The Body Next Door

Samantha Newman Mystery Series, Book 2

By: Gay Yellen

Narrated by: Natalie Naudus Bradner

Length: 7 hrs and 26 mins

Publisher's summary

Samantha Newman desperately needs a new job, a place of her own, and a fix for her rocky romance with cyber-security expert Carter Chapman. But with a dead man next door, and his missing wife hiding in Samantha's apartment, Sam gets dragged into the investigation. To make matters worse, a stalker is haunting her balcony. Could it be the real killer? When suspicion ruins her chance for a great new career and a happy future with the man she loves, she risks everything to try to solve the mystery herself.

The Body Next Door has won a Chanticleer Mystery and Mayhem Award and a Readers' Favorite Mystery Award.

©2016 Gay Yellen (P)2017 Gay Yellen

Tension throughout the book!

Twists and turns throughout holds you attention to the end. Gay Yellen is a master at creating tension to keep you engaged.

Natalie Naudus Bradner brought the characters to life.

I was given a free review copy of this audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

The Body Next Door

The overall storyline was very nice with an ending I did not see coming. I love it when I don’t figure it out five minutes in who the killer is! The cast of characters are unique and mostly fun. The little neighbor girl is cute! The officer is kind of a jerk until Carter has him set straight. The part about the cop that annoyed me though was that he kept bugging Samantha about the murder and dragging her to his office when she was not home when it happened. Yet Gertie was and after her initial interview she was not really mentioned in the case. And then their is the jerk lawyer who personally I would have called security on many times. I wish Samantha would have grown a backbone with him and the cop. That part overly annoyed me that she let them both walk all over her. Then their is Carter, the boyfriend, he gets mad at her and seems to have these childish tantrums and keeps running off. Anyway you look at it they have issues. Nice job on the narration.

I received this audio in exchange for an honest review.

Great mystery

Great mystery with an entertaining cast of characters. Great narrator too. I received a free review copy of this audiobook at my request and I have voluntarily left this review.

The Body Next Door

The Body Next Door
: Gay Yellen

This is book two in this series. Unfortunately I haven't read/listened to the first book. I wasn't familiar with any of the characters or the original story line. Samantha Newman is in need of a fresh start, the reasons why were supposed to have been explained in book one. A possible murder next door, a boyfriend that is mysterious, and a cast of interesting characters keep the listener in suspense. There were plenty of twists to make you wonder who did it and why.


The narration was well done. The characters were well portrayed by Natalie Naudus Bradner.



I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

Nice cozy!

This book is a fun cozy mystery. The main character Samantha is staying at her boyfriends ritzy condo while he was away on classified business. The condos classic drunk abusive couple down the hall are at it again and the wife shows up drunk and naked. After police arrive it is discovered the husband is dead, the wife is the chief suspect. What seems to be an open and shut domestic turns into a bit more when an obnoxious lawyer shows up, strange noises on the balcony occur and mysterious notes claim the wifes innocence are found. Full of pretensious, quickery, and strange neighbors Sam tries to solve the case while reconsiling her relationship with her mysterious boyfriend. The narrator does a great job! I think there may be more books in the series and if so I look forward to listening! I received a free review copy of this book at my request and have voluntarily ledt this review.

Really enjoyed this book

Pluses:
-- Great story line. Had me engaged, and I had no idea what was going to happen.
-- Even 3/4 through the book, I could not go to sleep one night, as I was thinking about 'who did it'.
-- Multiple times, I yelled out loud at Samantha for making bad choices. Other times, I'm biting finger nails.
-- Narrator: ...Like wow... I love her performance. Very engaging, and how can so many convincing voices come from one person. I love how she interpreted the book.


Minuses:
-- I thought for sure that Samantha was going to have a stereo typical scene of running for her life on the fire-escape 13 floors up and needing to escape the killer my climbing down the fire escape. I just knew that her fear of heights was going to come into play. But still, it kept me guessing.

-- Last time I yelled at Samantha was:
--> Come on, be reasonable to Carter, don't be so picky... and eventually marry the guy!!

But overall, I truly loved book!

Great characters

The stand out in this story is definitely the characters, their rich make-up creates an engaging and interesting story.

I haven't read book one, and while I was still able to enjoy this book as a standalone, it was very clear that I was missing a lot of backstory and that knowing the backstory would make a difference. So if you haven't already, I recommend that you get book one first.

The mystery aspect of this story was well done, there were lots of possible suspects and it wasn't obvious who the culprit was until a fair way towards the end.

A thrilling listen, I really enjoyed it.

The narrator did a great job, the character voices were well done and the delivery had a good rhythm and tone to it.

I received a free copy of this book from the author and/or narrator and/or publisher and I voluntarily wrote this honest review.

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Riveting Story, Amazing Performance

The story had a perfect mix of intrigue, action, romance, and humor. It had me constantly on edge (I earned the marathon badge while listening). Natalie's performance was amazing! I look forward to more installments in this series.

Good story and narration.

Although, I did enjoy the story and narration I thought Carter sounded more like a beta male character. Very soft spoken and I felt like he was always running away. Samantha came off a little naive to me. I haven't read book 1 so there is obviously a whole back story between these two. I was voluntarily provided this free review copy audiobook by the author, narrator, or publisher.