In Alice Feeney’s latest novel BEAUTIFUL UGLY, the reader meets Grady, an author who has lost his writing mojo since his wife Abby’s disappearance a year ago. When his agent offers him the use of her inherited cabin on a remote Scottish island (population: under 30), Grady jumps at it. Once there, he sees what looks like his missing wife and also finds a completed manuscript of a recently deceased writer. If you enjoyed THE PLOT, THE SEQUEL, or YELLOWFACE, you’ll see echoes of those plots in this one. In my opinion, those novels were a tad stronger than this one though. 

I really enjoyed the novel up until Grady got to the island. The island life got a little frustrating for me as a reader, as Grady seemed to lose almost all agency and IQ points. It was entertaining enough, and, while my early guess about the plot wasn’t completely correct, it was close enough. 

There are two audiobook narrators for this novel (one male, one female). The male author gets more air time, as Grady’s perspective is most of the book. There are some sound effects added which do make the audio feel more atmospheric. Those effects tend to be at the beginning of chapters and aren’t distracting. Due to the good production value, I think this one would be better to take in on audio than paper.

Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for an advance listener copy in exchange for an honest review. 

BEAUTIFUL UGLY publishes January 14, 2025.