⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ UNFILTERED HOLIDAYS — VOLUME ONE

 

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ UNFILTERED HOLIDAYS — VOLUME ONE

A summer escape that turns into something far more dangerous

Unfiltered Holidays: Volume One by Katarzyna Szczepkowska starts like the kind of novel you expect to read beside a swimming pool: a woman travelling alone to Croatia, a luxury hotel on the Makarska Riviera, cocktails, sunshine, flirtation and the promise of seven days away from ordinary life.

Then the photographs begin to tell a different story.

Julia Sadowska is thirty-four, exhausted by her job in social media, newly separated from a man who spent years undermining her confidence, and determined to prove that travelling alone does not make her lonely or unsuccessful. Her first small act of rebellion happens before the plane even leaves Warsaw, when she finally blocks her ex and switches her phone to airplane mode.

That seemingly simple beginning establishes one of the strongest themes of the book: the difference between the life we actually live and the version we present to other people.

And nowhere is that difference more striking than in Chiara Materazzi.

Chiara is a glamorous influencer with two million followers, perfect photographs, luxury campaigns and an apparently enviable relationship. Yet when Julia sees her in person at the Adriana Resort, something is wrong. The smile disappears as soon as the camera is lowered. Julia soon notices something even more disturbing: the man accompanying Chiara catches her by the arm, and later an accidental photograph reveals his hand clamped around her wrist.

From that moment, the novel changes gears.

What looked like a holiday story gradually becomes a mystery.

And that transition works remarkably well because the danger does not arrive with a dramatic explosion. It creeps into the story through small details: a reflection in a photograph, a bruise, an uncomfortable glance, a message from an unknown number, a woman whose social-media posts appear increasingly disconnected from reality.

Julia’s professional habit of analysing images suddenly becomes useful for something far more important than advertising campaigns.

The novel is especially effective when it plays with the idea that photographs can reveal the truth precisely because nobody realises what has been captured in the background.

Chiara even warns Julia to make copies of her photographs. Soon afterwards Julia receives the anonymous message: “Nice red dress.”

At that point, the holiday atmosphere acquires a genuinely unsettling edge.

Julia is an excellent protagonist

Julia is not written as an instant action heroine.

She worries too much. She overthinks. She avoids confrontation. She is painfully conscious of her body and other people’s expectations. Her growth therefore feels earned rather than manufactured.

She arrives in Croatia wanting to stop rescuing everybody else. Her own holiday rules literally include: don’t work, don’t check her ex’s profile, don’t pretend everything is perfect, and don’t rescue other people from their crises.

Naturally, that final rule becomes the hardest one to follow.

But Julia’s development is not presented through motivational speeches. It happens through choices—sometimes small, sometimes dangerous.

That makes her convincing.

And then there is Teresa

Teresa may be the novel’s secret weapon.

Her dry humour prevents the story from becoming relentlessly dark. Her exchanges with Julia are sharp, affectionate and often genuinely funny. The novel repeatedly lets a serious moment breathe by following it with dialogue that feels spontaneous rather than written merely to deliver information.

The same is true of Kamil, the hotel entertainer whose flirtation with Julia adds energy and romantic tension.

Their dance sequence is particularly good because it works simultaneously as flirtation and investigation. Julia agrees to one dance, only to start questioning Kamil about Chiara. His warning—essentially that Julia should not turn every photograph into a story—makes the conversation suddenly much more serious.

That mixture of humour, attraction and suspicion gives the novel personality.

The Croatian setting is more than decoration

Makarska is not simply a pretty background.

The Adriatic, Biokovo mountains, swimming pools, terraces, hotel corridors, bars and evening entertainment create a deliberate contrast with what is happening beneath the surface.

Everything looks perfect.

That is precisely the point.

Julia herself notices early in the novel that the real Adriatic is more beautiful than the photograph she has edited on her phone, so she removes the filters.

It becomes an elegant metaphor for the entire book.

Remove the filter and see what is actually there.

The mystery keeps expanding

The strongest sections come when the seemingly isolated incident surrounding Chiara grows into something much larger.

Police become involved. People disappear. Hotel passages, photographs, messages and social-media posts begin contradicting one another. At one point, even a seemingly reassuring post from Chiara's account becomes suspicious because the image offers no proof that she is safe or even that the photograph is current.

Later, the investigation becomes much darker, involving hidden areas of the hotel, bloodstains, abandoned objects and evidence suggesting someone has been manipulating events from behind the scenes.

Yet the book does not abandon the relationships that made the opening chapters enjoyable.

That balance matters.

Unfiltered Holidays is not simply a thriller transplanted to a Croatian resort. It retains the friendship, flirtation, humour, female perspective and emotional development of contemporary women’s fiction while steadily increasing the suspense.

What works best?

The dialogue.

The contrast between glamorous holiday imagery and escalating danger.

The friendship between Julia and Teresa.

The mystery surrounding Chiara.

And especially the central idea that in a world obsessed with creating perfect images, the truth may be hiding somewhere nobody intended us to look.

At more than seven hundred pages and twenty-two chapters, Volume One is substantial rather than a quick beach read. But readers who enjoy long, immersive stories may find that one of its strengths: there is enough room for the characters, relationships and mystery to develop instead of racing immediately toward a solution.

Verdict

Unfiltered Holidays: Volume One surprised me.

I expected sunshine, romance and Croatian scenery.

I got all of those things—but also an increasingly addictive mystery about surveillance, control, appearances, social media and the uncomfortable question of how well we really know the people whose lives we watch every day.

It is glamorous without being empty, suspenseful without losing its humour, and serious without turning into a lecture.

Most importantly, Julia is the kind of protagonist you want to keep following.

By the time her peaceful solo holiday has become an investigation involving police, secrets, suspicious photographs and people who clearly do not want her asking questions, the reader has travelled a very long way from that woman sitting on a plane simply trying to switch on airplane mode.

Rating: 4.5/5 ⭐

Recommended for readers who enjoy women’s fiction, holiday mysteries, romantic suspense, strong female friendships, social-media secrets and atmospheric Mediterranean settings.

📖 Unfiltered Holidays — Volume One
✍️ Katarzyna Szczepkowska

👉 Amazon:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0HD457L8F