The book is about a girl named Avery Kylie Grambs, who’s living in her car when she receives news that a billionaire named Tobias Hawthorne has left her nearly his entire fortune. She doesn’t even know this man and has no clue why he would have given his fortune to her instead of his family members—but the will says it’s hers, the only catch being that she has to move into the late Hawthorne’s sprawling manor in Texas, where there are more secrets hiding within the walls than she would ever expect. And along with all the riddles that Tobias Hawthorne left behind in his house, there are also his four enigmatic grandsons, two of which quickly develop tension with Avery while trying to decipher the mystery of their grandfather’s will. 

This plot was incredibly intriguing to me, but when I finally read it, it just started to fall flat. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a good book, but it just didn’t click with me. The writing is good, and the riddles and mysteries are so well put together. There was romance, too, as well as a sweet relationship between Avery and her sister, Libby. The characters were charming, especially Nash and Xander, who I ended up liking more than the two love interests, Grayson and Jameson (Grayson had the personality of a piece of cardboard in my opinion). All of these pieces should have added up to make at least a four star read for me, but something felt lacking to me.

I know a lot of people who have enjoyed it and the sequel, The Hawthorne Legacy, but it just wasn’t for me. I found myself bored or close to it most of the time. I wasn’t as invested in the love triangle as I thought I would be, and only really enjoyed Nash and Xander’s characters. 

But this isn’t to say that you shouldn’t give it a chance. The twists and turns of the plot were still enough to keep me reading, and I was invested enough to try and figure out some of the clues myself. I really do think a book like this would appeal to a wide audience of young adult readers, especially those who like mystery with a romance subplot, and I hope to check out the sequel in the future to see if it’s any better than this one.