When No One Is Watching: A Thriller

I loved that real world issues are woven into this book and it was not predictable at all. I was planning on 4 stars until the end just happened too fast. All the action, all the explanation and story lines culminate in a few short chapters. I’m left wondering how the good guys got away with the bad stuff they had to do for survival when government and cops weren’t on their side. Just too abrupt and a few loose ends left it at 3 stars.

I picked this up for a city wide bookclub.

The first half to three-quarters of the book was slow, but needed to set up the story, making me wonder why it was tagged as a thriller. The story took a hard turn during the last few chapters, clarifying why it was a thriller.

I enjoyed the book, but wish it had moved along more quickly. I would have rated it a 5 if it was a little more consistent throughout the book.

Enjoyed this book very much the ending was a little too far fetched but overall a good read.

Wow.
Wow Wow Wow.

Perfect book for this time of year...Halloween & Election Day. It's informative AND terrifying. It's a Must Read!!!

Gentrification as the monster under the bed, inside the home, and living next door? That metaphor alone is sharp, unsettling, and deeply effective. It names a fear many of us live with but rarely see framed so clearly in fiction. Where the book lost some momentum for me was in its execution as a thriller. The character backstories and the history of the Brooklyn neighborhood are richly—and at times heavily—developed, while the suspenseful elements feel comparatively rushed. It’s like being asked to patiently sit through all the responsible groundwork, only for the payoff to arrive quickly and without the same care. The tension is there, but it resolves before it has time to fully land. That said, what stayed with me most were the moments that felt true. I recognized people, conversations, and dynamics from my own neighborhood, which made the novel feel less like pure genre fiction and more like an act of documentation. In those moments, Cole reads as a historian and archivist of place—capturing the emotional and cultural costs of “change” with real specificity. While the thriller elements didn’t fully satisfy me, the social commentary did. This is a book that sparks conversation, reflection, and recognition—and for a book club, that may be its greatest strength.