Welcome to my stop on the Great Escapes Virtual Book Tour for Her Last Best Friend (Shadow Lake Ranch Murders) by Nellie H. Steele. Stop by each blog on the tour for interviews, guest posts, spotlights, reviews and more!

Her Last Best Friend (Shadow Lake Ranch Murders)

by Nellie H. Steele

Her Last Best Friend (Shadow Lake Ranch Murders)
Psychological Thriller
1st in Series
Setting – Shadow Lake Ranch, a working ranch in Montana
Publisher ‏ : ‎ A Novel Idea Publishing, LLC
Publication date ‏ : ‎ September 23, 2025
Print length ‏ : ‎ 316 pages

A friendship. A betrayal. A body. Welcome to Shadow Lake Ranch…where friendships come to die.

Quiet Lindsey isn’t sure about spending twelve weeks at Shadow Lake Ranch. Her best friend, Mel, swears the luxury retreat will be the perfect escape—horseback riding, yoga, emotional bonding. A killer summer.

But from the moment they arrive, something feels off. Lindsey can’t shake the dread curling in her stomach. And when she meets Travis—the charming cowboy who seems to only have eyes for her—things get even more complicated.

Especially when it seems Mel has set her sights on him, too.

As the lines between truth and paranoia blur, Lindsey begins to question everything—her friendship, her relationship, even her own mind.

And when Mel turns up dead, Lindsey becomes the prime suspect.

Was she the jealous best friend who finally snapped? Or is someone else hiding a much darker secret?

At Shadow Lake Ranch, nothing is what it seems. And there’s only one truth: You can’t trust anyone.

Her Last Best Friend is a twisty psychological thriller perfect for fans of Colleen Hoover’s Verity, Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl, and Ruth Ware’s The It Girl.

⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐
“I was left guessing what was coming next, and kept flipping through page after page.” — Readers’ Favorite

Read now—if you don’t mind losing sleep.

Character Guest Post – Friendship Isn’t What People Think It Is

By Mel Halston

People like simple stories. They like clear villains and innocent victims, clean lines drawn after the fact. Friendship, though, is rarely that tidy. It’s messy. It’s intimate. It’s full of assumptions no one ever says out loud.

I’ve been called a lot of things. Cold. Calculated. Disloyal. But very few people ask the more interesting question: How did we get here in the first place?

Friendship isn’t built on honesty alone. It’s built on habit. On history. On years of shared space and shared routines until you stop asking whether something belongs to you and start assuming it does.

That’s where people get confused.

When you’ve been someone’s best friend long enough, your lives overlap. You know their patterns. Their weaknesses. Their blind spots. You anticipate their reactions before they speak. You start to feel… involved in their decisions, even when no one explicitly invited you in.

People call that closeness. I call it reality.

There’s a lie we tell ourselves about friendship—that it’s selfless, that it’s supportive, that it exists without expectation. But expectations are always there. They’re just quieter. They show up in the way someone looks at you when you make a choice they don’t like. In the way they assume you’ll understand, you’ll forgive, you’ll adjust.

And most of the time, you do.

Until you don’t.

I think what unsettles people most is the idea that loyalty isn’t limitless. That it can be tested. That sometimes you want to know how far things actually go. Not out of malice—but curiosity.

Because once you know the truth, you can stop pretending.

If a bond is as strong as everyone claims, then it should survive scrutiny. It should hold up when things get uncomfortable. And if it doesn’t… well, that tells you something too.

People love to talk about betrayal as though it appears out of nowhere. As though one moment defines everything that came before it. But relationships fracture long before they break. Cracks form quietly. Resentments settle in. Power shifts without anyone naming it.

By the time something finally happens, it’s rarely the beginning of the story. It’s just the part people notice.

I didn’t wake up wanting to hurt anyone. I woke up wanting clarity. Wanting to understand what was real and what was just assumed. There’s a difference between taking something and discovering it was never protected to begin with.

That distinction matters—even if people don’t like it.

Friendship is supposed to be forgiving. Flexible. Endless. But nothing that demands constant sacrifice without acknowledgment can stay intact forever. Eventually, someone stops playing their assigned role. And when they do, everyone acts shocked.

What people forget is that I was still there. Still present. Still involved. Still part of the story. I didn’t disappear. I didn’t abandon anyone. I simply refused to pretend things were what they weren’t.

And yes, that made people uncomfortable.

It’s easier to condemn someone than to examine the structure that allowed everything to unfold the way it did. Easier to focus on one moment than to admit how many moments led up to it.

Friendship, at its core, is about proximity. Emotional, physical, psychological. And proximity changes people. It blurs lines. It invites entitlement. It creates the illusion that everything is shared—even when it isn’t.

If that makes you uneasy, good. It should.

Because the most dangerous relationships aren’t the ones built on hatred. They’re the ones built on closeness, history, and the belief that no one involved would ever cross a line.

Lines are crossed all the time.

People just prefer not to look too closely at why.

About Nellie H. Steele

Nellie H. Steele is a storyteller who doesn’t just write  books—she writes the stories her characters tell her. With distinct voices and minds of their own, her characters often take over, guiding her through tales of romance, mystery, adventure, and suspense.

A lifelong bookworm, Nellie vividly recalls sitting on the concrete floor of her childhood library, eagerly devouring Nancy Drew books and dreaming of solving mysteries of her own. Now an award-winning author, she spends her days crafting immersive worlds and unforgettable characters that feel like old friends. Her house is a zoo—literally—thanks to her rescue animals who seem perfectly happy napping while she writes.

Nellie’s writing process often involves background TV she never actually watches because she’s too wrapped up in her characters’ antics. When she’s not spinning stories, she works as a professor of statistics, where students who know her as an author are often surprised to find she really does teach math.

If you love twisty mysteries, soap-opera-style romance, and thrilling adventures, dive into Nellie’s books today and discover worlds you won’t want to leave. Connect with Nellie on Facebook at @NellieHSteele—she loves chatting with readers about characters, stories, and more!

Author Links
Website: https://nelliehsteele.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NellieHSteele/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nelliehsteele
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/19769743.Nellie_H_Steele
YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/channel/UC8dBA76D9ZRmZqadbn6XPNQ

Purchase Link: Amazon 

Enter the Giveaway

Her Last Best Friend TOUR PARTICIPANTS

January 20 – Ascroft, eh? – CHARACTER INTERVIEW

January 20 – Sapphyria’s Book Reviews – SPOTLIGHT

January 21 – Elizabeth McKenna – Author – SPOTLIGHT

January 22 – Jody’s Bookish Haven – SPOTLIGHT

January 23 – Novels Alive – REVIEW

January 23 – Christa Reads and Writes – SPOTLIGHT

January 24 – StoreyBook Reviews – REVIEW

January 24 – FUONLYKNEW – SPOTLIGHT

January 25 – Boys’ Mom Reads! – REVIEW

January 25 – Reading Is My SuperPower – AUTHOR GUEST POST

January 26 – Maureen’s Musings – SPOTLIGHT

January 27 – Christy’s Cozy Corners – CHARACTER GUEST POST

January 28 – Sarandipity’s – AUTHOR INTERVIEW

January 28 – Salty Inspirations – AUTHOR GUEST POST

January 29 – Socrates Book Reviews – SPOTLIGHT

January 29 – Escape With Dollycas Into A Good Book – REVIEW

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