Aggie Blum ThompsonCritiques

This is a soap opera in book form, about a murder. I was riveted, even as the WTF moments stacked up. They sort of qualified as plot twists at first I guess. The final reveal of one sibling's sexuality and status in the family is a Big Lipped Alligator Moment. Thanks to Nostalgic Woman for the term. This book is wild. I'd be interested in reading something calmer, somehow, of the author's.

This is a quick read. The author does not waste much time before Allie's life is upended and spiraling out of control. I could understand why people including Allie's husband, Mark was doubting her. When he would ask her a question, she would withhold information. Yet, I did feel bad for Allie.

I kept trying to figure out who was responsible for all of the bad things happening to Allie. Just when I would think I had it figured out, there would be a twist. You could say that I was really invested in this story. I was not let down by the ending. This book does not read like a debut novel. Looking forward to reading more books by this author.

What a super fun read! This is a twisty, suspenseful thriller that I read in one sitting. I couldn't put it down! Allie is an established photographer who has a great job, wonderful marriage, and loving little boy. She lives in a very clicky neighborhood where mothers constantly monitor each other, gossip, and essentially try to outdo each other. Allie has a dark secret past that not even her husband knows about, and she moved into the neighborhood hoping to bury her past and start over. But when a strange man calls her by her former nickname and then assaults her at a party, Allie begins questioning who might have access to her past. Then the man who attacked her is killed and the police are knocking on her door. She discovers that someone has been impersonating her online and all kinds of nasty photographs and rumors go viral causing serious damage to her reputation-socially and professionally. Even her husband begins to question the truth about his wife. As the police look for the killer, Allie becomes a suspect and it takes all her courage to reach into her past for clues as to who is framing her and trying to destroy her life.

ALL THE DIRTY SECRETS is a convoluted mystery, meaning it's more than just a mystery; it's mystery upon mystery upon mystery, and that's the best kind of mystery. So I appreciated it. But it wasn't for me. That is not to say anything negative about this book. It would have been for me back when I was in high school. It would have been a four-star book then.

Although this is one novel, it is made up of more than one story/mystery. Mainly, there are three, two taking place during beach week in 1994, one during present-day beach week. All three are about teenagers who drowned or are assumed to have drowned. And there's also another mystery of a man who was a track coach in 1994 at the teenagers' private school and is somehow now the head of that school.

The problem for me is that much of ALL THE DIRTY SECRETS is about teenagers, a subject that often bores me nowadays. Although the mysteries are told from the perspectives of different characters, including Liza as an adult, she is trying to solve mysteries that happened when she was a teenager.

This book would have been more appropriate for me when I, too, was a teenager.

I enjoyed this book mainly due to its location - set in DC, suburban MD, and the beaches of DE - all areas familiar to me.
25 years earlier, Liza Gold and her prep school friends went to the beach for Senior Week (Beach week). Her friend, Nikki, went missing after they all went swimming late at night, after drinking. Their friend, Whitney, withdrew from the friend group after Beach Week, and now just Shelby and Liza, along with friends Archer and Todd, still get together. Liza's teen daughter, Zoe, and Liza butt heads constantly, but when Zoe's best friend, Emery is murdered, Zoe is in danger, and Liza realizes that there are many similarities to Nikki's death years earlier.
As Zoe and Liza get closer to the truth, Liza discovers that things she believed are all wrong.
Chilling to read how far people will go to protect their family status.

I Don’t Forgive you
By Aggie Blum Thompson

Allie left her old life behind 17 years ago and moved to Eastbrook , DC with her husband Mark who’s a lawyer and their son Cole. Her mother has dementia , and is charge of her care which is expensive and deteriorating quickly. But as off as she seems to be she’s dropping hints left and right to her daughter.
She seems to have only 2 friends - Daisy her realtor and Leah who’s daughter is in the same class as her son.

Allie and Mark attend a party with the neighborhood block.

Should you be held accountable for things you did as a teenager? Yes, what Allie did years ago was stupid, but she thought she left that all behind. Now, living in an upscale neighborhood in Bethesda, with her lawyer husband, and young son, Allie’s past life is coming back to haunt her. Harmless flirting at a party turns into something more sinister. Things are popping up on social media which are damaging to her reputation. Allie is now being framed for murder, but why? Her memory is failing her, her mother is hallucinating, her job is on the line, but she swears that she isn’t doing any of the terrible things. Who is trying to hurt Allie, and how far will they go?
This will keep you guessing until the end. Looking forward to reading more by this author!

I Don’t Forgive You presents us with Allie Ross, a professional photographer, mother, and new resident of an exclusive D.C. suburb. Her life seems to be falling into place, but her past is waiting for her. Allie is so ashamed of her past, of events that transpired while she attened a private high school, she has not even told her husband, so when someone calls her a name she only used for a very short time at that school and when a shirt from that school shows up among her child’s clothes, she thinks someone is coming after her.

And are they ever! A local man is murdered the night after he called her a tease and accosted her at a party and there is a trail leading right to her door.. And still she does not tell her husband. He recommends a lawyer and she dilly-dallies. Even after meeting with the lawyer, she goes on her own to the police to file a complaint about false identities being used on social media.

There is a lot to like about I Don’t Forgive You. The suspense is real and I wanted to know who was persecuting her. Was it her former high school teacher, her sister-in-law, her former best friend, or some other neighbor? There was plenty to wonder about, but it was ruined by how completely stupid Allie was.

So, I get that people are reluctant to speak about past trauma. It’s certainly horrible that the victim of a predator carried the blame for so many years. But, when you’re husband thinks you are either unfaithful, an alcoholic, or losing your mind, you come clean. For your child’s sake, if you are a murder suspect, you tell the truth to your husband and your lawyer. You don’t risk losing your child and your liberty out of embarrassment, especially since the most damning element, a nude photo, has already been made public.

My frustration with Allie, the ability to know that her confidential work would be posted, her absolute stupidity made me angry. Seriously, the bad guy would have won the day if winning depended on her own actions other than one fortuitous move near the end, and that involved instinct, not intellect. It was the oh-so-tired ending of all spy films where the evil genius recounts all the steps of the plot before killing the spy but then is thwarted by some move or another.

It does say quite a lot about Aggie Blum Thompson’s writing skills that I remained in suspense and involved to the end of a book that irritated me so much.

I received an e-galley of I Don’t Forgive You from the publisher through NetGalley.

I Don’t Forgive You at Forge Books | Macmillan
Aggie Blum Thompson author site

https://tonstantweaderreviews.wordpress.com/2021/06/22/9781250773913/

Thank you to the author.

Don't let your past come to find you is all I can say. I would have never figured this book out if I wanted to. What happens is crazy in this book and so much going on with Allie (aka, Lexi (her name she used in high school or Sexy Lexi -- which comes back to bite her in the present). Someone is out to get her and she is accused of murder of a neighbor who she met at her realtor's house in Bethesda, MD. I loved that the author (who lives there) incorporated places I know about since I live close by.

It's a spider web of happenings and she can't get herself untangled no matter and more things keep happening with her mother who has dementia who lives in a home, and her sister Krystal (they were named after characters from the show Dynasty -- since her mom loved those kind of shows when they were on in the 1980s), who is not the best person either. Allie is the doting daughter who moved her mom to be closer to her.

So much going on that I can keep going on and on but I will let the reader find these things out.

I Don’t Forgive You by Aggie Blum Thompson is a 2021 Forge publication.

Crazy, Creepy, and Atmospheric!

Allie and her husband, Mark, along with their young son, have recently moved to DC- settling in an affluent neighborhood. Things so horribly awry after the couple attends a neighborhood party. Allie is assaulted in the restroom, which is bad enough- but when her attacker is later found dead, Allie finds herself a person of interest in the case after a fake Tinder account is found in her name.

From there, one thing after another, points to a deliberate smear campaign against Allie- an attempt to not only ruin her life, but to frame her for murder. The question is… Why?

As it turns out, Allie is harboring secrets from her past- and it looks as though she's been found her out. Is someone from her past seeking revenge, or has someone closer to her discovered Allie's dark secrets- like her less than charming sister in law- or even Mark?

The setup for this novel is unnerving- seriously unsettling- and draws from current fears of identity theft, and deep fakes. In fact, just a few weeks ago, I read an article about a woman who made deep fake videos of her daughter’s cheerleading competitors, which depicted them exhibiting behavior that would get them kicked off the squad. Just goes to show how anyone with the right computer skills could easily make one look guilty of something they didn’t do.

With just the slightest bit of evidence that points to a person’s guilt, the cops might latch on to that theory and run with it. Happens all the time. This is what makes the plot so disturbingly plausible.

The author did a great job with Allie’s character. Thinking about the way the story develops, Allie is the one who carries most of the burden in the novel. The secondary characters do their part- and do it well- as there is not one person Allie can completely trust.

Yet, Allie’s behavior can look a lot like self-sabotage –such as consuming copious amounts of alcohol, which doesn’t help her reputation much. Her one -woman show is harrowing, tense, edgy and very suspenseful.

We could stop there, and I’d be satisfied, as the book delivered what I was expecting it to. Yet, this one stands out just a bit more because although the author stuck to formats requisite rules, she broke form by taking the genre into deeper, darker, and more emotional territory than your garden variety psych thriller. I do hope readers will pick up on the more meaningful messages in the story, beyond the surface chills and thrills.

While one does experience the usual relief as the roller coaster ride coasts to a stop, the reader isn’t let completely off the hook, as the complexities and emotional aspects continue to linger after the last page is turned… as they should.

I'm going to make a bold prediction and say right now I Don't Forgive You will be one of the hottest psychological thrillers this year. It was a creepy and disturbing story that held my interest from start to finish. I had a good time coming up with different theories as to what was going on and yet I still wasn't able to piece everything together ahead of time with 100% accuracy. This author hit a home run with her debut novel.

Allie Ross has just moved to an upscale DC suburb with her husband and son. She's met a few people in the neighborhood but in general feels like a fish out of water. She also has a past she has gone to great lengths to leave behind. Allie is caught completely off-guard when a man at a party calls her by a nickname she briefly went by in high school. The next day, that man is dead. What happened to him?

For various reasons, you just can't be too sure what is going on especially if you are a frequent reader of mysteries and thrillers. It's like you are hyper-aware of everything the author could throw at you which means you have many possible scenarios floating through your head while reading this book. Combine that with the tension you feel as you place yourself in Allie's shoes and well, it makes for an incredible reading experience.

If you are looking for a good story to get caught up in and distract you from real life, this book is an excellent pick. There are some disturbing aspects of the plot but no more so than any other book in this genre.

I received an advance digital copy of this book from Netgalley and the publisher. All thoughts expressed are my honest opinion.½