One Book A Month Club

Welcome to the one book a month club! Yup, I just started that! I told you guys in my New Years Resolutions that I wanted to keep up my “one book a month” promise from last year! It is SO rewarding and such a great way to escape reality. But I must admit…

my secret weapon to knowing the best books is my book-worm-beautiful cousin Chloe! Yes that’s right, blogger Chloe Parr is cousin to me, Lauren Elizabeth! We have a very long last name and got very lucky with blogger worthy middle names, LOL. ANYWAY! Chloe puts the BEST book guides together on her blog so I asked her to put together a little list for my readers to kick off 2018 with the best recs! So here’s Chloe Parr with your first books of 2018!

 

The Perfect Stranger – Megan Miranda

Writer of bestseller All The Missing Girls, author Megan Miranda’s latest novel has the bone chilling twists of Gone Girl with the unreliable cast of Girl on the Train. When failed journalist Leah Stevens runs into an old friend, Emmy, the long-time besties decide to start over, escape their current mistakes, and move to rural Pennsylvania. However, one night a woman with an eerie resemblance to Emmy is assaulted by the lake and the real Emmy soon disappears days later. The weird part? As Leah tries to find her friend, she realizes there is no record that Emmy ever existed…no family, no identity, nothing. I just finished reading this novel and I have to say – Megan Miranda never fails to disappoint on jaw dropping revelations and creepy twists.

 

The Immortalists – Chloe Benjamin

I’ve been waiting for Chloe Benjamin’s new novel to hit the shelves and now it’s quickly become a bestseller. How would you live your life if you knew the day you were going to die? Well, that’s exactly the question the Gold siblings face in The Immortalists. In 1969 New York, word gets out that a mystical psychic who can tell anyone the day they will die is traveling through the Lower East Side. Bored and intrigued, Simon, Klara, Daniel, and Varya Gold decide to sneak out one night to hear their fates and their prophecies lead them in all different directions. Benjamin is only 28 years old but her novel is packed full of long-lived wisdom. I loved this story because it really makes you sit back and think about whether we are victims of our own destinies or if we can choose the outcome of our lives.  

 

The Woman in the Window – A.J. Finn

I’m not going to lie… I have become addicted to psychological thriller novels. The page turning stories keep me entertained for hours and I stay up so late I end up finishing the book in one day! One that I’ve been waiting for is The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn (out now and already a bestseller!). The story is about Anna Fox – a woman who hasn’t stepped outside her New York home in 10 months (yup you read that right). Anna’s only lifeline to the outside world is through her window, where she sits for hours everyday watching her neighbors. When a new family moves in, Anna finds their picture-perfect nature weirdly mesmerizing, watching them for hours every day. However, one night a blood curdling scream rips through the silent night and Anna witnesses something no one was ever supposed to see. Now Anna must find the courage to step outside the comfort zone of her home and uncover the truth of her mysterious and potentially violent neighbors. I haven’t read this book yet but it’s definitely next on my list. I’ve only been hearing great things!

 

Sweet Little Thing by Abbi Gline

Ask Lauren and she will agree that I am a hopeless romantic… to the point where I compare reality to the relationships in a bookl (how do you read Beautiful Disaster and not want that ok!?). Anyways… I should probably stop reading so many but I am addicted to new adult romances. Everyone has been talking about Abbi Glines’s “Sweet Series” so I decided to finally give it a try… and oh my I am hooked. Think Cinderella but hotter and with an unexpected ending. When Beulah Edwards is left taking care of her sister after her mother dies, she decides to take a job as a housekeeper for the wealthy Van Allan Family. Beulah soon learns that the Van Allan home does not belong to the parents, but rather the son who owns the whole fortune. Jasper Van Allan doesn’t understand why his mother insisted on hiring a young housekeeper, but when he sees Beulah, he can’t stop thinking about her stunning face. Everything is falling into place for Jasper and Beulah, until all the secrets and lies come falling out of the Van Allan family closet. This story is the perfect balance between steamy romance and unexpected drama. I was addicted to the story until the very last page and the ending left me wanting more and more (thank goodness it’s a series!!).

 

YOU by Caroline Kepnes

I was talking to Lauren about my favorite thrillers of all time and immediately YOU came to mind (along with The Good Girl, Defending Jacob, and Behind Closed Doors). I found YOU so creepy because the story is so REAL and relatable to right now in the social media age. It’s about a disturbed bookstore manager who develops a creepy obsession with a young, beautiful customer. The whole story is told from Joe Goldberg’s point of view and readers can quickly tell how deeply unaware Joe is about is psychopathic thoughts and sick, obsessive way of thinking. When recent graduate Beck comes into the bookstore, Joe is enthralled by her beauty and intelligence and decides to google her name on her credit card. Soon Joe obsessively and sneakily takes control of Beck’s life – using her social media to set up series of events to make sure Beck falls into his waiting arms. As Joe uses Beck’s online information to create himself into Beck’s perfect man, he goes from stalker to boyfriend all while quietly removing any obstacle that stands in the way – even if it means murder. This book will make you realize how vulnerable we all are to stalking and manipulation. I was so freaked out by this story that I honestly debated deleting all of my social accounts…

 

Thanks Chloe for making me want to stop working for the day and go read! I can’t wait to start reading all these books! Have you guys read any of these?! What are you going to Amazon first?! (Yes I am guilty of ordering my books on Amazon) Let me know in the comments or on social media!

Love,