Published by HarperTeen on March 17, 2020
Pages: 390
Buy on Amazon
Goodreads
Welcome to dinner, and again, congratulations on being selected. Now you must do the selecting.
What do the queen bee, star athlete, valedictorian, stoner, loner, and music geek all have in common? They were all invited to a scholarship dinner, only to discover it’s a trap. Someone has locked them into a room with a bomb, a syringe filled with poison, and a note saying they have an hour to pick someone to kill … or else everyone dies.
Amber Prescott is determined to get her classmates and herself out of the room alive, but that might be easier said than done. No one knows how they’re all connected or who would want them dead. As they retrace the events over the past year that might have triggered their captor’s ultimatum, it becomes clear that everyone is hiding something. And with the clock ticking down, confusion turns into fear, and fear morphs into panic as they race to answer the biggest question: Who will they choose to die?
WOW! This book was a rollercoaster of emotions!
In the beginning, I picked this book up as a time filler just to last me until I found a different one. I was interested in the synopsis, but I was scared that things would go downhill fast.
Turns out I was wrong… I really loved this book! Aside from a few technical concerns, it was suspenseful from beginning to end and I never wanted to put it down. I started it, and before I knew it I was already done!
From plot twists at every corner to some very questionable characters, this read was super engaging and high intensity. First off, the book started off right as the action began, which was super refreshing. Instead of having to read through fifty pages just to get to the actual story, the very first chapter is jam-packed!
Although the setup of the chapters was annoying at first (alternating chapters between the trapped room and one year before) the book needed it to make sense, so it ended up not bothering me. Usually, I’m the type of reader who gets easily confused and irritated by multiple narrators or stories told at the same time, so I was actually super surprised!
I think what I really enjoyed about this read was the intense plot, mystery, and oddly enough the characters.
The idea behind this is just so genius! It was based off on a bunch of other amazing reads, and combining them all made for a super interesting plot. It was cool to see how all of the characters were interconnected and that you never knew what was coming next.
I also really LOVED the mystery element! Throughout the entire journey, you never knew what was going to happen next, and whose secret is going to spill next. The entire book was filled with anticipation that drew me in. I’m actually really not much of a thriller reader so whenever I something like this I get really anxious and never want to put it down. I loved reading something different!
And last but not least the messed-up characters. The characters were… well, how do you put it… interesting? All of these characters were far from being angels, and they all made some pretty rough decisions, MULTIPLE TIMES.
Yet something about that was so gripping. The characters were all so starkly different from each other, it made the book so much more dynamic. Remarkably I wasn’t rooting for any certain character but it still added a great dimension. (That’s all I can say without spoiling!)
These three elements took this read above and beyond and based on those notes alone, it would probably be rated five stars. Unfortunately, I did have a minor issue with it.
This is going to be the hardest to explain… the ending. Don’t worry, I’m not going to spoil anything, but the ending just felt incomplete. And by this, I’m not talking about the end as in any secrets or spoilers but just the way the actual ending was written. (This may sound vague or confusing now, but trust me you’ll know what I mean when you read it)
Overall I adored this book, and I would recommend it to anyone up for a great thriller! This was definitely a super hard review to write without giving away any of the spoilers, so I’m super sorry if it sounds confusing or incomplete. I would rate this book a solid ⅘ stars, and end this review off by saying that I’m now inspired to dabble into more thrillers! I hope you enjoyed this review, and I’ll see you next time. Keep reading!
Favorite Quote:
But Strike a match in a room doused with Lighter Fluid, and you’re bound to get burned
No Comments