Stacy Alesi's BookBitch.com™

From the Publisher:

An extreme game of hide-and-seek turns deadly in this riveting new thriller from New York Times bestselling author Lisa Unger

When the real game begins, who will make it to the count of 10?

Charismatic daredevil and extreme adventurer Maverick Dillan invites you to the ultimate game of hide-and-seek. But as the players gather on Falcao Island, the event quickly spirals into a chilling test of survival. A storm rages as a deadly threat stalks the contestants, turning the challenge into something far more sinister than the social media stunt it was intended to be.

Enter Adele, a single mother with a fierce determination to protect her children at all costs. When she begins the game, she unwittingly enters a twisted web of deception and intrigue. Can she maneuver through the treacherous storm and the relentless competition and get home to her family? In a ruthless battle for survival where the stakes are higher than ever, the blurry line between the virtual and the real proves that the only person we can trust is ourselves.

“Unger plunges the reader right into a sense of dread, then skillfully ratchets up the physical terrors of the challenge while revealing one disturbing secret after another. The perils of the real and virtual worlds collide effectively in this relentlessly paced thriller.” —Kirkus, starred review

“Twists arrive relentlessly, keeping readers on edge and guessing until the final, breath-stealing twist.” —The Seattle Times

“Unger’s latest is a fast-paced, atmospheric, locked-room thriller…Readers of Lucy Foley and Ruth Ware will surely enjoy this nail-biter.” —Booklist

https://amzn.to/42OrnEm

This was an interesting premise for a thriller. Let me preface this by saying I don’t watch reality TV shows – I used to watch some, most recently “Love is Blind” and “Married at First Sight,” but I couldn’t get through their last seasons, so I just gave it up. I haven’t watched Survivor since the first season, or any of the Beast Games, or whatever else is out there, so I am not that familiar with how these things work lately. I pretty much went into this book just believing whatever the author told me, and that worked just fine. I also need to add that I really hated the title of this book; it’s too long, and while I understand the implication, I just didn’t care for it. On the other hand, I loved the cover.

Dylan Maverick is the star of the Extreme games that he produces for an online audience. He is a young white man, and his best friends and girlfriend all work with him. He cheats on his girlfriend quite a bit, and that becomes a problem. He slept with Chloe supposedly before he hooked up with Angeline, his girlfriend, but he actually slept with her a few times, ghosting her after each occasion. She ends up on one of his challenges, a Hide & Seek event where she hides and is never found. Chloe has gone missing, and while the Extreme team are all questioned, they are pretty much cleared of her disappearance. There are supposed sightings of the young woman, but none are proven, and she become fodder for a true crime podcast.

This new Extreme Hide & Seek event is set on Falcao Island, a fictional island owned by Portugal, loosely based on the Azores. There is an old abandoned hotel on the island, and that is where the event is taking place. There is an old woman who tries to warn them off, and they ignore her and her private security force. There are supposed to be four contestants: a wildlife animal TV star who has been canceled due to his supposedly killing a lion; a young woman with a large following on social media; a mystery contestant; and Adele, a single mom whose husband embezzled millions of dollars from his company and disappeared with all the money, abandoning his wife and children. Adele has created a social media channel following her rebuilding her life and her body. Her kids are in high school, and it is her son who finds out about the contest as he is a huge fan of Dylan and Extreme. He convinces his mom to enter the competition, and when she sees the prize is a million dollars, she decides to go for it. To her surprise, she is selected, and her kids convince her that they can take care of themselves for the few days she will be gone.

These characters are skillfully brought to life, and the setting is basically another character. There is a hurricane-type storm moving onto the island, making everything that much more difficult for the contestants and the Extreme team. Some weird things start happening, adding to the drama, and the tension becomes almost unbearable. There is a lot more going on than anyone realizes at first, and as the mystery deepens, so does the danger.

This is a fast-paced thriller with great characters and enough pressure and strain on them to take this to a very dark place. Fans of these types of reality shows will probably love this, and even if you aren’t (like me,) it is still an unputdownable locked-room thriller. Don’t miss it!

2/2025 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch

CLOSE YOUR EYES AND COUNT TO TEN by Lisa Unger. Park Row; Original edition (February 25, 2025). ISBN: 978-0778333364. 384p.

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From the Publisher:

A new Anne Tyler novel destined to be an instant classic: a socially awkward mother of the bride navigates the days before and after her daughter’s wedding.

Gail Baines is having a bad day. To start, she loses her job—or quits, depending on whom you ask. Tomorrow her daughter, Debbie, is getting married, and she hasn’t even been invited to the spa day organized by the mother of the groom. Then, Gail’s ex-husband, Max, arrives unannounced on her doorstep, carrying a cat, without a place to stay, and without even a suit.

But the true crisis lands when Debbie shares with her parents a secret she has just learned about her husband to be. It will not only throw the wedding into question but also stir up Gail and Max’s past.

Told with deep sensitivity and a tart sense of humor, full of the joys and heartbreaks of love and marriage and family life, Three Days in June is a triumph, and gives us the perennially bestselling, Pulitzer Prize–winning writer at the height of her powers.

“Sweet, sharp, and satisfying. . . . Tyler’s touch is as delicate, her empathy for human beings and all their quirks as evident in her 25th work of fiction as it was in her first, published an astonishing 60 years ago.” —Kirkus Reviews

https://amzn.to/4jNVqCa

This story is literally set over three days in the life of Gail Baines. It doesn’t start off too auspiciously; she finds out her boss is retiring, and instead of the promotion she is sure she deserves, she is told that someone from outside the school is being hired, and bringing their own assistant. Her job is now redundant.

The timing couldn’t be worse. Gail’s daughter, Debbie, is getting married the next day. Gail is a bit of a prickly person, and when her boss tells her she doesn’t have the people skills for the job, she clearly demonstrates that her boss is right. Gail isn’t especially close with her daughter, but even so, she appears to be hurt that she wasn’t invited to the spa day before the wedding that Debbie’s future mother-in-law had arranged. Her in-laws are also hosting the wedding at their private club, leaving Gail to feel like a guest at her daughter’s wedding.

To complicate things further, her ex-husband, Max, shows up at her door with a foster cat. He was supposed to stay with Debbie, but her fiance is highly allergic to cats, so Gail takes in both her ex and his cat. Then he tries to convince her to keep the cat.

There is a lot happening in these three days in June. The day before the wedding, Debbie comes over and tells her parents that she thinks her fiance cheated on her – at least, that’s what her future sister-in-law has told her. Nevertheless, the rehearsal dinner goes more or less smoothly. The day of the wedding, Debbie decides her father needs to wear a suit, and takes him shopping. The wedding goes as well as these things usually go, and the day after the wedding there is a family reckoning of sorts.

It’s amazing how much Tyler can pack into such a short book (it’s under 200 pages.) The characters are well-drawn and interesting, the timeline moves things along rapidly, and there is enough drama to keep the pages turning. Another excellent read from one of America’s most treasured writers.

2/2025 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch

THREE DAYS IN JUNE by Anne Tyler. Knopf (February 11, 2025). ISBN: 978-0593803486. 176p.

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Big Shots, Book 3

From the Publisher:

A steamy chance encounter between a professional hockey player and the manic pixie dream girl he just can’t seem to forget takes a turn when the pair realize that their parents are engaged—in an all-new rom-com by #1 New York Times bestselling author Tessa Bailey.

When professional hockey player Sig Gauthier’s car breaks down and his phone dies, he treks into a posh private country club to call a tow truck, where he encounters the alluring Chloe Clifford, the manic pixie dream girl who captivates him immediately with her sense of adventure and penchant for stealing champagne.

Sparks fly during a moonlight kiss and the enamored pair can’t wait to see each other again, but when Sig finally arrives to meet his dad’s new girlfriend over dinner, Chloe is confusingly also there. Turns out the girlfriend is Chloe’s mother. Oh, and they’re engaged.

Sig’s dream girl is his future stepsister.

Though the pair is now wary of being involved romantically, Chloe, a sheltered harp prodigy, yearns to escape her controlling mother. Sig promises to teach her the ins and outs of independence in Boston—but not inside his bedroom. They both know there can never be more than friendship between a famous hockey player and his high-society, soon-to-be stepsister. But keeping their relationship platonic grows harder amid the developing family drama, especially knowing they were meant for so much more…

A Spicy Sports Rom-Com with an Unconventional Love Story, Perfect for Winter 2025: Heat Up Your Winter Nights!

“The latest sensually hot and sweetly heartfelt addition to Bailey’s Hot Shots hockey series rewards readers with an ingeniously inventive cast that not only includes some memorable secondary characters, including a fierce and fabulous harp mentor, but also a perfectly matched pair of protagonists, whose combustible sexual chemistry provides the fuel for several incendiary love scenes.”— Booklist

“Readers who don’t like the instalove trope may not buy into the immediate connection between the leads, but Bailey backs it up with thoughtful characterization and red-hot sex scenes. This is a winner.”— Publishers Weekly

“This love-at-first-glance romance between a gruff cinnamon-roll hero and a naive dream girl is swoon-worthy. The tension between the characters is palpable, and readers will be on a knife’s edge waiting for it to break.”— Library Journal

https://amzn.to/4jCtD7p

I love Tessa Bailey and this series is one of my favorites. This latest entry was unputdownable for sure, but I had a hard time suspending my disbelief with the reason these two couldn’t be together.

Let me backtrack. Sig is a professional hockey player coming to the end of his first contract. This was more real-life than almost any sports romance I’ve read; his salary is not in the millions of dollars, and that is a reality for most rookies. Sig was brought up by a single mother who told him his father had married her for her money, taken that money, and disappeared. She came from a wealthy family, but refused to lean on them for support, so they were dirt poor. Sig got in touch with his father as he became an adult, and they had an understandably strained relationship.

Chloe grew up in the wealthiest enclave in Connecticut and has been a harp prodigy since she was a young girl. But she never really studied her instrument, and only did performances at her mother’s request. She lives the life of a socialite, for the most part.

Sig and Chloe meet when his truck breaks down on his way to meet his father for dinner. He manages to get it into a parking lot of a very exclusive country club. His phone has died, and he has no way of getting help, so he goes into the club where the very snooty concierge tries to send him away. Chloe spots him from across the room and rushes in to help, telling the concierge that she’s been waiting for him. She shmoozes her way past him and takes Sig into the bar. It is love at first sight for both of them. They hang out while his phone charges and share a very heated kiss. Then she needs to get home, and he needs to go meet his father and they part.

It turns out that his father is getting married and he wants Sig to meet his fiancée. He hears the most beautiful music he’s ever heard coming from the next room. It turns out Chloe is the musician, and his father’s soon-to-be step-daughter, and even worse, Sig’s soon-to-be step-sister. The rest of the book is about Sig & Chloe becoming best friends who can’t be lovers, and the tension between them is excruciating. I have read thrillers that didn’t have this amount of tension! So kudos to Bailey, she really knocked it out of the park in that regard.

The only problem is that step-siblings have no blood relation, and no real taboo about being together, except in this book. The hockey team dangles an eight-figure salary and team captaincy for Sig, and Chloe has the opportunity to study with the first chair of the Boston Symphony, who is retiring and wants her to take that spot. But both of these incredible opportunities hinge on Sig and Chloe never seeing one another again.

The matter is settled by the end of the book, and of course, there is a happy ending. But plan on putting aside everything else once you pick up this book – I read it in one very late night. It truly is unputdownable!

2/2025 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch

DREAM GIRL DRAMA by Tessa Bailey. Avon (February 4, 2025). ISBN: 978-0063380776. 320p.

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Paperback: This deluxe paperback features gorgeous sprayed edges with stenciled artwork and colored illustrations on the inside cover, with fan favorite tropes!