Good Bad Girl by Alice Feeney: ⭐⭐⭐🐞
Format: ALC from MacMillan Audio and NetGalley

I SCREAMED when I got this ALC from NetGalley and MacMillan Audio! Alice Feeney has been one of my favorite authors since I started reading again, and her bestsellers Rock Paper Scissors, His & Hers, and Daisy Darker are among my favorite mysteries of all time.

Good Bad Girl is the latest from Queen Feeney, a story weaving the lives of four women together, women who believe they are good people who just might have done a bad thing or two in their day. The intersection of their timelines is complex and masterful. I really enjoyed watching them come together at different points in the story!

Good Bad Girl cannot unseat Rock Paper Scissors from my personal top spot- in my opinion, the ending leaves a few too many loose ends. But I will always auto-buy Alice Feeney and will be on the lookout for her next books! Narrators Katherine Press and Stephanie Racine did a bang up job as always, I love their work. I recommend this book to my mystery reading friends!

Thank you to MacMillan Audio for the ALC. Good Bad Girl will be published next week on August 29th 🐞

Good Bad Girl is an enthralling thriller that had me from the first chapter. I was intrigued by the multiple narrators Feeney employs as well as the exploration of motherhood key to most of the action. Unlike the face-paced action I have come to appreciate in Feeney's storytelling, this one takes it's time and is much more of a character driven story. If you need the plot to be clearly moving and don't particularly enjoy feeling confused this one may not be a favorite for you. But I loved it! I found the multiple twists at the end well worth any frustration in reading and Alice Feeney remains one of my favorite writers in the thriller genre.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Macmillan audio for early access to the audiobook in exchange for this review. I enjoyed the audio presentation and usually prefer to listen to books in this genre. However, this one left me wanting a printed text to help me follow and process what was happening, not to mention reread sections after I finished. There is a lot I missed I'd like to go back and trace.

ARC Audiobook Review..

This story was super confusing. I feel reading the book would be less confusing, hopefully… The narrators should of used different voices for the characters. Especially when it was multi pov. I honestly couldn’t tell most of the time that it was two narrators..

The story had me feeling neutral. I didn’t love it, nor hate it.

I really wanted to love this audiobook. The synopsis of the story made me really intrigued. Kind of bummed.

Thank you Netgalley, Macmillan and Alice Feeney for the opportunity to listen to the audio and give my honest opinion

I am a huge Alice Feeney fan, but this one wasn't one of my favorites of hers. I didn't feel like I was ever fully invested in the plot, characters or outcome like I was in previous books. I thought there were a lot of characters to keep track of which may have fed in to that feeling. There were also a lot of different storylines to keep track of that eventually connected in the end, but I felt like the story was jumping around at times. Still, I liked how Feeney tied everything together in the end without leaving any loose ends. To be fair, this may also not have been the best time of my life to read this book about bad mothers and poor mother-daughter relationships. Regardless, I am still a huge Alice Feeney fan and I will continue to read everything she writes!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this arc audiobook!

I received this advanced copy from the publisher through net galley. The book had me in pins and needles. Twists and turns everywhere. Alice feeney does it again!

Another great thriller by Alice Feeney! I was hooked from the beginning, couldn't stop listening, and the classic Alice Feeney twist at the end had my jaw on the floor. Solid 5 stars and will continue to recommend to anyone willing to listen!

Alice Feeny crafts such clever twists. The whole time I was reading I thought I had figured it out!

I went into it expecting a thriller like Rock, Paper, Scissors (which I loved!) but it felt more like a suspenseful mystery. With that said - I thoroughly enjoyed this story and wanted to see how it unraveled!

The audio was really well done, the one issue I had was that the voices for the different POV’s were so similar that I got confused and needed to pause to make sure whose POV I was following.

3.5⭐
Genre ~ domestic drama
Publication date ~ August 29, 2023
Page Count ~ 310
Audio length ~ 9 hours 21 minutes
Narrators ~ Katherine Press, Stephanie Racine
POV ~ multiple 3rd
Featuring ~ dual timeline, kidnapping, murder, secrets, lies, short chapters

The prologue is intriguing with a baby stolen from her stroller in the supermarket.

Our main characters are:
Frankie~ works in a prison library, teenage daughter missing
Patience ~ works at Edith's care facility
Clio ~ therapist, mother of kidnapped baby
Edith ~mother of Clio

There's mother/daughter drama, some twists and a dog named, Dickens. Slow moving and confusing for quite a bit for me, but eventually we get to the meat of the story and it chugged along at a quicker clip. Overall, not my favorite, but interesting enough.

Narration notes:
They both did an okay job, but there wasn't that much distinction between them.

Alice Feeney’s knack for delivering clever twists drew me in once again with “Good Bad Girl.” I am happy to say that I was not left disappointed. This book offered a captivating story that kept me entertained for hours.

For me, Feeney shines brightest when she employs multiple perspectives to tell a story, a technique present in “Good Bad Girl.” However, the similarity in voices among these perspectives lead to a few moments of confusion, hence my four stars.

If you like this book, I highly recommend you check out Feeney’s other works, especially “Rock Paper Scissors” and “His & Hers,” which were five-star reads for me.

Thank you to Netgalley and Macmillan for this ARC!

Good Bad Girl is a slower burn domestic suspense/family drama. I would not go into this expecting an action-packed thriller. This is a fantastic mystery that will have you questioning what is actually happening until the very last page. I loved the short chapters and the peculiar characters. Told in 4 different POVs, it took me a little time to get to know each character and understand where they fit into the plot. I enjoyed puzzling through this book and there were a few twists I did not see coming. The exploration of mother/daughter relationships really resonated with me. I love the way Alice Feeney writes, there were many quotes on grief and loss that I wrote down. I will say if you have experience with postpartum depression, take care while reading.

Katherine Press and Stephanie Racine did a great job with the narration. I enjoyed both of their voices and thought they fit well with the tone of the story.

Thank you, Macmillan Audio and NetGalley for the opportunity to read this ARC!

My Ratings:
Plot ★★★★
Reading Experience ★★★★
Characters ★★★★★
Writing Style ★★★★★

Overall ★★★★.5

Good Bad Girl was a good book, but not a great book. I was expecting a thriller similar to Rock Paper Scissors, but this book was more of a mystery and a lot of drama about motherhood. It started off slow and a little confusing, but it picks up at the end and everything makes sense. It was well written and I loved the narrator. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to listen to Good Bad Girl!

I loved listening to this one.

While this didn't feel like a typical Feeney thriller it still held plenty of twists and turns to keep you captivated.

I would more describe this as a family drama with some murder involved. The dynamic of family by blood or by choice was so interesting. I couldn't have guessed where this would have ended up!

This one had some great twists! This was a little harder for me to listen to though; I think maybe having different narrators would have helped me keep the main female characters straight. It did start out slower, so this one took me a minute to get into,(partially bc of my life, partially bc it started slow) and then the twists started to unfold & I had a hard time stopping!

3.5 Stars
This was a bit confusing because it did go back and forth a bit, but it still sucked me in so much that I finished it in a day lol. I'm always trying to figure out how things are connected when I read thrillers and I was pleasantly surprised by the twists in this one and I love how this came together in the end. Another great read from Alice Feeney!

Thank you NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for the ARC!

First off, thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to listen to this audiobook in exchange for a review!!!

This is one of the those books that I wish I could give a 1/2 star rating to and give it 3.5.

I'm a huge fan of Alice Feeney so I was going to read this one no matter what. The 4 main characters: Edith, Frankie, Clio and Patience were introduced into the storyline and I thought it to be a little confusing at times, each with their own perspective but soon enough it all falls into place - maybe this is because I was listening to an audiobook.

Unlike most, I didn't anticipate one of the twist that was thrown at me and I always enjoy that.

20 years ago a baby was kidnapped and that's only the beginning. What do these 4 characters have in common and how the story unfolds will keep you reading to the end. You won't stop until you have the answers.

Good Bad Girl is similar in style to Alice Feeney's recent books - the narration switches between four women and in addition to the mystery unfolding, you are also given vague clues as to how the women are connected to each other. I loved that this one kept me guessing and I was most intrigued trying to figure out how all of the characters were connected to each other.

Alice Feeny has a way of connecting with her readers by taking something that may be going on in your everyday life and turning it into a twisty mystery. Everyone is faced with putting a parent into an assisted living facility, but not like the one in this book. As we are starting one story, there is another one being told and by the end they are woven together in a surprising twist. The narrators of this story were wonderful and this story held my attention and I did not want to stop listening.

Complicated family relationships is an understatement in this Alice Feeney book. Multiple women and multiple points of view to this story. I enjoyed the audio narration on this one and the voices really added to the story. This one was a slow burn , it went a long way with me not knowing where it was going, twisty, twisty, twisty. I love Alice Feeney and the way she writes a thriller. This books poses the thought that sometimes good people have to do bad things when bad things happen. Thank you NetGalley for this early access to Alice Feeney in exchange for an honest review. Feeney will continue to be an auto buy author for me. Highly recommend this one if you love thrillers

Good Bad Girl by Alice Feeney

⭐️⭐️⭐️

* Thank you to @netgalley and @macmillan for providing the audiobook of Good Bad Girl in exchange of a honest review.

This audiobook made me fall in love with the format! It was my first time listening to a book and this one was perfect. The narrator made it super easy to follow the story, the caracters were easy to distinguish and the overall story was thrilling and It kept me entertain until the end.

Good Bad Girl is not my first Alice Feeney novel and to be clear I am already a fan of her work. Rock, Paper, Scissors is one of my favorites and I was incredibly excited to get this ARC on audio. The production is done extremely well and the story is laid out in an incredibly easy way to follow.

The plot begins with the end and ends with the beginning. Sound complicated? Well, it is a bit actually, BUT my attention was grabbed quickly. At every turn and curve, I was either left frustrated waiting for the big reveal or holding on for the next big twist. The frustration I felt was also due to the constant cliff hangers before going back or forward in time and not due to major pitfalls in the plot. A good tactic by an author that knows how to lead the reader along.

Edith is a wily eighty-year-old that may have been tricked into a nursing home, but she doesn’t let that stop her from righting past wrongs. She has an estranged relationship with her daughter Clio that she wants to fix along with supporting a favorite worker at the care home whom she calls Ladybug. In the midst of these relationships there is a murder at the home and two of the people Edith cares about most are the main suspects.

Going back in time, the reader is let on to another crime that occurred twenty years prior. A baby was stolen from a pram while at a local supermarket. The fateful date this occurred was Mother’s Day…the same day of the murder at the care home twenty years later. Too many events to follow? Definitely not! I will say that I had the plot worked out with the major characters pretty early on. However, there were a few surprise elements that tied these into the plot nicely and I appreciated this immensely. This novel is a perfect fast read for a vacation or end of summer pool days.