I wanted to love this one—but I just couldn’t get into the writing. It felt a bit flat and lacked the depth I usually look for.

The premise is intriguing: a husband goes missing, and drama and gossip ripple through the community. I’d call this a “popcorn thriller”—easy to fly through, but not super memorable. Definitely a quick, beach-friendly read for when you’re in the mood for light suspense

HAPPY WIFE 💗💍🩸
By Meredith Lavender & Kendall Shores

•domestic thriller 🩸
•missing husband 😩
•young second wife 💁🏼‍♀️
•law firm 👨🏻‍⚖️
•florida 🌴
•money & lies 💰

Such a fun debut. Had me hooked from the start. Short chapters. A solid cast of unreliable characters…all hiding behind the glossy exterior of their fancy winter park, florida homes. A great poolside domestic thriller.

🌟 rating: 4/5
🗣️ genre: domestic thriller
🍾 publishing date: 6/24/25
📖 length: 320 pages

Not the typical young girl/2nd wife for a rich guy book and it was a pleasure to read. While it turned a little predictable towards the end, I love how it ended.

This was really good! I love love rich people drama so I think I’d always love this. Winter Park is close to where I went to university so having this take place here was very fun. A lot of the times FMCs are annoying in mystery books and I think Nora was not annoying almost at all as well as she felt like a really believable character!

I have to honest- my hopes for this book weren't very high. I'm not sure if that is why I liked it so much, but regardless, it definitely was much better than I had hoped. It wasn't really hard to figure out the killer, but that didn't detract from the fun I had getting to that point. Readers would be hard pressed not to root for Nora, especially as she navigates the world of the super-wealthy in South Florida.- and as the book even says, everyone needs as Este in their lives. One thing I was happy about is that although there was, of course, a dramatic final showdown, there was no kidnapping; no one was hit from behind and woke up tied to a chair; no one was hiding from the killer lurking RIGHT outside their hiding spot..... that whole scenario (plural, I suppose) are incredibly played out and as become quite predictable in thrillers/suspense/mystery novels. It's almost like without that final piece, a book isn't complete..... and it can be annoying. Sorry, not sorry. Now that I've stood on my soapbox, I'll end this by saying that this book was a lot of fun, a perfect summer read. I hope these two ladies will collaborate and write more for people like myself to gobble up in the near future!

I wasn't sure if I would like this book at the beginning, as I feel it started slow. It took me quite a while to get into it but, once I did, both the pace and the plot of the story picked up. It became a twisty mystery that was easy to follow and hard to know who-dun-it. I feel like the author added enough detail for the reader to visualize the setting but not so much as to be overwhelming. I will admit, I did not see the killer coming.

A fairy tale with a twist (actually, a few twists!)! Nora get the Cinderella story when she meets Will (Hot, Mean Lawyer). She is swept off her fee and into the elite crowd of Winter Park, FL. She doesn't fit in with the country club crew (since she used to work there), but makes friends with her eccentric neighbor - who also doesn't fit in. Nora tries to fit in by planning an amazing birthday party for her husband and inviting all of his friends. The party goes well - but following the party, her husband disappears. Will is later found dead in the lake bordering the Somerset home. The young, new wife is cast as a primary suspect. Nora knows that she will have to clear her name and work to find out what happened to Will on his 46th birthday. She begins to piece together things she'd heard from Will and from community gossip and through her sleuthing, she is able to provide the police what they need to arrest someone in the elite group in Winter Park.

While it was a bit predictable up to a point, it does make a few twists that are unexpected for a good ending. And of course, as with most fairy tales, Nora (the poor girl who became a princess) starts a life headed toward happily ever after.

I couldn’t put this down! I thought the chemistry between Will and Nora was so well written; I was sad he wasn’t in the book more!

This was an enjoyable summer read that held my attention throughout the novel. The authors used just the right amount of suspense to keep me turning the pages. Switching back and forth between the two time periods propelled the story along. There are enough twists and turns as well as secrets in the marriage of Will and Nora to keep you guessing about the husband’s disappearance. It’s the perfect book for the beach or pool. Thanks to NetGalley and Bantam for an eGalley of this book. All opinions expressed are truly my own.
#HappyWife #MeredithLavender #KendallShores #NetGalley

This gave Liane Moriarty vibes and was a fun read. The central mystery keeps the story moving. The characters all have secrets and the book is overall a twisty read.

Nora is a twenty-something woman, who works hard to make ends meet. Living in Winter Park, Florida, a town full of wealthy old money Floridians, she gets a job teaching tennis at a country club. Enter Will, a 40-something year old divorced lawyer with a teenage daughter who takes lessons from Nora. Will and Nora hit it off, and one of the reasons Will is so attracted to Nora is because she doesn't care about his money. '

A few years later, Will and Nora have gotten married and Nora is now throwing a 46th birthday party for Will. In the evening after the party, Will goes out to the boat to get something but never comes back home. After a few days of being gone, Nora finally alerts the authorities and a search begins to "Find Will."

But as Nora begins to look through Will's finances and calls for any clues as to where he may have gone, she begins to see some things that don't add up. Did Will really go missing or did he make himself go missing? Are his business partners really honest or are there more nefarious plots going on?

I loved this! The audio was fantastic. It was a great "wealthy-behaving-badly" thriller!

Nora Somerset is hoping that the lavish bash she’s throwing for her husband’s forty-sixth birthday party will help cement not only their relationship but also solidify her footing in the treacherous social structure of wealthy Winter Park, Florida. As Will’s new twenty-eight year-old second wife, she’s seen as an interloper – never mind that his first wife Constance was the one who left him several years before Nora and Will even met.

Nora’s anxiety makes the party far more nerve-wracking than it might otherwise be, but the night ends as an overall triumph. With the last guest gone, Will promises to join her in bed after he retrieves a sweatshirt from their boat for his daughter Mia, who lives with Constance. An exhausted Nora falls asleep before he returns. When she wakes in the morning to discover that he hasn’t come to bed, she’s saddened but not surprised. Will is a powerhouse lawyer and workaholic whose long hours finance their lifestyle. It has, as a matter of fact, become a point of contention between them recently:

QUOTE
He was developing a habit of seeking me out when his mood was right, but the rest of the time, he was too busy to have a cup of coffee with me in the morning. I could tell he was under pressure at work–more than usual anyway. He and Fritz seemed to be disagreeing more and more, and I felt like a distraction, a way for him to avoid dealing with his problems. I wanted to be flattered that he could count on me and my company for relief from the chaos of his day, but with as often as he was calling all the shots, it felt more transactional than being someone’s source of comfort.
END QUOTE

But when Will remains absent for the rest of the day, Nora begins to worry. She knows that he occasionally holes up at the local Ritz-Carlton for days at a time when he’s working on an important case, but hadn’t realized that he was on one now. She tries to pass the time with the usual distractions of the bored, wealthy housewife, indulging in workouts, beauty treatments and drinking. So when his law partner Fritz Hall shows up at the house, demanding to know where he is, Nora is genuinely surprised and not a little bit frightened. It’s one thing for Will to forget to tell her where he is, quite another for him not to tell Fritz.

At first, she and Fritz agree to keep Will’s disappearance hush-hush so as not to set off the rumor mill. But as evidence begins to turn up indicating that Will was the victim of foul play, the story escapes containment. Soon, Nora is the focus of intense press and public scrutiny. Everyone loves to wonder why the beautiful young wife waited so long to report her older husband missing. Was she somehow, as the gossip mill speculates, responsible for his disappearance?

Nora will have to navigate this gauntlet of unwanted attention, even as she tries to figure out what happened to Will. As his wife, she’s privy to information that the rest of the world doesn’t have. But will she be able to get to the truth and find her husband before she’s thrown in jail herself?

This sympathetic look at a second wife’s worst nightmare is anchored both by its honest dissection of the relationship between Nora and Will, as well as by the support she receives from the few friends she does have in Winter Park. Her next door neighbor Este, especially, is a rock for her from the very first day they meet, after a drunk Nora falls through the shrubbery separating their properties:

QUOTE
Something close to recognition settled on her face. “You’re the young, new wife I heard the country club moms prattling on about at yoga.” She shook her head. “Boy, do they hate you.”

It should have hurt. Her repeating this gossip back to me should have registered as something in the vicinity of pain. But she wasn’t saying anything I didn’t already know. And at least she was saying it to my face.

“Don’t worry.” She smiled gently. “I’m the new-money bitch from California. They hate me, too.”

“We should start a club.” My words sounded a little more solid than they had in the kitchen. Maybe the change of scenery, or a whack to the head, was helping me to sober up.

“Or a coven.” She shrugged. “Who gives a fuck what they think anyway?”
END QUOTE

Twisty and gossipy but ultimately filled with empathy, Happy Wife is the perfect summer read for anyone looking for a juicy domestic thriller whodunnit.

⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Hello to the wealthy and nouveau riche of Florida! In this story a wealthy wife of a prominent lawyer becomes the chief suspect in her husband’s disappearance and murder. It is up to her to prove her innocence and find the responsible parties.

With a rather small cast of characters, the net of “who dunnits” was relatively small, so my 3⭐️ vs 4⭐️ was due to me having some very big perceptions of the truth about halfway through. The extra 1/2⭐️ was that it was a quick, easy, and rather cozy read.

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This book! Once I started it, I couldn’t stop. What a story.

Nora is 28 years old and working at a country club in Winter Park, Florida, teaching swimming to rich kids—-and then she meets Will, a “hot, mean lawyer” who’s the father of one of her students. Therapy romance moves really quickly and soon they’re married and living in his gorgeous house and Nora is getting a crash course in Winter Park society. Thank goodness for her next door neighbor who becomes her best friend and defender!

Nora throws a fancy birthday party for Will and afterwards he goes missing. The story is told in dual timeline fashion, both before and after their wedding, and it was easy to follow.

The question becomes, what happened to Will? Where is he? What a twisted thriller! I didn’t have the mystery figured out until near the end of the book. I liked Nora and her best friend Estee, and there were plenty of villains in the story to hate! I wasn’t crazy about the way the ending wrapped up, but it wasn’t enough to drop my rating a lot.

This one is 4 stars!

I received a copy of the digital ARC via the publisher and NetGalley. My review is voluntary.

Happy Wife by Meredith Lavender and Kendall Shores (book cover in image) was a very challenging read. I found it hard very hard to get into, and ending fell flat and was predictable for me.

Thank you, @randomhouse, @ballentinebooks, and @netgalley for the opportunity to read this ARC. All opinions are my own. All opinions are my own.

Rating: 1 Star
Pub Date: Jun 24 2025

#RandomHouse
#BallentineBooks
#Bantam
#HappyWife
#MeredithLavender
#KendallShores
#Mystery
#yarisbooknook
#NetGalley

More of a mystery than a thriller/mystery. Recently widowed, Nora tries to understand how her hunky lawyer husband Will dies and why. So many think she was the gold digging and much younger second wife, so she must be behind it. Including the police. But Will was her true love, even though Nora discovers that he had been keeping secrets from her. Some twists and turns, but in the end the solution was not jaw dropping. Still, a great beach read, fast paced and enjoyable. Thank you to #netgalley, ##happywife #randomhouseballantine for the chance to read and review this book.

If you’re looking for a light, engaging read to toss into your beach bag this summer, Happy Wife by Meredith Lavender and Kendall Shores is a great pick. It’s the kind of book that doesn’t ask too much of you but still keeps you invested, making it a perfect vacation or weekend downtime read.
The story follows an endearing protagonist who finds herself swept into an unfamiliar, glamorous world. She’s very much the outsider, but her journey still hits those satisfying "rags to riches" notes without losing its heart. What makes the character stand out is her relatability. She’s someone you can root for, even as the stakes grow more complicated.
There’s also a mystery threaded throughout the novel, adding a page-turning quality that keeps things from feeling too light.
Overall, Happy Wife is a fun, breezy read with just enough intrigue to keep you guessing. If you enjoy contemporary fiction with a side of mystery and a dash of glamour, this one is worth picking up.

I enjoyed the premise of this book, and the characters and setting. It was a fun read that kept me engaged throughout. I did, however, find the ending predictable and rushed. Still, I definitely would still recommend if you love a good mystery and are looking for a fun, easy read.

A beach read but not much else. The premise was promising but the execution fell short. The ending had parts that seemed not plausible or realistic.

Winter Park is full of super wealthy people. Nora is at the other end of the economic scale - working two jobs and having to calculate whether or not her card will be declined when she gets groceries. While finishing up her shift at the country club, she encounters Mia getting sick in the bathroom. When Will comes to get his daughter, they click. Nora doesn't click as well with Will's social group as they consider her an outsider. Luckily, she becomes fast friends with her neighbor, a CA transplant who is also outcast as new money. Nora throws Will an amazing birthday party to try to be accepted but when he disappears the following day, she becomes the talk of the town as people suspect she did something to him.

Happy Wife is told from Nora's POV, alternating between the current timeline and her relationship with Will. The prologue makes it obvious that Nora is going to be a suspect and then you immediately switch to the party in chapter 1. Early in the book, the plot is more surface level - you get to know how out of place Nora feels in this society while also seeing her romantic bubble with Will. As the story progresses, the pace picks up and Nora becomes more aware - in both her relationship with Will and with the facade of the perfect lives the people in the town show. The chapters are pretty short so it's easy to get caught in the "just one more chapter" trap - especially once you think you have figured out what happened and just want to see if you're right.