Best Seller

This is a dark and brooding coming of age story, mixed with a touch of evil and mystery.
This is a dark and brooding coming of age story, mixed with a touch of evil and mystery. The young “heroine” is a strong, charming and astute young woman. But she hides a blackness on her life and soul, that blackness taints her future. She is smart, and interesting. She shows empathy, sympathy, love and kindness when she wants to. She may not look at herself the way we see her. Her true self is arrogant, spiteful, mean and manipulative. Her past is the reason she is what she is and does what she does. Family secrets come to her when she is too young to understand them and no one is left to explain them to her. She has a fantastic transformation during this story that many readers may not be excepting, because what she changes into is so wrong. This transformation is most definitely not for the better. The male protagonist is a unhappy, unsatisfied, cruel and desperate man. He wasn’t always this way, his luck turned on him. It leaves him vulnerable, sad, and isolated. He is focused on one thing, and one thing only. He had a fantastic writing career. It came with a moderate income, and success. But after his first book made it to the New York Times Bestseller list, his other books bombed. Along the way he tries in vain to get back out there, start writing again, start living again. He is extremely motivated to fix this one item in his life. As these two main characters cross paths, the fireworks start, and what a ride that is. There are some amazing twists and turns. You kinda might know what’s going to happen next, but then the story goes a little off center. The backstory of the characters are superbly written. The whole book flows so easy, that you may read way past your bedtime and not even know it. Pick this book up, you are going to love it. I know I did.

It was an okay read, interesting idea
I was excited for this book and the beginning was intriguing. I was interested until about chapter 35, though, starting out the book, I found it annoying at first how the chapters were back and forth equally between William and Nem. It was almost like reading two books simultaneously. Once I figured out how the stories intertwined, I thought it was clever and then I got excited again. However, my excitement was misplaced since the book seemed to drag on from that point and I found myself less and less interested and even rather bored. I did want to find out what happened after investing the time, so I finished the book. The ending wasn’t anything special either. I’m giving it 3 stars because it was an interesting idea. It just could have been much better.

Umm..Where Have I Been?
So, I cannot believe that this was the very first novel, I’ve ever read by Susan May, seriously where have I been? This one gripped me, although it took me a few chapters to really get into it, but once I did I couldn’t put it down. Well-written, and kept me on the edge of my seat wondering what was going to happen next. This book also opened my eyes to the darker side of the publishing world, and all I can say is, I’m really glad I’m not an author, I honestly don’t think I could stand that kind of pressure. I really enjoyed this, much more than I thought I would. It was a good way to while away the weekend, and plus I finished in about two days, and I can’t wait to read more of her books.

I saw an ad on Facebook for this book. The first few times I ignored it, but then I thought why not? And I’m so glad I clicked the link. The story follows our two main characters, and there is quite a lot of detail. It took me a while to get into the flow, but it was definitely worth persevering, as once I got to the ‘gotta’ I couldn’t put it down! My colleagues at work kept telling me how tired I looked, mostly because I favoured reading over sleep 😂. For those that don’t know (and I forget who said it) the ‘gotta’ is when you get to that part of a book where you just have to know what happens next, at all costs. For me this book has it in spades!

What a fun and fulfilling read!Nem is a young woman who can assign bad luck to one person and can balance that by assigning good luck to another. That would include Nem, herself.William is the author of a best seller, who has mentored Nem in her attempt to become a professional writer, and as his subsequent books and his credibility take a major downturn, while Nem rises to the top of America’s Best Seller lists, he becomes suspicious. From that, we get a fascinating game of cat and mouse, except you will not be able to tell which one – Nem or William – would turn out to be the cat, and which one would be its victim.The story starts starts with a visceral description of a child’s nightmare experience, and shifts smoothly into a blunt description of devastating domestic violence.The depiction of writers and the publication process for “Best Seller” books is fascinating, and likely represents some of Susan May’s own experiences from her career as a writer of “Best Sellers”. By times it is a cut-throat contest, and a dangerous game, and war is waged by some of the participants who have made an art of trashing the work of others, using clever statements, innuendo, and “fake news”.The story of Nem and William finds its conclusion in a graveyard during a brutal assault of wind and rain and lightening and thunder.You can try and anticipate where the story is going and what should happen next, and the ending is better than you can imagine.“Best Seller” should become a Best Seller.

Interesting plot. Kept changing my mind about the main character, which I feel is what the author wanted. Not the ending I expected. Not quite up to Stephen King standards but certainly worth a read.