Twenty Years Later by Charlie Donlea #charliedonlea @NetGalley @KensingtonBooks #mystery #suspense #bookbloggers

Kaceey’s Review:

I so wish I could say I loved this one. But truly all I can say is, it was… ok.💁🏻‍♀️

This story plays out in two timelines.

2001. In the midst of the 911 attack, with many references to the day in vivid detail. So for some this may certainly be a difficult read.

A famous author is killed, and the primary suspect Victoria just happens to be meeting with her lawyer at the time a plane hit the first tower.

2021 Avery, a TV investigative reporter travels to New York to investigate the death of this author, as well as the woman accused of his killing. But perhaps Avery has an alternative reason for being in New York.

The transition between timelines was smooth and was able to follow easily. But with a high number of characters and subplots along the way, you’ll definitely need to pay close attention.

For me, it’s been a bit of hit and miss with Charlie Donlea’s books. I’d say I was engaged throughout but not enthralled. 

I toggled between the audio and digital copies. The narrator did an amazing job with the characters and helped to keep me from putting this one aside.

Hoping I will be loving his next release!🤞🤞

A buddy read with Susanne that left both of us a bit underwhelmed.

Thank you to NetGalley and RB Media and Kensington Books for both a digital and audio ARC

Susanne’s Review:

Reading this, a sense of Déjà vu came over me.  

I read this with Kaceey – no surprise there.. and as we got into it, I told her that the plot felt a lot like one of Charlie Donlea’s earlier novels: Don’t Believe It. I recounted the plot of that one to her (it didn’t ring a bell – turns out she had read it when it first appeared on NetGalley years ago, while it was the last book of his I’d read, a few months ago now.  Hence why I remembered it so well and while there are some differences, the plot is quite similar – see my review for that book here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2694670653). I, therefore admittedly, didn’t quite love this one and found it to be somewhat tired and overdone. Shocking? Not shocking.  

Had the plot not felt familiar, would I have loved this? I asked myself that time and again…. (as often plots regurgitated by authors and I obviously do like some of them as I am an avid reader) but I think the answer is still a hard no. There were way too many things going on for me to honestly care and as Kaceey astutely pointed out there was a TON of repetition, which got kind of boring. The last thing of course was the surprise ending, which came out of left freaking field. Like WTH!?!?

So for me, that is all. Have I recounted the plot of the book here? No. Simply because you don’t need me to. There are lots of other reviews out there that already do that. The end result is that I didn’t dislike this one, I just didn’t love it.

A buddy read with Kaceey.

Thank you to Edelweiss, Kensington Publishing Company, RB Media and NetGalley for the alc and arc.

Published on Goodreads and Twitter.