Everyone Who Can Forgive Me Is Dead

A Novel

By: Jenny Hollander

Narrated by: Marisa Calin

What if everything you know about the worst night of your life turns out not to be true?

Nine years ago, with the world's eyes on her, Charlie Colbert fled. The press and the police called Charlie a "witness" to the nightmarish events at her elite graduate school on Christmas Eve—events known to the public as "Scarlet Christmas"—though Charlie knows she was much more than that.

Now, Charlie has meticulously rebuilt her life: She's the editor-in-chief of a major magazine, engaged to the golden child of the publishing industry, and hell-bent on never, ever letting her guard down again. But when a buzzy film made by one of Charlie's former classmates threatens to shatter everything she's worked for, Charlie realizes how much she's changed in nine years. Now, she's not going to let anything—not even the people she once loved most—get in her way.

A Macmillan Audio production from Minotaur Books.

©2024 Jenny Hollander (P)2024 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

"A twisty, thrilling story you won't be able to put down."—Town & Country

​"​Witty, tightly plotted, knife-sharp, and utterly immersive, ​Everyone Who Can Forgive Me Is Dead had me flaking on plans to squeeze in one more chapter. Fans of Jessica Knoll and Megan Miranda, meet your new favorite author.​"​—Andrea Bartz, New York Times bestselling author of The Spare Room​

"Jenny Hollander’s Everyone Who Can Forgive Me is Dead is exactly the kind of thriller I love. It’s a deliciously conflicting feeling to wonder when the shiny perfection of a new life built over a terrible secret will begin to tarnish, and in her first novel, Hollander doles out the suspense as masterfully as any veteran author. Honestly, this book had me at 'Scarlet Christmas'. A dark and dazzling debut."—Jennifer Hillier, award-winning and bestselling author of Things We Do in the Dark

I really WANTED to Love This Book

I anticipated this book for months! I was so excited to read it, even when reviews started coming out and they weren’t great I didn’t care. I was a little disappointed others didn’t like it but I felt like I would and I still couldn’t wait to get started.

*Sigh*

This book is about 8 chapters too long. It just goes on and on and onnnnn without ever getting anywhere. And just when you think you’re about to get somewhere, you don’t.

I didn’t want to DNF bc I had been so excited to read and I kept hoping it would pickup and get good. It did not.

And in the last two to three chapters where things start coming together (finally!!) it’s really hard to keep up with. Really hard. I’m not sure if I can adequately explain it, but the way she toggles back and forth between them and now is wild. And the way she introduces “John” in the last chapter… I mean maybe it’s just me bc I was already so aggravated and confused but wow. Maybe that would work in a movie adaptation but this was insane. All attempts at plot twists and surprises were really just more confusing than shocking. I can even say enough how much I hate writing this bad review. I wanted to love it. But it took me weeks to finish bc I would stop from being annoyed.


Anyway. Sadly the previous reviews I read were all correct. This was disappointing.

Bad ripoff of Luckies Girl Alive

Seemed like a told adult novel and the audio made it 100% more insufferable that the book was on its own. This was like a bad YA version of Luckiest Girl Alive.

Boring

This is boring, disjointed, and not at all engaging. The writing is choppy, The plot is messy and is not cohesive. Overall, it is a pointless and unpolished effort.

Great suspenseful story that's not too graphic

This is the kind of engaging story that's perfect for a car trip -- even one with multiple generations! It's not too explicit and it's told in flashbacks, the kind that reveal what happened little by little, until you're totally sucked in and can't wait to know what happens next. (Also, the author has a dry sense of humor which is a nice bonus!)