A review by adriannasophiabookss
The New Wife by JP Delaney

1.0

1.5 stars

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for this ARC. I’ve got all of J.P. Delaney’s books but haven’t read any of them yet so I was glad to receive this one.

This is a mystery/thriller following Finn whose father has just passed away leaving his third wife and her daughter behind on his sprawling estate in Mallorca. The estate has been left to Finn and his sister and so Finn is given the task of claiming their inheritance A.K.A booting the wife and daughter out so that he and his sister can sell the place and claim the money. When he gets there however it becomes increasingly obvious that something isn’t right and that ousting his stepmother and stepsister out isn’t going to be as straightforward as originally planned.

I would compare this book to a car accident. You don’t want to keep reading but you can’t help but carry on because you want to see how much worse it can possibly get. Just to give you a little taste of what to expect from this book, the main character Finn repeatedly lies to his sister, even tells her that LEGALLY she has to send over £40,000 despite their lawyer saying the opposite all because he doesn’t want to affect his chances of getting with his stepsister. Yes you read that correctly, his stepsister. I actually wished for his downfall because his decisions were so ridiculous

Finn also wasn’t very likeable as a character. He’s very selfish at every turn, even his gifts and support to Roze and Ruensa are performative and to make himself look and feel better. He’s also an absolute creep to be honest and just weirdly over the top. I almost lost it when Roze told him something personal from her past and he replied with “if anyone can mend you I think it’s me”. Just no. The way he talks about the incidents from her past is also absolutely disgusting. I will admit the twist was pretty good in my opinion so it gets an extra half star but that was the only redeemable quality.

I could rant on and on about this book to be honest but I’m going to stop there. I want to be clear that I have nothing against the author (just Finn) and I will still definitely check out his other work. If you want to read about an unlikeable character making one awful and impulsive/embarrassing decision after another then pick this up (it was released on 20th July so apologies for not getting to this ARC sooner). If not, give it a miss.