Did you know that January is National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month? Check out my blog post to learn more about human trafficking and how stories can help us build awareness and empathy for victims.
Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme. Read the rules and more teasers at The Purple Booker. Anyone can play along.
I have just recently started to read The Girls Weekend by Jody Gehrman, and am still in the setup stages. Five old “friends” get together for an isolated retreat, and we instantly have the setting for a closed-scene mystery. I say friends in quotes because, of course, they all have old secrets and resentments, and you know things are going to blow up before long. Everyone will get up in the morning to find one of their number sadly (or not-so-sadly) deceased.
Gehrman uses plenty of lyrical description, providing a vivid backdrop and introducing us to each character’s backstory as the time of the murder approaches. We already hate the hostess, who I assume will be the victim. Find a comfortable nook and blanket and cuddle up for what happens next!
Nobody has it easy, June. Even best-selling authors need friends.
Jody Gehrman, The Girls Weekend
Summary
For fans of Ruth Ware and Lucy Foley, a riveting locked-room mystery about five college friends eager to reunite after years apart–only to be ripped apart again when their host’s disappearance unearths dark secrets and old grudges.
Their reunion just became a crime scene . . .
June Moody, a thirty-something English professor, just wants to get away from her recent breakup and reunite with girlfriends over summer break. Her old friend and longtime nemesis, Sadie MacTavish, a mega-successful author, invites June and her college friends to a baby shower at her sprawling estate in the San Juan Islands. June is less than thrilled to spend time with Sadie–and her husband, June’s former crush–but agrees to go.
The party gets off to a shaky start when old grudges resurface, but when they wake the next morning, they find something worse: Sadie is missing, the house is in shambles, and bloodstains mar the staircase. None of them has any memory of the night before; they wonder if they were drugged. Everyone’s a suspect. Since June had a secret rendezvous with Sadie’s husband, she has plenty of reason to suspect herself. Apparently, so do the cops.
A Celtic knot of suspense and surprise, this brooding, atmospheric novel will keep you guessing as each twist reveals a new possibility. It will remind you of friendships hidden in the depths of your own past, and make you wonder how well you really know the people you’ve loved the longest.
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