Tag: freida mcfadden

Posted in Books, Reviews

Book Review – The Boyfriend (Freida McFadden)

Posted on by Katie Night

Hey Dearies!

Yes, we have another one of Freida’s books for me to review! I honestly love how fast-paced her books are; I swear, I fly through them so quickly! I have yet to run into another book of hers that I wasn’t able to read through so quickly!

Right now, her books have been recommended to me since I’ve been reading a lot of her stuff lately. Not to mention, I’ve got a few of them that I have saved to read next since I’ve been recommended to check out too.

Anyway, this one is about Sydney, who is a 34-year-old single woman who happens to meet this guy, Tom, after he saves her from the worst first date with this guy, Kevin, who tries to take advantage of Sydney, but Tom happened to save her from him.

She also can’t stop thinking about him because he was so kind and handsome, but she ends up just brushing it off for the most part. She tells her best friends, Bonnie and Gretchen, about this hero, but she wasn’t able to get a name.

Before she knows it, Bonnie mentioned that she had started seeing a doctor and had been seeing him for over a year, but didn’t tell her who his name was or when they started meeting each other. However, before she could give any details, she was murdered in her apartment.

Sydney’s ex-boyfriend, Jake, is a detective and is trying to figure out who had murdered Bonnie for Sydney’s sake, but also is concerned for her safety as well. I don’t blame him, and the first person I thought of who killed Bonnie was Kevin, her stalker, because Bonnie did tell him off beforehand since she knew Sydney was uncomfortable with him.

Again, Freida makes you think it’s someone, and it turns out to be someone completely different that you didn’t suspect at all!

Anyway, the book goes back and forth from Sydney’s present to Tom’s past when he was in high school. So, in Tom’s past, he mentions that his dad was an abusive drunk who would beat both his mother and him. He also talks about his crush, this girl, Daisy, whom he’s been in love with for years, and how he ends up with her.

While this is going on, they have one of their classmates who goes missing and then end up finding her dead, and everyone who knew her gets interviewed, including Tom. I honestly thought that Tom was the one who killed this girl, but his best friend, Slug, seemed more likely to do it, and even Tom suspected him as well.

Especially since Slug was a creep around the girls, which made me even more sure I thought he did it. Boy, was I wrong. Without spoiling it for you, I’ll let you keep reading and find out who did it, because it is connected to both Tom’s past and Sydney’s present.

When Sydney finally meets Tom, she ends up going out on a date with him, and they start to get to know each other. She finds out that he is a doctor or works in the morgue, which makes me think he killed Bonnie as well. It makes you more suspicious when you find out Tom has a thing for watching people bleed. Which Sydney has a medical condition where she is prone to bleeding.

Of course, Sydney is smitten with this guy, although she starts to suspect that he had something to do with Bonnie’s murder when she ends up finding Bonnie’s hair tie under his bed. This is when she also starts to figure out that the doctor that Bonnie was seeing might have been Tom.

I swear I really thought it was Tom for the longest time, but then the pieces start to unravel into who it really is, which I won’t say who it is, but it really makes you think who it could be and why they are doing what they are doing.

Overall, this thriller keeps you on your toes and makes you question everyone. I honestly thought it was Kevin, the stalker, who pops in and out of Sydney’s life throughout the book. He even goes as far as living across the street and watching her from her apartment. However, I’ll let you find out who the real killer was.

I now have a list of other Freida McFadden books that I’m going to check out, so don’t be surprised if you happen to see more of her works in the mix. I will try my best to balance out the thrillers, but like I said, it’s hard to not get into them when you get sucked into the story and Freida does an amazing job keeping you wanting to know how it all ends.

Let me know what you think about The Boyfriend and if you are starting to get into Freida’s books more? Also, do you have a favorite Freida McFadden book? I haven’t decided yet, but so far, I think The Divorce is so far my favorite one.

Posted in Books, Reviews

Book Review – The Teacher (Freida McFadden)

Posted on by Katie Night

Hey Dearies!

Okay, so before I begin the review, I just wanted to post a little side note:

If you see me suddenly stop posting blog reviews in the next few weeks, it’s because I had my baby boy! He’s due October 7th, so any time around then, if you notice either little to no blog posts, that is why I disappeared. In the meantime, I’m going to be trying to get as many book reviews as I can get done and have them scheduled out, just so you guys have something to look forward to on Sundays!

Now, back to the review!

Yes, I have another review from Freida’s library again! This one came up as a suggestion from Kindle Unlimited for me and a few others, but I wanted to give this one a go and see what she came up with for this one.

Before I go further into the review, I wanted to mention that this does have an underage romance between a student and a teacher. Now, from what I’ve read and heard, a lot of people had a hard time getting into the book because of it, which I completely understand. I was a little iffy about reading it as well because of that.

Anyway, the book has a few different people that you read about from their POV. Eve’s is the first one you start out with, and it goes between her and Addie, who is a high schooler who has both Eve and Nate as teachers; then lastly, you’ll get Nate’s POV.

It starts out by talking about what Eve and Nate’s relationship is, which is pretty basic since they are high school teachers. Eve teaches Math, while Nate teaches English. The only other thing you find out is that Eve has been having an affair with someone that she sees regularly.

Then you have Addie, who is a high school student who had a rough year before; she not only had her dad pass away, but she was accused of sleeping with another teacher, who ended up having to leave the school because of it. Although it doesn’t really explain or say if she did it, the only thing the teacher did was give her a ride home and tutor her with math. Eve ends up running into that teacher, and he warns her that Addie is a troubled girl.

Of course, Eve and Nate both have Addie as a student for this year, as she is a junior. Eve gives Addie a hard time in class, as the teacher she was accused of sleeping with was someone who was a mentor to her. Nate, on the other hand, thinks she is a struggling student who needs guidance.

On top of one of her teachers giving her a hard time, Addie is also getting bullied by one of the popular students, as well as the entire school, because of the whole situation she caused last year. Plus, her mother is also giving her a hard time about making friends, but the only people who wanted to be her friends were those who wanted to know more about the rumors.

So, Addie turns to writing as a way to release the emotions that she has bottled up. Nate happens to find her work very interesting and invites her to work with the newspaper club so that she can get one of her poems published in the paper.

This is when Nate and Addie start to get closer, more than just student and teacher, but more than that. Addie ends up losing her virginity to Nate, as Nate tells her she’s his soulmate and wrote a poem just for her about how amazing she is to him.

They start falling head over heels for each other and meet up frequently after school to have sex. Of course, Eve starts to suspect that something is going on with Nate and Addie as Nate starts to stay later at the school more. She also then accuses Nate of that and threatens to expose him to the principal.

I really did have a hard time trying to understand why Nate would go after Addie, but as a spoiler alert, she wasn’t the only high school student that she has slept with. Addie does find out that the girl who bullies her, Kenize, also slept with Nate as he got to her too, but she doesn’t tell her until later on in the book.

Anyway, Addie tries to visit Nate after Eve threatens to expose them, and Addie ends up knocking out Eve, but Nate makes her think that Eve is dead, which freaks Addie out. I honestly thought Eve was dead too, but as Freida does, she keeps you on your toes and has Nate freaked out over finding Eve’s favorite shoes randomly all over the house.

Overall, it was another quick read, but I get why a lot of people were uneasy about the whole “student-teacher romance”. Thankfully, there are only like two or three scenes where they kiss or have sex, which made it easier to get through. I will say, I don’t think I would randomly pick this one to read again, just because of that.

I swear that every time I read one of Fredia’s books, I think I know exactly who the murderer or trouble marker, but then you find out you were way off. For example, I thought Nate was innocent and Eve was the one who was going to kill either Addie or him, but nope!

What did you think about this book? Did you read it, or was this one of her books you didn’t want to read because of the student-teacher love affair? Let me know in the comments below.

Posted in Books, Reviews

Book Review – The Divorce (Freida McFadden)

Posted on by Katie Night

Hey Dearies!

You guys must be shocked to see another one of Freida McFadden’s books in my reviews again! She is on my list as one of my favorite writers to read! Out of all the thrillers that I’ve read, hers has so many twists and turns that you didn’t even expect to happen.

The story starts out by following Naomi, who is married to Jeremy, and they have a son, Teddy. Naomi thinks that everything is fine and well until her husband throws her out and takes custody of their son. Of course, this poor woman is sideswiped because she thought they were happy.

Instead, her husband wants to file for divorce and take custody of Teddy. Then Naomi finds out there is another woman he has been seeing, Veronica, or “Ronnie”, who is younger than her, that Jeremy has been seeing.

Naomi also doesn’t want to go through with the divorce because of the fact that she thinks there is a chance to save their marriage and thinks that Jeremy is going through a midlife crisis. However, Jeremy wants nothing to do with fixing the marriage and insists on the divorce, as well as pushing for her to get a lawyer so they can start the process.

When she goes out to find the best lawyer, Jeremy has already taken away most of her options. She also has no money, as she was a stay-at-home mom before all this happened, so her options are pretty slim.

I honestly was feeling bad for Naomi! Gets kicked out of her house, only gets her son part-time on the weekends, and now has to start all over by getting a job again, just to get back on her feet. Plus, while all this is happening, strange things keep happening at the new place she is living at, and she is thinking it was the new girlfriend that Jeremy is seeing again.

At first, I was on Naomi’s side, but then the book switches to Ronnie’s POV and talks about how she was struggling with drugs, but decided to get clean once she found out she was pregnant. Then, once she has her son, she ends up losing him because her boyfriend ended up doing drugs and passed out in the car while their son was in the back crying.

You are not going to believe who happened to take this poor little boy out of the car.

Honestly thought if you saw a passed-out dad in the front seat of the car with his screaming infant in the back, wouldn’t you have tried to wake up the dad before just taking the baby? Granted, he was passed out because he was shooting up, but still, I would at least have involved the police or something to that effect.

The crappy thing about this situation is that when Ronnie reported the baby being missing, when her boyfriend came back to the house, the cops didn’t do anything about it because they both had been arrested for drug possession, which I can understand why the cop didn’t make a report about it, but she also didn’t give birth at a hospital so there was no record of her son being born or having a birth cerifitcate.

Without spoiling it with you, I started to side more with Ronnie after that. I wanted Naomi to get what she deserved in the divorce and to have her son full time, but after knowing Ronnie’s side and what she has been through, I felt more for Ronnie than Naomi!

I really couldn’t believe it! I also don’t want to spoil how it ends or what else happens, but it’s like everything you thought you knew in the first part, the second part proves how crazy it really turns out to be. I love every second of it!

Overall, this was another one of her books that kept me on my toes for sure! I know a lot of people that I saw, it was hit or miss, but I’m a newly found reader of hers, so I’ll have to see how her other works are, but I really enjoyed this one!

I also am fairly new to thrillers, and I only started reading her works this year, which I also found out she writes like a few novels a year, which is amazing, and she’s a surgeon? How does she have the time to do both! I wish I was that talented!

Let me know down in the comments if you really liked this one or if you have another favorite/recommendation for me to check out of Freida’s work! I would love to know down below!

Posted in Books, Reviews

Book Review – The Housemaid (Freida McFadden)

Posted on by Katie Night

Hey Dearies!

I know I said I would be taking a break from thrillers, but I just couldn’t help myself! I actually saw the movie trailer, and when I found out it was a book, I wanted to read it before seeing the movie, especially since it looked really good!

Thankfully, the book series is all on Kindle Unlimited, which was even better! I also got this one recommended; it was more the movie than the book, and normally I don’t do thrillers, but I figured if the book was okay, I could handle the thriller.

Plus, since I read the book before the movie, I can review both and tell you if the movie followed the book. I also did find out the second one is also going to be a movie, so I really need to get started on reading the second one before the movie comes out!

So, before I go any further, I want to put in a spoiler alert because I will be talking about both the book and the movie, and if you really want to read or see the movie before, I highly suggest you do!

The book goes back and forth between Nina and Millie’s POV. Nina is the one who is looking for a housemaid and ends up giving Millie an interview to see if she can hire her for a live-in position to help clean, cook, etc. Nina also has a daughter, Cece, whom she didn’t have with her husband Andrew, but he has pretty much been a father figure for her since she was a baby.

Millie gets hired, and that’s when Nina starts changing from being the happy homemaker to being a bitch to her, telling her the wrong information, and being a complete bitch to her on purpose. Nina also does this stuff in front of Andrew, and he starts to take pity on her.

Little does Nina know that she planned for all of this to happen. She wants out of her marriage because Andrew is an abusive asshole who has been treating her like crap, and if she were to try and leave, he already has evidence against her that he would take her own daughter away from her.

The amount of gaslighting Andrew has done to Nina is insane! As soon as they were married is when the fairytale ended, and his control started to take over. Whenever she does something that he doesn’t like, he locks her up in the room in the attic, and she doesn’t get out until she does what she’s told.

Of course, Millie has no idea of it because he seems like a wonderful husband and father. She starts to fall for him, and they have a night where he takes her out to a show, they have dinner, and of course, they both end up sleeping together.

Which was exactly Nina’s plan. Hire an attractive housemaid, treat her like crap in front of her husband, have them be together alone so they sleep with each other, and then have her husband kick her out and leave her for the housemaid.

So, when Andrew admits that he has feelings for Millie, he ends up kicking Nina out of the house. Thankfully, Cece wasn’t there; she was staying at an overnight camp, so she didn’t see or witness anything. Nina acts upset and angry at both of them and finally leaves, but when she does leave, it’s a breath of fresh air because she’s finally free.

Now, if you were like me, you were probably questioning, “Is Andrew going to do the same things to Millie?”

If you answered yes, you are correct!

However, this part is where details are a little different from the book and movie. In the movie, when Millie gets locked in the attic, it’s because she broke his mother’s china set by accident, and he has her cut herself on the stomach with one of the pieces of china that she broke. In the book, she forgets to put away some of the books she borrowed from his library and makes her hold them on her stomach for 3 hours straight.

I know what you are thinking: history is going to repeat itself, and Millie will now be stuck with the abusive Andrew. Well, Nina had this all figured out because little did Andrew know was that Millie had a criminal record.

When she was younger, she saved a friend of hers from being raped, but ended up killing the guy that she saved her friend from and ended up serving time in jail for it. Nina picked her because she knew that if Andrew did the same things to Millie, she would take him out for her.

Now, the way everything happens at the end of the movie is very different from the book. I think the only reason why they switched it up was to make it more of a “thriller” vibe, plus it got Millie and Nina working against Andrew too, which was a nice touch since he treated both of them like crap. I won’t spoil it by going into details, but all I’ll say is justice was served.

Overall, it was a great read! I loved how sucked into this one, I think I finished this one in two days? Once you started reading, you wanted to know how it ends. I also liked the movie; it’s not for everyone. If you’re not a huge fan of blood or abuse, then I don’t recommend watching it.

If you are like me and have watched true crime or crime shows in general, it’s about the same. The book is a little bit tamer, I feel, so if you’d rather not see all that, then the book might be better for you than the movie.

Honestly, the movie did a great job sticking with the details of the book, other than the end. Plus, the actors did a great job of portraying the characters in the book, as well. I know a lot of people don’t like Sydney Sweeney, but I think she did really well in the movie.

They are making a second movie for the second book as we speak; it won’t be out until December of 2027. This gives me and anyone else time to read the second book before it comes out!

Did you see the movie first? Or did you read the book before the movie was even a thing? Let me know down below what you thought!