Member Reviews

⭐⭐⭐⭐
The Wife's Mistake by Lorna Dounaeva, an audiobook narrated by Imogen Church psychological thriller full of twists and random activities.

These are really stretched 4⭐. If I had read this book it would be 3⭐. In this case, Imogen Church saved the book and my experience. She did fantastic narration! The voices she managed to pull and intonation, it was so enjoyable and sometimes so funny!

For a long time, I don't remember a book where characters (nearly all of them) could annoy me so much! Seriously, I am surprised I didn't break my eyes from rolling them constantly. I started to get really frustrated as the story was going everywhere and nowhere at the same time.

What I liked was the twists, there were some really good twists so at least that saved this book.

Natalie managed to guess the winning number so 12 million pounds are on the way if she is ready to claim it! A lot of back-and-forth actions happen until her husband Hayden finds a ticket and winning money is on the way... and everyone else as well! So things become complicated. Who can they trust? Can they trust each other? They both try to hide some secrets but they forget that if there are more than 2 people who know - the secret is not safe!

Thank you, NetGalley and Bookouture Audio for this copy, I am intrigued to explore more books by this author.

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The Wife's Mistake by Lorna Dounaeva ended up a pretty good thriller. I kind of thought of DNF'ing it early on because they win a lottery and I get jealous of it! But I ended up listening to the whole book and I did enjoy it. It was a bit too long in my opinion. However, it has an interesting and different story line and the characters are nice to get to know. It does have a good amount of twists. The audiobook version was skillfully narrated by Imogen Church. She is such a great narrator, I love everything she narrates! Great choice!
Thank you Bookouture Audio and NetGalley for providing me with an early copy of this audiobook.

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This book delivers its promise...there is a mistake, and a hundred others follow, each one with worse consequences than the last. The plot is twisty and unpredictable but at times like...what? Huh? But it's a fun listen with a talented narrator, with the exception of one character. If you're looking for people to like this may not be your bag, but an enjoyable Scottish domestic thriller. I'm intrigued enough to try more of Lorna Dounaeva's stories.

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This audio was good. I liked the narrator and the storyline. There really wasn't any characters that I liked except for Marianne.
So many lies, cheating, and secrets kept from family and friends, People they all supposed to love.
Thank you to NetGalley for the audio to review.

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The Wife's Mistake by Lorna Dounaeva is an hold on to your seat English ride full of twists and turns. The characters were interesting, and well defined by the narrator. I enjoyed this audio book from beginning all the way through to the surprise ending.

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This is my first book by Lorna Dournaeva and I had heard some good things. It was an enjoyable listen and very different.

This book is about Natalie, who is bored with life, unhappy and working an unfulfilling job as a barista dreams of opening up her own coffee shop one day… That one day is sooner than she thought when she decides to play the lottery and wins 12 million dollars but instead of telling her husband aka Hayden, she keeps it a secret because she’s got some suspicion that he’s cheating on her after she saw a message on his phone from another woman just before she was about to tell him that she’d won. Unfortunately, Hayden discovered the winning ticket on his own and they ended up cashing it in and going halves. As soon as they have, things begin to change and people are after them and their money. It’s left them unsure of who to trust, they are even having trouble trusting each other. These two both have so many secrets…What they thought they’d put in the past, has come to the surface and what they thought would make their life better has put their life at risk with threats coming from every direction.


Let me tell you now,… This book was full of twists and turns… my head was spinning, at one stage, I felt like it was going to fall off and roll away! Even though this book was intense, it also had its moments where I found myself laughing at Natalie and Hayden’s banter.
It’s a perfect slow burn and the wait is so worth it. The plot twists towards the end were jaw-dropping!

Mind. Freaking. Blown!

4 STARS!!

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Imogen Church's narration in the audio version of this book was amazing, and Lorna Dounaeva’s writing style was absolutely captivating. I found myself easily picturing every scene and becoming thoroughly invested in the storyline! There were so many twists and turns and with each chapter I was kept on the edge of my seat anticipating what would happen next. The pace picked up significantly in the second half of the book but I did enjoy the setup of the story, even tho it was a little slower paced. As a newbie to this author's work, I'm excited to explore more of her books!

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This book had a lot of turns that I was not expecting! The narrator was excellent and I enjoyed listening to it.

There was lot going on and it wss a bit hard to follow at times. There were parts that dragged on for a long time.

The storyline was interesting but I didn’t get that it was a mystery until about half way through.

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The Wife's Mistake by Lorna Dounaeva had me drawn to the book the whole time. I used the audiobook version Narrated by Imogen Church. The way Imogen delivered the book kept me engaged and wanting to finish the book quickly. The tone of voice they had used was well thought-out and gave you the suspense you needed.

A book about a husband and wife who are just trying to make ends meet and working hard to keep their roof over their heads, win the lottery. Natalie who expected something was going on with her husband hide the ticket for safe keeping until she found out the truth. One day she came home and Hayden had already found the ticket and called it in. From that day forward their lives had changed and one would probably agree it was not for the best. As the story progress you go through a bunch of twists and turns until you reach the ending.

This book kept me engaged until the end. I do have to say the start was a little hard to get into but once I was hooked, I was hooked and ready to finish listening to the story. The suspense of the book is what kept me wanting to read and find out what happened.
Thank you, NetGalley for allowing me to listen to the audiobook and give my review. Thank you, Lorna Dounaeva, for spending the time to write this book. I look forward to reading other books by you.

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I wanted to love this book; a couple with substantial financial struggles wins the lottery and finds out it's not quite what they thought it would be? Count me in. Unfortunately I felt like that plot (win the lotto but things go badly) didn't start until almost halfway through the book. I saw an author once say a story should start as close to the action as possible, and all I kept thinking while I was reading was man if she had cut everything before they cash the ticket this would probably be golden. I just felt like it took way, way too long to get to the point. Then, the back half of the book was nearly the complete opposite. It moved very quickly and had a couple interesting plot twists but tried to take on too much. I think this book would have benefited from a deep storyline edit. I listened to it and I believe it said it was 11 hours? It probably would have a been a great book if cut back to 8.

I also typically love Imogen Church, but really struggled with the narration in this case. I'm not sure if it was the way the characters were written (I'm sure it was to some extent) but a lot of the secondary characters were annoying to listen to.

I think this author definitely has potential, but definitely needs a shorter, more streamlined approach to the story.

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Rating: 2/5 stars

This story was honestly all over the place and very confusing. The premise of the book and the intention behind all of it was good, it's why I kept going, but there were so many different conflicts and mysteries that were occurring that it was quite difficult to follow. The Wife's Mistake would be so much better if it was simplified, which in turn would make it shorter and easier to get invested in the story.

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The audiobook narrator, Imogen Church was phenomenal. Loved the lottery-winning premise but oh my gosh, I had no idea what kind of wild ride this would take me on! Lots of twists and turns that kept me wanting to listen to more! Thank you Netgalley and Bookouture Audio for the ARC.

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Absolutely brilliant!

Edge of my seat reading, every fear I'd have about winning the lottery was covered!

A roller-coaster of a book with so many twists that I kinda hated how much I loved it!

Very well narrated, great story - I highly recommend this book.

Thanks so much to the author, via Bookouture Audio at Netgalley for the opportunity to listen to this one.

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What a fun read! I could not guess where the book was headed at any point in the story.

Pros:
✅ Twisty, domestic thriller
✅ Intriguing hook
✅ Short, engaging chapters
✅ Interesting characters

Cons:
❌ No central plotline
❌ Some inconsistency in character actions
❌ Some subplots were not followed through on

A note on the NetGalley audiobook–chapter 27 was not available and each attempt to access it crashed the app.

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The layers to the plot as you get to the end make it worth the read! Got to read this with an ARC of the book. The beginning of the book felt a little disconnected - I found myself second guessing if I had read the right cover description in the first few chapters, but as I kept going further into the story I found it interesting because of all the intermingled plots. I do wish there had been a bit more of the story in some of the latter transitions but overall I loved that even the parts I had sorta figured out had some elements that got me with a “oh, I wasn’t expecting that to happen” - there are so many characters intertwined and at the end it leaves you thinking about how all of it could have been so different if the first events had never happened .

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This book was so twisty and fun. I was hooked from the prologue. I don’t want to divulge too much, but it gets messy.

I was not a huge fan of the narrator, but she wasn't all that bad.

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The Wife’s Mistake
By: Lorna Dounaeva
🎧 Imogen Church
4💰💰💰💰

Imagine winning the lottery and you’re not sure if your spouse should know! You think they are unfaithful and you want to get your life in order so as not to share! I enjoyed that this was a different plot from anything I had ever read before!
💰
Choices have consequences, and blackmail and foolish mistakes can hurt anyone, least of all who you expected! I love the narrator Imogen Church who is perfect the voices and reflection.
💰
Thank you Netgalley and Bookouture for this advance copy out February 19.
#thewifesmistake, #lornadounaeva, #booksconnectus, #bookoutureaudio, #imogenchurch
#bookstagram, #stamperlady50

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This book was not at all what I thought it would be. The summary seemed very intriguing, but the actual plot was incredibly dull. Further, the summary doesn't at all touch on the actual premise of the book: what happens when you win the lottery. I had no idea this would be a plotline, let alone *the* plotline. The summary was very misleading, as everything touched on in the summary doesn't even start until the second half of the book. I did, however, enjoy the narration. Imogen Church did a great job selling the emotional dialogue!

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Thank you to @NetGalley and @bookouture for another thrilling read! I read the ebook and listened to the audiobook. Absolutely LOVED this suspenseful thriller!

Wining the lottery isn’t always for the best…it may just be your demise.

Natalie and Hayden are struggling, middle-aged, newlyweds that win 12.5 million pounds. At first, Natalie keeps her win secret from Hayden, worried that he may or may not be cheating with his Megan Fox look-alike co-worker. Upon winning the lottery, unbeknownst to her husband, Natalie quits her job, starts looking for coffee shop venues and splurging on small purchases and uber rides.

All the while, as Natalie concealed her secret lottery win, I was a complete anxiety ridden mess! I kept waiting for someone to steal her hidden winning ticket or it to be lost. The author did a great job in building tension, making you feel like the story was headed in that direction! It was seriously AGONIZING and had me at the edge of my seat!

Natalie and Hayden claim their wining ticket and start to build the life of their dreams as true colors are shown, buried secrets discovered and a whole lot of deceit takes place. Natalie starts getting threatening messages and a long lost daughter comes out of the woodwork.

This book had me glued from the fist sentence to the last! A definite dramatic and suspenseful thriller that did not dissapoint!

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"The Wife's Mistake" by Lorna Dounaeva is a compelling domestic thriller with an engaging storyline that keeps readers hooked. The narrative unfolds at a steady pace, gradually revealing secrets and conflicts and relationships. “The Wife's Mistake" is an entertaining read that will satisfy fans of the genre looking for a suspenseful escape.

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