False Step

By: Victoria Helen Stone

Narrated by: Melissa Moran

Length: 8 hrs and 20 mins

Publisher's Summary

An Amazon Charts bestseller.

Stay calm, keep smiling, and watch your step. In this marriage of secrets and lies, nothing is what it seems.

For days, all of Denver, Colorado, has worried over the fate of a missing child, little Tanner Holcomb. Then, a miracle: handsome, athletic Johnny Bradley finds him, frightened but unharmed, on a hiking trail miles from his wealthy family’s mountain home.

In a heartbeat, his rescuer goes from financially strapped fitness trainer to celebrated hero. The heat of the spotlight may prove too much for Johnny’s picture-perfect family, however. His wife, Veronica, despises the pressure of the sudden fame, afraid that secrets and bitter resentments of her marriage may come to light. And she’s willing to do anything to keep them hidden.

But when a shocking revelation exposes an even darker side to Tanner’s disappearance, Veronica realizes that nothing in her life can be trusted. And everything should be feared.

©2019 Victoria Helen Stone. (P)2018 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved.

Critic Reviews

“[A] cleverly plotted thriller…Danger and savage emotions surface as [Veronica] discovers that she’s not the only one whose life is built on secrets and lies. Stone keeps the reader guessing to the end.”—Publishers Weekly

“False Step aptly demonstrates author Victoria Helen Stone as a gifted novelist with a genuine flair for originality and a distinctive, reader engaging, narrative storytelling style.”—Midwest Book Review

“Intense and chilling, False Step wickedly rewards thriller fans with a compulsive read that’ll leave readers wondering how well they know their loved ones. I was riveted!”—Kerry Lonsdale, Amazon Charts and Wall Street Journal bestselling author

worst book in a long time

I listen to book as I can't see well enough to read, in most cases I can suffer through and pretty bad books just for the background noise this one I had to finally shut off I just could not continue was a absolutely terrible storyline I don't know where it was going I don't even care at this point I am not sure of the age of the writer but I would almost guess it's a very young teen the story had no substance the characters were of no consequence and I really did not find that I cared one way or another I tried to suffer through a few more chapters just couldn't do it on to the next

Made it to chapter 8 hoping it wiuld get better.

Made it to chapter 8 hoping it wiuld get better. It did not. Got it as a Kindle First read. It was not for me.

betrayal

I liked the story but it was a bit predictable for me. I suspected early on. Certain plot lines I knew for sure and others I suspected. I was not disappointed however.
I knew I would like this book because I listened to Jane Doe and loved it. I am partial to that book for sure. I have also listened to Evelyn:After. I really like Victoria Helen Stone.
Her characters are very real. They are flawed, driven people. She writes people well so the reader can understand and predict their behavior. This story is about betrayal on all fronts. It is a suspenseful relationship drama with crime mystery thrown in.
The narrator was perfect for the material.

Great twists and turns

This was a suspenseful book that keep me on the edge of my seat wanting to listen to more.

Why did I even finish this book!

I totally disliked the main character and couldn’t find a reason to sympathize with her. The rest of the story was just lame.

repetative

struggled to finish. way to many references about how insecure Veronica's was. Whine, whine, whine. book would've been half as long if didn't repeat the same thing. really struggled to finish.

A rip off of several popular books

I listened all the way through, hoping for a plot twist to break my feelings of “been there, done that”, but none ever came. I’m disappointed, but thankful that this was a kindle unlimited book.

Terrible main character

Veronica is just far too annoying for the reader to develop any sympathy for her or her plight as the story unfolds. Whiny, immature, and non-sensical, ah ruins the entire story (which, even with a likeable main character, would be only mediocre and highly predictable at best). Don’t bother!

Terrible

This was a terrible story with one of the most unlikable main characters I have ever read about. She spends the majority of this book, whining and vilifying her dad and her husband for past crimes that they committed even though she is currently doing the same things that she is upset with them about. She acknowledges her hypocritical actions multiple times and almost acts like the fact that she acknowledges what she is doing is wrong is enough because she makes no attempt at stopping the bad thing that she knows she is doing. This is not even mentioning how she is actually upset in the beginning of the book when her husband finds the lost little boy because she worries only about how this is going to affect her secrets that she is keeping. There is no reason for anyone to even care about this character. She doesn’t need to own up for her actions or her lies at all. This was a waste of time.

Predictable

This is a story of Veronica, a typical wife, mom, and Physical Therapist. She had grown weary of her marriage, and had fallen out of love with her fitness trainer husband, Johnny. Johnny had had an affair from which Veronica couldn't seem to recover. She constantly suspected him of having another. When Veronica saw him using a secret phone, she was convinced. She decided, in her mind, who the affair was with, with no proof at all. Veronica also held resentment toward her father because he too had had an affair that broke up his marriage. Veronica also resented both men because her daughter, Sydney, was not only a "Daddy's girl", but was also very attached to her grandfather. I got rather tired of Veronica's continual whining about her father and Johnny. (But Veronica was not innocent herself, because she was having an affair with one of Johnny's good friends.)
When Johnny found a little boy that had been kidnapped and was missing while on a run, he became an instant celebrity. This also annoyed Veronica. When she found a large sum of cash hidden in her basement, she created a scenario, in her mind, of Johnny's involvement in the kidnapping, again with no proof.
As the story played out, I had predicted, correctly, the responsible parties. And though this was an easy read, it was predictable in many ways.

predictable plot

I stuck with this to thread thinking that that plot just couldn't be so predictable that I'd guess it without trying from the start. Unfortunately it was...