John

I don't generally read fantasy, and I am clearly older than the target audience for this, but it wasn't bad. It wasn't the best, either. Multiple times, I found myself surpised/intrigued/pleased with some turn of event, but it could have been 50 to 75 pages shorter. It sags a bit during the bulk of the narrative, although the POV switching does generally move the story along nicely.

Credit to the author, there were a few big surprises in here that I wanted to call bs on, but she laid the foundation for these things earlier and they were basically airtight. I never felt like any of them was merely for convenience, although they were convenient.

I'll probably read the next one, but I don't see myself digging into this world any deeper than that, aside from maybe giving the Shadow and Bone Netflix series a try.

Creepy, atmospheric read, with an ending twist that I'm not sure if I like.

I'll keep this as spoiler-free as I can at this point. This thing is 200 pages, and man, does it do a lot in those pages. In a good way. As the story unfolds, there are more and more events that are simply....off-putting. It does a very good job with keeping tension and creating atmosphere. I read along with the audiobook at about 1.5 (for some reason, these audiobooks are always slow). However, about 80 pages out, I slowed down and really took in those pages. It was great. Beginning with our lovers pulling up to the school, until the end of the story, is among one of my favorite reading experiences.

The last few lines of the novel seem to be instructions to the reader, to read it again, with all of this newfound information regarding life, love, philosophy, psychology, etc. And I love that. This is one that has stayed with me.

The twist, I'm just not sure that I like it, to be honest. I'm mulling it over.

I listened to the audiobook while I did some office work, and I really think that I may have done myself a disservice. I've heard this novella described as more of a creepy character study than an outright horror story, and that the author weaves sort of a grotesque poetry into their sentences.

Both of these things are true. The author clearly enjoys playing with language, and they are in their bag here. Sentences, entire passages, that had me rewinding and re-listening, were frequent. And it does seem like the scares are secondary to the interpersonal relationships between the characters. I probably missed out on some of this stuff by not giving the story my sole focus.

Very interested in seeing what else this author has to offer.

This was my first Riley Sager novel. I've heard you either love him or hate him. I did not love him.

I agree with most of the criticisms I've seen for this book: slow, boring at times, a flat hero, almost DNF'd, etc. That's all true. And more.

I'm willing to forgive all that.

But, when you deliver two major reveals, back-to-back on the same page nonetheless, they'd better be tight. When you go where Sager does here--dead husband is actually the serial killer the cops are looking for, and he's dead because our hero killed him, and he's a ghost who just possessed the missing girl--it needs to be believable.

I'm not talking about suspending disbelief. Okay, this guy's a ghost now. Also, our hero killed him. Fine. Tell me he was actually in outer space the whole time. I don't really care.

But this story is told in first-person. We are inside Casey's head the entire time. Which means that we have access to her thoughts, and there's no way that this wouldn't have crossed her mind on page 7.

The reveal cannot be something that has been inside of the hero's head the entire time, when I've also been inside the hero's head the entire time. There is a difference between being mislead for fun and being lied to for convenience.

It's a cheap trick, and it's a gaping hole in an otherwise weird, fairly enjoyable if sometimes boring story about an obsessive alcoholic woman and the ghost husband she killed last summer.

I like the fact that this thing turned and went somewhere I didn't think it would go. I like how it was actually a different story than the one I thought I was reading. But the whole thing pivots on a huge reveal that just feels underhanded. An unreliable narrator, I can accept. But I have to draw the line at an unreliable author.

To be fair, I am now seeing that this appears to be one of his worst-liked books, and I would honestly give him another shot. But this one is not recommended.

Not gonna lie: Picked this up more or less blindly, didn't realize it was for 15-year-olds. That being said, it wasn't half bad.

It's a PG-13 'Saw,' in a lot of ways. Something in between 'Goosebumps' and 'Fear Street,' with one use of the f-word, if you're counting. Melodramatic, obsessive, neurotic characters that probably would have been relatable a few decades ago.

For what it was, it was fine. Something I flipped through for a few hours last night. Can't say that I wouldn't flip through another one.

My only gripe is that the character with the most interesting possibilities--cousin Tess--is used like a prop throughout the entire thing, when it is clear that she is the true hero of the novel. #TeamTess

Trigger warnings for mental health / suicide.