Review by Booklist Review
When her boyfriend Ty unexpectedly has to work during their first trip together, Bree occupies herself with the viral coverage of a missing woman from their Airbnb's Jersey City neighborhood. Opportunistic vlogger Billie Regan has positioned herself to lead the search for blonde, beautiful Janelle Beckett, leveraging a stream of information gathered by energized viewers. The mystery leaps off the screen when Bree wakes up alone and stumbles upon a woman's blood-drenched body. Bree has no idea where Ty is or what happened to the woman, but detectives' suspicions are tweaked by Bree's record from an incident in college. She's spared arrest when her long-estranged friend, Adore, spots Bree in a live video and arrives, declaring herself Bree's attorney. But, after learning that the victim is Janelle Beckett, that Janelle once dated Ty, and that Adore is hiding something, Bree resolves to find the killer herself. Deceptive appearances, boundless speculation, and racial prejudices drive this twisty, chillingly relatable story. Garrett's second thriller (after Like a Sister, 2023) is a page-turning winner.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In the entertaining latest from Crime Writers of Color cofounder Garrett (Like a Sister), 30-something Breanna Wright believes she's finally found the perfect boyfriend in successful financial adviser Tyler Franklin. When he suggests the couple spend a few days away from Baltimore in an upmarket Airbnb in Jersey City, N.J., where his company has offices, Breanna jumps at the chance. After they arrive, however, she wakes one morning to find Tyler gone and the dead body of a slim blonde woman lying in the entryway, her face so bruised and bloodied she's unrecognizable. The corpse fits the description of Janelle Beckett, a professional dog walker in the neighborhood, and the police name the missing Tyler a person of interest in her murder. Speculation about the case runs rampant on social media, much of it fueled by a TikTok creator intent on boosting her engagement. Breanna, who had a dust-up with police as a college student, has no faith in the local cops and decides to investigate on her own, hoping to clear Tyler. Garrett remains remarkably sharp on matters of race, recasting such crime fiction tropes as police interrogations and tabloid frenzy through the eyes of a Black woman whose interactions with such forces are more fraught than her white counterparts'. Despite a few plot holes, this is a winner. Garrett's fans will be thrilled. Agent: Michelle Richter, Fuse Literary. (Apr.)
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
Garrett's latest thriller targets the insidious impact of influencer culture, as seen through the eyes of a Black woman. Baltimore-based Breanna Wright is at the "let's take a trip" stage in her budding relationship with Ty Franklin, her first serious boyfriend in more than a decade. When he invites her to spend a long weekend with him at a luxurious Airbnb townhouse in Jersey City, where his company is based, Bree jumps at the chance. But her romantic getaway turns into a nightmare when Bree descends the stairs on her final morning to discover the bloodied body of a white woman in the foyer and Ty gone. Could the victim be Janelle Becket, a beautiful blond dog walker whose disappearance the previous week has dominated the video postings of TikTok makeup influencer Billie Regan? When the police question Bree, she is frozen with fear--the result of a traumatic encounter with law enforcement years earlier--until Adore Smith, her estranged college best friend turned successful attorney, sweeps in to take charge. Garrett does a good job of capturing the online mob mentality that explodes as suspicion falls on both the missing Ty ("A dead white woman. A missing Black man") and on Bree (who gets doxxed in an act of guilt by association). But what could have been a razor-sharp, suspenseful tale about racial profiling gets bogged down in a plodding storyline that follows Bree as she checks in and out of hotels, sleuths by scrolling social media on her phone, and indulges in banal conversations with Uber drivers and hotel clerks. Bree is also a frustrating protagonist who continually ignores her friend's smart advice; indeed, the stylish and ambitious Adore is the most compelling and vividly drawn character in the novel. Clunky prose and illogical plot holes will disappoint Garrett's fans. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
