Title: Just The Nicest Couple
Author: Mary Kubica
Series: N/A
Dates Read: 18 – 20/08/2024
Published Date: 10 January 2023
Genre: Thriller
Pages: 320
Content Warnings (May contain spoilers)
Abandonment, Gaslighting, Grief, Gun violence, Infertility, Injury/injury detail, Medical content, Miscarriage, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Pregnancy, Sexual assault, Stalking, Toxic relationship, Vomit.
Who is this for? Young Adults, Adults
This book covers:
Format/Disclosure:
Rating: 2.25⭐
Review:
I’d heard so many amazing things about Mary Kubica and her thriller novels, so I went into this one quite excited. But, that excitement quickly just turned to boredom and frustration. There were errors that tripped up my reading (and seemed so obvious), the characters were as exciting as a plain cracker, the twist/s weren’t even twisty, and I just found it to be longer than it needed to be.
For those who are experienced with thrillers, you may know that the choice of whose POV you read can be a really telling thing. If there’s an odd character chosen, then it can be that they are the villain or alternatively if there is someone who seems like they would/should have a POV and don’t? Also very telling. (I also realise how hypocritical that sounds – if they do or don’t have a POV then they either are or aren’t a villain… Doesn’t sound like it should make sense). But, in this book, the choice of the POV being for Nina and Christian feels like an odd choice. If Lily is her close friend, then why aren’t we seeing her POV? Especially if she was the last person to see him alive. Instant alarm bells went off, and she clearly knew more than she was willing to disclose. Made even worse by her constant “oh I just don’t know, it was all a blur!” Like yeah, I see through you. But, in saying that, I never really suspected her as being the killer – I definitely suspected something else suspicious (and was very much correct about that part).
I will admit that although the thought passed through my mind, I didn’t expect the killer to be who it was. That character definitely comes across as very clingy/always needing to be around Nina, so I thought they were suspicious, but not quite to that extent.
Christian was just.. a weird dude. I think his devotion (obsession?) with Lily was meant to come across as sweet and endearing, but just made my hairs rise. I also wonder if this was the point and you’re meant to suspect that he actually had something to do with it and was just playing an unreliable narrator, but I dismissed that idea pretty early.
Overall, it was just.. a fairly bland book. It took too long for anything to happen, there were too many chapters that were literally just filler and nothing else, and the story really needed to be a lot shorter (Or more exciting!)