We Play Games by Sarah A. Denzil

We Play Games

Author: Sarah A. Denzil

Genre: Thriller, Mystery, Drama, Romance, Suspense

Narrator: Billie Piper, Dan Stevens, Shane Zaza, Avita Jay, Felicity Duncan, David Holt, Sarah Whitehouse

Audible length: 8 hours 41 minutes

3/5

An Audible original full of star-studded casts with promising story line but for some reason it just did not hit the right spot for me at the end. Effie and Ben are the perfect young couple, both rich and attractive with great career. They moved to a lovely neighbourhood and both were quickly accepted by their neighbours and their new community. Their neighbours, however, do not know about their little games and their dark secrets.

Effie and Ben quickly got to their usual scheme, planned their "games" and started the manipulation race competing against each other. Effie, played by Billie Piper, seduced a single dad neighbour, David, who on the outside appears to be wholesome but will quickly play an important role in her life. 

The story is narrated from multiple perspectives, mainly Effie, Ben, and David. Throughout the story, you will quickly symphatise with Effie, a famous social media star with a famous mother, with a complicated life. She is navigating her life, trying to escape the shackles of a tragedy that she still could not remember clearly, and trying to escape a controlling husband. Ben also has his own side of the story, dealing with his decisions that brought them both to this neighbourhood, his dark mind, and his need for control. David offers another point of view to the story, although it did not come clear until towards the end of the story. David also has his own agenda in this whole mess. 

One thing that is a bit different is how the different neighbours are portrayed very clearly, with distinct characteristics that each contributes narrative and nuance to the story. All the important characters are voiced by different narrators so it is quite easy to follow. The story is quite well paced, however the downside is that the twists and turns of the story seems to be a little bit predictable. Still, Sarah A. Denzil produced a story worth listening with We Play Games.

Get it on Audible from this link (not sponsored)

Husband & Wife by K. L. Slater

 Husband & Wife

Author: K. L. Slater

Genre: Drama, suspense, thriller

Narrator: Clare Corbett

Audible length: 9 hours 11 minutes

3/5

Parker and Luna look like a perfect couple from the outside. Parker is a hard worker who drives a fancy company car and Luna is beautiful social influencer coming from a rich family. They live in near the city with a beautiful boy, Barney. 

Parker's parents, Nicola and Cal, is the perfect working class grandparents. They love Parker, Luna, and their grandson beyond anything else. Luna's parents, Marie and Joe, are the archetypal rich parents who disapproved of Luna and Parker's relationships because they were not coming from the same society.

But was it all perfect? Luna and Parker had an agreement to keep a big secret, which derailed their already shaky marriage one day at a time. A car accident caused both Luna and Parker to end up in the hospital, badly hurt, having no control over the secret and how much of it would seeped out of their marriage.

Both mothers, Nicola and Marie, were very protective of their respective children and Barney. Nicola has a very strong moral compass and just cannot let go of things, no matter how little. It gets quite irritating at times but that only means how real the portrayal of Nicola is. Marie, however, is about the complete opposite at first glance. Towards the end you will find out that her motive is actually not the worst considering what happened in the past between Marie and Joe.

There is a twist at the end of the book that was not too easy to guess. However, the way K. L. Slater wrote Husband and Wife gives out that the twist will come from early on in the book. The narrative moves quite quickly but because the book is told from different characters' perspectives, some details are repeated. This helps if you read this between a few sessions, however, might get a little bit repetitive if you read quickly. 

All in all, I think Husband and Wife is definitely worth reading or listening if you are into thriller and suspense, especially one that highlight complicated family dynamics. The narrator, Clare Corbett, on Audible did a great job carrying the suspense through the story. She did not use different voices, but you can clearly tell which characters Clare Corbett is reading as, which I really appreciated when listening.

Get it on Amazon on this link or on Audible through this link this link (not sponsored)