to find Kylie before it’s too late. The book jumps between Stacie’s story and the murder investigation. It becomes apparent that there is a connection between these two different women’s lives. This was a great read and I hadn’t realized it was the second in a series. It could easily have been a stand alone.

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This was interesting, but it was definitely too long. Once I figured out what was going to happen, I wasn't as invested.

I received an advance copy. All thoughts are my own.

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an entertaining mystery and well written book. every chapter left me wanting more. the characters were not always likable but always interesting

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I was underwhelmed with this book, just as I was with the first book in the series. It didn’t grab me or hold my attention at all. I’m sure many of Ms. Parks’ fans will love it, but it didn’t work for me.

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Adele Parks has created another twisty thriller that keeps you intrigued and guessing until the conclusion. She creates characters that you like despite their bad decisions and personality flaws. This was a story I could not put down. This book completely works as a standalone story even though it is a sequel. I debated reading the first DCI Clements book before this one but decided to give it a try.

What happened to Stacie? She is trying to rebuild her memory with the help of her father. He has filled in the details of where she has lived and how her illness brought her back to her childhood home with him. But the details don’t make her fill comfortable in her own skin. She still feels like the story isn’t while, isn’t quite what she feels it should be.

Meanwhile, DCI Clements continues to work the disappearance of Kylie Gillingham. In unwinding the circumstances of the case, she knows Kylie was a bigamist with two husbands who both seem to have reasons to harm Kylie. But Kylie built a family with her first husband and his two sons. The “why” of her decisions haunt both families, especially her step-sons. The boys aren’t ready to give up their own hunt for answers. The storyline swirls around both husbands and bring them into each other’s search for Kylie and answers to what happened and why.

The bad decisions keep coming but build to an unanticipated resolution. Definitely a recommended read!

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This book took me a while to really get invested. Every. Single. Character. Has a POV in this book. This got to be too much at times. They’re also not actually told from their POV but rather a narrator telling their story. I noticed this was a second book but I didn’t know it was the second book of a lot of the characters. I didn’t read the first book and it might have answered a lot of my questions if I did read the first one.

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When one spouse is murdered, suspicion often falls on the other. But what happens when there are two spouses in the picture? Kylie's double life complicates things when she's kidnapped, leading the police to believe she's met a tragic end. The case grabs national attention, and it's a lingering ordeal for the two men connected to her. Stacie Jones is recuperating from an illness under the care of her retired father, hoping for a peaceful existence. This book has multiple POVs and takes many twists and turns. I have not read the first book in this series but plan to. This book can be read as a standalone but I think reading the first book would be helpful

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Adele Parks does it again. I know this is the second book in the series but you don’t necessarily need to read the first one to get in the groove of this one. There is just enough suspense, confusion and surprise to keep you wanting to read. Stacie is back living with her father after a tragic accident while the would is wondering what happened to Stacie. Her husband and sons are on the hunt to figure out where she is. Two worlds collide and all comes to light.
Read this if you love the ride to finding out what actually happened.

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After having read and LOVED Adele Parks novels previously, I was so excited for this book. But it just did not work for me like all her others. I couldn’t quite figure out why I didn’t like this one as well. It has a great premise, the twists were good, I just felt disconnected from the story and characters. I honestly believe timing is such a huge part of reading and loving books and I am a mood reader! This could definitely be a thing where if I read it at another time, I would have enjoyed it more. Overall, it was ok for me. I can see a lot of people enjoying this one. The multiple POV and storylines were great! I will absolutely read what Adele comes out with next!

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I really struggled with this one. I think that I still have some PTSD from surviving the pandemic with small babies. This is a really twisted story of a woman who is married to two different men and goes missing. Is she alive? Is she dead? And what does a woman named Stacy who is recovering from cancer and living with her older father have to do with the entire situation.

There is a lot of back and forth and I kept getting confused as to who was who and where the story had left off from the last point of view break.

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This was ok. There really wasn't ever a mystery for me. I pretty much knew the plot the whole time. I read a lot of books that have multiple points of view, and for some reason, this one was a little confusing to me. The action at the end was good, but overall, the story was just ok.

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4.25/5

Two Dead Wives by Adele Parks is the follow-up to her previous novel Woman Last Seen, and believe me when I say, you will enjoy this book a heck of a lot more if you read that one first. It is an immediate continuation from where the first novel ends, and it is full of spoilers that might not make you want to go back and read the first one if you start with this. I also would have been pretty confused had I not read them in order, so you have been warned. I loved that we had mostly the same characters again and that includes my beloved DCI Clements. I think I knew pretty early on what was going on here, but somehow Parks still managed to throw twists at me that I didn't see coming.

This book also introduced a new narrator for the audio which I was a little surprised by, but I loved Kristin Atherton and was very happy with her narration for Two Dead Wives. As with the previous novel, there are still multiple viewpoints, but the storyline is really easy to follow along with and I had no issues keeping up with them or knowing who was who. It also provided some much-needed closure, and I enjoyed the way everything was tied up at the end. While I wouldn't say I loved all of the main characters (not by a long shot), a couple of them grew on me and I ended up not hating them completely in the end. High praise I know 😂 If you are a fan of this author, I would definitely recommend checking out both DCI Clements novels and skipping over the synopses!

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I knew going in that this book was the second to feature DCI Clements, but I had no idea from the synopsis that it was a sequel to Woman Last Seen which is on my TBR list, but now I don't know if there is a point to reading it. I do think in hindsight that it would have been really beneficial to have read Woman Last Seen first, as it would have probably changed my thinking on this book.

I did enjoy the twist on the theory that the husband is always the suspect, but what happens when there are two husbands? I also thought that the isolation of the pandemic did play into the effectiveness of the Stacie plot line and that the author captured just how happy people were to return to pre-pandemic socializing.

Edit: In reading other reviews, a lot of readers found themselves in the same position as me with not knowing about Woman Last Seen, so maybe this wasn't such a me thing and more of a marketing thing.

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When I read this book, I didnt realize it was book two in a series. It worked well as a standalone. After reading some of the comments though, I can't not read the first book. I definitely thought this book was unique. I don't recall coming across a similar concept. The beginning sucked me in. Is Kylie dead? Is she alive? Why does the story switch to another storyline and what's the connection? It all came together in the end. I'd say parts of the book were more fast paced than others. Overall it kept my attention. I guess the minus one star would have to do with the far fetched elements that coincidentally happened. Maybe I need to suspend my imagination more. Time to go find the first book now.

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Thank you Netgalley and Adele Parks!

This was a slow burn thriller and I figured out the twist early on. However, there were many loose ends I wanted to see hopefully tied up, so that kept my interest throughout.

The plot involves a bigamist woman who goes missing and is presumed dead. I liked it because it's not a topic I see too often and it kept things interesting.

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Two Dead Wives
⭐️⭐️⭐️.5
Author: Adele Parks

I requested a digital advanced readers copy from NetGalley and Harlequin and providing my opinion voluntarily and unbiased.

Synopsis: Lost. Missing. Murdered? How do you find a woman who didn’t exist?

It's a case that has gripped a nation: A woman with a shocking secret is missing, presumed dead. And her two husbands are suspects in her murder.

DCI Clements knows the dark side of human nature and that love can make people do treacherous things. You can’t presume anything when it comes to crimes of the heart. Until a body is found, this scandalous and sad case remains wide open.

Stacie Jones lives a quiet life in a small village, nursed by her father as she recovers from illness, and shielded from any news of the outside world. But their reclusive life is about to be shattered.

How are these families linked, and can any of them ever rebuild their lives in the wake of tragedy?

My Thoughts: This was the second book in the DC Clements series. I have the first one on my TBR but did not read it and had no issues following along, so this can absolutely be read as a standalone. This psychological thriller was tense, captivating and explosive. It starts a bit confusing but as it goes along, you completely understand what is happening. It makes national news on a women’s disappearance with both husbands suspected of foul play. Then jump over to Stacie Jones who lives a quiet life with her father as she recovers from a serious illness. As their lives intersect, are they connected? Will they be able to rebuild a happy life with so much tragedy?

The story has multiple narrators. This plot line was very attention grabbing, “a bigamist woman is missing,” and kept my interest peaked. Kylie had created two very separate and different lives, one with Daan, living a very high lifestyle with the wealthy, socializing with high powered VIPs and A-List celebrities. Then she has a life with Mark, more of the family life with two stepsons that she really adores. Neither husband was none the wiser until she went missing, then the dam broke. Kylie definitely made mistakes but the husbands were not necessarily the victim in this scenario, Daan was a cheater, never a one-woman man, while Mark essentially dumped the responsibility of the kids, who are not biologically hers, on her shoulders. The characters were well fleshed out, especially if you read the first book, they were mysterious, intriguing, and creatively. The author’s writing style was complex, suspenseful, twisty, and captivating.

This checks all of the boxes for a psychological thriller, it is twisty, devious, creepy, dark, and captivating. I would highly recommend picking up the book or audiobook.

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