This Is Not Over

by Holly Brown

Two women are caught in an escalating game of cat-and-mouse that leads to an explosive ending in this breathtaking psychological thriller from the author of a Necessary End and Don’t Try to Find Me.

You’ll have your deposit within seven business days, just like it says on Getaway.com. I’ve put through a refund to your credit card for the full amount, minus $200 to replace the sheets. I couldn’t get the stain out despite professional laundering and bleaching. . .
Miranda

All Dawn wanted was to stay in a beautiful beach house with her husband, to live like money’s no object, for just one long weekend. Then Miranda, the home’s owner, has to send an e-mail like this, full of lies and the suggestion that Dawn’s so dirty, she needs to throw out her sheets. Someone needs to teach Miranda a lesson.

Beware of your "host"
I wouldn’t leave a review on Getaway.com at all, if I didn’t feel it was my civic duty to warn others . . .
Dawn

Miranda cannot believe her eyes. Yes, she may be a doctor’s wife, but she needs the rental money from the beach house desperately. Someone needs to teach this Dawn a lesson.

Two very different women with one thing in common: Each one knows she’s right, and each is determined to win this battle of words and wills and (eventually) worse. Neither will yield, not before they’ve dredged up hidden secrets, old hurts, and painful truths that threaten to shatter the foundations of their lives.

Because it’s never really just about the sheets, is it?

This is not over.

This is so not over.

Genres: Fiction, Thriller, Mystery Thriller, Psychological Thriller, Audiobook, Suspense, Mystery

400 pages, Paperback

First published January 17, 2017

About the author

Holly Brown is a practicing marriage and family therapist and author of the novels DON'T TRY TO FIND ME, A NECESSARY END, THIS IS NOT OVER, and HOW FAR SHE'S COME. She teamed up with three internationally bestselling thriller writers (Sophie Hannah, B.A. Paris, and Clare Mackintosh) for THE UNDERSTUDY.

Reviews

[Zoeytron · Rating 3 out of 5]

A less than positive review posted on the website of an AirBNB rental turns into a full scale war.  The host and the guest turn out to be pure D nutters.  One is obsessed with her complexion and the other with her meth-head son.  Full of deceit and manipulation.  Gah!  These women!  Stand back for the fallout.

[Abby • Crime by the Book · Rating 1 out of 5]

I've been debating whether or not to write a review for this one - I tried reading it a few weeks ago and was going to just let it slide... but I just had to share a few thoughts. First of all, I didn't finish this book, so please keep in mind I can't speak to the whole book.

So why didn't I finish it?

Well. I loved the concept of this book - I love the idea of examining a very ordinary, everyday situation and seeing how different individuals can react to it. We've all had a moment where we read a comment on social media or get a rude email that just nags at us for a while after we've read it. I think this plot has great potential: starting with something very ordinary, and watching the fallout that can happen as two different personalities, each with their own psychological baggage, come in conflict with one another.

However, this book completely fell flat for me, at least in the portion of the book I read. I hoped for more psychological insight and more tension -- instead, the portion of this book that I read really did just have the main characters go back & forth about the house's security deposit. I found it incredibly tiresome and utterly lacking in intrigue. It got to the point where I simply couldn't spend any more time reading about security deposits, so I had to set the book aside.

I truly think this book's plot has potential - I'm very open to the idea of going into a detailed examination of psychological trauma from an ordinary event. However, I didn't feel that I experienced any real insights into the minds of the characters, or genuine tension between them. It honestly makes me so sad to rate a book so badly, but I truly think there are much better psychological thrillers out there to spend your money and time on.

[Suzanne Leopold (Suzy Approved Book Reviews) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dawn and Rob Thiebold rent Miranda Feldt’s home in Santa Monica during their vacation. They are a young married couple on a tight budget while Dawn attends college full time. After the vacation, Dawn receives an email from Miranda stating that $200 was deducted from her security deposit to replace stained sheets. After emails go back and forth between the two, communication decays resulting in Dawn leaving negative reviews on the rental website.

Miranda relies upon her rental income to support her drug addicted son, Thad. His father is not supporting him monetarily because he is not compliant in his drug recovery program. The negative review left on the website has Miranda unhinged and she is worried about her future revenue stream.

Tensions continue to rise between the two women after a series of insulting email exchanges. Tempers flare and any attempt at resolution breaks down.

This is novel is told in the voices of Miranda and Dawn. It is a fast paced story where each character’s secrets are revealed. In the digital world we all have had instances where what we wrote was not what we meant. Sometimes the best choice is to pick up the phone to resolve an issue.

Book giveaway on my blog until 3/8 https://www.facebook.com/suzyapproved...

[Susan W · Rating 3 out of 5]

You don't like any of the characters. In fact you can't figure out which you dislike the most. You keep putting it down, skipping ahead, because you really don't like these people.
But you keep reading, stay up late to read, come straight home to read this book you don't like.
And then you really get hooked into it. Figures.

[Judy Collins · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved the cover, the audiobook, the narrators, the author, and the book!

Need to pass this along to all my hotel clients (and guests). Being in the business-- this is like "everyday reality madness" with reviews and social media-- in the hotel and vacation rental business. Yes, it really happens, and could add even more horror stories to this. . . . .

Lots of humor and great one-liners. Made my day while plowing through work!. Designing websites this week. Behind on my reading and writing reviews. Review to follow!

[Laura Wonderchick · Rating 4 out of 5]

This isn't just a book about security deposits. It's an in depth view of bullying, even as adults, about how behind closed doors someone's life may not be what it seems. And definitely about how living your life not being who you really want to be can backfire.

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well I'm just going to have to do it and give this one 5 stars. It deserves it and I read it. This is a guilty pleasure read. If you read this book, you are going to feel like you just emerged from a full Saturday of binge watching Dance Moms and eating an entire extra large Domino's pizza dunked in blue cheese dressing. But I have to give it all the stars because I could not put it down and it couldn't have been better. This was a super well-written, outstandingly trashy book. 5 stars.

[Cindy Roesel · Rating 3 out of 5]

"It's not about the $200, which I could most definitely use. It's the principle."

Psychological warfare heats up on the Internet in author Holly Brown's thriller, THIS IS NOT OVER (William Morrow).

Thirty-year old Dawn Thiebold grew up poor in a lousy Northern California town. She's about to graduate from college and is married to a guy who gives her pretty much whatever she wants, but that's not enough; they live in a rundown apartment luckily in the best part of the city. Her sometimes too perfect husband takes her on long weekends to luxurious rentals, so she can make believe that she's rich.

Dawn belongs to Getaway.com, an online rental site and finds a perfect beach house in Santa Monica. After a less than perfect vacay, she receives a letter from her host, Miranda telling her she's keeping half of Dawn's deposit because she left a "stain" on the sheets. This hits a nerve with Dawn, who immediately wants to lash out and find out who this Miranda woman thinks she is.

Dawn looks into Miranda, finds out she owns two homes, one in Beverly Hills, she's married to a doctor and obviously wealthy. This doesn't sit right with Dawn who feels as if she's being ripped off and that her host is stealing from her. After less than civil email exchanges, in which Miranda insinuates she's better and cleaner than Dawn, Dawn is ready to take this Internet fight to a new level. She leaves a scathing review on Getaway.com about Miranda's rental.

This is not over.

Miranda Feldt is wealthy , but despite the image she projects, her life is far from perfect. Miranda is dealing with her son, Thad who is a drug addict and a husband who has cut him off, after repeated chances for Thad to get clean. He makes it known that Miranda is not to have contact with Thad in anyway, but Miranda is a classic enabler, and living a secret. She uses the money she makes from renting out the Santa Monica house, which her father left to her, to financially support and stay in contact with Thad. When the negative review posts, Miranda's revenue is in jeopardy.

This is far from over.

The tension increases, exchanges on the Internet and text messages continue to escalate until finally Dawn and Miranda have their day of reckoning.

Brown's novel captures how social media has changed the entire landscape of communicating; the projections, misperceptions and how it can embolden the writer to lash out covered by the veil of anonyminity.

The novel is written with alternating narratives between Dawn and Miranda. You can feel the tension and anger rising, but there were also sections while reading that I felt the fighting had gone on too long. Enough already, ladies. The prose were repetitive and needed an editor's eye.

THIS IS NOT OVER is coming out at a highly relevant time. Personally, the novel made me revisit how much information I have made accessible on the Internet and perhaps, I need to take a moment and breathe before sending that next email or text. A good rule of thumb is responding, rather than reacting.

Holly Brown lives with her husband and daughter in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she’s a practicing marriage and family therapist. Her blog, “Bonding Time”, is featured on Psychcentral.com, a mental health website with 1.5 million visitors per month. For more, visit hollybrownbooks.com.

[Stephanie · Rating 1 out of 5]

Yes, this is a "thriller" (?) that revolves around a $200 security deposit charge. It is both as ridiculous and as boring as it sounds, with every cliché thrown in for good measure.

[Hailey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Two women: Dawn Theibold and Miranda Feldt fighting like teenagers about a $200 security deposit that Miranda is keeping due to a stain being left on sheets at the house in Santa Monica, CA, that Dawn and her husband rented from Miranda. This was my third book written by Holly Brown and I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was easy to picture in my head the animosity between the two women even though Miranda seemed to make a mountain out of a molehill. If she hadn't done that, there would have been no story to be told. You never know what happens behind closed doors; just because it appears Miranda is more well off than Dawn, it doesn't mean her life is easier than Dawn's either. Each woman was jealous of the other for their own reasons.

[Teryl · Rating 2 out of 5]

Could two more deluded people have come into contact with each other? I found the book quite a difficult read because both the main characters were so unlikeable. The ending bore that out, for me, too.

[kylajaclyn · Rating 2 out of 5]

SPOILERS AHOY!!

These characters are unlikable. But a lot of unlikable characters can still be compelling. These two women, Dawn and Miranda, were not a train wreck you can't look away from. They were just a train wreck. This book had so much potential to be amazing. Nothing is more relevant in our world right now than social media and cyberbullies. When do we let something go? What if we don't, and we insert ourselves into someone else's life? That is what happens to Dawn and Miranda who cannot and will not let a rental stay gone wrong go. The problem is, things don't come together until the end. You don't feel the humanity of these characters until the final 20 pages. And that's a problem for me. There was a lot of humanity to be found under the surface of Dawn and Miranda, both struggling with a mountain of issues. The problem is that Holly Brown doesn't go deep enough into their psyches.

It becomes clear very quickly that the feud between the two women is a cover for all that is wrong in their respective lives. But when one of them inserts a mention of the other into their thoughts, it feels jarring. Brown attempts to give us a deeper look at these women, but then she pulls you out and shows you how petty they can be. In the end, I was more frustrated with Miranda then Dawn. Her son, Thad, struggles with meth addiction, but she absolutely refuses to cut him out of her life completely, so she gives him money on the sly in the hopes that he will stay alive and connected to her. Her husband, Larry, doesn't approve, and this is why Miranda's rental house, which she lends out to Dawn, is so important to her: it provides her with extra income for her hopeless son. Dawn is much younger and newly married. But her husband, Rob, can't understand why she doesn't want to memorialize her father who has just passed or help her now-widowed mother. Turns out that her mother was dependent upon her father her whole life and only cared about him at the expense of not paying attention to Dawn. Meanwhile, Dawn's father whored her out to a friend for a so-called job that he didn't end up taking.

Where Thad is concerned, both women converge. Seeking leverage to use against Miranda, Dawn finds Thad and his tweaky tweets and promptly follows him only to have him, surprisingly, immediately message her. Thad begins to tell Dawn all about his history with his mother, things that Miranda needs to know. Because while Dawn and Thad grow ever closer, Miranda spirals further into despair. She is convinced Dawn is out to get her, especially once she finds a dead rat and muddy footprints at the rental house (it was Thad squatting there all along). She buys weapons to protect herself while her husband is out of town (drinking his life away, as it turns out). Then she sees Thad tweet about Dawn, and she takes her revenge crusade to Oakland, where Dawn lives. There she happens upon Rob and tells him all about the "affair" occurring between Dawn and Thad. In her defense, he did make her come... but it was over the phone. When Dawn finally meets Thad and he continues to open up to her, she lets her grudge against Miranda go. But it's a little too late. Rob barges in and is furious, obviously, and Dawn gives a laundry list of her issues but how he needs to accept her anyway. It was probably the best part of the book but, again, it came way too late for me. Miranda is driving furiously to Dawn's house, and she stops when she sees Thad run in front of her car. But she also sees the hatred in his eyes, still, and she accidentally-on-purpose runs over him. When she gets out of the car, hysterical, her and Dawn's paths finally converge.

While at the hospital, Dawn tells Miranda that Larry fed Thad lies about her (Miranda) all his life. He hated her, in part, because of someone else's design. Miranda still doesn't want to believe in some goodness in Dawn, even in the middle of these confessions, and that was extremely frustrating. She only gives up the fight within the last couple of pages. And the ending. Well. It's a bit too easy. Miranda is told her son has brain damage - he will have to relearn everything again. This is her chance, finally, to get things right. Maybe he'll forget he loves meth, she thinks. But what a deus ex machina. Talk about an easy solution to someone's drug addiction! I could kind of buy the ending, however, since Miranda did mean to run him over. She still has to live with the guilt of knowing that she both wanted and didn't want to hit him at the same time.

Ultimately, this book had so many things to say, but it never quite said them. At one point Dawn laments how Miranda has left her with blue balls. And that's how I feel after reading this book.

[Cheryl · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is the second book I have attempted to read by this author. I say this because the first book I found uninteresting and unforgettable. Yet, this time I was super hyped to check this book out. I forgot about the past. This book was a let down to me.

There was nothing appealing about either Miranda or Dawn. Both women came off as childish. In fact, I don't think that either one was coming out on top as the winner. The author tried to make me the reader feel for each woman by providing me details about their lives. This may have worked if most of the alternating chapters were not focused on the mud slinging. The obsession was getting out of hand. For example when Dawn was being pleasured by her husband and she is talking about Miranda. Dawn finally realizes in that situation that she was focusing too much on Miranda that she decides that her and her husband are going to have sex and so she jumps on top of him to ride him like a stag. I thought this book would get better for me, thus I kept reading. I could only get to chapter 20 before I could no longer stand Miranda and Dawn.

[Joyce · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting read. Intense look into characters and their thought process under adverse conditions. The character subterfuge each other consciously and throughout question themselves. Unusual writing, quite creative in the presentation of the story and a very surprising ending. Must stick with it to the end to realize how good a read this is.

[Michelegg · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this book. Absolutely adored every page. And yes, it all takes place over the dispute between a landlord and tenant and a $200 deposit but that dispute is just the beginning of a journey that delves into the real heart of life's issues for Dawn and Miranda and the discovery that maybe they aren't as different as they think they are.

I'm sure the issues that this book revolve around were especially poignant for me, as a mother of a drug addict I could relate in pretty much every way with Miranda and I agonized with her and cried with her. It is a painful painful thing. I definitely felt a connection with her from the very beginning. So I was hooked and needed to see how this all played out.

I found the dispute and its escalation absolutely riveting and unfortunately very real, in today's Facebook world I see these same things played out in the very same way every day. So for me, it was a fictional look at a very real issue and I thought the author handled it very well. The tit for tat back and forth vengeance was actually quite entertaining to watch and the whole story was very riveting to me.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys an anxiety producing and fascinating look at misunderstandings and difficult life experiences.

[Anne-Marie · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book I am so glad I didn't give up on. It's true, don't judge a book by its cover or the first 75 pages

[Debra · Rating 2 out of 5]

intriguing possibilities that just were not fleshed our well enough

[Cheryl · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dawn stays at Miranda’s rental house for a long weekend. Miranda won’t return the cleaning deposit because of a dirty set of sheets.. Dawn is upset about it and leave a nasty review. They go back and forth arguing about it online.. Dawn has a poor background and feels she is trying to live up to husband’s wealth and Miranda has bad marriage and an addicted son. Both have secrets from their husbands. Dawn and Miranda’s son start meeting online and finally in person where there is a show down. 9

[Barbara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you to the author, publisher, and Ann-Marie Nieves of Got Red PR for the opportunity to read and review this book. I guess you could say this might be the perfect book for me. In my working world, the one that pays the bills, I am travel advisor and have been for 28 years. This book appealed to me on several levels, it's a psychological thriller (a favorite genre of mine) and it deals with a travel problem.

What happens when you rent a place via Air BnB or VRBO and the owner doesn't return all or part of your deposit? What if they claim you caused damage and they need to fix, repair, or replace what was damaged? The only thing, you didn't cause any damage! This is the premise of This Is Not Over by author Holly Brown.

The story is written in a series of emails and texts back and forth between Dawn, who rented the place in Santa Monica with her husband,  from Miranda, the owner. The story is multilayered, so we begin to see more of each women's private and public persona as we read on. In addition to the emails and texts the story lets us in on the lives of the two women.

Dawn is a 30 year old wife who has gone back to college to fulfill her dream of becoming a better person. Dawn has always felt less. Less pretty, less rich, less smart and the email from Miranda saying she soiled the $200 sheets during their stay, brings out all of Dawn's feelings of inadequacy. Dawn has worked hard to hide where she came from. She loves to go on getaways where she can "try on" a different persona, pretend to be someone else and she's not going to let a snob like Miranda get away with keeping her deposit and sullying her at the same time.

Miranda is an older woman and wife of a well-known doctor in Beverly Hills. Most people think the rental in Santa Monica is a little project to keep her busy, but what they don't know is she needs the income from the rental, desperately. Miranda's son has a drug problem and she's been sending him money without anyone knowing.

As the story progresses the dispute between Dawn and Miranda escalates. We begin to realize the desperation each woman feels and we understand why neither is able to back down. Miranda's son starts applying pressure on her, her husband is up to something too, plus she can't let him know she's been sending money to their son, causing her more stress. Dawn's crazy past comes back with a vengeance when her father dies and her mother shows up on her doorstop threatening to ruin her new life. Dawn's husband begins to see the cracks in her facade.

The author has added plenty of twists and you will be unable to put the book down until the very terrifying and surprising ending. This Is Not Over, by a long shot!

[Carmen · Rating 2 out of 5]

Both the women in this story are self involved liars. and betray their husbands.
One doesn't want children (ok with me.. she's awful), the other has a drug addict son she enables against her husband's wishes and without his knowledge...
Did not care what happened to either of them until the well devised end, which is how this book "won" the second star.
Mostly a book about cyber bullying.
Miranda: has a son, Thad, she enables to be a drug addict and is used to luxury living.
Dawn: Victimized by awful parents never feels good enough to live in this world. Marries a man who makes a subsistence living but had a good upbringing and great parents. Dawn's husband supports her in sending her to college so she can build a good career.
Yet both idiots spend a fortune in getaways while living in a slum (how to meld the characters...they rent Miranda's 4 million dollar beach house)
Miranda accuses them of staining sheets and keeps $200 of the security deposit... and the war is on - ad nauseum.
I suppose it helped them both in the end to blow up each others' lives to begin to live honestly.
It just took too long of the same mess over and over and over.
If I never hear about another stained sheet it will be too soon.

[Ash Kemp · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book starts out full of humor, with moments of pithy, and sometimes controversial, musings on life and status.  Then it gets darker.  And more complicated.  Until it gets to a point where you think, I can't stand to find out more, yet I can't stop reading.  In the end, there were numerous gasp-inducing surprises, and some less-than-surprising revelations.  I felt the author really made an effort to give each woman, Miranda and Dawn, their own personality, their own view of the other person, and their own faults.  Neither was right, but neither was wrong.  You kept thinking one thing, along with one or the other of these characters, then second guessing yourself, and what you'd read.  There was quite a bit more moral ambiguity than I expected, which worked rather well in the context of this particular story.  It's about more than a house, or a refund, or a disagreement.  It's about what we can stand to lose, what we can't fathom ever having to give up, and what we are willing to do to keep what we think we deserve.
4 stars and my thanks to Harper Collins and TLC Booktours for the review opportunity!

[Sharon · Rating 4 out of 5]

A psychological story about two women, enemies in their minds due to a very small issue -- isn't that always the way? Each feels wronged and can't let things be. The book is well written and slightly suspenseful. I love reading new books and this one is different and well done because the author is a marriage and family therapist and writes from experience. I'll be interested in the author's other books.

The older woman is married with a wayward son and often-absent husband. The younger woman is married, finishing a college degree, and has a dark past. They have more in common than they realize, both with somewhat troubled pasts and marriages. The story reveals how they became enemies and all that transpires after the initial incident. Some good twists near the end. Well worth your time if you enjoy this kind of book.

[Christina · Rating 4 out of 5]

wow a very modern story and a great take on life in this day and age ...read it in one and half days! could not put it down but it was a weekend and my dvr is empty so but but still a good story and it kept my attention ..

[Renita D'Silva · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thrilling

[Nicole · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow! Brilliant execution.

The first indication that this isn't going to be one of those drippy, cliche filled thrillers with gut wrenching circumstances that don't have the tone or punch to back it up, is the quote on the front by Mary Kubica, a master of psychological depth and suspense herself. "A Master storyteller and an expert of suspense," Kubica says. I almost missed this one, as it wasn't recommended to me like all the others I see on my Audible queue. I found it because I typed the authors name in, and found this book, which appears to have not garnered that much attention. (And it deserves more than most of the recommendations/suggestions I'm offered on kindle.)

Swerving from one disillusioned pov to the other, these two women in very different circumstances encounter each other online through trivial coincidence, and somehow become embedded in each others thoughts until they're total enemies. A lot of the chapters begin with letters written or reviews from one to the other, followed by the characters thoughts. I really like the way Brown started out with such a superficial premise, the kind of thing you'd expect to see in a Jane Green or Sophie Kinsella book that's light and comic, but that superficial premise was just one guise to draw you into the tumultuous depths of these two women's lives.

Holly Brown delivers both povs with unflinching individuality. I sided with one voice more than the other (Miranda's) but I'm sure there are probably just as many people who sided more with Dawn. I'm in awe of the way the author was able to grow a faint grudge into a war with casualties on both sides, and the way these two women kept misinterpreting each other at every turn. That was the brilliant part: Brown really captured those insightful psychological details of what goes on when you're misunderstanding someone else's motives.

However, if you're the type of reader that needs to really root for a character, to have a hero that is going to inspire you with their moral clarity, this isn't your type of book at all. While the characters do find a way to overcome their circumstances and their biases, the trip is filled with rocky moments of moral grey, incidents that might might make you hate the characters before you reach any satisfaction. (I'm guessing if I read other reviews there will be complaints like "the characters were unlikable" which seems to be a complaint I hear a lot in plenty of the books I tend to like.)

This is the second Holly Brown book I've read, (The first was "Don't Try To Find Me") and I have not been disappointed yet. I hope that the next one I read (A Necessary End) is as good.

[Vee · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm going to be honest here, I really didn't like this novel. I will admit, I wasn't expecting any kind of crazy thriller. But this was just a little more preposterous than I could handle. The story is told from alternating points of view and each woman gets her chance to tell her side. I didn't like either woman. They've got so many issues and they really just never think things through. Their self-centered attitudes and belief in their own righteousness drove me crazy. By the first 70 pages, I could see myself getting bored as the story started to pull away from this dispute and start to focus on other areas of their separate lives. And again, I didn't really care about what else they were going through, or what their past was like. Both of these women were married but I couldn't take either of their marriages seriously. Dawn's marriage seemed very juvenile and lacked any substance. Miranda's marriage was like something out of the 1950's, where the husband is always right and it is the wife's job to look pretty and cook nice dinners. This really bothered me because I like females to have a stronger role than that in the novels I read. I had figured out the ending by the halfway point; it was not as thrilling as one might expect. At the end, I was just wondering why this novel was even a good idea. It really didn't have that much to do with the renting idea that it started with and it just got more and more ridiculous the further you read it. Also, the ending, while technically making sense, didn't actually work. Overall, this novel failed for me because it's story lacked the thrills I was seeking and the characters were very unlikable. For those reasons, I'm giving this a 1/5 stars.

[Jayme · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars! Miranda rents out the home she inherited from her parents, on Getaway.com. Dawn and her husband, are one of the couples who have rented the house for a weekend. When Miranda withholds $200 from the couple's security deposit, for soiled sheets, Dawn posts a review on the website, giving their host a "less than stellar" review.

Told from the alternating viewpoints of Miranda and Dawn, the book starts out strong, and as the emails and texts become increasingly "heated", I was trying to determine which of the women was the more reliable narrator.

The tension slows a bit too much, as the author fills in the background stories of the women, explaining why they think and act as they do, and I wanted to skim ahead to find out who would prevail.

Wanting to make sure that you understood that the women came from two very different social classes, the writing became "smutty" at times, which was not necessary as it had already been clearly established, in my opinion and that brought down the rating for me.

"Social media can be aggressive and unchecked by empathy. The written word is devoid of nuance. Face to face, you have to deal with the consequences of your actions...something you do not have to when you hide behind a screen".

The book does a great job of demonstrating how UGLY social media can be, and showing you that things are not always what they seem at the other end of the screen...

[Julie · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ugh. I really, really hated this book. I thought about giving up several times, but persevered with the optimistic hope that it would get better. It didn't. I DNFed about 3/4ths of the way through.

To start - I hated the premise. It simply makes no sense. You have to give me something more believable than two people getting irrationally angry with each other over a short term vacation rental and what is akin to a bad AirBnB review. But no such justification is given - we're just meant to accept that this is rational behavior we should go along with.

Secondly - I despised, despised, despised Dawn. I'm sick of self-sabotaging characters who do so just to advance the plot. I mean, Miranda was no walk in the park either, but at least she was wrestling with some real internal demons. Dawn was stirring shit up just to stir shit up.

In the end, I gave up shortly after Dawn essentially cheated on her extremely kind, caring husband by having phone sex with the meth addict (are you kidding me?) I decided life is too short to even attempt to read the last quarter of this. Hard pass on this whole train wreck of a book.

[Erin (from Long Island, NY) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ok so i know at times this book was petty, & a lot of people feel it was bordering on ridiculous... But i have to admit, i enjoyed every minute of it! I think it was entirely plausible.. & people constantly dwell on things that aren't actually worth their energy. Regardless, it was fast, easy listening & i ate it right up!🙈 It might not be a classic but give it a shot, i bet you secretly love it!

[Vivian · Rating 3 out of 5]

It all starts with an email message about a refund and goes downhill from there. Dawn and Rob Thiebold enjoy spending weekends away from their Oakland apartment and routinely use VRBO homes. Dawn is in charge of finding the homes they stay in and she takes her research into these homes quite seriously. The beach rental should have made for a perfect weekend getaway, but it is anything but perfect and then she receives an email stating they left a mysterious "stain" on the sheets and wouldn't be receiving a full refund. Dawn tries hard to channel Rob's more laidback attitude and let this go, but she refuses to accept Miranda's version of accounts and fights back the only way she can. Dawn's text message and email responses to Miranda quickly turns into an internet campaign to right a wrong. If dealing with Miranda isn't enough, Rob wants to start a family, and Dawn's father dies and she finds out her parents were never legally married. Everything seems to be crashing down around her and she finds refuge with an unlikely ally.

Miranda isn't sure how a simple text message could have evolved into a campaign to besmirch her character as a VRBO host. She tries her best to remain civil with Dawn and work out a reasonable arrangement. She even offers to refund Dawn if she'll only take down the somewhat negative review posted on the VRBO host website. Miranda is also dealing with an aging parent suffering from dementia, a distant husband that never seems to agree with her opinion about anything, and a drug-addicted son that seeks to keep her off balance while constantly seeking financial assistance. The only thing Miranda can focus on is maintaining a little bit of sanity in her increasingly insane existence, her status as a good VRBO host. When that is taken away from by Dawn's reporting the short-stay vacation rentals to the authorities, Miranda decides to take a stand. She stands up to her mother and is kicked out her mother's assisted living facility. She stands up to her husband and he takes off for a medical conference. But what can she do to stand up to a renter that lives hours away?

I found This Is Not Over to be a rather fast-paced read. It is a psychological thriller that kept me guessing until the very end. It is easy to see how a seemingly innocent text message or email could be taken out of context when it isn't possible to hear the sender's voice or see their nonverbal cues. The reader sees and hears what they want to see and hear. Dawn sees one thing and mounts what might be seen as cyberstalking and cyberbullying behavior. Miranda is all too focused on her reputation to see that she's living a lie. She wants to be perceived as the perfect host when her marriage and family life are crumbling down around her. Both Dawn and Miranda make assumptions about one another and their actions are based on those preconceived notions. This Is Not Over is not a she said/she said story, it is about misconceptions and an unwillingness to see the other side of the equation. This story contains lots of family angst and drama, cyberstalking, cyberbullying, hopelessness, despair, and an inability to see circumstances clearly while enraged. I could tell you where the psychological thriller component comes into play, but then you wouldn't need to read the story. The story was slow moving at first, but then it picked up and kept my attention to the very last page (I had to know what happened next). If you enjoy reading psychological thrillers filled with family drama, then you'll definitely want to read This Is Not Over.

This review originally posted on 2/1/2017 on www.thebookdivasreads.com:.