Review: All Our Secrets by Michelle Gross ⋆ Daisy Knox's Tales of Love, Life and Murder

All Our Secrets
by Michelle Gross
Standalone
Published December 2022
All Our Secrets on Amazon

My Rating:

I believe moments define us. A split-second decision can shape your future, and you don’t realize it until it’s too late.

A scared, agonizing choice ruins mine.

I’m scarred, hateful, and nothing a beauty like Peyton will want. So when I come face to face with her, I pretend not to be MoodyKing1, her gamer friend King.

The choice changes everything.

She marries my best friend, Theodore. For years, I watch her with him. I try to move on. I try to let her go, but I can’t. I have to come clean to her, even if it’s five years too late. I don’t get to tell her then either, though, because Theodore dies, leaving her and an unborn child behind.

I’ll be there for her, even when she fights me every step of the way. Nothing is ever easy. I learn that again when the impossible happens. Theodore’s inside her house, roaming the halls, and I’m the only one who can see him. He’s determined to keep me away from Peyton. I’m more determined to do what I couldn’t before:

Take the chance I was too afraid to take before. My only shot at happiness. I tried living without Peyton, but I can’t do it any longer.

A ghost isn’t my only problem when it comes to getting the girl. What happens when she learns who I am? Or will Theodore’s existence in a world he doesn’t belong in destroy everything?

This story is one wild ride. Peyton and King are the best of friends but they’ve never met in person because of his insecurities. It takes years but the very day he finally scrounges up the courage to agree to meet face-to-face, he meets his best friend’s new girl and it’s Peyton. She recognizes him immediately but his immediate reaction is to deny it and insist her on-line King is someone else. Life went on, with Peyton eventually marrying Theodore, King avoiding Peyton as much as possible and growing to resent his best friend and Peyton always wondering what happened to her King. Then Theodore dies and this is where the story starts.

It’s difficult to describe without being a spoiler but this is equal parts enemies to lovers and friends to lovers. There’s a love triangle and a ghost but it’s her memories of him, her loyalty and her guilt, not his continuing presence which bind her to Theodore and make her confusing feelings about King all the more difficult.

This was a fun read but not at all light-hearted. It’s full of angst and pain, with a hint of suspense and a good dose of the supernatural. I loved everything about it and though this is my first book by the author, it won’t be the last.