Tropical Girl Reads

Welcome to the family,” Nina Winchester says as I shake her elegant, manicured hand. I smile politely, gazing around the marble hallway. Working here is my last chance to start fresh. I can pretend to be whoever I like. But I’ll soon learn that the Winchesters’ secrets are far more dangerous than my own…

Every day I clean the Winchesters’ beautiful house top to bottom. I collect their daughter from school. And I cook a delicious meal for the whole family before heading up to eat alone in my tiny room on the top floor.

I try to ignore how Nina makes a mess just to watch me clean it up. How she tells strange lies about her own daughter. And how her husband Andrew seems more broken every day. But as I look into Andrew’s handsome brown eyes, so full of pain, it’s hard not to imagine what it would be like to live Nina’s life. The walk-in closet, the fancy car, the perfect husband.

I only try on one of Nina’s pristine white dresses once. Just to see what it’s like. But she soon finds out… and by the time I realize my attic bedroom door only locks from the outside, it’s far too late.

But I reassure myself: the Winchesters don’t know who I really am.

They don’t know what I’m capable of…

An unbelievably twisty read that will have you glued to the pages late into the night. Anyone who loves The Woman in the Window, The Wife Between Us and The Girl on the Train won’t be able to put this down!

HOLY COW WHAT DID I JUST READ?!?!?!?! This is an unbelievably a five star rating!

Millie gets a job as a housemaid at the Winchester household. Everything seemed to be perfect until Millie realizes how demanding Nina can be and how Andrew, her husband looked broken and Millie felt that the marriage might be tearing apart. But one day Millie tries on Nina’s dress…and then things start to change then.

I simply couldn’t put the book down! This book is trending in Instagram and Tik tok no naturally, I decided to try out this book…and boy, this was so good! It took me less than forty-eight hours to finish this book and still, my mind is reeling from the end! This was such a fast paced thriller, filled with twists and turns, told in Millie’s POV and Nina’s POV, offering a perspective on both sides of the story. The ending…OMG!! That’s what I thought after I read the ending…and I like the small cliff-hanger in the end…which means we are going to see Millie in book 2 of the Housemaid series! Overall, I highly recommend this book–if you are looking for a fast paced, unputdownable twisted thriller that will keep you up all night, then The Housemaid will keep you at the edge of the seat–worth a complete five stars!

Everyone loves a good pie. But how about a pie that’s as deadly as it is delectable?

Daisy bakes a little murder into every pie she creates, and she and her dog, Zoe, deliver them to the town’s worst cads. Now, Daisy’s entered a televised, elimination-style competition and has a shot at $100k in prize money—but she still has a murder pie to deliver between filming.

In a completely unexpected turn of events, she discovers that her intended victim is one of the competition judges, and he turns up dead before the pie even arrives. Now, Daisy has to solve the murder—even if it means working a bit of magic—before someone calls foul play and exposes her murderous secret.

For anyone who’s ever fantasized about the world of competitive baking à la the Great British Bake Off—or has ever dreamed of getting back at that guy who wronged them years ago— Popp’s culinary cozy series is as alluring as a perfectly baked pie, this edgy yet utterly charming novel takes the idea of “a dessert to die for” to a whole new level.

Have you watched the reality TV show called The Great British Bake Off? Well, Daisy is going to take part in the reminiscent of the Great British Bake Off. Daisy is famous for murder pies so when she finds out that one of the judges in the competition was the one that she was supposed to be making the murder pie for, she was shocked. Competitions and drama enfold in the competition and one of them soon gets murdered…

This is the second book of the Pies Before Guys mystery and I was super excited to read the second book as I enjoyed reading the first book. This book was OK to me. The first part of the book was slightly boring–all about setting up the competitions–baking cakes and puddings and breads and of course a bit of drama off the screen. A girl named Chloe gets murdered first and soon one of the judges gets murdered. Daisy was determined to find out who the killer was even if she was eliminated from a round. I enjoyed reading this book and I do like the fact that there are recipes behind the book so we could try them at home! The descriptions of the food in general made my mouth water. Overall, this is an OK thriller which worth 3.5 stars! Cannot wait for the third book of the series.

Many thanks to Netgalley and Crooked Lane for the ARC. The review is based on my honest opinion only.

Pip is not a detective anymore.

With the help of Ravi Singh, she released a true-crime podcast about the murder case they solved together last year. The podcast has gone viral, yet Pip insists her investigating days are behind her.

But she will have to break that promise when someone she knows goes missing. Jamie Reynolds has disappeared, on the very same night the town hosted a memorial for the sixth-year anniversary of the deaths of Andie Bell and Sal Singh.

The police won’t do anything about it. And if they won’t look for Jamie then Pip will, uncovering more of her town’s dark secrets along the way… and this time everyone is listening. But will she find him before it’s too late?

Pip is back with another crime adventure!

This is the second book of the Good Girl’s Guide to Murder.

Pip and her friend Ravi are running a podcast after their success of solving the case. Pip promised herself that she will not get involved in anymore but when her friend Connor asks her to help him find his missing brother Jamie, Pip couldn’t help but notice that there’s a foul play in Jamie’s disappearance.

I was literally hooked into the story! I couldn’t simply put the book down and I managed to finish the book within two days! I do like the format in which the story is written–snippets of email, pictures, text messages–it was interesting to read them and really made the book unique. The story was also engaging as well–lots of twists and turns and I must say, the author did a good job of drawing the reader into the story and making the reader feel like they are part of the story as well. The ending was completely unexpected and overall, I enjoyed the book overall–so worth 4.5 stars!

In the propulsive debut novel from the host of the #1 true crime podcast “Crime Junkie,” a journalist uncovers her hometown’s dark secrets when she becomes obsessed with the unsolved murder of her childhood neighbor—and the disappearance of another girl twenty years later.

Everyone from Wakarusa, Indiana, remembers the case of January Jacobs, who was found dead in a ditch hours after her family awoke to find her gone. Margot Davies was six at the time, the same age as January—and they were next-door neighbors. In the twenty years since, Margot has grown up, moved away, and become a big-city journalist, but she’s always been haunted by the fear that it could’ve been her. And the worst part is, January’s killer has never been brought to justice.

When Margot returns home to help care for her sick uncle, it feels like walking into a time capsule. Wakarusa is exactly how she remembered: genial, stifled, secretive. Then news breaks about five-year-old Natalie Clark from the next town over, who’s gone missing under eerily similar circumstances. With all the old feelings rushing back, Margot vows to find Natalie and solve January’s murder once and for all.

But the police, the family, the townspeople—they all seem to be hiding something. And the deeper Margot digs into Natalie’s disappearance, the more resistance she encounters, and the colder January’s case feels. Could the killer still be out there? Could it be the same person who kidnapped Natalie? And what will it cost to finally discover what truly happened that night?

I listened to the audio book of this book and…well here goes my review.

In 1994, January Jacobs was found murdered in the basement of her home. Her mother was the suspect of her murder, though she was never charged with January’s murder due to lack of evidence. The small town of Wakarusa, Indiana was haunted by the murder of Janaury Jacobs.

Present Day, Margot Davies, a struggling journalist and a childhood friend of January Jacobs returns back to the small town to look after her uncle. The small town soon became grappled with a disappearance of a young girl Natalie Clark. Margot believes that the disappearance of Natalie Clark is similar to January’s case. Is she right? Has the same killer returned back to the small town after all these years?

I actually enjoyed this story from the first chapter to the end that I almost rated this five stars. There were so much twists and turns in the book, too many viable suspects including supecting her own uncle. This was a mind blowing gripping psychological thriller and it was quiet unputdownable too. But the ending…kind of lowered my rating to four stars. I felt the ending was hurried, rushed and that there was some kind of cliffhanger in the book. Will there be another book? What’s going to happen next? Hopefully, it will be another book but I am not sure.

Overall this book worth four stars!

Faint sunlight dapples the two figures lying on the ground. The mother cradles her daughter close to her side, a stuffed toy elephant next to them. Leaves from the tall trees fall onto their faces, but neither moves to brush them off.

When a dog walker in a local Virginia park finds the bodies of a mother and daughter, Detective Amanda Steele is first on the scene. Her own daughter has a toy just like the girl’s elephant and seeing the child like this is her worst nightmare come true. Heartbroken, she vows to get justice.

They quickly get an ID—Jill Archer and six-year-old Charlotte were reported missing last week, but interviewing Jill’s husband, Roy, Amanda’s gut tells her he is hiding something. When the autopsy reveals a terrible pattern of bruises, she’s certain that a domestic argument escalated out of control, and tiny Charlotte got caught in the crossfire. But just as Amanda is about to arrest Roy, another grave is found, containing another mother and daughter.

Desperate for a lead, she goes to every place the women could have been targeted, and learns from a concerned ER nurse about Leanne Reilly and her young daughter, Gracie, who haven’t been heard from in a week. Amanda hopes that Leanne has simply left her deadbeat husband, but she’s gripped by the fear that they are the killer’s latest victims. Now every second counts for Amanda to find the family and stop a little girl’s nightmare before it ends in tragedy…

This is the seventh book of Detective Amanda Steele series. I have read nearly every single one of the series and make sure to read all of Amanda Steele series.

The story starts out with a dog walker discovering the bodies of a mother and a child in a park. Detectives Amanda and her partner Trent discover that the bodies belong to a woman named Jill Archer and her six year old Charlotte and Jill’s husband is a police officer. But Jill has been suffering from domestic abuse and initially they suspected that Jill’s husband might have been responsible. But when they find the remains of another set of bodies, Amanda and Trent realized that they are dealing with a deranged serial killer.

This was well written, and the author managed to put us on the edge with her writing. This book was quiet unputdownable and there were some twists and turns you find along the book, as we do not know who the real suspect behind the killers is. The book was fast paced which made it really interesting and intriguing and the ending was really great. What’s more, while in the midst of solving the case, I like how Amanda’s personal life was also labeled out in the book.

Overall, this was a great thriller that will keep you up all night–worth five stars!

Many thanks to Netgalley and Bookouture for the ARC. The review is based on my honest opinion only.