The Cousins

4.5

Book source ~ Tour

Milly, Aubrey, and Jonah Story are the grandkids of Mildred Story who disinherited her own four children twenty-four years ago. The kids, Adam, Anders, Allison, and Archer, never understood why. They only received a letter through the family lawyer that said, “You know what you did.” But they don’t. Or so they say. When the now teenaged grands each get an invitation to work the summer at the family resort, they are resentful, but also a bit curious about the grandmother they never met. So they go (with much pushing from their parents) and, whoa boy, they have intrigue coming out of their ass. Not literally.

Strap yourselves in because this is going to be a wild ride. Not so much action-packed, but full of show more questions, a few answers, more questions, holy shit moments, and finally answers. Wow. There’s a few spots where the story drags just a tiny bit, throwing me off my stride, but on the whole, it flows smooth as delicious frozen custard. Mmmmm. Where was I? Oh yeah! The cousins are fully fleshed out (and likeable!), there are multiple POVs, so I was able to see it in 360º technicolor and the plot, while being a teensy bit over the top, is still a doozy. I highly recommend this twisty-turny YA Mystery. show less

Milly , Jonh and Aubrey have never known their grandmother since she disinherited her four children back in 1996 with the terse note "You know what you did." So it is very surprising for each of them to receive a letter asking them to work over Summer at their grandmother's resort. Milly dreams of being rich, Aubrey wants to please her parents and Jonah wants revenge, so all three say yes. But things aren't what they seem as when they arrive, their grandmother knows nothing about the letter and disappears to Boston. As well as this, one of the cousins is holding a deep secret.
Fascinating mystery with lots of plot twists and turns and red herrings thrown in to boot. The ending is sort of satisfying although I don't think the villains show more could really have carried off such a complicated ruse - I believe they would have been discovered long before the cousins came along. BUT, if you can suspend that thought it makes for engrossing reading. From the author that brought us "One of us is lying". show less

I said I'd only read a chapter or two and it ended up being all of it. It's almost 6am in the morning and it'd be a disservice not to ramble incoherently during the afterglow of this great great story.
Saying this was a good book would be the greatest understatement ever. This was one white-knuckle ride of a book and the road was bumpy as all hell, in the best possible way.

You think you have the story figured out? Hell no, you're gravely mistaken. You think grandma is here to receive you with open arms and tea? Wrong once again.
Granny and her shady backstory is going to beat your sorry ass up and by God, you'll enjoy it.

Read this cursed book if you enjoy being constantly tricked and gaslighted. Once again, in the best possible way.

(May show more have got a lil crush too but shhhhhhhh.) show less

Teen fiction makes for great escapist reading. My latest escape is New York Times bestselling author Karen M. McManus' new book, The Cousins.

The Cousins has all the right elements - three teens who are related, but haven't seen each other since they were young. Their parents don't speak to each other either and everyone has been estranged from the family matriarch for twenty five years. Her choice. She made it clear with a "You know what you did' letter to her four children. So, Milly, Aubrey, and Jonah Story are quite surprised to be invited to Gull Cove Island to work for their grandmother's resort. The three are excited and hope to meet her. But things don't go quite as imagined...

The three leads are great - all with different show more personalities, strengths and weaknesses. Their interactions ring true with believable dialogue. I think Aubrey was my favorite character - she grows as the book progresses. They are each given a voice with their own chapters. Also given a historical voice are the parents - from when they were teens on the island. This gives the reader a chance to have a different perspective, knowing more about the why and the what of that ' You know what you did' letter.

The setting is well imagined and easy to picture. (I want to be on the beach!) But it is the mystery of what happened all those years ago that drives the book forward. The three are slowly putting things together....and then BAM....McManus throws in a twist, a revelation and promptly turns things in a different direction. I love being caught off guard and kept on my toes. And the last page provides one last gotcha.

The book moves along at a good clip with those twists. There's a romantic subplot that is well done and doesn't overshadow the mystery. There are some truths woven into the book as well - family relationships are complicated and messy sometimes.....

The Cousins was a fun, lazy Sunday read for me. show less

So not going to lie, but Karen McManus is quickly becoming one of my YA authors. Why? Well, first of all, having an author write something OTHER than fantasy/dystopian is a rarity these days ;) Additionally, I believe she creates an intriguing world that the reader wants to know more about.

The Cousins had a lot of hype (in my mind) to live up to. After all, I practically devoured One of Us is Lying and One of Us in Next. Now, the Cousins is a bit slower paced; I was a little bored initially as I expected the mystery (of three cousins summoned by their grandmother, the grandmother they had never met, the grandmother who had disowned their parents) to hit the ground running. It didn't do that. Rather, it was a slow burn that built to an show more engaging climax.

Some reviewers here claim that the ending did not make sense. On the contrary, I felt a lot of actions were explained. Whereas we had three point of views set in the current time, there was only one telling the back story. I would have enjoyed seeing the events play out from ALL parental perspectives (since we did for the cousins anyway).

The ending that the Grandmother had already died twenty-four years earlier was a fantastic twist and I did not quite predict it. I didn't see the twist that one of the cousins was not really a cousin but someone hired to masquerade as one. So for that, I really appreciate Karen McManus. No one wants to read a mystery where they already can predict plot turns.

There are some characters you root for and others, dang, they SUCK. You want what is coming to them! You feel the pain of Archer's alcoholism and Allison's miscarriage. You understand the secrets Millie, Aubrey, and Jonah want to keep buried. But here is the thing with secrets....as the reader discovers.....secrets always have a way of being found out. show less

This book alternates between the past and present, as well as between several POVs. Milly, Aubrey, and Jonah Story are cousins. They hardly know each other, but they're united by family mysteries and drama. Twenty-four years ago, wealthy Mildred Story shocked everyone by suddenly disinheriting all four of her children. The only explanation she gave was a letter sent through her lawyer that said "You know what you did." Mildred has refused to have any contact with her children since then, and she's certainly never contacted her grandchildren.

Until now. Out of the blue, Milly, Aubrey, and Jonah have been invited to spend the summer working at one of Mildred's properties, the Gull Cove Resort. None of them particularly want to go there, show more but their parents, hopeful that Mildred might be softening in her old age, don't give them much of a choice.

The Story family has more secrets than any of the cousins ever realized, and Gull Cove Resort is going to give them an opportunity to find them all out.

I think this might be the best of McManus' books I've read so far. It does start off a bit slow, with only a few hints of potential "rich people" drama to keep readers interested, and I never really got into the scenes set in the past as much as the scenes in the present. Eventually, however, the hints of something else going on under the surface became more intriguing.

Milly and Aubrey were a great pair - I loved their interactions and the friendship blossoming between sunshiney Aubrey and cool and sharp Milly. I was iffier about Jonah, especially since McManus seemed to be hinting at a development I wasn't wild about (thankfully that went better than I initially expected it would).

Maybe I just read this at the right time - it was nice to read a YA thriller that didn't take place at school, and I was definitely in the mood for a little rich people drama - but for the most part I really enjoyed this.

Extras:

A book club discussion guide and an interview with the author.

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.) show less

This book started slow, and even the shifting between the viewpoints of the three cousins didn't really help with that. It did do good things for filling in a range of background, as well as setting up a number of details that didn't become relevant until much later.

It wasn't until the first major twist, at something like a quarter or a third through, where I started getting invested. I have some spoilery thoughts about the twists and turns of this story, so I've put that below.

For all that I found this slow paced, according to the reading app it too me an hour (across multiple commutes) to finish, which seems much shorter than I would have assumed.

I loved that most of the twists had to do with identity. And that the various people show more all had such interesting ways of interlacing their two selves. There are definitely some parallels that can be drawn between being a Story (or pretending not to be) and pretending to be a Story.

I was frustrated by the inevitable confrontation followed by risk to life and limb, but eh, I accept that that is a trope of the genre. It is just one of the things that make me not love the murder mystery genre. show less