Item: We Were Never Here
Rating: 4.00
Author: quirkycat

by Andrea Bartz

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • REESE’S BOOK CLUB PICK • “This book is every suspense lover’s dream and it kept me up way too late turning pages. . . . A novel with crazy twists and turns that will have you ditching your Friday night plans for more chapters.”—Reese Witherspoon

A backpacking trip has deadly consequences in this “eerie psychological thriller . . . with alluring locales, Hitchcockian tension, and possibly the best pair of female leads since Thelma and Louise” (BookPage), from the bestselling author of The Lost Night and The Herd.

A Marie Claire Book Club Pick • Named One of the Best Books of the Year by NPR and Marie Claire

Emily is having the time of her life—she’s in the mountains of Chile with her best friend, Kristen, on their annual reunion trip, and the women are feeling closer than ever. But on the last night of the trip, Emily enters their hotel suite to find blood and broken glass on the floor. Kristen says the cute backpacker she brought back to their room attacked her, and she had no choice but to kill him in self-defense. Even more shocking: The scene is horrifyingly similar to last year’s trip, when another backpacker wound up dead. Emily can’t believe it’s happened again—can lightning really strike twice?

Back home in Wisconsin, Emily struggles to bury her trauma, diving headfirst into a new relationship and throwing herself into work. But when Kristen shows up for a surprise visit, Emily is forced to confront their violent past. The more Kristen tries to keep Emily close, the more Emily questions her motives. As Emily feels the walls closing in on their cover-ups, she must reckon with the truth about her closest friend. Can Emily outrun the secrets she shares with Kristen, or will they destroy her relationship, her freedom—even her life?

We Were Never Here was one of my three August choices for BOTM, and I am so extremely glad that this one came across my plate! This suspenseful thriller was written by Andrea Bartz – the author of The Lost Night and The Herd.

Emily and Kristen have been best friends for years. They're so close that they make a point of traveling at least once a year. That includes this year, despite the horrible events of their last trip. Yet history seems about to repeat itself, as Emily comes back to find blood and a body in their hotel room.

Back home, Emily can't seem to let what happened to go. She knows that she should be a better friend right now, but Kristen is letting her help, which is setting off alarms and anxiety that Emily can't ignore. So instead, she begins to question the truth.

“Just because a feeling is real doesn’t mean it’s true.”

We Were Never Here was a fun and thrilling novel for obvious reasons. I love it when a mystery successfully gets me hooked, forcing me to try and sort through lies to find the truth at the center.

That was very much the case for We Were Never Here. It was impossible at times, to tell the truth from lies, and I can imagine how much more difficult that would have been for anyone involved.

What blew me away was how in-depth and intense this book got. I went into it expecting one story, and instead, I found a book full of layers, as years and years of built-up lies, came to the surface.

The thing I loved the most about We Were Never Here is how introspective some of the characters ended up being. Emily wasn't bumbling around in a mystery – she took full ownership of her mental health and wasn't afraid to talk openly about her issues. I feel like we could all be better at this, so I had to respect the hell out of Emily for it - especially given her situation.

Long story short: I adored We Were Never Here and will be adding Andrea Bartz to my growing list of thriller authors that I will automatically buy from.

Check out more reviews over at Quirky Cat's Fat Stacks

We Were Never Here

by Andrea Bartz

Reviewed by Quirky Cat on Aug 30, 2021

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