e-Audio, 09:14:50
Narrated by: Steven Molony, Ferdelle Capistrano, & Brittany Pressley
Release Date: May 28, 2024
Published by: Books on Tape
Read from: May 23-25, 2024
Stand-alone
Source: PRH App (I received a copy of this e-audio from the publisher and their audio app in exchange for a just and honest review. This did nothing to influence my review.)
Content Warning: Domestic abuse, Adult/minor Relationship, Car Accident, Abortion, Pregnancy, Sexual Content, Kidnapping
For Readers Interested In: Dark Romance, Thrillers, Mysteries, YADark romance, high stakes, and plot twists abound in this paperback original YA thriller that’s perfect for fans of Colleen Hoover.
What you don’t know can hurt you….
It’s been months since the accident that killed Ella’s best friend, Hayley, and Ella can’t stop blaming herself. Now Ella is back at school, and everywhere she looks are reminders of her best friend—including Sawyer, Hayley’s boyfriend. Little by little, they grow closer, until Ella realizes something horrifying . . .
She’s in love with her dead best friend’s boyfriend.
Racked with guilt, Ella turns to Hayley’s journal, hoping she’ll find something in the pages that will make her feel better about what’s happening. Instead, she discovers that Sawyer has secrets of his own and that his relationship with Hayley wasn’t as picture-perfect as it seemed.
Ella knows she should stay away but finds herself inextricably drawn to him—and scared of everything she never knew about him. Perhaps it’s his grief. Or maybe his desires, cut short by tragedy. Or could it be something twisted only Hayley knew about?
A dark, romantic thriller perfect for fans of Colleen Hoover and Laura Nowlin, Everything We Never Said explores the secrets in even the best of friendships and asks how well you ever know the ones you love.
*MY THOUGHTS*
I’m not even going to lie to y’all… I saw a certain person’s name in this synopsis and I was annoyed lol I said I wasn’t going to read it at all. But then I had some branch librarians asking if it was age appropriate and what the conflict in this one was. And I hate to say it, but I actually enjoyed it.
Ok so let’s talk about this plot twist. (If you don’t want spoilers of any kind, look away!) I called who it was from the beginning. BUT that still didn’t stop me from being so engrossed in it. I needed to know if I was right and if I guessed the why. And let me just tell you, just like usual, I got all of that. But that damn ending? I legit said wth out loud. If you’ve read this, I need to know what your reaction was. Because if you say anything other than you sat up and said some variation of wth/wtf/what?! I don’t believe you. This is definitely one I didn’t see coming.
The characters were also a new level of toxic that I didn’t care for. And when I say toxic, I mean I was trying to pop some of them upside the head through the book. I DID like that they recognized the toxicity and got help for it tho. Because untreated that could become a problem. And I didn’t want any other teens out there to read this and ignore the signs like they were at first.
Another thing to think about for this book is the smex. There are some smexy scenes in this, but they’re not explicit and they are fade to black. They do serve a purpose in the story, but I think that made it worse for me? Like why are you using this as a plot device? I hated it. But then as the story goes on, it gets a lot more uncomfortable, so please check the content warnings. None of them are super dark since this is still YA, but these things are mentioned. (I’m giving you this information in the event that you want to opt out before you read it!)
*SPOILER!* I did feel like it should have been some more obscure teacher tho. I mean there’s enough people that don’t want to go to therapy already. Why scare them with this book? *END SPOILER* But I guess it was toxic enough, so they had to throw this in too. That was disappointing.
I don’t want to say anything more about this because I don’t want to like give any spoilers. I need to find out what some of y’all think. Like please, someone read this and let me know. I need to bounce my theories off of you. Because this was wild.
Overall, I give this
