The Villa

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A complimentary copy was provided by St. Martin's Press via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. In deze debuutthriller van Ruth Kelly volgen we Laura die van haar baas de ultieme opdracht krijgt: zij mag undercover als deelnemer van De Villa, een nieuwe realityshow die het moet gaan maken over de hele wereld. In deze ultieme datingshow krijgen tien deelnemers - waaronder dus Laura - de kans om in een prachtige luxe villa ergens in the middle of nowhere op zoek te gaan naar de liefde. Elke seconde worden ze live gestreamd en de kijkers hebben meer invloed dan ooit. Maar feit is ook... hoe hoger het eveneens te winnen geldbedrag wordt, hoe verder de kandidaten lijken te gaan om hun concurrentie uit te schakelen. Met alle gevolgen van dien... Past and present collide when two old friends spend a summer writing at an infamous villa in Italy. If you want a smooth read while highlighting the struggles of different relationships, sprinkled with intrigue, this’ll do it. It’s not what I’d call a slow burn, but it’s not a fast paced suspense novel either, it neatly lies just in between.

In the present, Villa Rosato is now known as Villa Aestas, a luxurious holiday retreat, in spite of the fact that it's a murder house. For best friends, writers, Emily and Chess, it's the perfect spot for them to go and reconnect. And yet that first bit still stands on its own, another kind of story, another universe of might-have-beens. The Villa is a story told in two timelines. In 1974, 19-year-old Mari is invited to spend the summer at an Italian villa with her lover Pierce, her stepsister Lara, a famous musician named Noel, and his drug connection Johnnie. On July 29, 1974, what would later be known around the world as the “Villa Rosato Horror” takes place, leaving one of them dead. But from that sadness grew two stunning pieces of art: Lara’s 20-million-copy selling debut album Aestas (think Fleetwood Mac’s Rumors), and Mari’s feminist horror novel masterpiece, Lilith Rising. Meanwhile, in the present, Emily is a 30-something novelist struggling with her latest entry in her cozy mystery series and going through an ugly divorce. Her childhood best friend Chess is a more successful self-help author, who persuades Emily to join her for a summer getaway where they can both focus on their writing. When Chess arranges for them to stay at the very same Villa that Mari and Lara had stayed at all those years ago, Emily begins to read about—and then write about—Mari and the Villa Rosato Horror, which she suspects was more complicated than people think…. Born in Virginia and raised in Alabama, Rachel Hawkins has been writing since Kindergarten when her first book, a tense thriller involving a unicorn, a witch, and a princess, was called, “very imaginative!” by her teacher and “a searing work of genius” by her mother. There was one “reveal” that I saw very early in the book, and I just wanted the author to reveal it already.Well, that sounds like an interesting little party! Unfortunately, (for me) this book was far from that! It touches on grown men going after minors and the competitive streak that can sometimes surface between friends. Young, star-crossed musical artists looking for inspiration and a getaway, rented an Italian villa. I was taken with The Villa immediately. By far, it has the tightest plotting I've seen from Hawkins to date. Both Mari and Emily’s storylines are intriguing and written skillfully, allowing Hawkins to draw interesting parallels between the lives of the two lead characters. She also does a great job of ratcheting up the intrigue by inserting news articles, song lyrics, and excerpts from Mari’s horror novel into the narrative. When Emily finds a dusty, old copy of “Lilith Rising” among the bookshelves, she will be compelled to seek out what actually happened that fateful night.

Overall, I really enjoyed The Villa, and it was difficult to put down after the first 33% (so don’t give up if you are in the first part of the book)! It was then, within the stillness, before the vast Mediterranean seascape, that I first felt it. A current of unease that was so fierce it made my hairs stand on end." Five people, two, no, three are musicians, one or two are writers, and the last is a resentful fifth wheel. All spending time at Villa Rosato in Orvieto. Too much drink, drugs, and doing it with anyone makes for a bad mix. It might be good for the creativity of a few but it's bad for the health of others. If only a different choice, here or there, had been made, everyone might have been able to go home. I should be a fool if I didn't know I was prettier than most women. It's true that sometimes I felt that I had something to give that might mean a great deal to the person I gave it to. Does that sound frightfully conceited? […] My poor Rowley, you're the last man I would ever have had an affair with. But I've sometimes thought that if I ever ran across someone who was poor, alone and unhappy, who'd never had any pleasure in life, who'd never known any of the good things money can buy – and if I could give him a unique experience, an hour of absolute happiness, something that he'd never dreamt of and that would never be repeated, then I'd give him gladly everything I had to give.’The two timelines remain parallel to one another until around 38% of the way through the book where the story shows its hand very early on and reveals what happened. I mentioned before about the dual narratives but there’s also a third element to this, which comes from news snippets and extracts from the aftermath of the murder, giving context to what happened at the end of every chapter. Only… they’re completely unnecessary additions. Ever since Hawkins' The Wife Upstairs, I've been waiting for one of her books to recapture that sort of magic. Het lijkt de ultieme reality-tv-show te worden: tien deelnemers, een luxe villa op een prachtig privé-eiland. Elke seconde live gestreamd naar een wereldwijd publiek dat ongekende controle heeft over degenen die strijden om de geldprijs. The Villa is a slow-burn thriller/drama about a crime from the past that intertwines with the present. Laura werkt bij de krant en voor een smeuïge primeur is ze opgegeven om deel te nemen aan het programma. Ze voelt zich er ongemakkelijk bij maar probeert zich er aan over te geven, er staat een mooie geld prijs tegenover. Maar de sfeer verandert als ze wordt geconfronteerd met haar verleden en wanneer er ook nog iemand dood gaat is dat het einde van het programma…