🤯 W I L D W E D N E S D A Y review 🤯 featuring “She Didn’t See It Coming” by Shari Lapena!

MY RATING: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Bryden and Sam are living the dream as a perfect couple, both having thriving careers and a young daughter that they absolutely adore.

Sam receives a phone call one evening from their daughter’s daycare saying that Bryden never showed up to pick up Clara. Sam is shocked to hear this because Bryden ALWAYS goes to pick up Clara every day and he cannot fathom where she could be. After picking up Clara, they return home to find Bryden’s car in the garage and her purse, keys and cellphone still in their apartment. It seems as if Bryden disappeared into thin air … and what follows is a shocking investigation into the lives of their family and the secrets that have been firmly kept behind closed doors!

💭 THIS BOOK IS WILD! I was instantly hooked and could not put it down! My mind was on overdrive the entire time and all the twists and turns made my brain feel like complete mush! All the characters are super SUS, much like the chain of events that kept spiralling in different directions! This book is a mix of domestic thriller, whodunit and police procedural and has become one of my favourite books written by Shari Lapena!

Thank you kindly to @sharilapena @doubledayca @penguinrandomca @netgalley for my advanced digital copy in exchange for my honest review! This book releases on July 29, 2025 and needs to be on your TBR immediately 🔥

Yes Shari! My spooky Canadian sister.

Shari Lapena knows how to write thrillers, and since this is my summer of "all I can bring myself to read is memoirs about depressive writers and thrillers" I was so lucky to get this arc. Despite the ending feeling a litttttle bit rushed, She Didn't See It Coming was an excellent domestic thriller. Kept me guessing until the end and had some truly despicable characters, who I was truly bummed to say goodbye to.

Thank you so much to the publishers for the e-arc.

A big big thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Random House Canada (Adult) | Doubleday Canada for eARC in exchange for an honest review of this one.

I love Shari Lapena, she's the queen of suburban thrillers. I'm not a usual fan of the genre, but her writing style that's short and to the point just does it for me. Had I had the time, I would've binged it in a day, alas, life. So I binged it in 2 days.

There were some part I would've cut, and I found a tiny part in the middle to slow down a little, but all in all I was completely hooked on this one, so I highly recommend!

Shari Lapena did it again!
I loved this little murder mystery with a twist...then another twist!
It was so hard to put down! The chapters were quick, which is another favourite of mine! The story had good pacing and at the end playing the guess who did it is always fun! I wasn't shocked by who did the murder, but either way it was a good read!

Another fun, twisty psychological thriller read by Shari Lapena. I flew through this one and read it in a day.

Various POVs kept my interest and I kept changing my mind about who was the guilty party. Full of secrets, lies, and betrayal. The writing is so easy to read and the short chapters suck you right in. A great summer read!

Thanks to the publisher for this complimentary copy. All opinions are my own.

Omg this book! Hooked me from chapter 1, I feel like if my theory had been the outcome, it would have been 5 stars, I was a bit disappointed in the ending.
I read this book in one day. It was so fast paced and suspenseful that I just couldn't put it down. Excellent domestic thriller with just enough suspects and twists to keep you guessing.
Shari Lapena will always be on my autobuy author list.

When a beloved wife and mother disappears, a luxurious condo building transforms into a potential crime scene, and the investigation begins: can the detectives find her before it's too late? Bryden and Sam have it all: thriving careers, an apartment in a luxury condo, supportive friends and a cherished daughter. The perfect life for the perfect couple. Then Sam receives a call at his office. Bryden – working from home that day – has failed to collect their daughter from daycare. Arriving home with their little girl, he finds his wife’s car in the underground garage. Upstairs in their apartment her laptop is open on the table, her cell phone nearby, her keys in their usual place in the hall. Except Bryden is nowhere to be seen. It’s as if she just walked out. How can she have disappeared from her own home? And did she even leave the building at all?

Getting an arc of a Shari Lapena novel is a DREAM!!! Literally one of my favourite authors, I just loveee the way she writes. This did keep me guessing the whole way through. I loved the ending. I did find myself getting a little tired of it toward the end, but overall I really enjoyed it and it was quick to read! (3.5 ⭐️)

✨ Thank you NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for my honest review ✨

Available July 29, 2025

A perfect summer book! It was a quick, easy read. A woman is murdered and there doesn't seem to be any reason for why anyone wanted her dead. And then you keep reading and the secrets get revealed one by one. Lots of twists right until the end.

Thank you to Netgallery and Penguin Random House Canada (Adult) | Doubleday Canada for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

👀 ARC BOOK REVIEW 👀

PUB Date : July 28th

My Rating : ⭐️ ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 4 Domestic Stars 🙌🏼

🔥 🔥🔥 Where are all my domestic thriller lovers at , because boy do I have a winner for you !!

I LOVE domestic thrillers , I could read them all day long and that’s just exactly what I did with She Didn’t See it Coming .

This book was such a bingeable gripping read and had more twists than than a plate of curly fries 😳

She Didn’t See it Coming starts off with a murder mystery on our hands and starts off nice and slow , slowly pulling the reader in , then at about 40% Holy Sheep 💩 things get wild 😜 so buckle up baby and hold on for dear life because you don’t want to miss this ending !!

I thought I knew who killed Bryden but our author did a great job of planting little red herrings throughout the story and had me second guessing EVERYONE in this story and well everybody had a motive !!

If you love true crime vibes, domestic thrillers and unhinged characters and a book that will steal hours of your sleep , then yes 💯 you should add this to your TBR 🙌🏼

The only reason for not a full 5 stars is I felt some things were just a little bit repetitive and some of the paragraphs were loose and didn’t flow properly but other than that , I loved it !! 🖤

QOTD- Have you read this author ? Do you have a fave by Shari ?
AOTD- Everyone Here is Lying 🤥!! And this one are a tie !!

Thank you NetGalley , @penguinrandomca and Shari Lapena for this UNPUTDOWNABLE ARC !!

Thank you, NetGalley, for the opportunity to read an ARC. All opinions are my own.

At first, the plot seemed predictable, until I hit a had pivot and was hooked! It is a un-put-downable book! Last night, i proimised myself 'just three more chapters' but didn't listen to me. :)
For the first time, I almost felt sorry for the bad guy.

Thank you, Shari, for another juicy read!

She Didn’t See it Coming by Shari Lapena is a domestic thriller that starts with a great prologue that gave me a sense of foreboding and hooked me immediately. The story was unpredictable, building up the mystery told from the points of view of family members, friends and neighbours of the missing woman, as well as the investigating officer.

The story moved at a pretty good pace, and it was hard to put down, as I was eager to make it to the conclusion and find out the mystery of what happened to Bryden. I enjoy books that plant red herrings to keep the reader guessing, and there were plenty of those here. I had my theories about the guilty party, and while I did guess correctly, the reveal felt quite anti-climactic.

There were a lot of characters in this book, and while I know they were there to add to the mystery, Lapena didn’t have enough time to really flesh any of them out. I will say that I think the character of Alice is one that could star in her own book. I would read an Alice origin-story!

All in all it was a decent mystery, but it didn’t offer much in the way of thrills or suspense. It was definitely a book that drives home the point that you never really know what’s going on behind closed doors.

Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada and Netgalley for an egalley in exchange for review.

⭐️⭐️⭐️.5/5

When a loving mother and wife vanishes her husband and family are devasted. The police begin questioning everyone including her sister and best friend and both say the couple had a loving marriage, so who wanted her gone.
I enjoyed the story . It's well written and keeps readers guessing. The ending was fine for me but not everything was explained.

Twisty. Tense. Totally Addictive.

Let’s be real: Shari Lapena didn’t just give us another domestic suspense—she dropped us into a locked-box mystery, handed us a wine glass, and dared us to keep guessing while everything caught fire.

This one? A straight-up puzzle box with people who lie, cheat, and look suspicious even when they’re brushing their damn teeth.
And I ate it up like popcorn laced with anxiety.

If you’re into fast-paced thrillers with a tangled web of secrets, marital mistrust, and plot twists that slap you mid-sip—She Didn’t See It Coming delivers. Lapena writes domestic suspense like a magician who’s just a little bit mean, and I am HERE for it.

⚠️ Trigger Warnings
- Missing person investigation
- Murder
- Marital tension / infidelity
- Gaslighting
- Psychological manipulation
- Grief and trauma

🌀 Synopsis (As aways, No Spoilers)
Bryden and Sam? On paper, they have it all. Dream apartment. Adorable daughter. Stable careers. Life goals: unlocked. Until Bryden disappears—like actually disappears.

Her keys are on the counter. Her phone’s in the apartment. Her car’s in the garage. But Bryden? Gone.

Cue the panic. Cue the lies. Cue the “how well do you really know the person you sleep next to” existential horror that Lapena absolutely thrives in.

As the investigation unfolds, neighbors whisper, friends scatter, and secrets start surfacing faster than the cops can process evidence. Everyone has a motive. Everyone has something to hide. And just when you think you’ve cracked it?

Nope. Plot twist. Again.

🔍 What to Expect
- A missing woman, a spiraling husband, and a timeline that won’t sit still
- Red herrings for DAYS
- A cast of shady side characters with secrets spilling from their designer bags
- Pacing so tight it could snap
- A twisty ride where literally no one is safe from suspicion

💭 Final Thoughts
She Didn’t See It Coming is a damn masterclass in domestic suspense. Lapena builds tension with the precision of a surgeon and the glee of someone who enjoys watching her readers spiral.

This isn’t a high-octane thriller. It’s slow panic. It’s quiet dread. It’s watching a perfect life unravel thread by thread until all that’s left is guilt and guesswork.

The POVs are crisp. The secrets are juicy. The pacing? Chef’s kiss. I couldn’t put it down, and I refused to trust a single character—and still got blindsided by the ending. Every time I thought I had it figured out, Lapena threw another twist.

Do I still have questions? Hell yes.
Do I need this to spin into a series with Detective Salter’s intuition and her psychologist boyfriend’s lowkey suspicious vibes? Immediately.

🔮 What’s Next from Shari Lapena
This probably wraps the case—but the way it ends? There’s room. Room for more secrets. More lies. More of Detective Salter wrecking people’s lives with her instincts and ice-cold reads.

Here’s hoping this isn’t a standalone... because I didn’t see that last line coming.

⭐ Final Rating
★★★★☆ (4/5)
Would absolutely cancel plans, miss texts, and speed-read through dinner to finish this one.

📢 Call to Action
Love messy thrillers, suspicious marriages, and twists that keep you yelling “OH COME ON” every third chapter? She Didn’t See It Coming is your next obsession.
You’ll play detective. You’ll fail.
You’ll love every second.

This book has me hooked right away! This is a must read for Shari Lapena fans and anyone who enjoys a good thriller

Of course Shari Lapena does it against. Blockbuster of a book. Had me totally involved in the who part of the story. I honestly couldn't make heads or tails on who. Great read!!

Thanks to the author,the publisher and Netgalley for an early release of this book.

Twisty, pacy, and exactly what you’d expect (in the best way) from a Shari Lapena thriller.

She Didn’t See It Coming hooked me from the very first page—Lapena wastes no time throwing you into the thick of the mystery, and I was instantly invested. This one centers around a small town rocked by a chilling crime and the ripple effect it has on its residents. Secrets unravel fast, suspicion spreads like wildfire, and as always with Lapena, no one is above suspicion.

What I loved: the short, punchy chapters that made it impossible to put down (I kept saying “just one more” until I realized it was 2AM), the sharp dialogue, and the way Lapena manages to make even the most mundane characters feel like they might be hiding something terrible. I had at least four different theories while reading—and I was still surprised by the ending.

Why not five stars? A couple characters felt a little underdeveloped, and there were moments I wished for a deeper emotional payoff. But honestly, those are small gripes in a book that does exactly what it sets out to do: entertain, mislead, and keep you on edge.

If you’re a fan of The Couple Next Door or Someone We Know, this will be right up your alley. Classic Lapena—reliable in the best way.


Also I was lucky enough to get the ARC for this book!!

Ohhhhh this was so good! I was literally taking notes as I was reading because I was desperate to crack the case as I went along!

Bryden, a 35 year old woman, is reported missing. After failing to pick her three-year-old daughter Clara up from daycare, her husband Sam is concerned. It’s not like Bryden to forget to pick her up on time and it’s certainly not like her to not pick up her phone.

Sam arrives home after leaving work early to collect Clara, and finds that Bryden’s car is still in the parking lot; her phone and keys are still in their condo, and there are no signs that she willingly went anywhere. Yet, she isn’t in the home. Sam quickly reports her missing and the police come onto the scene.

Detectives Jayne Salter and Tom Kilgour are tasked to find poor Bryden, as it looks like foul play has been involved.

This is my type of book! I read it in less than 6 hours because I was hooked from the moment I started. There were several characters and suspects, each of them truly keeping me guessing! I loved the multiple POVs because it keeps it fast paced and me on my toes.

Definitely one of the best books I’ve read in a while, and would recommend to anyone who likes suspenseful domestic thrillers, sudden disappearances, “perfect marriages”, and being able to unpack the mystery alongside the detectives.

Thank you to Net Galley and Penguin Random House Canada for a e-arc in exchange for an honest review! All opinions are my own.

I love Shari Lapena and this was no different. With red herrings and so many unreliable characters each with their own POV, I was constantly suspecting everyone and no I never did figure it out! I binged this in 24 hours and highly recommend

I love a Shari Lapena novel and was so excited to receive an early copy of her upcoming book!!

This story centers around the disappearance of Brayden, who seemingly walked out of her apartment she shared with her husband and toddler mid-day without a trace - after failing to pick up her daughter from preschool. Throughout the book, we experience the POVs of multiple characters/potential suspects who had reason, motive, and/or opportunity to tear this perfect family apart.

Lapena is so good at writing unputdownable domestic mysteries and thrillers and this was no different. The characters are always so evenly fleshed out and intriguing and you never know who’s at fault. The chapters are quick, there was good pacing, and it’s fun to guess who’s at fault. It was also interesting to include some of the main detective’s personal life and intertwine it with the plot.

That said, the big reveal was just ok and a bit cliche and I would have loved something a bit more shocking. The ending was also ok but I didn’t really understand the point of including it if there wasn’t going to be a sequel or anything. I would also consider this a mystery more than a thriller - if that matters at all.

Overall, this was a quick and enjoyable read - 3-3.5/5. Thank you so much to NetGalley and Penguin Random House Canada for the arc!!

She Didn’t See It Coming is classic Shari Lapena: fast-paced, twisty, and impossible to put down. Every time I thought I had it figured out, she pulled the rug out from under me.

The tension builds slowly but deliberately, and the ending? Chilling in the best way. This one made me question how well we really know the people around us.

If you love domestic thrillers with morally gray characters, short chapters, and that “just one more” feeling, this is a must-read.