Thanks so much to Random House for my Advanced Reader’s Copy! I was so thrilled to get a copy of this — it’s been getting lots of hype on Bookstagram and I totally think it’s worth it! Pretty Things is the first book I’ve read by Janelle Brown, but she does have some other interesting titles in her backlist.

Pretty Things is a very character driven thriller. It centers around Nina, the daughter of a single-mom con artist who tried to do the right thing and went to college — but is crippled by her debt. To help her sick mother pay medical bills & pay off her loans, she does a series of heists of high-ticket antiques with her boyfriend, Lachlan. Nina & Lachlan decide to pose as a yoga instructor and traveling professor to rent a guest cottage at the Liebling estate in Tahoe. Vanessa Liebling is an instagram influencer who decided to leave New York after a breakup and wants to ‘find herself’ in nature. Nina knows about the Liebling estate, having had gone to school with Vanessa’s younger brother and spending long hours there.

The book is long — almost 500 pages — but the twists & turns didn’t make it feel as long as it was. Sections of the book were told from either Vanessa’s or Nina’s point of view, and Brown does a really fantastic job of showing the events from the two different perspectives. It jumps back and forth in time, but I never felt confused about time or perspective. I thought it was all super well-done, and there were some scenes where I loved or hated each character and I flipped my feelings on a dime.

This novel was a delicious cat-and-mouse game and you never knew who was backstabbing who. I absolutely devoured this book and I hope you enjoy this one when it comes out on April 21! 4.5/5 stars for me!