The House in the Pines: A Reese Witherspoon Book Club Pick and New York Times bestseller - a twisty thriller that will have you reading through the night

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At this point, the prescriptions have run out. She needs to stop. It's going about as well as would be expected, which is to say, not well at all. Then Maya makes a disturbing discovery. After seven years later, she has Klonopin withdrawals, hiding the truth from her boyfriend Dan she’s living with, suffering insomnia and obsession about a YouTube video that shows a young painter named Cristina dies behind her boyfriend’s eyes as they sit at the dinner. That boyfriend is the same man haunting her for seven years, who might be responsible for her best friend’s Aubrey’s death.

All in all, I think this is a good and entertaining thriller. There are uneven parts but it really does try to cover many different topics from friendships, mother/daughter relationships, jealousy, addiction and more. Special thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a free, electronic ARC of this novel received in exchange for an honest review.A big component is that Maya has gaps in her memories of her time with Frank and what happened with Aubrey. So with that, she becomes somewhat of an unreliable narrator and the reader has to decide if what Maya is relying is actually the truth. An ancient poplar loomed at the entrance to the abandoned road, its rounded mass of huddled gray limbs reminding her of a brain. She passed beneath its lobes, twigs branching like arteries overhead as she entered the forest.-------------------------------------- Deep in these woods, there is a house that’s easy to miss. How do you feel about Maya’s decision to hide her addiction from her boyfriend, Dan? Do you think it’s ok to withhold some truth from your partner? How did the alternating timelines contribute to the novel? Do you enjoy this writing structure in general? We always chose to provide the publisher synopsis because we feel that it’s worthwhile to discuss whether the official book description actually squared with your experience of the book.)

After many years mourning the death of her friend Aubrey during high school, Maya decides to return to her hometown in the Berkshires to find out. A YouTube video has surfaced of a young woman sitting across from a man named Frank...the SAME man who was with Aubrey the night she died. In the video, this new woman appears to drop dead while her gaze is firmly trained on Frank. Maya does her Miss Marple thing to try to find out what really happened to Aubrey, to find out how Frank killed her, and one more thing. During the few weeks in which she dated Frank, there were multiple episodes in which she lost hours of time. Did Frank drug her? There is peril aplenty, as we take Maya’s word that Frank is a killer, so all her activity might be putting her in mortal peril. If only the cops had taken her seriously, but you know the cops in such almost stories never do. I really enjoyed the pace of this as well. I couldn't put it down once I started. While I found some reveals fairly predictable, if you've recently read Shea Ernshaw's A History of Wild Places, you may see it too, I still enjoyed the story a lot. stars rounded up. The House in the Pines was Ana Reyes’s debut novel. I listened to the audiobook that was narrated by Marisol Ramirez. The cover of this book initially pulled me in. You have to admit that it is pretty creepy! The beginning and ending of The House in the Pines were strong and atmospheric. I lost some interest when the middle part of the book took a slower turn and thus my 3.5 rating. The House in the Pines alternated between the past (before Aubrey’s death) and the present. These questions have been tailored to this book’s specific reading experience, but if you want more ideas, we also have an article with 101 generic book club questions.This story follows Maya. When Maya was a Senior in high school, her best friend Aubrey, died suddenly, mysteriously and with no identifiable cause, directly in front of Maya's eyes. The only other person around, a young man named Frank, fled the scene. Frank knows just what to say and it seems they have similar interests. Before too long though, Maya begins to notice certain things about their time together that make her greatly uncomfortable. In fact, she becomes so ill at ease around him, she actually begins to fear him. What signs did you notice which demonstrated Frank’s manipulative character? Is it understandable that Maya missed or ignored these signs? Thank you to PENGUIN GROUP Dutton and NetGalley who provided me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All the thoughts and opinions are my own. Maya has no idea the can of worms she opens will bring about more questions than answers and she must face that there were many things she can't remember about her relationship with Frank when she was a teenager and if she does confront him again it could be her life at stake this time and there won't be anyone there to save her.

Maya once saw this cabin as an idyllic place, like a cottage from a fairy tale, but now she knows the danger that lurks beneath. At the end of the novel, Maya decides that she will return to Guatemala and finish her father’s story by ‘writing Pixan home’. What’s the significance of this decision? Special thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Groping Dutton for sharing this digital reviewer copy with me in exchange my honest thoughts.the book) suffers from doing way too much at the same time […] I really struggled with following this narrative, and the drinking/pill popping trope is so overused at this point. However, I do think there’s a reader/audience for this book. The synopsis is calling it “utterly unique” and I can see that because as the story develops after the halfway mark, it is indeed very different than I expected. Readers will either love or hate the ending, which will make for great book club discussions.” If it were guaranteed to work, would you ever consider undergoing hypnotherapy to correct a habit or forget about a painful experience? Why or why not? Overall, this psychological thriller felt menacing and chilling at times. It also had suspense, interesting characters, and a thought-provoking story line. If you enjoy psychological thrillers with an unreliable narrator, then this may be the book for you.

When she meets Frank at the local library, inexperienced Maya is taken in by the older boy right away. It's not necessarily his looks, but more a certain magnetism he has that is hard to resist. He said her fears about Frank were delusional but assured her that she wasn’t the first to react with magical thinking to a death so sudden and unexpected. Less than two out of every hundred thousand people suddenly drop dead for reasons that can’t be explained by an autopsy.

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Maya has struggled with addiction since the death of her best friend, has been labeled “crazy” by doctors and even her loving mother, and is fearful that her boyfriend will leave her if he ever finds out the truth. She is an exceptionally powerful character who is so dysfunctional and human, I couldn’t help but root for her. Right from the start, there is something not quite right about Frank but Reyes keeps this secret hidden until the deliciously twisted ending, which was unexpected yet still extremely entertaining.