High Season is one of those books that takes its time to unfold, and I’ll admit there were moments when I found the writing a bit verbose. Still, the extra detail felt necessary—it gave room for each character to be fully drawn and for the stakes of their lives to be understood. The pacing let me settle into the world of seaside glamour and subtle tensions that drive the story.

I especially enjoyed getting to know Nina, Hannah, and Josie. Their personalities, choices, and flaws were so different, yet they all felt real and relatable in their own ways. The book doesn’t shy away from showing how friendship can be messy—filled with loyalty, jealousy, disappointments, and unexpected grace. Watching their paths cross and diverge added depth to the drama unfolding around them.

At its core, the novel explores what lies beneath the polished surface of high society. Behind the summer houses and enviable lifestyles are secrets, insecurities, and shifting loyalties. That blend of privilege and vulnerability kept me hooked. I always enjoy a story that delves into the hidden lives of the wealthy, and this one delivered both the glitz and the raw humanity beneath it… as well as one heck of a mystery to unravel.

It’s a story that asks for patience, but rewards it with atmosphere, layered characters, and an honest look at the complexities of friendship, family, and belonging. Finding out what happened to Nina’s older sister keeps the momentum of the book going.

After reading Katie Bishop's debut novel and loving it I was so excited to have been gifted the second book as well. I had no idea what to expect from this one but I had high expectations. The writing style of this book was exactly what I needed as a reader. Katie Bishop took a very dark and serious subject but she wrote it in such a way that it made it lighter for the reader. This made it much easier to get into the plot, the characters, and to completely become submerged in her world. This book although had multiple different timelines and I enjoyed every minute of it. Twenty years ago seventeen year old Tamara was discovered dead in her family's swimming pool. Her little sister, Nina, age six, was the only witness to the crime and claims that, it was their babysitter Josie who pushed Tamara in the pool. However as we flash back to current times we learn that memory is in fact a multifaceted concept and not always as clear as we think. I loved this story because it was quite dark however so realistic. And even when the characters were wrong in their retelling I got a sense that they weren't always malicious about it it was just human error. With so much going on we as the reader are left deciding what is real what is fake, who is telling the truth who is misremembering and who is straight out lying to cover their tracks. Through the time lines we also get to see the character evolve and grow over the years, and see how the tragic actions of the past came to shape their adult lives. And when the circumstances surrounding the death get looked at once again we are thrown for a major curveball. I loved the back and forth time changes it really made everything much more fascinating. The characters in this book were very complex and realistic. I loved trying to figure out what really happened and each time I was given more information my opinions changed. I was constantly looking for tells in the characters and everyone was guilty at one point or another. Fantastic job and I'm so mad I waited to long to read this book. Don't follow in my footsteps read it ASAP. This book will make all others pale in comparison and I literally lost track of time as I read these pages. The story was so compelling that nothing else matters while I read this. I'm so glad that I got the chance to check out this book as Katie Bishop shows us yet again that she is a force to be reckoned with in the literary world.

This multilayered, character driven mystery explores the fragile nature of memories, complex relationships, family secrets, childhood trauma, and the power of perception. Told through multiple POVs and dual timelines, it incorporates a true crime documentary that adds another layer to the story as they unravel the secrets of what happened on that tragic night.

Bishop does a great job creating a slow burn buildup, crafting well-developed questionable characters, and being incredibly descriptive, which made it easy to visualize the setting and feel like I was there experiencing the scorching heat.

The audiobook created an incredible immersive experience. The audiobook narrator, Alix Dunmore, did a great job with tone and voice differentiating the multiple eccentric characters, and setting the mysterious, atmospheric vibes. Dunmore definitely helped bring the story, setting, and characters to life and delivered a flawless performance from start to finish.

Thank you @stmartinspress, @macmillanaudio, and @netgalley for the #gifted ARC and ALC. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

3 stars. It wasn't bad at all, To me a 3 is a nice, solid read. The pacing was good and I really enjoyed the multiple POVs that we got. Additionally, going back and forth in time helped really paint the picture of what happened and what was going on prior to the party. All-in-all, it was a well fleshed out story and I would read books by Kate Bishop again.

This is the perfect book to squeeze in before summer ends. Truly everything you want in a mystery.

The multiple POVs and different timelines adds so many layers to the story and it was so fun to watch them peeled back to reveal the truth of what happened that summer 20 years ago.

I loved the way the author unravels the story little by little in the present timeline as we follow the past timeline leading up to the death. I just couldn’t put the book down if I tried.

Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC!

“You gave evidence when you were five?”
“I had to,” Nina said. “I was the only one who saw.”

“But if you don’t remember it,” he said, “how do you know you weren’t making it up? Kids make things up all the time, right? They make believe. How do you know that you were telling the truth?”

Thus is the dilemma that has haunted Nina for 20 years in the traumatic High Season by gripping mystery writer, Katie Bishop.

Nina was 5 years old when her 17 year old sister was found floating in their estate's pool. The only witness, she testifies that her baby sitter Josie fought with Tamara, pushed her into the pool, and left her there.

Now 20 years later Josie is free, Nina is in constant doubt, gripped in guilt, of what her 5 year old mind actually witnessed that summer day. When a true crime podcast opens up the case asking for interviews with Nina and Josie, the high season, in this tourist seaside town, will once again implode with consequences.

My first time listening to voice actress Alix Dunmore was profound. Between the writer's ability to create these in depth emotional characters, and this narrator's distinctive voices capturing their intensity, I was left not just wanting the truth for myself, but for them.

Told in a dual time line, two summers 20 years apart, we witness privilege at its ugliest, grief at its hardest, and the effects of long lasting trauma. This slow burn family drama mystery is about truth more than a twist, about memory more than forgetting and a gripping read as our high season summer ends.

I received free copies of this book/audiobook from St. Martin's Press and MacMillan Audio via #NetGalley for a fair and honest review. All opinions are my own.

Bishop's latest thriller 'High Season' is her sophomore novel. It is a mystery thriller that is told in a dual time line and multiple view points. When teen Tamara is found dead in the swimming pool, Josie is convicted. Twenty years later, after her 10 year sentence and 10 years of freedom and trying to get her life back together, the case is picked up by a social media influencer . Hannah who was Josie's friend returns to town. I really enjoyed the story line and did not find it predictable.. Thank you Net Galley and St. Martin's Press for an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

With dual timelines, multiple POVs, and strong summer vibes, this mystery was a slow burn yet still propulsive enough and had me turning the pages.
Probably could have been a tad shorter, although I still found it quite the enjoyable read.

Thank you to Netgalley and St. Martin’s Press for the opportunity to read this ARC.

A thrilling story - saw the twist coming a mile away, but still a rich story and well-written. It was immersive and compelling. Recommend as a great beach read.

Really enjoyed this one! Two timelines, lots of interesting characters without being too overwhelming, and a great setting. Exactly what I wanted for a summertime mystery-thriller.

Thrilling, mind-bendingly good
I was on tenterhooks until the very end. By the time I realized what was happening, I became so fearful for the innocent characters in this thriller of a tale. If you like mysteries that give you all the details but in sporadic order where you begin to piece together the crime on your own, you will want to read this book! Beyond that there are poignant moments, like the last chapter. I was sobbing by the last paragraph. If you do not feel something while reading that chapter, check your pulse.
This is a mystery about two classes of people: the working class who do the work for the others in the upper-class. Hannah, Josie and others have jobs that cater to the upper-classes. Nina, Tamara, Blake and Evelyn Drayton with others in this book make up the more affluent set who can afford to do almost anything. The book jumps from 2004 when the death of Tamara occurs to 2024 when a documentary about her heinous death and the incarceration of Josie will be released. This stirs up lots of awful memories for our cast of characters. Over the length of the book, you will ascertain the true nature of these people. Some turn out to be more honorable than originally thought while others show their cheating, conniving ways. I volunteered to review an ARC of this book through NetGalley and St. Martin’s Publishing Group. I am so glad I had the opportunity!

I struggled to get into this book. I love multiple POV and timelines. Josie seemed to be trying to move on from the past it she was tethered to it and always pulled back. Nina is a bit unreliable, with shaky memories. It was a good premise and storyline but I couldn't seem to connect to the story.

Multiple POV domestic thriller that never fully hooked me. Josie’s chapters show her trying to move forward but constantly being dragged back by her past, while Nina comes across as an unreliable narrator whose memories are shaky at best. The storyline itself was fine, but the whole digging up the truth twenty years later just felt a bit far-fetched. Decent premise, but didn’t really land for me.

This is a pretty good thriller. It kept me turning pages and I loved the twists. I think this will be a popular one!

Thank you netgalley again for another fantastic ARC its already out so snag it!! I loved the deep recesses of the mind and how it stored trauma so deeply. The familial connections that make us have to question all of our stories. The plot took time to get into, but things became more complicated and interesting as the novel progressed. It was a great summer thriller.

3.5 stars

Tamara Drayton’s death is the dark cloud hanging over every character in High Season. Nina, who was 5 at the time, has always wondered if her witness testimony was accurate. Josie, having served time for the murder, is living a shell of a life as a convicted felon. Blake is looking out for Nina and hoping to inherit the family home in Côte d’Azur. Hannah has been living in England, far away from the memories of that night. When a true crime blogger hones in on the 20 year old case, the documentary threatens to expose the secrets from that night.

High Season is a dual timeline story, alternating between 2024 and the weeks leading up to Tamara’s death in 2004. Details are slowly parsed out, keeping the reader in suspense of what really happened. I enjoyed this mystery/thriller, especially the twist towards the end, and how everything concluded.

Thank you to St Martin’s and NetGalley for the invitation to read this book.

Leaning heavily on themes of haves and have-nots and the ethics of true crime, this really isn’t anything we haven’t seen before. Still, it’s well written and handles the material thoughtfully.

This is a tough book to say I really “liked,” as the characters aren’t particularly endearing or unusual, and the story itself is kind of a downer. If you haven’t previous read novels exploring the ethics of true crime podcasts, this might be enlightening. For me, while I thought it respectably put together, it just felt like something I’ve seen way too many times in a novel in recent years.

The way the author ultimately handles that aspect of the story is notably refreshing, so that definitely counts for something. And if you enjoy slowly unfolding family drama, you may appreciate this one more than I did.

absolutely obsessed with this one. the beginning had total 𝓌𝑜𝓃𝒹𝑒𝓇𝓌𝒶𝓁𝓁 by oasis vibes. soft, moody, a little nostalgic, and then it shifted into a little of cw’s 𝒹𝓎𝓃𝒶𝓈𝓉𝓎 levels of messy drama. betrayed best friends, secret crushes, hidden lies.. it had everything!

blake + hannah falling for each other completely hooked me, until the reveal that he actually had a secret elite gf he was cheating on (typical). blake will literally do 𝐚𝐧𝐲𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 to protect his image, which made every scene with him feel tense.

the twin storyline wrecked me (especially that betrayal). as a twin myself, i felt so connected to tamara (and liz gillies is her in my head 😍). i also loved how the story unfolded through tamara, hannah, josie + nina. each of them holding a piece of the puzzle while also hiding their own secrets.

this book kept me on edge from start to finish, and i truly couldn’t put it down. solid five stars.

This was my first book by Katie Bishop, and it definitely won't be my last. I always love a good "rich people behaving badly" murder mystery, and this story had so many interesting layers to it. This was definitely a slow burn, but it was so tenuous, mysterious, and atmospheric that you don't realize it was a slow burn. The pacing really made the story more mysterious, and I kept wanting to turn the page. All of the characters were highly suspicious, and there was so much family drama intertwined in this story. This was told in multiple POVs and alternating timelines that added just that much more depth to the story. The podcast/true crime aspect of the story was done very well. It fit perfectly into the narrative and wasn't overdone.

Thank you, NetGalley, Macmillan Audio, and St. Martin's Press for the eARC and ALC of High Season! What a perfect end-of-summer book to finish on.

Katie Bishop’s second novel, High Season, is a conundrum. On one level, the novel operates as a mystery: what happened to seventeen-year-old Tamara Drayton, who died twenty years prior after being found with a head wound in the family’s pool at their summer home on the Cote D’Azur. A local working class girl was ultimately convicted of the crime based primarily on the testimony of Tamara’s five-year-old sister Nina. And yet Nina does not recall what took place on that night, and is tortured by the thought that an innocent woman may have gone to prison based on a false memory. After finding out that a documentary of the case is being made, several of the women with knowledge of the matter, including a true crime blogger, set out to discover the truth.

The novel does not really work well as a whodunnit as the pacing is incredibly slow, with few twists and turns and a rather predictable ending. The novel does, however, do an incredibly effective job showing the deficiencies of the criminal justice system, which favors the haves over the have nots, and men over women, particularly if the women are not perceived to live up to heterosexual norms. The novel also raises serious questions about true crime bloggers who can both expose injustice, while also exploiting tragedy. These are the greater social mysteries that make the book worthwhile.

Thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for providing me with a complimentary copy of this book.