Trust Only Me by McGarvey Black

Part-time thriller author Jillian Samuels dreams of writing a bestseller. She works as a freelance HR in the mornings, and at night and on weekends, she kills people- fictionally, of course. Jillian’s chef husband Teddy and prima donna BFF Natalie support her writing career.

But then, her stories begin to come true. Crimes from her old thrillers start to happen for real and the police are asking questions. Someone is out there, committing copycat crimes – from harmless arson cases to murder.

“During the week, I placed people in jobs. But on nights and weekends, I wrote dark thrillers about psychos and serial killers. They often included dead bodies, severed limbs, explosions and the occasional torso without a head. The number of casualties in my stories depended on my mood.”

Trust Only Me by McGarvey Black was one heck of a gripping, creepy and gritty psychological thriller. I was hooked and could not put down the book until the end. Do yourself a favor and do not read this book at night. No, it’s not about those ghost-ridden or creepy joker kinda nightmares… It’s much more than that.

The story begins with just another normal day in the life of Jillian Samuels – a wannabe bestseller author. She receives a call from her BFF Natalie asking to check the recent tweets – it concerns Jill’s book. Turns out, there was a fire at an unused warehouse – not accidental fire but arson. Witnesses saw a superman flying across seconds before the explosion. It was a drone dressed in a superhero attire. Just like the ones in Jill’s books.

The police question Jill and ask if she’s had any stalkers or any creepy lurkers. She answers in negative but tells them about a green SUv that’s been following her on and off for a couple of months now.

As the story proceeds, we learn a lot about Jillian’s personal life – how she met her husband, how much Natalie influences her life (they have a toxic friendship), the creepy postman, and much more. It becomes very clear to the reader that someone’s out there trying to harm Jillian. Then there’s the book deal with Matthew – a literary agent who initially made false promises to Jillian about her book getting movie rights, conversion to many languages, this that blah blah… his mask falls off soon after Jill signs up with the agency.

Though this story was gripping and gritty, the stalking and copycat crimes got a bit repetitive in the second half. Also, Natalie was being a pain in the backside and yet Jill tolerated her antics. At times, I felt like diving into my kindle and giving Jill a piece of my mind – warn her or at least make her see that her friendship with Natalie is nothing but Toxic spelt with a capital T.

Then there’s Teddy and his chain of business failures. I couldn’t understand as to why Jill still looked forward to financially support Teddy in his next (mostly-probably another failure) business investment. As things started to get tense, it became pretty clear that someone close to Jill is committing these crimes.

I don’t want to give away any spoilers but there is this shocking discovery at the end of the story – and quite honestly, it was no surprise. Jill was too trusting and she paid the price. Having said that, Jill too played a game of her own… Revenge is not always sweet, is it?

Overall, this was a fantastic read. Niggles aside, this book kept me hooked until the end so I will recommend it to those who love psychological/domestic thrillers.

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I received an ARC from Joffe Books in exchange for an honest and unbiased opinion.

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