Such A Good Wife

Such a Good Wife. That’s Melanie Hale, a middle aged, devoted wife of a successful realtor, mother of an angsty teenage daughter and autistic son, caregiver to her mother-in-law who is bedridden with dementia and dog owner. Definitely sandwich generation. She loves her family and knows she has a good life. But something is missing. She gave up her dreams of writing and dropped out of her master’s program when her son was born. At her husband’s urging, she decides to join a writing group, held in a local bookstore. Here’s where you want to say “No, Melanie, don’t go! Don’t stare at that hunky romance author Luke giving a reading near your group. Don’t have a glass of wine with him! It will not end well.

It doesn’t. Well into the affair, Melanie finds Luke dead next to his swimming pool. She’s determined to protect her family at all costs even if it means more lying to them, to the police and worse. Such a Good Wife is a suspenseful, fast paced domestic thriller. Melanie Hale is a complicated character. No matter what she does, you are sympathetic and on her side. The other characters, especially Lacy, are well drawn. This is a 5 star read.

Thank you to NetGalley, Titan Books and Seraphina Nova Glass for this ARC.

This book actually has a well constructed story an amazing characters that tie it together. I couldn’t wait to find out what was going to happen and I wasn’t disappointed with the ending. Highly recommend!

A twisty, chilling and hypnotic thriller. A must read.
The story revolves around Melanie Hale, a wife to Collin, a loving mother to Bennett and Rachel and a carer to her mother-in-law, Claire. Apart from this, she wants to write a book and therefore joins a writing group and there she meets Luke Ellison, a local bestselling author and starts her affair with him. She becomes addicted to him and starts going to his home secretly without telling her husband. One day she goes there and found Luke's dead body. She tempers with the crime scene to clear anything that might point in her direction but someone knows what she did and they started blackmailing her. And someone else in her life is keeping secrets from her.
Who murdered Luke? Who's blackmailing her? Who else is keeping secrets? Read this hypnotic thriller to know more.
I love all the characters. Each character is awesome. And ending is mind blowing.
Narration of the story is excellent and engaging. I was hooked.
Overall,it's a must read book and I highly recommend it to everyone who loves psychological thrillers.
Thanks to NetGalley and Titan Books for giving me an advanced copy of this psychological thriller

I. Freaking. Loved. This. Book!!! I started and just could not stop! I had to know what happened on the next page and the next and the next! I love Mel in first person perspective. I have to admit that I cringed quite a bit while I read some of the choices she was making and I snuggled up to my own husband a little bit more as I read! I love to theorize as I go and find clues to support or disprove my theories and I honestly did not know who killed the guy until it was revealed to us! That was a fun surprise! (I guess thriller lovers can use the word “fun” to describe finding out who a murderer is, right? *shrug*) I really enjoyed Seraphina Nova Glass’ debut novel, Someone is Listening, last year and I was really excited to read this one and it did not disappoint! In fact, I liked it even better! I can’t wait for her next book!!!

This was an enjoyable quick read for me. Not in length, but in the sense you can pick it up in the morning and be almost done by the afternoon.

Here we meet Melanie Hale, the typical character who has everything she could want. A loving husband, two kids and a nice home and lifestyle. One of her children has autism and she helps look after her mother in law who has dementia but all in all she appears reasonably happy.

In order to get out more, she joins a creative writing club where she meets Luke - a relatively successful author who strikes up a friendship with Mel and a lot more. On one night when Mel visits Luke she finds him dead and is desperate to find the killer before she herself becomes a suspect.

As mentioned, the story is enjoyable and is well written but didn't really suck me in. It may be because all the characters were pretty unlikeable and I didn't really care much about their eventual outcomes.

Definitely worth a read if you are a fan of the genre and will help you pass a few hours quickly.

Thanks to Netgalley and Titan Books for an ARC in exchange for an honest review

This is a great book!
A very well written, fast paced domestic thriller full of brilliant characters and lots of suspense.
I was kept guessing until the end with this book, I had no idea who the murderer was and was pleasantly surprised that it was the last person I was expecting it to be.
A really enjoyable quick read, I was hooked.
This is the first book I’ve read by Seraphina Nova Glass and now I can’t wait to read more from her.

An interesting title…and a debatable one!
This is a story of a married couple, their relationship, their loyalties to one another, and the secrets they do not share…
I was really impressed with this book, how the author weaved events together, and how she made me question some of the decisions made by the characters….
The plot was very good to follow, not complicated by too many characters, raised a number of moral issues, not quite Jodi Piccoult but certainly in her kind of arena.
I thought this was a great book, plenty of ‘grit’ and easy to visualise…would highly recommend as it’s a relatively fast-paced read that throws unexpected surprises in along the way.
Many thanks to NetGalley for my copy, this is my unbiased opinion, also posted on Waterstones as Gypsyfeet 2020

EXCERPT: I look at my shaky hands on the steering wheel and notice I don't have my wedding ring on. That whole time, he never saw a ring. Not that Luke Ellison was flirting with me. I am 100 per cent positive that the stress has made me delusional,and he was just being friendly the way he would with anyone he found sitting reading his book. He wasn't making a pass. No.

I look at my naked ring finger. I didn't leave it off intentionally. I was making turkey meatballs with Ben, and I was wrist deep in raw meat. Last time we made them, bits got stuck in the grooves in my ring, and it took me half a day to figure out why a tinny, bloody smell was following me around. It's sitting on the windowsill above the sink right now. But it doesn't matter. He wasn't coming on to me. I didn't do anything wrong. Except that I was going to let him.

ABOUT 'SUCH A GOOD WIFE': Melanie Hale is a devoted mother to her two children, a diligent caregiver to her ailing mother-in-law and a trusted neighbor in their wealthy Louisiana community. Above all, she’s a loving partner to her wonderful husband, Collin.

Then there are the parts of herself that Mel keeps hidden. She’s exhausted, worried and unfulfilled. So much so that one night, after a writers’ group meeting, Mel begins an affair with a successful local author named Luke. Suddenly she’s transformed into a role she doesn’t recognize—a woman who deceives with unseemly ease. A woman who might be capable of just about anything.

When Mel finds Luke’s dead body in his lavish rented house, she realizes just how high the stakes have become. Not only does she have to keep her affair a secret in order to preserve her marriage, but she desperately needs to avoid being implicated in Luke’s death. But who would want to kill him? Who else in her life is keeping secrets? And most terrifying of all, how far will they—and she—go to keep those secrets hidden?

MY THOUGHTS: Every now and then I come across a book that is deliciously trashy and that I just love. Such a Good Wife doesn't quite make the grade, but it comes close. It's a good read and I enjoyed it, but didn't love it.

The characters are all flawed, and even though Mel makes some stupid decisions I could relate to her. I loved her take on the book club women. I think we all know women like them!

I had totally the wrong person picked for who had killed Luke, so that was a twist that surprised me. I'm still not 100% sure about the ending. On one hand I think it was quite clever, but I think it would be extremely difficult for Mel to have done what she did and pull it off.

One thing puzzled me though, and that was how Mel, who has her mother-in-law Claire who has dementia living with her, sometimes hires a day nurse to look after Claire while she keeps her assignations, and at other times seems to just waltz off and leave Claire to fend for herself. Minor quibble, I know, but it annoyed me.

Altogether Such a Good Wife is a quick, easy and entertaining read.

⭐⭐⭐.6

#SuchaGoodWife #NetGalley

I: @seraphinanovaglass @titanbooks

T: @SeraphinaNova @TitanBooks

#contemporaryfiction #familydrama #murdermystery

THE AUTHOR: Seraphina Nova Glass is an Assistant Professor of Instruction and Playwright-In-Residence at the University of Texas, Arlington where she teaches Film Studies and Playwriting.

She holds an MFA degree in Dramatic Writing from Smith College, and a second MFA in Directing from the University of Idaho.

DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Titan Books via Netgalley for providing a digital ARC of Such a Good Wife by Seraphina Nova Glass for review. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own personal opinions.

For an explanation of my rating system please refer to my Goodreads.com profile page or the about page on sandysbookaday.wordpress.com

This review is also published on Twitter, Amazon, Instagram and my webpage

I think Such A Good Wife is one of those rare books where whilst I really enjoyed reading it, I absolutely hate the lead character. Honestly, this book is a great read, and I had an absolute blast trying to figure out the mystery and reading long after I should have taken a break because was desperate to find out what happened next, but Mel is not a person I would ever be able to like.

The story begins by introducing reads to Melanie Hale, a woman with a decent life. She has a caring husband who gives her space when she needs it, is kind and caring when they spend time together. She has a teenage daughter who's becoming a bit of a handful. And she has a young autistic son who's close to joining a new school equipped to meet his needs. They all live in a big, expensive house in a great neighbourhood. Other than taking care of her kids needs whenever they're not in school Mel's only real responsibility is to take care of her mother-in-law, who lives with them but is suffering from dementia.

Mel has some responsibilities and some stresses in her life yes, but she doesn't have to work, her finances are secure, and she has the freedom and encouragement to turn her hand to any kind of hobby or activity she might ever want to. So, with all that in mind she doesn't seem like the kind of person to go out and have an affair. Yet when she meets a smutty romance author when taking part in a local creative writing group she soon finds herself turning her back on her family and jumping into bed with this exciting, rich writer.

Despite constantly telling herself that she can't keep cheating on her marriage, that she's hurting her wonderful, kind husband, and deciding to break off her affair with Luke she keeps going back to him, keeps sleeping with him. Until one day she goes to his house and finds him laying dead outside. Fearing her affair coming to light and destroying her family, she tries to remove any evidence of her presence in the house and steals Luke's phone. Worried that he might not be found, she makes an anonymous tip to the police. This begins an investigation into his death that Mel watched via the news with baited breath.

However, when the news says that Luke was murdered, and Mel begins receiving mysterious messages threatening to reveal her connection to Luke Mel finds herself caught up in a desperate web of lies as she tries desperately to not have her entire life fall apart around her.

The central mystery of Such A Good Wife, of how Luke ended up dead, of who might be trying to blackmail Mel, and how Mel is going to get away with things is an interesting one. There were times where I thought I'd begun to piece things together, to figure out what the answers were, but Seraphina Nova Glass is clever enough to lead me down an obvious path before pulling the run out from under me to reveal something completely different. Much like her previous book, Someone's Listening, the mystery is never what you first think, and there are clues laid out early on that if you're anything like me you're going to overlook because of how carefully they've been hidden.

The characters are mostly nice people too, and there are some people in the book who you'll come to care for. Mel's husband, Colin, is a decent man, one who manages to balance out his busy work life with caring for his family. Early on it looks like he's going to be one of those husbands who's always working late, his head buried in his laptop, or chatting away on phone calls; but he always seems to have time to take part in barbecues with his wife and children, he takes his kids out for meals, he gives his wife the time away to go and spend time with her friends and take part in clubs. He's a decent man, which makes you feel even worse for him when Mel cheats on him.

Another character who I really enjoyed is Lacy, a young woman who Mel comes across in a bar parking lot after she's been sexually assaulted and beaten by a local cop called Joe, the same local cop who runs the baseball club for kids that her son plays in. Mel helps Lacy out because she sees a woman in need, and over the course of the book she keeps coming back to her, at first to check in on her and to make sure she's okay; but eventually so that she can use her connection to the police for her own good. Lacy is a decent person, a struggling single mother who's caught up in a relationship with an abuser. She comes from a completely different world than Mel, living paycheck to paycheck, doing multiple jobs just to keep a roof over her sons head and food in his belly; but she's a nice person. She comes to see Mel as a friend, tries to form a connection with her, all whilst being used by Mel to get what she wants.

I think I ended up connecting with Colin and Lacy because they were two people who Mel was hurting the most, even though she may not have wanted to, and she may even have ended up doing good for them by the end, she does treat them as disposable and beneath her at times.

There is one thing that I feel I do need to talk about, and it's something of a spoiler, so if you don't want to read about it please skip forward to the last paragraph. Such A Good Wife features sexual assault. The story-line with Lacy is heavily connected with rape and abuse; it's how we first meet her. And this in itself is fine to include, it's important to talk about how people can get stuck in abusive relationships and how people in positions of power, like cops, can be abusers too. The part of the book that I struggled with, however, was that at the end Melanie fakes a rape. She seduces Joe, gets him to sleep with her whilst being rough and films it. She then beats herself to add more wounds, collects the semen from his condom and inserts it into herself, and edits the footage. She goes to the hospital, has them fill out a form that says she was raped, and collects the semen as evidence. She then uses this to blackmail Joe into taking her name out of the murder investigation and to leave Lacy alone.

I honestly didn't know how I felt about this. This was essentially someone faking a sexual assault, lying about being raped; something that is awful and should never, ever be done. However, she did it to a man who is a rapist, a man who beats and abuses women, and uses his powers as a police officer to get away with it. If anyone deserves to be taken down a peg or two it's him for sure, but to do so with a fake rape? And for Mel to further lie to her husband after everything she's already been through? It just didn't sit right with me. It might just be myself, and I'm sure that different people will react to this differently. But the thing that I disliked about it the most was that in the review copy there was no content warning given in the book. As this is something more books have started doing, and books from Titan, I was surprised that one wasn't included for these themes of abuse and rape. Hopefully this will be something that will be included in the finished release.

Overall, I really enjoyed Such A Good Wife. The plot was interesting and engaging, with a mystery that I was invested in and characters that I came to care about. Yes, there was some moral ambiguity in the book too, with a lead character that I didn't really think was a decent person, but then being challenged like that is part of the fun of books with dubious protagonists that aren't just 'good' people. If you enjoy a good mystery story, and like seeing how domestic life can quickly go off the rails this is a book that you'll probably enjoy.

Intense domestic thrillers are always books that I’m drawn to and I didn’t need to read too much of the synopsis of this book to know that I wanted to read it.

Melanie Hale is an excellent wife to hardworking, relentlessly kind Collin and has her work cut out as a devoted mother to teenager Rachel and autistic Ben. Collin’s mother Claire has recently moved in with the family too, so that’s another item on Melanie’s agenda. Somehow, Melanie manages to carve out some time for herself and get back to what she really loves by joining a writing group, who meet at a local bookstore. While there, her eyes are drawn to the handsome, accomplished author Luke Ellison and a sordid affair begins. But then Mel finds Luke dead at his lavish mansion home and she knows that if anyone knew their secret, she could be a prime suspect. But who actually killed him?

It’s not too hard to see why Mel would have her head turned by Luke. She has given up her career and dreams to take care of her family and Luke represents everything that is now out of her reach. As more of Luke’s past comes to light, Mel’s idea of Luke becomes less real but the fantasy is enough to keep her returning to him time and time again, despite her crippling guilt. I think most people (especially women) who have abandoned a part of themselves will eventually miss it and question how much different their lives could be if they had taken a different path. That is ultimately what drives Melanie throughout the first part of the novel.

Mel’s mother-in-law Claire is a fascinating character and seeing her as she was in the book was heartbreaking. I really thought she would play a bigger role than she did because she played the part of a silent observer so well. There is a scene involving Claire that chilled me to the bone and that made me certain that there was much more to her than I was being shown.

As this is a complex, clever thriller, I won’t talk too much more about the plot because it’s definitely a book that is best enjoyed as blind as possible. Such A Good Wife is a page-turning, compelling novel with flawed personalities, plenty of betrayal and lashings of satisfaction at its close.

Such a good wife by Seraphina Nova Glass.
Melanie Hale is a devoted mother to her two children, a diligent caregiver to her ailing mother-in-law and a trusted neighbor in their wealthy Louisiana community. Above all, she's a loving partner to her wonderful husband, Collin.
A good read with good characters. I did like Mel. 4*.

Full of twists and turns, the characters were well written and you really want to know what happens next, new author to me so hopefully not the last one I will be reading.