"In My Dreams I Hold a Knife": A Story of Hope and Self-Discovery

Amazon Customer: 3.5, I wish there was more depth to some of the characters and that we were better able to understand their motives.

I didn’t hate Jess but she definitely wasn’t someone I was rotting for throughout the book and it was frustrating to see everything work out for her despite her constant betrayal of her friends and poor decision making.

United States on Mar 05, 2024

Krysty MalysKrysty Malys: From the outset, this book just seemed like another whodunit murder mystery, which, thanks to Jeneva Rose, I’ve found out I love. 🔥

But in reality, this book read more like a commentary on the human condition. Winstead splayed out inner secrets so raw and really put out how we carry baggage we tell absolutely no one about, even our closest friends. She laid out in detail how that pain, those secrets, rip apart families and friendships. The prose in the book was almost poetic to me. Heartbreaking and brutal.

Would give it ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ on the mystery and the whodunit alone. I would give it six stars and break the damn scale if I could.

United States on Feb 06, 2024

uthayakumar ramasamy: i bought it for my sister and she loved it

Canada on Dec 25, 2023

Nicole M WhisnerNicole M Whisner: In My Dreams I Hold a Knife
by Ashley Winstead
4.5/ 5 ⭐️

It has been ten years since they stood on campus. Ten years since they were together as the East House Seven. Ten years since Heather’s murder stained their college years. Now at Duquette University Reunion Weekend, they are together again but still haunted by the events of that toxic night.

Jessica Miller is finally going to prove everyone wrong and show them the confident, successful woman she has become. Ten years ago, she lost everything including her one true love because of Heather. Her plan backfired when the reunion turns dark and fatal. Even though Jessica has moved on, not everyone else has. Secrets and memories of that deadly night surface and one person is determined to find the real killer and make them pay.

WOW! This book was a wild ride of characters, flashbacks, and hidden truths. The alternating timeline between then and now was beautifully choreographed. There are a lot of characters to comprehend in the beginning, but the characters drove this book. Each and every character is deceitful and shady. I’ll be honest, I thought I had figured the whole mystery out and was a...

United States on Jul 30, 2023

Rachael M: Oh, my, goodness! The hype for this book was real, and it was not misplaced at all. This was my favourite book of November ❤️.

This book is told in duel timelines: then and now. The two timelines are interwoven together perfectly to slowly drip feed us trickles of information that kept me guessing until the very last pages... I constantly had different theories, and everyone of them was wrong. In the end it was shock after shock after shock.

I loved the character development in this book. Every character felt so real and was so deliciously flawed that I was enthralled. The East House Seven characters are a bunch of liars, cheaters, stalkers, drug dealers, and drug addicts. Their strong friendship bond consists of lies, betrayal, and rivalry.

The other thing I loved about this book is how well timed every single twist and turn is. Some of them left me gobsmacked. I loved this wild, action packed, trickery, whodunnit premise so much and devoured it at one sit!

I think I may have a slight crush on Coop, he is just the perfect bad boy made good!

I liked going back and forth between different timelines which give enough clues about characters’...

Australia on Mar 12, 2023

Angie67: This was one of my most anticipated reads of this year. I couldn't wait to get my hands on it after seeing some bookstas raving enthusiastically about it.

I have to say that I was not disappointed.

If you love academic thrillers, you can't miss out on this one.

I loved the dual timeline which is very well done in this book as we follow the reunion of former college friends (minus a dead one) today and the story of what really happened ten years ago.

First of all thank you @mariesembar for buddy reading this with me and explaining everything I needed to know about sororities and US colleges. I would have been lost without you.
 
We follow Jessica Miller who is determined to steal the show from everyone at her reunion with her once closest friends at the elite Duquette University. Today she is a successful woman, well dressed and nothing like the lost girl she once was when her roommate Heather was murdered and her life sealed forever.

At the time, everyone was sure that Jack, Heather's boyfriend, was responsible for the murder, but the police could never find any evidence. When the group is unexpectedly confronted by Eric, Heather's...

Italy on Aug 16, 2022

Gabrielle GrosbetyGabrielle Grosbety: “My life was a narrative I couldn’t parse, full of conflicting evidence.”

For a while, it was quite comforting, perhaps strangely so given the genre, to always have this book to return to to break up what I was otherwise doing, especially amidst finals. I relished in being part of this world that tilted slightly, dangerously, on its axis, drawing suspicion towards every character by the end. With the thought that each was imperfect, damaged, and at most turns messy, but definitely, undeniably, twistingly human. Author Ashley Winstead just does it right. She exacts from each character turmoil and powerfully unearths the shameful, ugly parts that they desperately wish to keep hidden from others. There were also little, surprising undertones of dark humor woven in, which only strengthened the story and made me just unabashedly feel and feel deeply and pensively.

“But in a flash, a vision of torn blond hair, sticky and red, matted against white sheets. I shook my head, pushing away the glitch.”

Now, for the actual story: Jessica Miller, the narrator, breathlessly, urgently craves perfection, always has since college where she meets and becomes part of...

United States on May 02, 2022

Jade: Went between e-book & audio but mostly e-book.

This kind of book is hard to navigate a review for especially being a murder mystery. So, in part there's possibly going to be spoilers.

<b><i> “It was my secret shame: I wanted, I wanted, I wanted”</b></i>

Firstly, as a person who reads mostly romance books and needs to like the Main Characters I had to switch off from that because it's a very different dynamic.

Jessica is our narrator - the Main Character in a sense but we get to know the other Main Characters too as they are all connected.

Jessica is obsessed with perfection. She's obsessed with being the very thing she apparently raged against. I disliked her and that dislike turned to hatred. She's unlikable. I thought she was psychopathic the more we get to know her and her obsession with goodness. From the second we meet her - even a decade out from leaving college behind her - she is driven by being the centre of everyones attention. Even the whole reunion for her is about being *seen*. If morals are knocking at the the door she's not answering. I'm not sure anything will ever be enough. For me she is...

United Kingdom on Apr 11, 2022

Alisa: Six Friends.
One college reunion.
One unsolved murder.
😱 😱 😱

In My Dreams I Hold A Knife is a debut by Ashley Winstead that seriously packs a punch! This book had all the elements which I love and I was completely absorbed and devoured it. But not too quickly because I wanted to savour all the juicy details 😉. The college setting/reunion, dual time lines and characters which you kind of hate but love at the same time, plus an unsolved murder = winner for me. As with all “hyped” books I avoided reading reviews or the synopsis when I got the book and just went in blind so I had no expectations. And I loved it! If you’re a fan of dark academia, plenty of drama and a layered story which peels away beautifully with each page, give this a read.

I seriously had a book hang over after this one.

This was a perfect summer read!!!!!

Canada on Aug 20, 2021