Survive the Night Review

 

Survive the Night 

By: Riley Sager

Released: June 29th, 2021  

Pages: 336

My Rating: 3.5/5 

Goodreads Synopsis: 

It's November 1991. George H. W. Bush is in the White House, Nirvana's in the tape deck, and movie-obsessed college student Charlie Jordan is in a car with a man who might be a serial killer. 

Josh Baxter, the man behind the wheel, is a virtual stranger to Charlie. They met at the campus ride board, each looking to share the long drive home to Ohio. Both have good reasons for wanting to get away. For Charlie, it's guilt and grief over the murder of her best friend, who became the third victim of the man known as the Campus Killer. For Josh, it's to help care for his sick father. Or so he says. Like the Hitchcock heroine she's named after, Charlie has her doubts. There's something suspicious about Josh, from the holes in his story about his father to how he doesn't seem to want Charlie to see the inside of the car's trunk. As they travel an empty highway in the dead of night, an increasingly worried Charlie begins to think she's sharing a car with the Campus Killer. Is Josh truly dangerous? Or is Charlie's suspicion merely a figment of her movie-fueled imagination?

What follow is a fame of cat-and-mouse played out on night-shrouded roads and in neon-lit parking lots, during and age when the only call for help can be made on a pay phone and in a place where there's nowhere to run. In order to win, Charlie must do one thing -- survive the night. 

My Review:

I went into this book knowing I would find it somewhat predictable because I find Riley Sager to be a very predicable writer, but was hoping that I would be wrong. I was not. That is not to say that I did not enjoy this book, because I did, but if you have read Riley Sager before and know how his stories usually go, you will be able to predict quite a bit of this one. 

I was lured into this book with the synopsis and how it alluded to the 90s. It also gave me "I'm Thinking of Ending Things" vibes and that book still gives me the shudders thinking about it! This is a quick read and I had fun while going through it and seeing how all the twists actually played out, but again, I just saw many of them coming well before they happened. I don't know how I feel about the ending of it per say. It was something I said I was hoping wouldn't be the case but it wasn't played out exactly how I was thinking so I'm okay with it?

I'm trying to not give away any spoilers since this book just came out, but if you have read it please feel free to message me so we can discuss further! I would love to know what you all think about it because I feel so torn. I know so many people love Riley Sager books and I don't dislike them but I never seem to love them as much as others. 

Catch you later, 

Molly