FROM THE USA TODAY BESTSELLING-AUTHOR OF LIKE, FOLLOW, KILL AND WITHOUT A TRACE! A night she won’t forget… When single mum Ivy wakes up to a complete stranger lying next to her, she knows her one-night stand hook-ups have to stop. The encounters mean nothing to Ivy, but for just a short time, they make her forget her own terrible life. A murder she can’t remember But then Ivy discovers … she can’t remember
But then Ivy discovers the stranger in her bed has been stabbed to death, and she is covered in his blood…except Ivy has no recollection of bringing this man home. Could she have killed him?
As she tries to piece together what happened last night, Ivy’s own past returns to haunt her. And secrets can’t stay hidden forever…
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Wow! I’ve read all of Ms. Lynch’s books but this one is perhaps my favorite one, and that says a lot since I absolutely loved all of them! I think the non-linear timeline was a perfect choice for this story, which revealed not only the truth behind the protagonist’s – Ivy’s – past but explained a lot about her personality and present-day situation. And what a way to begin! I don’t know about you, but I can’t imagine starting with something more gripping than waking up and discovering a dead body in your bed and another one under it. From that point on, I couldn’t turn pages fast enough to find out what exactly was going on and how much Ivy had to do with any of that.
What I also always enjoy about Ms. Lynch’s books is how intensely she presents the parent/child relationship and the difficulties mothers have to face in their everyday life. Ivy’s protectiveness of her teenage daughter Delaney was truly admirable, just like her determination to sacrifice herself if needed in order to keep her girl safe. The ending was also absolutely perfect impo. No spoilers, but Fran rocks!
Five huge stars for this winner! Brilliant work!
My Review
How can a one night Stand Possibly go wrong.
Waking up to a complete Stranger in your bed, not Not only is he a stranger but hes a dead stranger. And you have no memory of how he ended up in your bed..
And then there’s the corpse under your bed…
Ivy has, Naturally a past a shocking one .that and little-by-little you get to learn more about the people in her life and how they’re related.
This Story is like a slow Burn
Building up to the twist and wow what a twist because I never saw that coming…
I never imagined who the killer was..
I definitely recommend this book
I would give this book 8 Stars if it was Aloud…..
Carissa Lynch
I liked this book at the beginning but then the story became hard to believe. It was very suspenseful, but the ending was a disappointment.
I couldn’t put it down, it was great.
A quick read, and an unexpected twist at the end.
I highly recommend this book! Great writing.
Horrible. I could not develop any empathy for the main character due to the ridiculous and unbecoming choices she was making.
An ok read. An easy read. But not much character development. Not much logic on the side of our heroine either.Other books out there are more satisfying.
Another wonderful story from Carissa Ann Lynch!
This story passes through some time: from middle school in ’93, to “Then” and “Now”, we follow Ivy who has been trying to get her life back on track.
With a teen-aged daughter who she just can’t see eye-to-eye with anymore, an ex-husband and his new wife, and her well-meaning friends who set her up on a dating site to get her back out there. While working on her personal life, she also has a new issue:
She’s woken up to a dead man laying next to her, and she cannot remember him.
Having had a few one-night stands, could she have drank too much the night before and invited him over? How could she have been this irresponsible?
But things are never as they seem with Carissa’s books, and this amazing whodunit really keeps you guessing. Definitely a new favorite, and a ton of fun!
Single moms are allowed to have one-night stands. Even drunken ones that you can’t quite remember, as long as it’s not your night with the kiddo… right?
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Carissa Ann Lynch brings about an enticing fresh take on one night stands, especially the ones you can’t remember! Right from the get-go, you’re thrown into Ivy’s thoughts waking up from an unmemorable one night stand only to find out there’s a stranger’s dead body in her bed! Aside from wondering who, what and why Ivy knows she must keep the dead guy under the sheets on the down-low to protect her teenage daughter.
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The One Night Stand was enthralling from start to near finish! I reveled in the mystery as I tried to form my own opinions on whether or not I thought Ivy could’ve actually murdered her bedmate! Aiding in that suspense was the dual timeline narratives giving the reader a glimpse of the past and present in multiple staggering styles. I found Ivy’s character quite realistic in many ways, from the way she always tried to put her child first to the way she handled her friends and lack of intimate connections – after all, we’re only human, and we all have needs.
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The ending was the only real downside for me. Exciting, yes. BUT it just felt a bit too easy of an out; I was expecting a little more, something different, out of it, but overall, I quite enjoyed the buildup and the connecting storylines. I would highly recommend this book to anyone looking for a quick thrill of a read!
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Thank you to NetGalley, the publishers from HarperCollins UK, One More Chapter Books, and the author Carissa Ann Lynch for providing me with a complimentary copy of this title in exchange for an honest review.
This is a riveting story. It kept me guessing until the very end. I really like the formatting of this book, it has long and short chapters. The shorter chapters left me, sincerely stunned. And the “before” and “now” moments were pretty impressive, reminded me of my favorite TV show, How To Get Away With Murder.
I really enjoyed this book and look forward to catching up on Author Lynch’s other stories.
How screwed up can one woman’s life be?! Powerful suspense in the suburbs
4.5stars
Excellent thriller with a shocker of a bedroom scene and a mother willing to go the last mile to protect her surviving twin daughter. By alternating between the present, the near past and mom Ivy’s school days, the slowly revealed drama of past events built the foundation for a crazy, twisted present (and Ivy is lost as to what’s happening)! The villain was a mystery to me right to the slammin’ finish.
This book was easy to read and fast moving with a just-right length to tell the tale without unnecessary distractions. I did note an inconsistency or two, but they were minor and did not detract from a super read.
Thanks to publisher Harper Collins UK, One More Chapter and NetGalley for providing a complimentary advance copy of the book; this is my voluntary and honest review.
The One Night Stand begins with divorced mom Ivy waking up in her bed at home with a man she does not know. She has no memory of him or of inviting him to her home. When Ivy tries to get him out of the house, she realizes he’s not asleep but dead. After that engaging chapter, the story is told in Before and After segments interspersed throughout the novel, as we learn how Ivy got to this point, what she does after finding him, and how he got there in the first place. Is Ivy as innocent as she seems?
The book reads quickly as we follow Ivy as she tries to deal with family issues related to her teenage daughter and her ex-husbands new family, jumping back into the dating scene, and of course the dead man in her bed. Recommended for fans of psychological suspense.
Content Warnings SPOILERS biphobia; homophobia; misogyny; bullying; sexual harassment; sexual assault (not on page) END SPOILERS
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC. The opinions in this review are honest and my own.
Ivy wakes up when her daughter yells at her wanting to know who the man is in her mother’s bed. Problem is … Ivy has never seen this man before .. and he refuses to wake up. Throwing the covers off she notices the man is lying in a pool of blood .. and it’s evident he was stabbed to death.
She was drinking the night before, but surely she would remember if she had done this. And where’s the knife? Looking around and then under the bed, she finds something much, much worse….
There’s another dead man under her bed … and this one is someone she knows.
This is a well written mystery/crime fiction which is set in three different times … before the stabbing, after the stabbing, and when she takes us back to her schoolgirl days. Ivy has dangerous secrets … and someone has discovered what those secrets are. The characters are deftly drawn, and I have to admit my favorite is Fran, the elderly neighbor lady.
The plot is nicely paced, suspense is high from the very first, and the ending was surprising and unpredictable.
Many thanks to the author / One More Chapter / Netgalley for the digital copy of this crime fiction/mystery. Read and reviewed voluntarily, opinions expressed here are unbiased and entirely my own.
Ivy’s life is that of a typical single mother struggling to raise her rebellious daughter, Delaney, after her husband left her for a new woman. Except, Ivy’s got secrets, and they tie into the dead man in her bed.
I am left breathless from this book.
Every chapter had a twist, every character a secret, and now that the book is over, my head is spinning. That ending! Wow, I still can’t catch my breath. After everything that Ivy went through, this book had a sort of bittersweet ending to it, but that was why it was so real, so easy to feel.
Ivy was definitely an unreliable narrator, and while it’s easy to think that she’s innocent at first, her flaws start to seep through more and more throughout the book. I love how Miss Lynch gave us the impression of getting to know Ivy the way we would a person in real life. Layer after layer, we slowly became aware of who she was until she had no secrets left.
Just another top-notch thriller from Carissa Ann Lynch.
This book was given to me for free through Netgalley at my request, and I provided this voluntary review.