I read Ladykiller last year, Katherine Wood’s debut novel and liked it. But her newest Sunburned just came out last week (7.1) and I think this one was even better.

Set in Saint Barth’s, this novel had all things for a summer mystery/thriller … blackmail, secrets, betrayal, multiple suspects all in the most perfect vacation setting.

Don’t want to give too much away, but I honestly flew through this one. With past and present story lines, a group of very guilty people there was multiple twists and turns while reading. I could 100% see this playing out in mini series form on screen.

Thank you Netgalley, Random House - Bantam for this eARC copy to read and review.

Sunburned is a summer thriller that takes place in the Caribbean. A woman is hired by her former boyfriend (many years later) to help investigate who is blackmailing him. And this all takes place in a giant house in the islands and on a yacht. Murder, secrets, lies, deceptions with a side of romance and beachy vibes made this book so juicy and fun. A quintessential summer thriller full of twists, turns, and red herrings to totally throw me off.

This is the perfect summer thriller! I love the authors writing style and ability to pull the entire story together seamlessly. This is definitely a book you’re going to want to take on vacation, read on the beach or if you want to mentally getaway to a private island. The story was engaging, with plenty of twists and juicy secrets.

Sunburned by Katherine Wood is a captivating mystery with classic whodunit vibes and a modern edge, evoking the spirit of Agatha Christie while carving out a voice all its own. At the heart of the novel is a smart, complex female lead—layered with a shadowed past she’s tried to leave behind—who is pulled back into a world of secrets, lies, and long-buried truths.

When a call from an old friend—who also happens to be the father of her children, though no one knows it—disrupts her carefully rebuilt life, the mystery begins to unravel. What starts as a simple request for help quickly spirals into a tangled web of deception, where nothing is quite what it seems. Wood masterfully guides the narrative through unexpected turns, slowly revealing twists that keep the tension high and the pages turning.

With sharp writing, compelling characters, and a plot that steadily builds to a satisfying and surprising conclusion, Sunburned is a standout mystery. It’s both a homage to classic detective fiction and a refreshing take led by a heroine readers will want more of.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the copy. Sunburned follows Audrey as she is invited to St. Barth to her ex’s Tyson’s mansion to uncover his blackmailer. Once there, a body surfaces, and a classic whodunnit emerges. I enjoyed the storyline. I liked how the story switched between the present and 11 years in the past. I feel like this added depth to the story. I did predict the ending, but overall I enjoyed the book.

Sunburned is a very entertaining story. It’s a very well written romantic mystery/suspense. The plot twists kept me on my toes. I thoroughly enjoyed Tyson and Audrey’s journey.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Random House | Ballantine | Bantam for gifting me a digital ARC of the sophomore book by Katherine Wood, following her debut Ladykiller, which I enjoyed. All opinions expressed in this review are my own - 4.5 stars rounded up!

Audrey Collet's ex-boyfriend, Tyson, calls after over a decade absence, threatening to expose the secrets in her past unless she helps him figure out who is blackmailing him. Tyson is now a billionaire and lives on St. Barth's in the Caribbean, and has invited all his suspects there for Audrey to help him figure out who's extorting him. Once there, Audrey realizes that everyone has a reason to wish him harm.

I love a good locked room mystery and one set in the Caribbean with private beaches and yachts involved? Sign me up! This book was very well-executed, with glimpses into the past and secrets that Audrey and Tyson share that are threatening to come to the surface. I suspected everyone but was rooting for Audrey throughout the book, although there are plenty of morally-ambiguous threads here. The story was tense from the beginning when a foot shows up in the Everglades to that twisty end I didn't see coming. Perfect for summer reading!

This is a great summer thriller with an island setting! Yes please!
There’s a dual timeline- current and past.
There’s extortion, missing person, murder mystery, ex-lovers, who did it?!
The writing style was great. I loved the shorter chapters. Everything flowed well even with the 2 timelines.

Thank you to netgalley and random house publishing group for the ARC in exchange for my honest review!

Let me start out by saying that once you start this book, you will be sucked in and unable to put it down. Audrey has been summoned to help her ex, Tyson, at his island home in St Barth's - all after a foot has washed up in the Florida Everglades. The person previously attached to the foot was someone they both knew. The twists and turns in this one were wild and I loved the descriptions of the island. I finished the last 50% in one sitting. Thank you to NetGalley and Ballantine for a copy in exchange for an honest review.

Set in the tropical Mediterranean locale of St. Barth's, you are introduced to exes Audrey and Tyson. Because of blackmail and betrayal, the two have collided again in order to solve a mystery. Murder, mayhem and more ensue. You jump from past to present in Audrey's POV, but it is not confusing. It actually gives clarity to the mystery unravelling with each turn of the page.

Katherine Wood is great at suspenseful thrillers. Sunburned is a perfect summer vacation read!

Thank you to Random House Publishing Group and NetGalley for the ARC. The opinions expressed are my own.

This is the perfect light, fun beach read! I first read and loved Ladykiller from this author, another great beach read, so was excited for this one. I did think the first was a bit better, but this one is still worth the read! Audrey is a "discoverer" for law firms. She is summoned to St. Barth's by Tyson her ex to find out who is blackmailing him. Oh, and Tyson is a billionaire now and their teenage relationship ended badly. So, what could possibly go wrong? Well, murder for one. A body turns up and we get to figure out who did it from the group assembled by Tyson at his beachside mansion. There are a lot of suspects, and I had several different ideas for what happened and was wrong on all counts! Pretty cool twist that I didn't see coming. Extra points for the rich-people island atmosphere and I especially loved the diving sequence! I could practically see the fish! I would love more from Katherine Wood!

Thank you to #NetGalley, Katerine Wood and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine | Bantam for this ARC. All opinions are my own.

I will post my review to Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Instagram and other retail and social media sites upon publication day of Julu 01, 2025.

Audrey Collet is a mother of twins and a partner in a discovery agency, where she and Rosa help law firms track down information to help in their cases. Audrey is the computer expert, a hacker since she’d gotten bored with gaming as a teenager while Rosa does more of the hands-on investigating. So when Audrey’s ex Tyson, called and asked her to come to St. Barth’s to help him figure out who is blackmailing him, she is his only choice. Because not only is investigating her job, she’s also privy to many of his secrets, including the one that has the potential to blow up his latest deal and his entire company.

Tyson has created a multi-billion dollar company based on his ability to turn salt water into potable water with efficiency. They are preparing to open a new site on St. Barth’s, the Caribbean island that is home to a great deal of wealth. But a foot has turned up in the Everglades, and now everything is at stake.

The foot, a human foot, once belonged to Ian Kelly, who had lived in a trailer behind the house of Tyson and his brother Cody. Ian had been a drug dealer who had gone missing the summer Audrey and Tyson had dated. But there was more going on back then than just a little bit of drugs, and Audrey and Tyson both know that things could go badly for them if the police start digging around Ian’s disappearance.

But when Audrey arrives at his villa on the island and gets to know those Tyson has surrounded himself with, she realizes that there are several people under his roof that could mean him harm. Add to that Tyson’s increasing paranoia, and Audrey knows that she will have a difficult time figuring out who is it that is blackmailing him. Between Tyson’s double-dealings and secret deals, his wife, his business partner, or his brother could be gunning for him. And then there’s his butler Laurent. Laurent seems to know a lot of what’s going on, which Audrey finds surprising, because Tyson confides in others so rarely. Audrey can’t deny that she is drawn to Laurent, but she thinks it would be unwise to trust him, especially since she is there with some pretty big secrets of her own.

But when Tyson is killed during a scuba dive gone wrong, Audrey is faced with even more questions, and she’s even more vulnerable to exposure. She has to figure out who is was who killed Tyson and who was blackmailing him in order to get back to her life in the States, and to her twin boys, safe and sound. But then the killer turns their sights on her, and she has to figure out who to trust to save herself.

Sunburned is a white-hot thriller about the dealings of the wealthy and how even they have to deal with the secrets in their past. The setting in St. Barth’s makes for a gorgeous backdrop for this murder mystery, and the story is filled with crazy twists. It’s an exciting beach read for thriller fans, with a side of romance and layers of secrets and hidden agendas. I loved reading Sunburned, and while I couldn’t get to the beach myself to enjoy it, I did bask in that Caribbean flavor and had a lot of fun with this story.

Egalleys for Sunburned were provided by Bantam through NetGalley, with many thanks, but the opinions are mine

I had the pleasure of diving into Sunburned by Katherine Wood, an atmospheric read that kept me on the edge of my seat from start to finish. The author's skillful storytelling and ability to create tension and suspense had me hooked from the very first page. What I loved about this book was the twists and turns that kept me guessing until the very end. The pacing was perfect, making it hard to put the book down once I started reading. Overall, I highly recommend this book to anyone who loves a creepy ride filled with suspense, mystery, and unexpected surprises. It's a must-read for fans of the genre.

I devoured this book! It sucked me in from the beginning and kept me hooked. The boat storyline of being held on it reminded me of other stories I previously read but it still kept me engaged. This is a perfect read for summer!

I loved this book. It had short to mid size chapters and easy to follow. The ending still shocked me and the smaller twists did along the way as well. I wish we heard the ending of what happened with her foot and how it got healed.

Caribbean Islands, beautiful people, beautiful rich people, what more could you want? Audrey wants to be as far away from this party as possible, yet, here she is, and she can't leave until she figures out who is blackmailing her ex. When her billionaire ex-boyfriend blackmails HER to find out who is blackmailing HIM, the stakes are a little skewed in his favor until he dives off the yacht and doesn't come back up. This was not only a terrific mystery/thriller, but it was also very entertaining watching Audrey move from one suspect to the next while trying not to get herself killed. After reading SUNBURNED, I'm going to have to add her first book, LADYKILLER to my TBR.

Sunburned by Katherine Wood involves an island paradise, murder, and blackmail. This fast paced thriller was a great summer read. There were several unexpected twists that I enjoyed. I enjoy Katherine Wood’s writing and will definitely read her next book!

Audrey is a successful discovery agent with twin boys when she's summoned to St. Barth's by her ex, Tyson, after a dismembered foot turns up in the Everglades. She wants nothing to do with him, but he's now an extremely paranoid billionaire who is being blackmailed for past crimes that also implicate her. Upon arriving at the posh island home, Audrey quickly realizes that everyone staying there - his brother, his brother's girlfriend, his business partner, his wife, and his wife's friend - hates Tyson in their own way, making everyone a suspect. When a diving trip on Tyson's yacht turns deadly, Audrey has to turn up the heat on her investigation into the blackmailer before she winds up dead too. The story alternates between the present and eleven years prior, when Audrey, Tyson, and his brother Cody were in their early 20s. Sunburned is a fast-paced beachy read about luxury, lies, and how thoroughly haunted you can be by the past. The only, let's call it a low point, for me was how completely untouched Audrey is by consequences because she is far from innocent.

Sunburned
No Spoilers
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Pairs perfectly with a summer rose

➡️ locked room thriller
➡️ twisty
➡️ duel timelines
➡️ the perfect island vacation setting

I’ve been a die-hard fan of Woods (formerly St Johns’) work and will continue to read anything she publishes! I was so grateful to receive an advanced copy of her work - Thank you NetGalley and XXXX Publishers

Overall, I devoured this story! The writing I’ve come to know and love was ever present and the duel timelines meshed perfectly. I loved the setting of St Bart’s and think this will be an ideal story for pool and beach readers.

A couple of critiques are I did feel like after Part 1, the storyline felt overall a little rushed. I love an Agatha Christie style mystery but at times it felt like we were being force-fed options for who the assailant was vs. them being hidden under the placemat for us to find on our own. The back half of the story felt a little clunky with so much information ping ponging us back and forth…

That with the addition of characters late in the story it was hard not to see some of the “twists” coming, even though we were being told to look in so many directions. I appreciated this fun thriller though it wasn’t a favorite I will still be an avid reader of her books always!!

Katherine Wood does it again. It has been a very long time since I've finished a book in less than 2 days. And I did it with this one. I love her writing so much. The twist in this one blew my mind - like WHAT?!?! You think you know but you don't. :). I also loved that there was a small little romance sub plot going on as well and was rooting so hard for the FMC! Huge 5 stars all around!!