This book is about three sisters coming together at their family’s hotel after their father’s death, with the main character being the hotel maid. The story explores their complicated relationships and hidden secrets. While the premise had promise, the book felt a bit scattered. Most of the characters were so unlikable that I found it tough to connect.

There were some interesting moments, but overall, it didn’t quite come together in a way that kept me fully engaged. If you’re into family dramas with lots of tension and unresolved issues, it could be worth a read, but it wasn’t my favorite.

Would recommend for fans of…
⛱️ Not A Happy Family
⛱️ Good Bad Girl
⛱️ Home Is Where the Bodies Are

One Big Happy Family is a domestic mystery following three sisters out to claim their inheritance on one stormy weekend. What they don’t know is that one of the maids, a young woman named Charley who is hiding many secrets of her own in the hotel.

This was a pretty solid book! It’s one of those titles that’s perfect for any reader who wants thrills without chills. It’s twisty and suspenseful but never quite crosses into ‘scary’ territory. I really enjoyed how the story was structured, particularly how Charley served as the main protagonist. Getting her POV upfront really helped to set the stakes of the story and established the emotional arc.

My one issue with the book it’s that it felt a bit predictable. There were a lot of elements that felt very familiar, and while that’s not a bad thing, avid readers of the genre may feel like there’s not much original material in this one.

One Big Happy Family is out now. Thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.

*I received a free copy of this novel from NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for my honest review.*

Charley is working at a legendary hotel on the coast of Maine with a crotchety and handsy boss who has recently died. She thinks she had it made with room and board included with the job and isn't sure how things will work out with the boss's daughters who will inherit the hotel - will she keep her job or be out on her bum? This is the weekend that the will will be read and Charley is nervous about changes that may or may not be coming her way. Add to the mix a hurricane that is heading straight toward the hotel and it sets up a great story for a locked room mystery.

The descriptions of the characters and how the stories were laid out was fantastic! Some things I was able to guess, but other things were out of left field to me. The 3 daughters were so different in their lives and personalities as were their partners and the children. It kept Charley on her toes to be able to take it all in and keep everything tidy throughout the weekend.

I feel like there were things that were added in that were secondary to the main story at the hotel, but there was also reason for Charley's thoughts to be split between there and the assisted living house where her grandmother was. But the grandmother story line was a lot more secondary to me and somewhat of a distraction.

Very enjoyable book with very despicable characters! A great read!

Thank you for the ARC!
This book was great ! Love this author and all her other books as well !
This story was very interesting and easy to follow. Definitely recommend !

A hurricane is headed towards Maine, but it's not stopping any of the events planned at The Precipse, a family owned Inn located (as you might guess) on a steep hill along the coast. George, the owner, has died and his three daughters are coming to the inn for his funeral and the reading of his will.
The book is filled with almost all unlikable characters, with the one exception for me being Charley, a young local woman who works as the Inn's maid (and even she had a few unlikable characteristics). I always love a Maine setting and Ms. Day did do a good job of portraying a small coastal town. There were a couple elements that didn't make sense, although I know it was needed for the plot (ie the rationale for letting Bree stay during the storm). It also seemed that the story moved very slowly.
Thanks to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for the opportunity to read One Big Happy Family in exchange for an honest review.

I enjoyed reading Block Party by Jamie Day previous and was so excited to get my hands on this next novel. This is the story of three sisters who following their father's death, travel to their family-own hotel on the coast of Maine. to hear the reading of their father's will. Each sister wants their stake of of what they believe is theirs, as well as the young chambermaid who works at the hotel. Everyone has secrets that are slowly coming out and it's unsure if everyone who came to hotel before the big storm isn't going to make it out alive. This was a very slow read the first 50% of the book, but it definitely picked up. All the characters are pretty unlikeable (by design) but I enjoyed how awful there were. If you're into toxic family dynamics (think Succession) and secrets galore. 3.5/5 stars from me.

This was some screwy arsed book, and I was here for it!
I had initially seen this on Netgalley and decided that it definitely wasn't for me, then I received an invite from the publisher and decided to read it. My thinking was that the publisher often knows what I like, and sometimes "not often" they know better than me! True dat! I ignored it initially because it was family drama. I'm not usually a fan of that genre, but every once in a while...I just stinking loved this damn book!
I loved Charley, the housekeeper and hated everyone else.
This really was one truly despicable family! But, as the story unfolds I realized that as messed up as my "un" blended family was, it couldn't hold a candle to this family.
I'll confess that I had fun reading this story. The ending though was kinda a soft landing. I did still appreciate it, but did find it to be a bit unrealistic. So for that I'm taking a star.
This is a book I'd recommend. Just because I had such a good time!

After not being a huge fan of her last novel (The Block Party), I am glad I gave the author a second chance! I loved a locked room mystery. The story centers around a young maid and three sisters who are new owners of the hotel after their father passed. Each member has their own drama and secrets. It was more of family drama than suspense but was a quick read that I couldn't put down.

I really enjoyed this author's novel, The Block Party, and looked forward to this twisted suspense story. Everyone was a suspect, and I wondered how each character would come through the family drama. Charley, the teenage "chambermaid", is stuck in the middle of the dysfunctional family hoping to keep her job... and her secrets.
With a large cast of characters, the author gave them each something to fight for in the story and tied things up at the end. Another fun who-is-the-guilty-party story! Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for my early copy of this book.

ONE BIG HAPPY FAMILY - Jamie Day

Suspenseful - 3.5 stars

Plot - 4 stars - The Precipice is a legendary, family-owned hotel in coastal Maine. With the recent passing of their father, the Bishop sisters have come to claim it. But with a hurricane looming and each of the Bishop sisters harboring dangerous secrets, there's murder in the air—and not everyone who checks into the Precipice will be checking out. Each sister wants what is rightfully hers, and in the mix is the Precipe's nineteen-year-old chambermaid Charley Kelley: smart, resilient, older than her years, and in desperate straits.

Writing - 3 stars - I'll admit that the first part of the book was a bit slow for me. I was initially interested in hearing the story from the point of view of the maid, but then her problems seemed uninteresting in comparison to the stories of the other characters--the actual family members. By Part 2, about the Bishop Sisters, I was hooked and had no problem with seeing through the eyes of the maid for the rest of the book.

Characters - 3.5 stars - I guess I'd say that they are equally unlikeable. Charley is fairly nice, but she is a thief, no matter how she tries to justify it because of her straitened circumstances and her need to take care of her Nana. The three sisters are all horrible. Vicki is on a power trip, Faith is a model hiding behind her facade, and Iris is an ex-con with a persecution complex. That's not to say that I didn't enjoy reading about them. They are all relatively evil, with few morals, and they were each very interesting in their own nasty way. Quinn (Vicki's son) is too good-looking to be true, but he turned out to have more of a moral compass than pretty much anyone else. Oliver (Faith's son) seems a little off--smothered by his mothers and speaking mostly in rhyme. Bree (the stowaway) seems nice enough, but we don't really get to know her until the end. Backup characters of Rodrigo (hotel manager), Hope (Faith's wife), and Ms. Black (attorney reading the will) add more depth to the story.

Title - 4 stars - This is definitely a sarcastic title since this is far from a happy family. The backup characters (who are not part of the Bishop family) served the purpose of adding more possible suspects to the list, but are they important to the plot or are they simply there as narrators or foils?

Cover - 3 stars - I don't quite understand the cover since it doesn't really mesh with the plot. We are in the midst of a hurricane (which explains the dark sky), but the Adirondack chairs seem inappropriate and don't add appropriately to the mood.

Overall - 3.5 stars - This is a new-to-me author, and I mostly enjoyed reading this book. The mystery was intriguing, although the suspense factor wound down a bit here and there for me when I would have preferred to remain on the edge of my seat. The setting was excellent--very gothic--and I particularly liked that it was set in Maine since I've visited there many times and could recognize the rocky coastline and stormy environment. None of the characters was particularly appealing, but that didn't bother me since the entire plot was centered on an evil plan, so that made pretty much everyone a possible (and believable) suspect, which kept things interesting. I'll admit that I got confused a couple of times because of the large number of main characters (it took me a while to sort them out). I also felt that the many possible outcomes seemed unnecessarily complicated and got the plot into tangles that would have been more smooth with fewer red herrings. The ending certainly ended up tying things up with a bow, but it was satisfying nonetheless, and I will look for more from this author.

This book had so much potential however none of the characters were like able to me so I had super difficult time getting into this one. The plot just felt very predictable and left me wanting more depth.

A great murder mystery with lots of family drama. It was a fast paced read with lots of twists and turns. Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC.

This was a really fun murder mystery thriller. Plus who doesn’t love some family drama. Perfect fast paced & easy to read.

Thank you to St Martins Press & Netgalley for the opportunity to read & review this ARC.

It's been a while since I've read a murder mystery novel where I cared so little about who killed whom or why.
The characters were two-dimensional, the storylines were unoriginal and predictable, and at times, the writing was just...not great. After two books with two star reviews, I'm done with this author.
Thanks to #netgalley and #stmartinspress for this #arc of #onebighappyfamily in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for the eARC of One Big Happy Family! All opinions in this review are my own.

I have been trying to read a thriller with the perfect setting and so much tension that I can't put it down for the past few months and I finally found it! Jamie Day's sophomore novel was so good I'm recommending it to anyone who likes thrillers. Not only is the setting fantastic, a family-owned hotel set on a remote cliff in Maine with a hurricane heading directly for it, but this thriller is also filled with family secrets just waiting to be revealed! I am already looking forward to Day's next thriller!

This family is insane! There were several choked laughter moments, from how dysfunctional they were.

Charley is the current maid at the Precipice hotel. It doesn't pay much, but gives her a place to live, and mostly covers the cost of her grandmother's assisted living. When it doesn't, Charley tends to skim a little from the guest's belongings.

When the owner of the Precipice dies, his 3 daughters come home for the first time in years. Their family dynamic is... odd, to say the least. With tension springing up at the worst moments, Charley just hopes to survive the weekend with her job intact. The will is read, and two of the sisters have their inheritance stolen from them - by Todd, Vicki's husband and an all around unliked guy it seems.

When Todd is found dead the next morning, and they're trapped inside by a hurricane, things go from bad to worse. Pointed poems start showing up, claiming that one of the sisters will die if an old secret isn't revealed. They're held at gunpoint by an unhinged Vicki, sure that someone is trying to frame her for Todd's murder.

All around, this hit a little more on the comedic side than a true thriller. It had all the trappings of one - locked in, budding tension, everyone unable to trust each other. Not that this book was laugh out loud at any point, but there was a lighter side to it. The sense of danger and stakes was never fully there for me. Still, this was an enjoyable read, and I'll definitely try some more Jamie Day books in the future!

Family drama, secrets, lies, and revenge yes please!!! This was one screwed up family but man did I enjoy this book. This is a locked room who dunnit that had me suspecting everyone. Loved the twist and the ending touched my heart. Thank you Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for the ARC in exchange for my review.

3.5 rounded down. I think this was a good story, I personally found it to be predictable but I everything wrapped up nicely at the end.

I've read Jamie Day before and was both impressed and entertained, so I just knew I had to dive into this one. I love stories that feature family inheritance. In this case, it's a hotel on the Maine coast that the daughters of the deceased have set forth to stake their claim. What comes of the hotel is looming on the horizon, along with a hurricane, that will force everyone into close quarters and enact secrets to come alight. An entertaining read through and through.

Charley, a live-in chambermaid at The Precipice Hotel, wants nothing more than to do her job, live a quiet life, and care for her elderly grandmother who suffers from dementia. When the hotels patriarch and owner passed away, his daughter descend in the cliffside hotel during a hurricane for the reading of the will. Charley becomes embroiled in the family's drama as they feud over the contents of the will. When people begin to die and disappear at the hotel over that weekend, Charley must figure out who she can trust and how to keep herself safe. This is twisty turny novel filled with family drama and secrets. It is definitely worth a read!