Tell on One of the Year's Best Psychological Thrillers A teacher is infatuated with his beautiful 16-year-old student. She's his dream of a second chance, but she's also a budding psychopath. His dream becomes a nightmare.This fast-paced psychological suspense novel takes you on a harrowing journey through the dark side of marriage and reveals the dangerous webs spun by troubled adolescent girlsPsychological thriller author Dr. Freda Hansburg draws on her experience as a clinical psychologist to delve into the provocative situations depicted in this gripping psychological thriller.
Freda Hansburg is a psychologist and psychological suspense author. Her novels include Suffer Little Children - 2022 Independent Press Award Winner and 2021 NYC Big Book Award Distinguished Favorite for Suspense, Tell on You - 2020 Independent Press Award Winner for Psychological Thriller, 2019 New York City Big Book Award Winner for Suspense and 2019 Next Generation Indie Book Award Thriller Finalist, and the mystery thriller Shrink Rapt. Freda is also co-author with Mel Silberman of PeopleSmart: Developing Your Interpersonal Intelligence - a bestseller translated into a dozen languages - and Working PeopleSmart. Freda has the good fortune to live on beautiful Hilton Head Island, where she can soothe her wild imagination by sitting on her dock watching dolphins and pelicans fishing on the intracoastal waterway. An avid Pickleball player, Freda has spent her entire adult life being mistaken for Carol Burnett.
It was so entirely cliché it was suitably a "gag-me-with-a-spoon" fest. Every single character was atrocious, spiteful, vindictive, deceitful, repulsive and loathsome. There was not a single person worthy of pity or being likable on any level.
I have seen better writing from high school freshmen. This book is touted as a thriller. The only thing I was thrilled about was reaching the last page. The last few sentences of the book are so cringe-worthy I thought my eyes were going to roll out of their sockets.
This is a story that has been told about a million times. Many have told it brilliantly with twists and turns at every corner and in new and interventive ways. I can assure you that this was not one of them. This is the typical high school mean girl who's a little psycho,
and the needy girl who will do just about anything; the one we can usually root for, or at least feel sorry for, but no, not in this case!
The teacher who has the need to feel validated by the fact that he still "has it" by being attractive to the teenage girls in his class...in particular, a certain little hottie, and he can TOTALLY justify this.
Not to mention a horrible wife, in-laws from hell, and a lawyer that makes you wonder whose side he is really on.
My litmus test for 'a good read' is how much the book interferes with day-to-day chores and things I really should be doing...but I'm reading instead. This book seriously disrupted my chores list! Such a good story, had me on the edge of my seat right through. It would make a great movie - but until then, the book is highly recommended.
When does the downfall begin? When you cross that line that is forbidden. That is exactly what Jeremy Barrett did. He was in need of something new, something different, something exciting. He had baggage, a baby on the way, family that drove him crazy and he had no future, as he saw it. A 33 year old teacher and on the prowl. He has a student, Nikki Jordan who he feels is beautiful. He feels good when around her. Is this the place where the forbidden line is crossed? She encourages him to follow his dreams, take chances and to write poetry. She's a 16 year old disaster waiting to happen, to him! She is going to be far more than the mundane life he feels he's been living. Soon he will welcome that old life, but right now he's in for the nightmare he can't wake up from. This is one of those "fatal attractions".
The suspense will have you on a roller coaster ride as you turn the pages. The author introduces you, or re-introduces you to the dark crevices of a person's mind. We all have them, you know. Sometimes we can't control ourselves. We think the grass is greener on the other side of that forbidden line. Is it ever? Some just keep them in the dark, others step over that line and the crevices become holes.
You may find you feel for the characters, especially Jeremy and then you have to take into consideration, he's the adult, she's the child. Who should have control? But life sometimes intervenes in ways we don't want, understand or need, but it happens. As the author takes us into the deep, darkness of the mind, where will the reader end up? Will Jeremy come to his senses? Will danger raise it's ugly head? What happens between this unlikely couple, the teacher and the student? Boundaries have been crossed and there must be consequences. What will they be?
I was given a copy of this book from the author and PUYB and voluntarily decided to review it.
First off when I hear the words, Gone Girl, I think of a very suspenseful thriller. I did not really experience that from this book. Not that this is a bad book but I wanted to be left hanging on the edge of my seat. This is because the actions by Nikki were at times predictable and childish.
If I am brutally honest; Jeremy was not that likable. He kind of put himself in the difficult situation. He did not truly show remorse, except for when he got caught. So, he kind of deserved what he got. Although, the intrigue level was middle, I still read this book in a matter of a couple of hours. The pacing was good, the storyline was fine as was the characters. I would read another book from this author and can't wait to see what author, Freda Hansburg comes out with next.
I knew going in this would be a twisted emotional read, and it was. When will adults ever learn? And it shouldn’t surprise me how distorted teenage girls can become with all of that angst building up inside them.
Jeremy Bates is a popular teacher in a private school. His class is exciting and innovative. So it’s no surprise that some of the girls develop a crush on him. One girl in particular, Nikki Jordan, sets her sights on him and the repercussions are enormous.
Reading about how Jeremy struggled with and justified his actions had me squirming. The author made it believable and, as we’ve read in the headlines, it’s actually happened all too many times. I wanted to beat him over the head with a baseball bat. What was he thinking. By the end of the book I didn’t feel any different for him, but that didn’t stop me from enjoying the story.
And Nikki. Sheesh, what a mess. Her poor mother. She needed to rein her in. Easier said then done, I know. This girl has such a warped idea of how things should be. She’s totally self-absorbed and has a one track mind. For those that get in her way, it’s a train wreck waiting to happen.
Even though I’ve read other books with a similar plot, along with some movies. this came across as fresh. It brings out all of those feels and has a killer ending. Well worth your time.
I received a complimentary copy. My review is voluntarily given.
FTC: I received a free copy of this book from Pump Up Your Book in exchange for my honest review. I received no other compensation and the opinions expressed in this review are one hundred percent true and my own.
Tell On You by Freda Hansburg was a book that kept me reading because I had to know what was going to happen next. I would be lying if I said that I liked Jeremy. Right from the start, I wasn’t a fan of him and the things that he did. I couldn’t even make myself feel sorry for him no matter how hard I tried. I really did enjoy this author writing though, and I would love to check out other books by her in the future. I also wasn’t a huge fan of the girls either, but they acted how I would assume teenagers would act in today’s society. I think the author did an excellent job of making the story come to life and I think that is what I enjoyed most about this book. If you are looking for something different to read this summer, I would for sure recommend this book to you.
I haven't read anything this good in a while. I loved hating all of these characters. Mr. B is a high school teacher at an all girls school who makes some really dumb choices. Namely getting involved in a very inappropriate relationship with the most manipulative and psychotic student in his class. Add to that drama a bunch of other very dislikable characters like rich and controlling in-laws, a pregnant princess wife, and another student that claims he molested her. This book has a lot of "What the F were you thinking?" and "Calm down crazy!" moments. It is kind of a short book, 240 pages, but its an incredibly well written and entertaining thriller.
This book will take you through emotions hard to explain. But it will also grip onto you right at the beginning. I had a hard time putting this read down. I let curiosity get the best of me and couldn't escape the book! Completely different than what I was expecting, but yet surprised at it all!
Tell on You is the first fictional work by Freda Hansburg, a psychologist who clearly understands teenage angst and social pressure in high school girls. She builds empathy for all of the characters, as vile as they are. Very engaging and fun reading, hard to put down, so thankfully the chapters are short! Can't wait for the next book!
The one thought that I had while reading Freda Hansburg's "Tell On You" was, 'Wow. These people are pretty horrible". It's not that she did a bad job of making characters, it was the characters themselves that were just horrible people. "Tell On You" is a web of lies and backstabbing, and no one is really immune.
I've read that this book was along the same lines as "Gone Girl", but I disagree. Mainly because the biggest factor in that book was the big twist and reveal. "Tell On You" is written with multiple points of view, so the reader is clear on what each character is thinking and scheming, making it hard for any twists to be present. This makes he book less suspenseful, but it's still a quick read and the story keeps moving forward.
As I already said, the characters are not the greatest people. This made it hard to really root for any of them to come out on top, but i guess I did root for one or two to fail more than the others.
One thing that I wished was different was the ending. It happened so quick that the reader doesn't really get a lot of closure with all of the story lines and dirty dealings that had been happening. I wanted to see what kind of consequences as a whole the characters would be facing.
While it lacked suspense, I did keep reading until I was done. So you might not fall in love with any of the characters, but it is an entertaining read and a good way to spend a day or two.
This is an engrossing suspense novel, where the plot twists depend on the changing perceptions and self-evaluations of the novel’s people. Hansburg has an ear for dialog and a master psychologist’s sense of the weaknesses, impulsiveness and humanity of her characters. The reader is carried along by the plot, and his/her responses to the characters change as the characters themselves deal with the sitations they create, evolve and, in some cases, grow. This is certainly the case with the novel’s protagonist, whose blundering immaturity sets off a train of events, which reader will recognize as all too common, that leads him to disaster and finally to self-awareness and — but the reader must read to the end to see what happens. The reviewer below must have had an ax to grind, since Tell on You, written by an accomplished psychologist and co-author of the well-known People Smart, is certainly the work of an insightful and skilled writer.