*I received the E-Arc from Berkley Publishing from Net Galley. All reviews are my own.*
YALL! Yall. I was not ready for this book. I was not prepared for the twist, turns, rise, and falls of this story. Hands down have to be one of the best Thrillers I've read this year. Amanda Jayatissa blazes the pages with her latest offering, My Sweet Girl, and let me tell you, this book is worth the loss of sleep. I've already threatened a couple of my Bookstafriends to read this book, and I might as well add yall to the mix.
"Ever since she was adopted from a Sri Lankan orphanage, Paloma has had the best of everything—schools, money, and parents so perfect that she fears she'll never live up to them.
Now at thirty years old and recently cut off from her parents’ funds, she decides to sublet the second bedroom of her overpriced San Francisco apartment to Arun, who recently moved from India. Paloma has to admit, it feels good helping someone find their way in America—that is until Arun discovers Paloma's darkest secret, one that could jeopardize her own fragile place in this country.
Before Paloma can pay Arun off, she finds him face down in a pool of blood. She flees the apartment but by the time the police arrive, there's no body—and no evidence that Arun ever even existed in the first place.
Paloma is terrified this is all somehow tangled up in the desperate actions she took to escape Sri Lanka so many years ago. Did Paloma’s secret die with Arun or is she now in greater danger than ever before?"
"There's a special place in hell for incompetent customer service agents, and it's right between monsters who stick their bare feet up on airplane seats and mansplainers." From the very first sentence, I knew I was going to love this book. My Sweet Girl tells a dual timeline story of Paloma Evans; her past experiences as a little girl growing up in a Sri Lankan orphanage and the present as an adult who's trying to get her crumbling life together in the U.S. The theme of the thriller also follows the Sri Lankan lore of Mohini – a ghost of a woman who has the power to make people lose their minds or die of fright. As children, Mohini was the scary bedtime story you told during sleepovers, and it seems Paloma carried that myth with her to the U.S.
As an adult, Paloma is a mess. She is this quiet yet feisty drunk that is right up my alley of no fucks given. Her inside voice is the introvert's wildest dream. But she also got issues. Boy, does she have problems! It was entertaining to see how she dealt with them with a plastered smile on her face. This may be a spoiler alert, but I've never seen a narrator fuck with the reader so much in my life! Paloma had a way of revealing jaw-dropping information like it was a casual conversation over tea and crumpets. Nah, hold up! We're not speeding past that type of information. EXPLAIN YOURSELF!
It did start to get a little slow in the middle. For a second, I didn't think things were going to come to a head. But then the reveal happened. OMG, the reveal! The unveiling of it all will knock you off your feet, help you get back up, then trip you again. READ THE BOOK!
One thing that bothered me is the lack of translation. Kindle does not have a Sinhala to English translator, and trying to use Google's search queue didn't help either. I got the gist of some of the terms of endearment, but I would love to know what "Sudha," "Aney," or "Haiyyo" meant.
Clearly, I gave this book a 5-star rating. I believe this to be my first thriller read of the year, and it did not disappoint. It has all the elements – Mystery, suspense, and surprise. I was not joking when I said I've already threatened a couple of Instagram friends to grab this book because I damn sure am. I guarantee you'll have the same excitement I had at 2 in the morning.
My Sweet Girl debuts September 14, 2021
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