Just when I thought I knew where this book was going, there was a swerve of all swerves. I love how this author always keeps me on my toes and keep me guessing. Perfect summer read. Can’t recommend it enough.

This was a suspenseful psychological thriller.

Written in dual timelines, the novel kept me glued to the pages as I tried to keep up with all the characters and figure out what had gone on years ago and what was going to happen in the present. Tessa Nilsson is attending a bachelorette party along with her sister, Lena, for one of their oldest friends on a remote, basically deserted island known as Isle Blind. Coincidentally (or not) the place happens to be where four friends disappeared 1o years ago. It so happens that Tessa is a true crime podcaster (now disgraced and canceled) who is set on trying to revive her career by finding out what really happened to those women known as the Nacka Four. Shortly, Tessa finds herself in a very precarious position that might just end her and her friends.

Without spoilers, the book deals with sisterhood, friendship, and the girl code as well as what happens when you don’t do the right thing by others. Although it didn’t end as I’d hoped, it kept me in suspense and guessing throughout the story.

I was able to listen to the audiobook while also following along in the e-book ARC —both formats provided by the publishers. The narrator, Laura Jennings, did a great job of voicing all the characters and bringing great dramatic flair that made for an excellent production. At one point, toward the end, I just had to speed up ahead of the audio as things got really tense and exciting. The audio definitely enhanced my enjoyment.

I definitely enjoyed this & was excited to see what truly happened to the Nacka 4 but it was a bit drawn out for me. I was def intrigued with whatever threw Tessa's life into a tailspin but for the girls at The Bachelorette Party, none of them are very likeable. It was entertaining and I didn't 100% guess the outcome which is refreshing but also, it was a bit unrealistic and that loses the suspense for me.
Good, not great.

This is my first book by this author. She and it came highly recommended by several of my book buddies. While it was enjoyable, I do feel it fell a little flat. While every thing felt very thought out and planned, it just didn't come together the way I really wanted it too. I became easily confused about who was who, guessed the twist early, and felt there was no good twist that just left me shocked.
The writing was very good, very fleshed out characters. I definitely want to read more by this author cause she does come highly recommended. Maybe one of her earlier works will hit the spot so many people told me about.

The tag line initially drew me in but overall this book fell flat for me. I couldn't get invested in the characters and the dual timelines were clunky.

i really enjoyed the first half of this book, however the second half, and the reveals, fell flat to me. additionally, i feel that splitting the timeline impeded my enjoyment of the book, because it felt like there was not enough development in either timeline.

Two timelines - one in the days leading up to a yearly get together of longtime friends on Isle Blind, a tiny island in the Baltic Sea. The other timeline is ten years later, five friends have been invited to stay at a luxury resort not yet open to the public, built on that same island. While the author does a great job of building tension, at times I felt like it was just dragged out for too long. In the middle of several very intense what-will-happen-next moments, we have repetitive inner thoughts of the main character. It felt oddly forced. The overall story was good, and I definitely kept turning the pages. There wasn't a big revealing moment for me, because much of it was inevitable, but I did enjoy the story.
Thanks to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for the opportunity to read this new-to-me author! I'm adding her backlist to my tbr to try out!

Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC of The Bachelorette Party...

I'm a huge fan of mystery thrillers and the more twists, the better. I loved the premise of this book. But the execution just didn't do it for me. It was all over the place, the timeline between the first murders and the party had way too many holes, and the big reveal at the end kind of fell flat, after such a big lead up. It ended up being all about revenge and against the wrong people.

I did enjoy most of the story and the suspense element was great. It was just a bit too holey and I kind of felt let down with the ending.

This was a creepy little thriller with an interesting backstory. I did not see the big twist coming, which was good fun as the reader, though I found the eventual unveiling of who the killer(s) were to be really predictable. The dual timelines made for a nice reading experience, and it was easy to get sucked into the story. I struggled a bit with how unlikeable I found the narrator, but that was ultimately part of the charm of the book.

3.5 stars

ARC was provided by the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Pretty good thriller. Podcaster (ex) Tessa goes on a trip with some friends and well bad things start happening on said trip. Murder and mystery and tragedy strike. Pretty good read.

Scream meets the guest list? Sign me up! Unfortunately, I found this one slow and boring. It did not live up to its comp titles.

I hate leaving reviews like this but DNF at 11 percent. Nothing is happening. I don’t even care enough to keep reading. Just not for me

The Bachelorette Party is my kind of premise for sure. I can’t pass up a locked in vibe (on a secret island no less) AND a cold case.

Tessa a semi retired (not by choice) infamous podcaster can’t help but try to find out what happened to the mysterious four that disappeared ten years ago and the bachelorette party for one of her best friends just happens to be on the same island. A secret island that one of the murdered girl’s sister now owns and transformed into a luxurious retreat.

Sounds predictable right? Well, it is. I still enjoyed it though. Touted as Scream-ish (I don’t really agree), this one is a fun read but also not as good as I hoped .

I’ll keep reading this author but liked her last book better for sure. If you like a fun locked in vibe you’ll probably like the entertainment value here. Not bad -
But not great (for me). Thanks to NetGalley for the early copy.

It’s been a while since I’ve reached for a thriller. I used to tear through them like a plate of cookies (and let me tell you, I can down some cookies!). I loved the unexpected twists, the unreliable narrators galore, secrets buried in every chapter. But after a while, they all started to feel the same. Either the twist was so far-fetched that it made no sense, or the characters were cardboard cutouts serving the plot rather than driving it. So I backed off. Took a break. Let the genre rest a bit. But then I saw this book compared to "Scream", and as someone who unapologetically adores that series of movies, I was immediately curious.

Is this book actually like "Scream"? No. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Aside from the whole “people get murdered” thing, the comparison feels like a huge stretch. But that doesn’t mean the book wasn’t enjoyable. I just went in expecting a slasher-adjacent thrill ride and got something a little more grounded. Not a bad thing, just not what the marketing led me to believe.

The story centers on Tessa Nilsson, a podcaster who once had a thriving show focused on true crime in Sweden. She’s obsessed with a case from ten years ago. Four best friends who disappeared during their annual trip to a secluded island. One of the women babysat Tessa when she was a kid, so she has a personal stake in the story. What's perplexing about the case is that the clues left behind were scarce, and no bodies were ever found. The case went cold. Kind of like Tessa’s podcast. (Though that happened for other reasons.)

When her best friend Anneliese plans a bachelorette weekend at a luxurious yoga retreat on—you guessed it—a remote island, Tessa can’t shake the feeling that the island bears more than a passing resemblance to the one from the cold case. And while everyone else is focused on girls trip fun, Tessa is here to dig. To investigate. Maybe even to solve the mystery that’s haunted her for a decade. Maybe this will help revive her podcast and her reputation as a top podcaster.

Of course, things go sideways fast. People go missing. Secrets surface. And Tessa, ever the amateur detective, is suddenly in the middle of something far more dangerous than she anticipated.

Here’s what worked: the pacing. Camilla Sten doesn’t waste time dragging us through endless backstory or unnecessary filler. The book moves. Each chapter pushes the story forward. The setting is spectacular. I felt like I was there. It adds the right amount of claustrophobia. You can feel the isolation. The tension builds at a steady clip, and once people start to disappear, the suspense holds.

Tessa is a solid main character. She’s smart, determined, and a little impulsive in a way that feels believable. Her motivations are clear, and I liked watching her try to piece together a puzzle that everyone else had given up on. There’s a decent amount of emotional grounding in her character too. She’s not just there to chase thrills, she genuinely wants answers.

The supporting cast, though, is a bit of a mixed bag. Some of them have interesting dynamics and backstories, but a few felt like stock characters you’d expect in any thriller. They weren’t badly written, just not especially memorable. I found myself having to remind myself who was who, which doesn’t help when you’re trying to keep track of possible suspects. That said, each character does serve a purpose in the story, and no one feels like pure filler.

As for the twist? I saw it coming. Maybe not every detail, but I wasn’t shocked by the reveal. That didn’t ruin the book for me, though. Sometimes the journey is more fun than the destination, and this one kept me turning pages regardless. It’s not a twist-heavy thriller in the sense of pulling the rug out from under you repeatedly. (Which I REALLY appreciated.) It’s more about the unspooling of tension, the peeling back of secrets, and the creeping sense that something terrible is about to happen.

My only real complaint is that I wish it leaned harder into the Scream-like chaos I was promised. The setup is there, but the story never really gets as wild or as unhinged as I hoped it might. It stays in that “elevated thriller” lane, which is fine, but part of me really wanted it to embrace the slasher vibe just a little more.

All in all, this is a solid read. If you’re looking for a smartly written, well-paced mystery with a strong female lead and an atmospheric setting, it’s worth checking out. Just don’t go in expecting a slasher flick in book form. Adjust your expectations, settle in, and enjoy the ride.

This is intense, spooky story. It's actually two stories in one. Four friends who meet up for an overnight on a deserted island in a Swedish archipelago go missing. No one knew where they were going but they never returned. Now ten years later on that same island is a spa hotel hosting its first guests, a bachelorette party of six. Since the hotel isn't open for business there is no staff on the premises but there is a cook and a hostess. One of the six is a podcaster who is very interested in the story of the missing girls and the hostess is a sister of one of them as well. The story is creepy and
hard to put down. I enjoyed its intensity and twists and would gladly recommend this book.

I've enjoyed previous works by this author - and have loved Scream and similar movies since I was a teenager - so requesting this one was a given for me. I loved the setting and the slow build of the mystery, and enjoyed the side story of the main character's podcast debacle. I didn't particularly connect with any of the characters, but the overall vibe and story were enjoyable. This was a quick read with some nostalgic Christopher Pike type notes. This would make a great beach read.

That being said, I didn't find the story very memorable - and had to go back and remember how it all came together since I listened to this a bit ago.

Slow burn thriller which I found just ok. Some plot points felt a little unbelievable and the killer’s motive felt a bit off to me. Overall, this thriller was just ok

Predictable, but gotta love a locked room (or island) plot. I could put together generally how each character was going to be involved, so nothing was very twisty. The ending was very dramatic and probably didn't need to be so much. I wish we got a little more into the scandal Tessa was involved in. Overall though, an easy read with enough going on to keep it entertaining

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC!

I have mixed feelings on The Bachelorette Party by Camilla Stein. I typically love the alternating views, but it didn’t work for me on this one. I didn’t find the characters interesting enough to feel a connection with. Typically I get aggravated with a character’s choices, feel pity for them, I didn’t feel anything for Tessa or Anneliese.
The ending was not a shock, I am not sure if it was supposed to be a great twist. I was a little bored with this one.

The beginning of this book was so good and creepy! I love that it took place on an abandoned island during the night!

I didn't find the storyline that took place ten years into the future to be as exciting but that could be because I didn't care much for any of the characters and at times it didn't seem like much was happening. I did like that there was some mystery surrounding Tessa's past and I thought that was a great twist when it was finally revealed!

I had to suspend disbelief a good bit at the end of this book because it was way too over the top.

Overall, this was a pretty quick locked-room thriller and I think a lot of readers will enjoy it!

Thank you, @netgalley, and @minotaur_books for the #gifted e-arc and physical copy!