Name: We Could Be Beautiful
ISBN: 9781101912188

Swan Huntley

Catherine West has spent her entire life surrounded by beautiful things. She owns an immaculate Manhattan apartment, she buys exquisite handbags and clothing, and she's constantly redecorating. And yet, despite all this, she still feels empty. After two broken engagements and boyfriends who wanted only her money, she is haunted by the fear that she'll never have a family of her own. One night, at an art opening, Catherine meets William Stockton, a handsome man who shares her impeccable taste and whose parents even shared a personal connection with Catherine's family years ago. But as he and Catherine grow closer, she begins to encounter strange signs. Her mother, now suffering lapses in memory, seems to hate William on sight, and cryptic entries in her diary warn that no one is to be trusted. Is William lying about his past? And if so, is Catherine willing to sacrifice their beautiful life in order to find the truth?

We Could Be Beautiful

A spellbinding psychological debut novel, Swan Huntley's We Could Be Beautiful is the story of a wealthy woman who has everything--and yet can trust no one. Catherine West has spent her entire life surrounded by beautiful things. She owns an immaculate Manhattan apartment, she collects fine art, she buys exquisite handbags and clothing, and she constantly redecorates her home. And yet, despite all this, she still feels empty. She sees her personal trainer, she gets weekly massages, and occasionally she visits her mother and sister on the Upper East Side, but after two broken engagements and boyfriends who wanted only her money, she is haunted by the fear that she'll never have a family of her own. One night, at an art opening, Catherine meets William Stockton, a handsome man who shares her impeccable taste and love of beauty. He is educated, elegant, and even has a personal connection--his parents and Catherine's parents were friends years ago. But as he and Catherine grow closer, she begins to encounter strange signs, and her mother, Elizabeth (now suffering from Alzheimer's), seems to have only bad memories of William as a boy. In Elizabeth's old diary she finds an unnerving letter from a former nanny that cryptically reads: "We cannot trust anyone . . . " Is William lying about his past? And if so, is Catherine willing to sacrifice their beautiful life in order to find the truth? Featuring a fascinating heroine who longs for answers but is blinded by her own privilege, We Could Be Beautiful is a glittering, seductive, utterly surprising story of love, money, greed, and family.

What the heck did I just read?  Let me start by saying that this book is in NO WAY a thriller much less a psychological thriller.  It really is pushing it with a “mystery”.  Spoiled trust fund baby Catherine West has all the money in the world.  She shops, redecorates, shops, dates, buys art.  Wash, rinse, repeat throughout the entire book.  She finds her true love, looses her fortune and has to get pregnant to gain it back.  There is ONE twist in the entire book and it’s toward the end.  It happens and just as quickly it gets resolved and brushed under the rug.  Back to shopping.  It really was a waste of time.

Trigger warning:  abortion, sexual content, some language, verbal abuse of dementia elderly.

Barbara Williford

What the heck did I just read?  Let me start by saying that this book is in NO WAY a thriller much less a psychological thriller.  It really is pushing it with a “mystery”.  Spoiled trust fund baby Catherine West has all the money in the world.  She shops, redecorates, shops, dates, buys art.  Wash, rinse, repeat throughout the entire book.  She finds her true love, looses her fortune and has to get pregnant to gain it back.  There is ONE twist in the entire book and it’s toward the end.  It happens and just as quickly it gets resolved and brushed under the rug.  Back to shopping.  It really was a waste of time.

Trigger warning:  abortion, sexual content, some language, verbal abuse of dementia elderly.

Haylie

Swan Huntley has a pacing problem. 

Maybe it's because I read her latest work before the debut, but trust me, it's apparent all-around. I don't know if it's a stylistic thing she thinks is cool or what, but it's happened twice and it does a disservice to the reader.

In WCBB, we follow Catherine West in her luxurious life - the massages, the hobby "job", the shopping - an effective way to promote that our narrator is aloof and out of touch with reality beyond her 1% realm, but when you really want some action to break up the monotony, you get the ~insert mysterious guy here~ schtick. OF COURSE, he's everything West wanted as a lonely, rich woman in her mid-40's, it's so by the book that it's really disappointing.

SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS

Other than some outbursts from her mother (that reveal nothing), the reader spends most of their time reading about West being wooed, moving in with her stranger lover quickly, and planning a wedding. When a ~reveal~ appears in regards to West's finances, the impact is muffled because of how obvious it was because of the mention of her throwing out her bank mail at every turn.

Things get juicy - but only for a moment - when it's revealed there's a connection between Lover Boy and Mommy Dearest, but our narrator is too dumb to even be cautious at this halfway point in WCBB. It's a chore to read her make defense after defense of her fiancee when even she continues to ask herself: who IS this guy? I feel like this is something where some true detective work could blossom and not wait to be hastily added in (like it was after more than half of the books was done). I was more interested in seeing what West was up to looking in her family's storage unit for clues with her BFF and pursuing the nanny than I was on all the time spent going over dialogue with her wedding planner. 

I'm not saying there's a lack of detective work, but it's too much too late. We get the moment when she finds her mother's journal, then suddenly we get the nanny hunt, then it takes forever for the meeting between West and the nanny, then the reveal from the nanny feels rushed, and then we're in this weird limbo where ONLY NOW does West wonder where her fiancee has run off to. 

Then it's back to more action items that seem added in just to check off some boxes: little boy fiancee tutors is scared of the guy more so implying he's a creep rather than a guy that hates kids, suddenly fiancee grabs West a little too roughly for the FIRST TIME and leaves a giant bruise on her arm OUT OF NOWHERE. These are cast off because of the fact that the threat doesn't have a solid foundation. Did West's fiancee do something creepy or violent to her mom? No? Um????

Then we're here at the last bit of action where it's like: boom, your fiancee slept with your drunk mom (but we're going to ignore the fact that this is like a double rape since he was only 17 and she was drunk) and then suddenly you learn your sister is your fiancee's daughter with your mother? 

The way WCBB was slapped together in the end and the cheesy "I just needed love after all" ending is so...tacky and messy. If you need to have a 400-page book and have the most important actions and info be present when you're in the 300-page mark, then you need to cut down the clutter in that's weighing down the beginning of your story. Jesus.

Hayat

Kelsi Proulx

I had high hopes for this book but I found the main character so obstinately, almost intentionally, naive and ignorant that she just drove me nuts. She has never had to live without money so when she loses everything she panics. Like what a nightmare to live without $80,000 a month that she doesn't have to work for...welcome to real life! *Eye roll.* The whole book she completely ignores any hints that might have set her on a better path. She also completely erases herself to please the man she is with because she is just so desperate...Not much mystery to speak of either. This is not a book I would recommend.

A spellbinding psychological debut novel, Swan Huntley's We Could Be Beautiful is the story of a wealthy woman who has everything—and yet can trust no one. Catherine West has spent her entire life surrounded by beautiful things. She owns an immaculate Manhattan apartment, she collects fine art, she buys exquisite handbags and clothing, and she constantly redecorates her home. And yet, despite all this, she still feels empty. She sees her personal trainer, she gets weekly massages, and occasionally she visits her mother and sister on the Upper East Side, but after two broken engagements and boyfriends who wanted only her money, she is haunted by the fear that she'll never have a family of her own. One night, at an art opening, Catherine meets William Stockton, a handsome man who shares her impeccable taste and love of beauty. He is educated, elegant, and even has a personal connection—his parents and Catherine's parents were friends years ago. But as he and Catherine grow closer, she begins to encounter strange signs, and her mother, Elizabeth (now suffering from Alzheimer's), seems to have only bad memories of William as a boy. In Elizabeth's old diary she finds an unnerving letter from a former nanny that cryptically reads: "We cannot trust anyone . . . " Is William lying about his past? And if so, is Catherine willing to sacrifice their beautiful life in order to find the truth? Featuring a fascinating heroine who longs for answers but is blinded by her own privilege, We Could Be Beautiful is a glittering, seductive, utterly surprising story of love, money, greed, and family.

A Novel

Lauren Attaway

Interesting character study

Not as suspenseful as I usually prefer, but a neat, nasty little glimpse into a blessedly unlikeable female protagonist's life.

Renee Blankenship

“It took me a long time to understand that what I had wanted was not a picture of something perfect. I already had that. What I had wanted was the feeling inside the pictures, the thing I had been trying to buy and drink and eat and not eat and fake my way to all my life. I wanted what everyone wanted. I wanted love.”

I love this quote. How real is that feeling in our land of Instagram and Facebook and Snapchat? Its SO SO easy to see something online and then see it again and again in various permutations and think "Oh, I want that." and then "Oh, I want people to think I have that too." Without even realize you're doing it. 

Swan Huntley's We Could Be Beautiful was so much of that sentiment, wrapped up in a twisty thriller of sorts. Catherine is a thirty something Manhattan woman with seemingly the "perfect" life. Fancy apartment, clothes, owner of a boutique card shop, spa days and a massages...all those things that cost money. What she doesn't have is love, which is a resounding theme throughout the story and the thing that makes her question what she's really doing with her life. When she meets William, a man with similar tastes, she immediately falls for him. He says and does all the right things. And she wants so desperately to love someone and be married and have all those married couple things. As their relationship continues she starts to pick up on some strange signs, words from her mother's diary, little things that make her wonder if William is being truthful about his past and their connection through their parents long ago. The ending was a bit of a shocker to me and something I'm not sure would really ever happen, but still good none the less, with where it leaves Catherine emotionally. 

There was a lot about this book that I loved. Reading this story through Catherine's privileged viewpoint was kind of like putting on a pair of fancy shoes and pretending you wear them everyday to work (and not just once a year on your birthday). I know some reviewers mentioned a disconnect because of this but I really loved reading about fancy lunches and dresses from Bloomingdales and buying art (real art!). It made the story more enjoyable, slipping on that lens for a while and viewing the world as if money was no object. 

I also loved that Catherine was able to come down from all of that "privilege" and learn something from the lack of responsibility she'd had for so long when it came to money. As much as this book was a page turner trying to figure out what William was really up to, it was also about Catherine figuring out whats really important, love.

We Could Be Beautiful

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