LADYKILLER by Katherine Wood is a twisty suspense set in the Greek Isles. The author does an admirable job in bringing the setting to life through vivid imagery. It’s difficult not to want to hop on the next plane and visit Greece with its golden sand beaches and crystalline turquoise waters. However, it was hard to connect to the characters. Told from two different points of view: rich and overly entitled Gia and her underprivileged best friend, Abby. Gia’s story is told mainly through a manuscript she writes at her vacation home on a remote Greek island. Abby’s story is her quest to find out what happened to Gia, with the help of Gia’s brother. While the setup of the plot is good, and there are several twists along the way, it’s the ending with all the unresolved questions that ruined it for me. However, if you like unreliable narrators with a dose of provocative sex scenes and suspense, and having to use your imagination to fill in the ending, then Ladykiller is worth the read.

I was provided with an advance copy. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

a girl goes missing and her friend tries to find her. This is a quick mystery read, it will keep you guessing until the end.

Fun, twisty addition to the horrible rich people in exotic, deadly locales genre of thriller- I will definitely keep Katherine Wood on my radar as an author to look out for.

Gia has been fabulously wealthy all her life, and when, as a teenager, Abby’s mom becomes a chef for Gia’s family, Abby reaps some of the rewards of being wealthy in the form of having her prep school and then law school paid for. She also gets to travel with Gia and her brother Benny to places like their beautiful island home in Greece. When they were 18, tragedy struck. Gia ended up writing a memoir about it; Abby did her best to forget it by throwing herself into her studies and then into her work. They remain friends, but Gia’s impulsive lifestyle doesn’t mix well with a junior lawyer working six days a week to make partner.

The story is told from Abby’s point of view and from Gia’s manuscript that Abby will find when Gia goes missing. The manuscript is a racy account of Gia’s hasty marriage to a man whose motives for marrying an heiress quickly come into question. But a manuscript may be based on true events while fabricating many others. What is the truth? Where is Gia now?

Parts of this were hard for me to read. Maybe because I didn’t grow up with massive wealth, I had trouble identifying with Gia’s wild behavior. Lies long concealed are revealed while other questions remain unanswered.

NetGalley provided an advance copy of the novel, which RELEASES JULY 9, 2024.

The Prologue of Ladykiller, by Kathleen Wood, opens at a very showy funeral. Readers are teased with hints of prior “scandals” involving family members of the very wealthy, newly deceased patriarch. In his sermon, the minister praises the deceased for his generosity in primarily leaving his vast fortune to his charitable foundation, and it is unclear whether his previous three wives and their children were aware of this philanthropy.

As the story begins, the narration switches to alternate perspectives of two young women intimately involved in the family dramas, especially their connection to one unexplained but apparently very traumatic past incident. The pace moves unhurriedly in the novel’s first half, as the characters party their way through leisurely and pampered lifestyles along with friends and acquaintances who share the same privilege and hedonistic behaviors. However, humming subtly along in the background is a mounting sense of uncertainty about who truly has a lot of money, and who might be just pretending to wealth and actually plotting to con someone else. And then, in the book’s second half, the fun stops, someone disappears, and mystery and dread take over. The earlier languid pace is gone as disappearances, threatening emails, questionable narrators, a missing revolver and faked identities propel the story forward through multiple twists and turns.


Ladykiller is a fun and fascinating mystery in the hands of a talented author who knows exactly how to set the scene, pace the action, and speed the momentum up to maximum effect !

Thank you to Bantam Books and Net Galley for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Abby & Gia, lifelong best friends who couldn’t be more different. Gia comes from a wealthy family & lives a lavish carefree lifestyle while Abby was raised by her single mother, who worked as the family chef for Gia’s family growing up. The two girls drifted apart after a horrific tragedy took place during a summer spent in Gia’s family home in Greece years before. Abby became a lawyer & Gia wrote a bestselling book about the girls’ tragedy. Gia is newly married, to a man she hardly knows, Garrett. Abby didn’t make the trip for Gia’s last minute wedding but when she invited Abby & Benny, Gia’s younger brother, to check an item off of their bucket lists, to visit the Northern Lights, she doesn’t refuse. The problem? Gia never shows leaving Abby & Benny, whom have always harbored feelings for each other, alone together for the first time since that summer ended in tragedy. Unable to get Gia on the phone & after a visit from a man who doesn’t appear to be whom he says he is, the two head to Greece to find Gia. Gia’s latest manuscript is found in the abandoned home. Are the things she’s written about Garrett & the couple they met & invited to stay with them in it true? When Gia is found kidnapped her story doesn’t seem to add up leaving Abby desperate for the truth about her best friend as well as what happened that night all those years ago.

From the very beginning of Ladykiller, by Katherine Wood, I was completely hooked. I love a past & present timeline & this was no exception. I found myself second guessing everyone at some point as no one appeared to be trustworthy.

The description of the villa in Greece as well as the shops, restaurants & town made me wish I could transport myself. If Greece wasn’t already on your bucket list, it will be.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Thank you to NetGalley, Bantam Books & Katherine Wood for the opportunity to read this book ahead of its July 9th release.

A deliciously slippery tale that keeps you second-guessing who can be trusted! I couldn’t put it down and ended up finishing it in a day and a half. Great story-telling and suspense building!

This was a very good book! It had me on the edge of my seat and the twists and turns were awesome. It took me a little while to get into but when I did, I was very invested! Thank you so much for allowing me to read it!

First of all let me just this cover is AMAZING!

This was my first novel by Katherine Wood, and man does she have a fan in me! This book keep me guessing until the very end. I loved how confused I was throughout the storyline. The characters were very complex and Ms. Woods did a great job describing each and their purpose. Everyone was introduced at the right time and it made the storyline flow.

Gia was a character that I loved and hated. I wanted her and Garrett to beat all the odds that were stacked against there spontaneous wedding. There romance will definitely take readers on a roller coaster ride. Leaving many readers to say in the end, what was really true and what was part of Gia's imagination. I also love the way the author told her story through Gia's manuscript. It was very well written. I can not say enough about how great this novel is!

So far my best read of 2024.

Overall this was a solid read. I enjoyed the parallel storylines, especially the “Gia’s Manuscript” chapters, they were really engaging, even more so with the beautiful descriptions of Greece! I feel like I wasn’t fully satisfied with the ending because I like more closure, but still enjoyed it

I absolutely loved this book! It was a quick read and kept me guessing up until the end! It captivated me from the start and I found myself wanting to read it at any spare time that I got. Highly recommend if you are into psychological thrillers and endings leaving you thinking so what really happened…like in Colleen Hoover’s Verity and Lisa Jewell’s None Of This Is True. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a copy of this book to review.

Nice story, but kind of a slow start. It got more interesting as I got further into it. Fun concept, I kind of pictured it as a movie.

Good book. I liked this book. It was a slow start for me but it did pick up and I enjoyed it in the end. I would recommend it to my friends.

This book surprised me. It’s a journey through lifelong friendships and what happens when you really don’t know each other as well as you thought you did.

Abby and Gia were the typical “opposites attract” friendship. Gia was from a wealthy family and given every opportunity in life, and Abby was raised by a single mother who barely scraped by. But they were inseparable as teens, even being tangled up in a tragic accident and then scrutiny by the police. After spending that fateful summer in Greece with Gia, Abby returns home to the states, but she and Gia have a minor falling out when Gia becomes engaged to a man she barely knows. After not speaking for ages, Abby decides to meet Gia in Switzerland, but Gia never shows up. This is where the story really takes hold. Is Abby right about this new husband? Why would Gia disappear?

There is plenty of angst and suspense, especially later in the book. The descriptions of Greece are so lovely, and the characters are exactly how you imagine a wealthy family to be. If you love a great mystery/thriller, you’ll definitely enjoy this one. Thank you, NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine for the eARC.

A twisty book, where it was impossible to know who to trust. Well, even more so - it was really impossible to trust anyone. The influencer, rich life-style was pretty interesting, and I'd love to see the Greek island this is set on (although I'd just be a poor tourist). I hate to say much about the plot, because I'm sure I'd spoil something. It was difficult to like any of the characters, but it sure did keep me wondering.

Ladykiller by Katherine Wood is a definite page turner. Great character and plot development. Two high school friends plan to meet for a birthday reunion weekend, but one disappears. Her story is told through the book manuscript she was writing. But what is true and what are lies. Amazing ending! . The descriptions of the Greek countryside is like a beautiful travel guide.

The aspect I loved most about this book was that every character was suspicious, right from the start. It kept me on my toes and made me want to keep reading to see how it would unfold. However, the pace overall was slower than I would have liked and it discouraged me from rating this higher. I expected a bit more from Abby's point of view, especially since I enjoyed that side of the story more than Gia's manuscript.

50-70% of the book definitely picked up the pace and redeemed itself for me. Overall, it was an enjoyable read but it wasn't as much of a thriller as I would have expected based off of the description.

This thriller had me at the edge of my seat with some cold sweats. I just had to know what happened and kept flipping the page. I was so invested and flew through this book.

Katherine Wood killed it with this book!! I could not put it down!! I love all the second guessing of what was going on, the characters, the story lines, just everything!!

This thriller had a good, slow buildup of tension. I liked the back and forth between Gia's fiction/memoir that was unreliable and Abby's pov as she discovered her friend missing and attempted to figure out what was going on. Much of this book is set on a beautiful Greek island, making it a good beach read. Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced copy in return for my honest review.