Made for You by Jenna Satterthwaite #bookreview #fantasy #scifi #mystery #thriller

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Title: Made for You

Author:  Jenna Satterthwaite

Publisher: MIRA 

Publication Date: July 2, 2024

Page Count:  402

My rating: 4 stars

About the book:

Hi. My name is Julia. I’m a Synth. And I’m here to find love…

Synthetic woman Julia Walden was designed for one reason: to compete on The Proposal and claim the heart of bachelor Josh LaSala. Her casting is controversial, but Julia seems to get her fairy-tale ending when Josh gets down on one knee.

Fast-forward fifteen months, and Julia and Josh are married and raising their baby in small-town Indiana. But with haters around every corner, Julia’s life is a far cry from the domestic bliss she imagined. Then her splintering world shatters: Josh goes missing, and she becomes the prime suspect in his murder.

With no one left she can trust, Julia takes the investigation into her own hands. But the explosive truths she uncovers will drive her to her breaking point—and isn’t that where a person’s true nature is revealed? That is…if Julia truly is a person.

Told via dual timelines, Jenna Satterthwaite’s twist-filled debut deftly explores the exhilarating point where artificial intelligence, reality TV, and bone-chilling murder mystery meet.

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Excerpt:

THEN

“Can you hear me?” A male face peers into mine. Midthirties, glasses, expressive eyebrows. Andy. Kind.

“Yes,” I say. There’s an overwhelming barrage of hot sensation, then click, it all evens out—light, sound, the air on my skin—settling like embers, then cooling.

I breathe in, feel my chest balloon, breathe out. Lift my hands to face level and flex my fingers, mapping how the smooth pale skin with its smattering of freckles shifts and ripples over my knuckle ridges.

I’m sitting. Dressed in what seems to be an evening gown. I register how tight the skirt is around my thighs. How beautifully the blue sequins catch in the ice-white light from above. Palms down, I skim the fabric, tickling the pads of my fingers as the sequins catch, lift, fall. It’s like wearing a party. I like it.

“Do you know who you are?” says Andy.

I look up and feel myself smile. He’s in baggy jeans, a gray T-shirt with a buffalo plaid shirt open over top and a pen hooked on the breast pocket. A dark five-o’clock shadow travels down his neck. His look screams sleepless nights.

“Of course,” I say. Everything is simply there, no effort, natural as breathing. “I’m Julia Walden.”

“Do you know where you are? What year it is?”

“We’re in LA. It’s January 2022 and Biden is President.” I tilt my head. “We’re in the middle of a pandemic.”

“Do you know what’s about to happen?”

I register, out of the corner of my eye, a boom mic operator to our deep left, but keep my attention on Andy.

“I’m about to compete on The Proposal.”

“God,” breathes Andy, putting a fist to his chest like my answers are slaying him. “You—you’re—” He crooks a finger at his lips.

“Here?” I suggest with a light laugh. Now I’m rubbing my arms, the rough skin at my elbows, allowing my hands to touch my own face, then wander up to my hair, long and loose. I fish it around my shoulder. It’s a fiery, sun-gleam red. I love it. I love everything about being Julia Walden.

“Real,” says Andy when he’s recovered his speech. “Working. Amazing. I kind of want to hug you?”

“You don’t have to ask.” I stand in my high heels, taller than Andy by nearly a head. His glasses collide with my shoulder as applause bursts around us. After a second, he hooks my hands in his and pulls back, eyes moist.

“Wow, Julia. Just wow.”

I scan our surroundings as flashes pop. We’re in a warehouse. To the right, large machines quietly rest. I note hydraulics, robotic arms, big sheets of pale, rubbery material. Skin, I realize, and my own skin seems to respond, tiny goose bumps racing up my arms.

It’s not a bad feeling, exactly. Just…unpleasant, like touching something wet that you thought would be dry.

To my left, a film crew makes a crescent shape. One hefty man shoulders an equally hefty camera, trained on me. I know without being told they’re here from The Proposal.

It’s a little strange to be having this intimate moment with Andy while everyone watches. Then again…that’s about to be my life. Fully on camera.

Andy claps his hands. “So. Ready to meet Josh?”

“I was born ready,” I say with a laugh. My eyes flicker up to the answering sound of laughter from the film crew. But while I did mean to be funny, I also mean it.

Andy pulls out a cell phone. “This is yours. Let’s break it in.” He leans into me and we smile for our first selfie.

“Should we post it to Insta?” he says. “Your handle just went live—we had to wait until the other contestants’ phones were taken away. Oh, and we can’t mention you’re on The Proposal yet—” But I reach for the phone.

“I got it.” My fingers navigate the screen easily. Also, wow— how does @TheRealJuliaWalden already have close to a million followers…and counting? I caption the picture the journey be-gins!!!, noting the tug of resistance within me as I put the phone down. I guess part of me wanted to watch the reactions roll in. Immediately I wall up this thought. I’m not here for everyone. Just one man.

Andy has pulled out a blue pen while I’ve been messing with the phone, and is nervously gnawing on the clicker end. Weirdly, I want to reassure him, It’ll be okay. You’ll see.

“Julia!” the producer calls out. “Could you introduce your-self? For our viewers?”

I look at the camera’s cold eye across the distance and imagine that I’m looking into the face of a friend who can’t wait to see me. I smile.

“Sure! I’m a Synth. My name is Julia. And I’m here to find love.”

Excerpted from Made for You by Jenna Satterthwaite © 2024 by Jenna Satterthwaite used with permission by MIRA/HarperCollins.

Made for You by Jenna Satterthwaite is a science fiction thriller novel. The story in Made for You is one that is told in a dual timeline in about a year and half ago in the past and in the present time. It’s also narrated by a synth (synthetic human) character.

Julia Walden was designed and created for one reason, to win the heart of Josh LaSala. Josh has been cast as the latest lead on the reality television program The Proposal (The Bachelor) and among the women vying for Josh’s heart will be Julia, a synthetic human.

Fifteen months after the show aired Julia is now married to Josh and has given birth to their child when Josh leaves on a weekend trip and he doesn’t return. The local small town Indiana sheriff already didn’t trust Julia in his jurisdiction and now is sure she has murdered him on his watch despite Julia’s do no harm programming.

Made for You is a debut novel from author Jenna Satterthwaite and well worth taking a chance on reading. I was completely hooked on this scifi thriller from the opening pages with my love for reality tv pulling me in and then mixing that with a unique murder mystery to keep the pages turning. Having an AI synthetic leading the narrative certainly gave a new twist to unreliable narrators and then there were plenty of twists and turns one would expect along the way to really keep one guessing. Definitely an author to look out for again in the future.

I received an advance copy from the publisher via NetGalley.

About the author:

Born in the Midwest, Jenna Satterthwaite grew up in Spain, lived briefly in France, and is now happily settled in Chicago with her husband and three kids. Jenna studied classical guitar, English Lit and French, and once upon a time was a singer-songwriter in folk band Thornfield. She loves sushi, reading in her natural habitat (aka her bed), and women taking back their power. Made For You is her debut novel.

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