Traveling Sisters NetGalley Review: Until I Met Her by Natalie Barelli

Until I Met Her by Natalie Barelli

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Traveling Sisters NetGalley Review by Norma with Brenda, Lindsay and Kaceey’s thoughts.

A book within a book – how can we go wrong with that?  We all absolutely love reading books that are about or have books within the storyline.

UNTIL I MET HER (The Emma Fern Series, Book 1) by NATALIE BARELLI is a fun, clever, exciting, compelling, and character-driven debut thriller novel that grabbed our attention right away and had us all totally engaged and curious throughout this story as we were trying to figure out the direction, motivation, and intentions of all the characters involved.

NATALIE BARELLI delivers a wonderfully written story here with the most standout character that we have ever read and the highlight of this book was our main character’s personality.  The snarky commentary of Emma Fern was one heck of an entertaining, amusing, and the most enjoyable aspect of this novel!

To sum it all up it was an intriguing, mysterious, fast-paced, and a quick and easy read that will keep you entertained right to the very end with the help of our main character’s quirky and sarcastic inner dialogue which will leave you wanting more in the end.  We are looking forward to what the author has in store for Emma Fern in the next book of this series, AFTER HE KILLED ME which is due out in October, 2017.  Would recommend!!

Thank you so much to NetGalley, Thomas & Mercer and Natalie Barelli for the opportunity to read a copy of this book for a fair and honest review.

 

 

BRENDA’S THOUGHTS:

What a fun, pleasant and clever little gem Until I Met Her was for a Traveling Sister Read with Norma, Lindsay and Kaceey.

Until I Met Her is a wonderful and delightful web of deceit, lies and betrayal that had me engaged, interested and excited to find out the consequences to the deception.

Natalie Barelli does a great job creating such unlikeable characters it was hard not to loved them.  Emma’s wit, snarkiness and inner thoughts had me laughing and cheering her on in her web of deceit and in the things she did to maintain that deceit.

The ending wrapped up a little too neatly and quickly and had Kaceey yelling out loud again with  “A little more drama please”.  I too could of used a little more in the ending I will definitely be looking out for the second book to see what web of deceit Barelli might have in store for us.

Thank you so to NetGalley, Thomas & Mercer and Natalie Barelli for a copy to read and review.

KACEEY’S THOUGHTS:

An intriguing debut thriller!

Emma lives a rather ordinary life. She owns a small furnishings store and is married to an economist who never seems to fully appreciate her. One fateful day, Beatrice Johnson-Greene, an award-winning and bestselling author walks into her shop…and into her life. Emma is awestruck. What grand fortune! See, Emma has secretly, desperately always wanted to be an author. Her dream since childhood.

All it takes is one little lie from Emma “I wrote a novel once.” And with that, their chance meeting blossoms into a new friendship. Only Beatrice has a deeper motivation behind this new whirlwind of a friendship! She wants Emma to be the name and face of her latest novel. And for Emma to take ownership of it. (Why she would want this I could never understand!?).

It’s a dream come true for Emma. To become the successful author she always wanted to be.  But how far will she take this farce? When is it no longer a far-fetched fantasy but a reality?
I found Emma’s quirky and sarcastic inner dialogue both entertaining and endearing. It was great fun watching her deal with the consequences and fallout of this very bizarre experiment. Emma truly was the best part of this book! You couldn’t help but love her!

The books reads very fast and held my attention throughout. There were parts I thoroughly enjoyed and was hopeful the intensity would hold till the end. But it left me wanting more. (Is that good or bad??). I can’t imagine what the author has in store for Emma (or us readers) in book two After He Killed Me due out in Oct 2017.

Thank you to NetGalley, Thomas & Mercer and Natalie Barelli for an ARC to review.

LINDSAY’S THOUGHTS:

4 stars!   This was a quick, entertaining, character-driven read.

A book about a book – how can you go wrong with that? I enjoyed reading about the life of a writer and the accomplishment of publishing a highly successful debut novel.   The author, Natalie Barelli, did an excellent job keeping me curious as to the intentions and motivations of each of the characters throughout the story – it kept my interest from start to finish.   With that being said, I did feel that the ending wrapped up a little too quickly and neatly.   I would have liked a more dramatic finish (my ‘sisters’ and I agree that we love drama in our books, not in our lives 😊).

I loved the main character, Emma Fern.  Her snarky inner thoughts and comments were highly entertaining, often making me laugh out loud. I enjoyed following Emma on her crazy journey – her character was, by far, my most favourite part of this novel!

As always, it was a pleasure reading along with my sensational sisters – Norma, Brenda and Kaceey!