Book Review / Survive the Night by Riley Sager

 

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 inside 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 follows is a game of cat-and-mouse played out on night-shrouded roads and in neon-lit parking lots, during an 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.  

Published:    29th June 2021
Publisher:  Dutton Books
Goodreads :  Click here
Series or Stand-Alone:  Stand-Alone
Source:  Bought

MY REVIEW

I can't tell you how excited I was to pick this up.  I have thoroughly enjoyed each and every Riley Sager book that has come out so far.  I was intrigued to find out how I get on with this book as I have seen mixed reviews, so I thought maybe this was a marmite book (you either love it or hate it)!

I read this in one sitting and couldn't put it down.  What I loved the most was the fact that you have Charlie who makes a very dumb decision to hitch a ride, right at the time where her friend has been killed and the killer is on the loose.  Now, you would think this was a very easy story with no surprises or twists as you already have the intended victim and killer in the car.  What else could be surprising?  There were certainly one or two twists that I wasn't expecting.  I have to admit that I did guess the ending but only right near the end and just before it was revealed.

Loved this latest novel from an author who is now firmly on my favourite author list!