The Guilt Trip by Sandie Jones (2021) Snapshot

We follow Ali, her fiancee Will and 4 of his oldest friends Rachel, Jack, Paige, and Noah, as they attend Ali and Will’s destination wedding in Portugal. Throughout the weekend, secrets will surface and threaten marriages and friendships. At the end of the trip, all of their lives will have changed forever. 

I love Jones’s work and her characters. I slowly got to know them, but at the same time felt like I knew them forever. Each one had their unique personality and voice, and their entanglement was almost a character in itself. 

The plot was intriguing and promising, so I am sad to say that the execution fell short for me. I’m shucking it to wrong expectations, though. I was expecting this to be a fast-paced, twisty, and turny, batshit crazy book. It was more of a slow-burning character-focused story than I had anticipated. My opinion is not on Sandie Jones, her narrative is compelling, and I will be picking up more of her books; I was just in the mood for more action.

I first read The Guilt Trip as an audiobook produced by Macmillan Audio and narrated by Clara Corbett. I really enjoyed her narration style; she delivered a well-paced story that made it easy for me to both follow the story and identify the characters. I look forward to reading more books narrated by her. With that said, I feel that The Guilt Trip would have worked better as full-cast audio. 

All in all, I do recommend this book as a solid summer read, and I can’t wait to check Sandie Jones’s other novels.

My total rating: 4.25

Until next book, be the hummingbird!