One Perfect Couple by Ruth Ware

Good morning, readers! Today I'm a stop on the Random Things tour for Ruth Ware's latest thriller, One Perfect Couple. 

Lyla, a virologist, and Nico, an actor, may seem like and unlikely pair, but for almost three years they've been living together happily. And now Nico has an opportunity to participate in a brand new reality show his agent is certain can launch his career. The catch: it's a couple's competition. 

Lyla is against it at first, but agrees to go along to support Nico. Plus, her current contract project isn't panning out and a couple of weeks off won't hurt. But she's not thrilled about the competition stipulations from the start. The idea is that the "perfect couple" will win through a series of challenges where one loser is kicked off each week. So it could be a "couple" winning. Or it could be just one person. But the pictures they're sent of the resort where the show is filming is breathtaking.

Unfortunately, the contestants aren't there long when a storm hits, leaving them stranded with limited supplies and no electricity. 

Pretty soon, the stress of their situation begins to break them down. And by the time someone is murdered, they've already begun to question who can be trusted. 

I absolutely love that Ruth Ware enjoys throwing her readers off kilter from the very beginning of the story! 

The prologue is a short couple of paragraphs about a man and a woman fighting for their lives. Fighting one another. Told from the woman's POV, but with no hint as to who the two might be. 

What's more, for the first part of the book chapters are intermittently separated by simple entries that include a date, time, and pleas for help. Ware changes this later in the book, further throwing the reader off  of whatever conclusions or guesses they've made thus far about the various who's and the what of the plot. 

Ruth Ware has taken Love Island and thrown in a bit of Survivor and a whole lot of the twists and turns she's known for. 

And you know me, inappropriate reading rec location for maximum atmosphere: an island paradise of course! Or, your backyard with your feet in a kiddie pool if, like me, that's what you've got to work with!

One Perfect Couple is out now in the UK and the US. 

Eye of the Beholder by Emma Bamford

Good morning! Today I'm one of the stops kicking off the Random Things tour for Emma Bamford's latest, Eye of the Beholder. 

Before: Madeleine is a ghostwriter beginning her biggest job yet. Having written autobiographies for some of the most elite, it's not a surprise when her friend recommends her as a ghostwriter for Angela Reynolds. She's a cosmetic surgeon for some of the most elite people in the world and her company, Reynolds RX, is poised to make a killing. 

The book. Well, Madeleine has just a month to write it. And she's the second author brought on board. But it's more money than she's ever been paid for ghostwriting and she gets equal writing credit. 

After: Scott is supposed to be dead. And though she's suspected that she's seen him before, now she knows she has. And he does too.

Ok, I think I've done a fair job of avoiding spoilers. But one more thing. Eye of the Beholder is an homage to Hitchcock's Vertigo! (Which is also based on a book, apparently.)

Vertigo is old enough at this stage that I think I'm safe summing it up in part without worrying about spoiling either it or the book. 

In the film, Jimmie Stewart, a retired cop suffering from fear of heights after seeing a fellow officer die, is hired to investigate the strange behavior of a friend's wife. The friend claims he believes his wife is possessed. Meanwhile, Stewart's character falls for the woman and then witnesses her death, suffering a second blow to already shaken mental health.

But then he sees the woman. Follows her to her apartment. And thus the plot thickens.

So it's easy to see from the start (where Maddy follows the man she believes is Scott into a club) the influences. But Bamford's twist on it is much more gothic in tone. 

Maddy is shut up on Angela's private estate all by herself. Or so she thinks. It turns out Angela's business parter, Scott, is also there. And as strange things happen in the home, Maddy becomes closer to and more reliable on Scott.

The story is split into two parts, Before and After. And the book begins with the After scene I noted above, at the club. But the reader still questions Maddy. Still questions everything that's brings her to that point. And even things that happen After!

Bamford's novel debut, Deep Water, was my introduction to her writing and it was one of my favorite reads of 2022. She excels there, and here, in creating complex characters and in playing with the reader's perception of said characters. Setting it in the cross section of two very private and intimate worlds: that of ghostwriters and their subjects, and cosmetic surgery, amplify that in incredible ways! What, more than anything, relies more heavily on perception than telling a story that isn't your own and relying on the subject matter to disclose their story AND the entire industry of elective surgery intent on erasing aspects of a person's life?

Bamford is a fantastic writer and has once again penned a book guaranteed to be on my favorites list!

Eye of the Beholder is out now from Simon and Schuster UK. It'll be out in the States in August from S&S's US imprint, Gallery.