One of Us is Dead by Jeneva Rose is a 2022 Blackstone publication.

A group of ultra rich friends congregates at a Boutique salon, making Jenny, the proprietor very successful, in the process. But, when one of the ladies goes through a public, high profile divorce, it shakes them all to the core and one of them will wind up dead- but which one?

The story has a fresh approach- challenging the reader to guess not only who the murderer is, but who the victim might be.

Although I have never seen a single episode, It seems obvious within the first few chapters, that the author is going for something along the lines of a Real Housewives of… atmosphere- signaling this could be one of those fun, snarky sort of crime thrillers. Naturally, these books are not intended to be taken too seriously, so I settled in for what promised to be a nice bit of escapist fiction.

Unfortunately, by the half way mark I was becoming annoyed with the characters, the introduction of unnecessary, unrelatable material, and found the characters and the dialogue were not at all funny or witty- they were just downright mean- which is not creative, nor is it entertaining in the least.

It got old in a hurry, and I found myself feeling rather bored with the whole thing and these extremely unlikable characters. But I was thinking the story might have a highly original twist somewhere down the line, so I stuck with it, only to find the conclusion to be unbelievably ridiculous and even convoluted.

Overall, this book appears to be well-received, so I’m an outlier here- but for me, it was yet another 2024 dud.

2 stars ( )

fun fun fun! rich, mean, gossipy, women who hang out at a salon! yes please! WE LOVE DRAMA! it's giving Desperate Housewives... of Buckhead, Georgia. this wasn't too serious until the end of the book, which i saw coming. it's full of unbelievable catty behavior and delicious backstabbing among the "friends" all for good drama. and when the claws come out they come out fast! you won't want to put this one down once you started. great characters all around!! if you're into audiobooks this one is a great listen ( )

With awareness there are (many) readers who enjoyed this, it's biggest plus was that it read fast and was over quickly. Everything else was stinky cheese polished with hype and marketing dollars, a coordinated effort deserving a full star. ( )

I really enjoyed this book and finished it one day. It's a really fast read and short chapters. And some of these characters were just awful. I really wanted Olivia to die and was honestly kind of surprised when she actually was the character that died! I was thinking Crystal had something to do it with it, but the fact that all the women set up Bryce and they killed her was just amazing. Especially that Jenny was included, really good. I didn't see that coming. I love Jeneva's writing, it's engaging, and I don't even realize I'm flying through pages. Some of the characters I just disliked and that's how it's supposed to be. Mostly Olivia, which is why I was surprised that she did end up being the dead body. And Jenny dating the cop at the end, that's a bit much considering she was the one who pulled the trigger. But since it's a book and not real life, it was a cute little twist.

The only negative was I got nothing done as I wanted to in the day and sat and read all day long...and that's it. It's a great beach murder read! ( )

this is the second book I’ve read by this author. i think I liked The Perfect Marriage better. This one had a lot of POVs and characters to keep up with in general. The beginning was a slow burn. The suspense didn’t really start building up and releasing until halfway through the book. With the present day flashbacks sprinkled throughout, I did enjoy the fact that you don’t find out who was killed until towards the ending. And I did like the change in pace of the chapters getting shorter as the book was ending and facts were revealed. the answer to whodunnit and how was still a complete surprise. ( )