From the bestselling authors of The Good Widow comes a chilling novel of psychological suspense that will make you think twice about what your best friend may be hiding… Mexico? But even after they’re reunited, no one is being completely honest about the past or the secrets they’re hiding. When Ashley disappears on their girls’ night out, Natalie and Lauren have to try to piece together their hazy memories to figure out what could have happened to her, while also reconciling their feelings of guilt over their last moments together.
Was Ashley with the man she’d met only days before? Did she pack up and leave? Was she kidnapped? Or worse—could Natalie or Lauren have snapped under the weight of her own lies?
As the clock ticks, hour by hour, Natalie and Lauren’s search rushes headlong into growing suspicion and dread. Maybe their secrets run deeper and more dangerous than one of them is willing—or too afraid—to admit.
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It’s trouble in paradise for three best friends struggling to make amends in the latest thriller from the dynamic writing duo of Liz Fenton and Lisa Steinke. Girls’ Night Out is a chilling page-turner full of secrets and hostility that will leave readers shocked again and again… and again. I loved it.
Girls’ Night Out is a heart-stopper of a thriller, rippling with suspense from its opening pages. But it’s also much more: Liz Fenton and Lisa Steinke plumb the intricacies of female friendship with skill and depth and heart. It’s a deeply satisfying read, and one you won’t want to miss.
I don’t think I can rave about this psychological thriller enough! Not only was it un-put-down-able but brilliant writing, unique and intriguing story of a group of girlfriends take a trip to Mexico and one goes missing. I don’t know how this dynamic duo of magical writing unicorns does it! Liz and Lisa are my thriller writing heroines and if you want a book where you don’t want anyone to bother you for one second because it is so damn good, this is the book. I absolutely did not figure it out and when a story and the writing does this then I’m so in and invested! This is a perfect book to share with girlfriends a book club or hole up in your favorite reading spot and have it all to yourself. This is something magically special. The brilliance in the story, the characters, the emotions, the setting. It’s all here. Get . this. book. 5 stars that blast about like beautiful fireworks. Loved it.
Hanging with your two best friends is like playing in a jazz trio: when you’re in sync, you toss the melody effortlessly back and forth between you, never losing the beat, laughing the whole time, and it feels easy. But when you’re out of sync, the beat drops, the melody flails, and everyone flounders. It’s painful to see, and painful to read (in the best possible way) in this pitch-perfect story of three friends on a girls-only getaway trying to find the beat in a friendship that has, for many reasons, gone sour. No one is innocent and no one is guilty either–they’re all trying, they’re all holding on to old grudges and painful hopes, they’re all likeable…and they’re all in trouble as one of their number goes missing before vacation comes to an end. But it’s less about whodunit here than “Can this friendship be saved?” Fenton and Steinke–a writing team with a long friendship–make you care deeply about the answer to that question. A fun fast-paced read with serious things to say about why your friends are so important in your life.
Natalie, Ashley, and Lauren have been friends for twenty years, but ugly fissures have taken a toll on the foundation that once glued them together. Ashley and Lauren haven’t spoken for a year after a tragedy drove a knife between them, and Natalie and Ashley are on opposite ends of a major decision. The two friends are also business partners, their once start-up company now mainstream with a buyout offer from Revlon. Natalie wants to sell, Ashley is opposed. Each has hidden personal reasons for their stance. In an effort to repair their friendship, Ashley invites Natalie and Lauren on a vacation in Mexico—sun, beaches, margaritas, and good times. But once they arrive it becomes apparent how far apart they’ve drifted. Toss in an enigmatic stranger who takes a shine to Ashley and offers to act as a personal tour guide and the three friends find the minimal glue holding them together quickly deteriorating.
The book starts with Natalie waking up on the beach, after a night of partying, her clothing soaked, with no memory of what happened the night before. One thing is apparent, however—Ashley is missing. Told from multiple viewpoints and moving back and forth between the present and the nights leading up to Ashley’s disappearance, the reader becomes privy to how this vacation—meant to heal relationships—went very wrong.
I was hooked on the dynamics of the three women, their backstories, and their efforts (and non-efforts) involved in salvaging their friendships. The book lost me a bit when it delved into Mayan beliefs and made a major player out of Marco, the mysterious local who beguiles Ashley. This is one of those books where everyone is flawed, capable of doing despicable things. Most of the book holds up well, keeping the mystery intriguing, although the ending fizzles a bit. Could have been better, but still entertaining, and an easy read. I can see the movie in my head.
Lisa Steinke and Liz Fenton have conjured up the tropical vacation of your nightmares. After reading the unsettling Girls’ Night Out, you’ll never look at a tequila shot the same way again.
Set against the idyllic backdrop of tropical Mexico, Girls’ Night Out twists its way through the dark recesses of friendship, proving that nothing is ever uncomplicated or quite as shiny as it seems. An exciting new thriller from a proven team.
Liz and Lisa never disappoint! A twisty thriller set on a girls’ weekend in Mexico. One woman goes missing after a night of partying. Did she run away or meet with foul play? Pick up this novel for a great, fast-paced read.
Girls’ Night Out by authors Liz Fenton and Lisa Steinke is a book I could not put down or stop reading from the beginning until the end! Oh. My. Goodness! As I write this review I am suffering a book withdrawal or psychological hangover and I feel sad for the characters.
I will just post an overview without spoilers, but this book conveys the loving ties between friends and also the searing conflicts which can tear the friendship apart. In the story of best friends Ashley, Natalie, and Lauren, life has taken them in an unexpected direction. Is there a point when the friends you have loved as sisters become too close and more of a burden to sustain than you can manage?
This story is written in segments of the past and present among the three girls. Secrets which they kept from each other will be the underlying cause of misunderstandings and bitterness. Lauren has been estranged from Ashley and Natalie since the death of her husband, Geoff. There is a little mystery there. Ashley and Natalie have become successful in a business venture together with the original design and marketing of a cordless blow dryer named, BloMe! Recently Natalie’s circumstances have changed and her secret is crushing her and she needs money immediately. Ashley is thrilled to have an offer from Revlon to purchase their product and the patent to be included and marketed in the Revlon name, but she does not want to give up the thriving energy of running her own company. This causes tension between Ashley and Natalie. So, Ashley decides to plan a girls vacation to Mexico in order to reconnect the friendship with Lauren and to resolve the decision with Natalie about refusing to accept the Revlon offer.
In beautiful Tulum, Mexico each of the girls have to face their hidden waves of anger, jealousies, and unsettled feelings which have built up over the years. What should have been a healing and wonderful retreat, becomes a place of misery and death to one of the friends because of a mysterious man, Marcos who forms an attachment to Ashley and sends the whole plan way off track!
Thank you to NetGalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read and review this book.
Girls’ Night Out is an utterly enthralling read that is impossible to put down. The dual timelines are captivating, just days apart, as they unfold both the frantic search for a missing friend and the circumstances that led to her disappearance. This is a book that makes you question how well you truly know even your closest friends, and also what you yourself might be capable of doing.
In Girls’ Night Out, Liz Fenton and Lisa Steinke guide readers on a suspenseful international tour of friendship at its best and worst. As enviable fun takes a turn through suspicion toward pure fear, you’ll find out just how wrong a trip to paradise can go.
This suspenseful novel is full of twists and turns, and makes clever use of chronology. It will make you think twice about going on a girls’ night out!
This is why I don’t do girls’ nights!
This book is the story of 3 best friends who are all basically estranged for different reasons. Ashley and Natalie still work together, owning a successful beauty line, but they have a major difference regarding the company’s next step. It has torn then apart. Ashley and Lauren had a falling out years ago, and both hold major grudges against each other. Lauren and Natalie just drifted out of reach, attributable to each being jealous of the other woman’s friendship with Ashley (ain’t that a joke?).
This trip to Mexico is meant to reconnect the ladies. Um, it doesn’t.
This book is about the grudges we hold. How they really end up holding us. How “moving forward” is just a cliche, and apologies are demanded more often than they freely given.
Death is a metaphor for a cancerous grudge in this book. It permeates the story, and it’s brilliantly and effectively used to showcase how toxic a grudge can be.
Caveat: this is not the thriller it’s marketed as. But it’s definitely a mind-tease. This book will get you thinking about every wrong done to you, every grudge you’ve refused to drop, every apology you should have given. It reminds you that you do hurt those closest to you, and then you push them as far away as the rubber band allows, daring it to snap.
As you follow along on the investigation into one woman’s disappearance, you’ll perform an autopsy on your own life, your choices, your regrets. Because that’s all life is… Until it’s death.
Great mystery, and study of women’s friendships. Ashley, Natalie and Lauren have been friends for two decades, but as with any long friendship, there are wounds, and wrongs, power struggles, and petty jealousies. Both Natalie and Lauren are in their own ways overshadowed and over-awed by the beautiful and vivacious Ashley, and the love they have for her is laced with resentment. Lauren is nursing an old grudge, and Natalie a new frustration with Ashley when all three of them agree to vacation together in Mexico to help clear the air and mend the fissures in their friendship.
But things go horribly awry when Ashley goes missing.
The book follows all three women’s retrospective before Ashley’s disappearance, and the regrets that come after. And through it all, the details of the night she disappeared are gradually revealed. This was a great read (and listen) because both the mystery and the intricacies of the women’s friendship were independently fascinating. If one of those elements of the plot had been eliminated altogether, I would have still enjoyed this book. And I especially loved that the author did justice to how complicated it can be when THREE women are good friends. There is always a “favored one” with constantly shifting loyalties, and balances of power.
This book has made me curious about other work by Liz Fenton.
One of my favorite books ever! I am still thinking about it. I love this mystery/suspense route Fenton & Steinke took. It is so well-written. The twists and turns with the suspense of trying to figure out what happened to Ashley kept me on my toes. Down to the very last paragraph, this book completely held me and surprised me. I was completely taken and continue to think about it, looking at women as well as friends differently all due to this book! I absolutely loved this book and cannot say enough good or give enough stars!!! Thank you, NetGalley and Lake Union Publishing!!!
WOW, what a great fascinating story! These ladies are new authors to me and I am thrilled with what I just read! I will be reading more of their books. Thanks ladies!
Girls’ Night Out was hard to put down! I enjoyed the dramatic, mysterious tone. Ashley, Natalie, and Lauren have been friends for many years. But their friendships have been strained recently because of some things that have been said and done. They arrange to go away on a trip to Tulum, Mexico in the hopes of repairing their relationships. As the days go by while they are in Mexico, they realize just how serious their conflicts are and tensions build. Then on their last night there, Ashley disappears. This last night was perhaps the worst for all of them as the strain of their conflicts finally hits them. What happened to her? And who was involved? The secrets of Ashley, Natalie, and Lauren are revealed as each of their stories are told. Besides the strain of the relationships between them, each of the women has her own personal struggle. Liz and Lisa have created a twisted plot where everything becomes more mysterious as the storyline goes on!
From the first paragraph to the last, this fast paced read will keep you wondering. Three besties at a crossroads in their friendship. They take a trip hoping to heal and get back on track. Do we really tell our friends everything? And what happens if we do? Does it change the way we see ourselves, or the way we see each other? And, maybe, if we open up, will things be better? Or, have some friendships run the course and it’s time to move on?
Loved the complexities of these relationships, the characters..real, relatable, flawed. Marriage is hard, friendships are hard. This book showed that and more.
I received an ARC of this book. Opinion is my own.
Absolutely enthralling, gripping, emotional and haunting story about 3 woman and their broken, grief filled friendship. I could not put this book down! I was sucked in from page one and it kept my mind wrapped up until the end! So so good!
I have to say that this book was a little disappointing. I felt like there was too much dysfunction in the relationships between these three “friends.” And I put friends in quotes because friends don’t treat each other the way these three ladies did. The “girls” in this book were selfish and more focused on drinking, screwing around, not supporting each other.
There was mystery involved. And the fact that the book was told from three different voices made it interesting. Though there was so much rehashing of some of the issues. It just got old.
I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for my honest opinion.