Nasty Little Secrets: Advanced Reader Copy Review

As an employee at Barnes & Noble, I am extremely lucky to have access to advanced reader copies of select books. Having these copies available to booksellers allows employees to stay informed on titles before their release. One of the titles I picked up recently for myself was Gabbie Hanks’s debut novel Nasty Little Secrets.

Nasty Little Secrets is a psychological suspense where protagonist Rose Dearling scrambles to uncover the mystery behind her recently missing younger sister. Rose Dearling is bestselling author whose most notable title is a fictional retelling of her brother’s alleged false murder trial. Rose has faced constant backlash for her book as the general public disagrees with its sentiment that her brother was falsely imprisoned. However, she realizes her book might hold the answers to uncover her sister’s sudden disappearance as the two cases might be more related than they seem.

I personally do not typically gravitate towards the genre of suspense/mystery. However, I was compelled by the books synopsis and the author’s background. Gabbie Hanks is a former librarian and now works in literacy for the government. She is an avid psychological suspense reader and this is her debut novel. Hank’s experience with literature absolutely catapulted the quality of her debut out of the park. Even as someone who does not frequently indulge in this genre, I was so captivated by her story, right from the first chapter. Her novel has a touch of familiar modernity and immediately fills the stories with clues and moments that leave you questioning and page-turning consistently. This has been one of my most enjoyable reads this year and I would definitely recommend it to any other new psychological suspense/mystery readers who want an undeniably exciting taste of the genre.

The “book inside of the book” narrative framing device functions as a celebration of the impact of fiction. While reading this story, I often connected the novel’s events to Ralph Waldo Emerson’s quote, “Fiction reveals truth that reality obscures.” The fictional book in the novel and Hanks’s actual novel both reveal hidden truths. Rose Dearling’s novel does so by containing clues regarding her brother’s mistrial and her sister’s disappearance. Gabbie Hanks’s novel does so by functioning as a societal commentary on how women are treated in the public eye, sexual assault in varying lights, and the cruelties and injustice that can occur within the criminal justice system.

I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to read Hanks’s advanced reader copy of her debut novel and I’m excited to see her journey begin and take off!