I loved the fact that this was realistically set in a covid world, however I couldn't cope with two supposedly ordinary people walking in and out of a house with a dead person in it. It was just too unrealistic with unlikeable characters.

2 stars. This one missed the mark for me. Maybe because I’m sick of COVID and living lockdowns. I want to take my mind off of the things happening right now with this virus but yet there’s no escaping it with a book about a lockdown. I didn’t care for the storyline of a cheating wife sneaking out of her house to see her lover and then finding him dead. It was just a little too far fetched. 

Thank you to NetGalley and Hodder & Stoughton for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review

I had such high hopes for this book, but I was disappointed.  I wanted to like it so badly that I kept reading even tho I wanted to stop many times.

I'm a big time thriller lover, and was intrigued by the cover and author of Stay Home. However, I did not realize it revolved around COVID and lockdown. I just have enough of that going on in my real life than wanting to sit down and reading about it for enjoyment. Just couldn't get into this because I'm just so sick of this pandemic. The writing style was fine, though a bit wordy at times. I will still read other books by this author. I just think the subject matter was a turn off for me. 

Thank you to the publisher and author for my advanced copy.

This was the first lockdown 2020 inspired novel I have seen or read. It made it very relatable to life.

Interesting characters with relatable lives and experiences. The momentum was kept up, leaving you wanting to know how it would end.

A good story and well written. I felt I couldn't relate to the main characters and found them a little boring.

This is the first book that I have read that takes place during Covid so I was really looking forward to seeing how the author would tackle this! Unfortunately, it wasn't very interesting . I found both of the main characters to be a bit boring and was skipping over pages of their inner ramblings.

I have heard mixed reviews for this book Stay Home by Ava Pierce so I thought I would see what it is all about.
Catlin has been having an affair with David for more than a year when the country goes into Lockdown. So, it’s hard to go and see David.  She is fed up being stuck in doors with James and her two bickering kids, so she decides to put her running gear on and saying she is going for a run. Instead she goes to visit David that lives not far down the road only to find him dead. 
Not far from David’s house lives Ali who watches and records what goes on in the street and she is also an alcoholic. She wonders what’s happening with the pony tailed woman Catlin and her coming and goings in David’s flat. Catlin leaves the apartment and lets someone else report David’s death as she doesn’t want her husband to find out she was having an affair.
Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for a copy of Stay Home. This story was about murder, adultery, alcoholism, and the current lockdown but it I am afraid this didn’t interest me.  This story is all narration and no action, and I couldn’t differentiate between the two characters. None of which were likable. I only realised there were two because of the headings on the chapters. I rarely give a book a low star rating but it’s only 2 for me.

This is a character driven novel that is, at times, confusing to follow.  There do not seem to be any redeeming characters although this might seem to be true because of the confusion.  Give it a try though as it does become more interesting as the plot develops.

I’m sorry but Stay Home is insufferable. It doesn’t work, the writing style really doesn’t work for me. I struggled to connect with characters and I found their internal dialogue irritating. 
A great idea wish it was executed differently.
Absolutely not for me 2/5.

An ENTIRE book filled with virtually nothing but internal dialogue.

There was a whole lot of telling, but not much doing. The endless rambling became tiresome. The two main character's voices were indistinguishable, despite one being an alcoholic. Their eventual friendship seemed forced and not entirely believable. And the conclusion was not only expected, it absolutely fizzled.

This is the third book I've read recently with Covid tie-ins. Honestly, that's becoming tiresome too. I want to escape reality with my books.

Anyway...I won't be recommending this one.

Available December 31, 2020

My sincere appreciation to NetGalley and Hodder & Stoughton for my review copy.

. Caitlin and her husband James and their teenage children Ellie and Harry  experience the pain of being in a lockdown because of the covid 19 virus. Caitlyn had been having an affair for a year with a man named Daniel, but the lockdown made her trysts with him very complicated. How does one get out of the house when there is no reason to be out and it isn’t allowed? She vowed to end her affair now that it was increasingly difficult to see him but she decided to go see him one last time. Caitlyn then finds herself in a terrifying situation and doesn’t know where to turn. Many twists and turns ensue and you will find them shocking! A very unique and intense story that kept me turning the pages well into the night to figure out what was happening.

I was so excited to read a book based in the current times we are living in. 

Caitlin has a happy family life, but is also having an affair. Unfortunately lockdown hits and she has to find a way to see her lover. She manages only to find out he is dead. 

Ali is an alcoholic watcher at the window who sees and records everything that happens in the street where she lives, the very same street that Caitlin’s lover lives on. 

The story is a murder mystery with both characters trying to work together to see who did this. 

Unfortunately this book has very little intrigue but the very end is good

Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I have always joked about if anyone was living a secret life, having affairs on the side, the whole stay at home during pandemic would have made that impossible.

Finally, a book about it. It's the first book I read that talks about quarantining at home, and covid.

This book is set in March 2020 in the fist lockdown caused by the pandemic. Caitlyn had been having an affair with a younger man but decided to call it off and concentrate on her husband and teenage twins. One day she decides that she can’t stand staying away and decides to go and visit him using exercise as an excuse to go out. When she gets there she finds her lover has been murdered. She decides her best course of action is to leave and let someone else report it to stop her family discovering her affair. What she doesn’t realise is the woman across the road who is an alcoholic has seen her.

I really enjoyed reading a story set in England in lockdown whilst currently living through lockdown 2.0 . I will say that it is a bit of a slow start until you get beyond the synopsis of the story. After that though the story seemed to fly by. The story was a bit different to what I had expected from the synopsis. the characters are all flawed but I really appreciated that and made the story more realistic. There are quite a few twists and turns throughout the story but that didn’t stop me guessing the ending.  I enjoyed the author’s writing style and will definitely be looking out for any future releases.

A different, enjoyable and very timely read being based during lockdown. Secrets, lies, affairs, unruly teenagers and an alcoholic make a surprisingly good combination!

"Stay Home - Stay Safe", is a phrase that applies to Caitlin in many different ways. As a consequence of the broken rule, Caitlin pays an unusual price. Well... technically not Caitlin herself, but her year-long lover. After finding Daniel in a pool of his own blood, Caitlin is drawn even more to the scene of the crime. 

While in the world's biggest and longest lockdown, Daniel's neighbor Ali finds herself in a bit of a pickle herself when she accidentally stumbles into his cold body. Shocked by such a horrifying find, for the first time in months Ali no longer finds comfort on the bottom of a wine bottle. Instead, driven by curiosity, she decides to play a detective and digs a bit farther than needed into Daniels cyber life.

And that's how Caitlins and Ali's roads cross. But Caitlin's nightmare is far from over. Secrets, like skeletons in a closet, start to come to open one by one. She keeps wondering if she would have stayed home on that one fatal day - would she have been safe now?

Such a fun and entertaining read. I absolutely loved the short list of the characters and their involvements in the story. And the storyline itself kept on moving tremendously fast which made me flip the pages of the book with rapid speed. Thank you, NetGalley and Hodder & Stoughton publisher for an advanced copy of this wonderful novel.

Caitlin a married woman with two children has been unable to visit her lover because of lockdown. When she finally gets the chance to visit him she finds him dead.
This is a slow moving story about adultery, lies and murder that failed to hold my interest.
Thank you to NetGalley and Hodder & Stoughton for my e-copy in exchange for an honest review.

I had mixed feelings on this one! It was very well written and had an interesting idea, as well as being very timely in terms of the pandemic setting - but I found there was a little too much stream of consciousness / lengthy monologues within a character’s mind. I would have preferred more dialogue which I think would have broken up the chapters a little more and given more insight into characters other than Cat and Ali. 

Overall I didn’t feel enough happened (apart from the initial murder obviously!) to keep my interest through the middle of the book, but the author is obviously talented and I wouldn’t rule out reading more from her in future. 

Thanks to netgalley, the author and publisher for the ARC.

This is the first tale of suspense I’ve read that takes place entirely during the initial COVID lockdown, but I’m sure it won’t be the last. 

Caitlin is struggling. Not only has she been in lockdown with her husband and two teenaged twins (who incessantly bicker) for two weeks,but she hasn’t been able to sneak out and her see her lover, Daniel...who lives just down the street. She broke things off with him, but misses him. She finally gets a chance to “go for a run”, (aka go to Daniel’s), but when she turns up at his house, she finds his dead body on the floor. 

Ali is struggling. She’s a semi-functioning alcoholic. She lost her teaching job before the lockdown, but isolation makes everything worse. One things she does well is keeping tabs on her neighbors. She’s always watching from her windows, or to and from the corner shop, where she buys her allotted two bottles of wine and some food. She finds it interesting when she sees Caitlin enter, and quickly exit, Daniel’s house. 

Initially suspicious of Caitlin when Ali finds out Daniel is dead, events put them in the same room...and they both try to figure out what actually happened to him. 

This is a very interesting and quick read...but the flow is off. The first half is very wordy. I know what you’re thinking: “It’s a book, Michael! What do they put in books? WORDS!” Yeah yeah, but it almost seems to be a bit too descriptive in places where it doesn’t need to be...which is mostly the first half. I appreciate that we get so much background on the main characters, but I feel like the descriptive nature would’ve been better suited for the second half...when things seem to pick up steam. 

I also think I would’ve enjoyed the suspense to keep building. After Caitlin and Ali join forces, most of it simmers down to zero. Contradicting myself, I love the “friendship” that builds between Caitlin and Ali, and would’ve loved for that to have been explored further. The culprit of the crime almost takes a backseat, and once it’s brought up again, it’s neither surprising...nor twisted. 

There’s some fantastic commentary about living life through lockdown, especially towards the end. It looks like this is the debut novel of Ava Pierce (unless it’s a pseudonym). I think she can be a force to be reckoned with if there are just a few tweaks between character and plot development - to help create an even flow - in the future. 

So, since I seem to contradict myself quite a bit throughout this review, let me sum my thoughts: 

A little more thrill
A little more kill
A little more friend
A+ for the lockdown trend

Thank you to Hodder & Stoughton, Ava Pierce, and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.