Home Before Dark by Riley Sagers – Book Review

Riley Sager does it again! I have loved all of Riley Sager books although my favorite is Final Girls but that may be because it’s the first I read by him. I’m so excited that this book is out for everyone to read. Sagers knows how to write a fantastic novel that allows you to connect with the characters. This book has a little bit of haunting/ghost in it but don’t be fooled it’s so much deeper than that. I couldn’t put this book down and reading it in the dark was hard but I didn’t want to put it down. This book takes on a roll coaster of dark secrets and family drama. Also, the ending is so great because it’s a complete surprise (I seriously didn’t see it coming). I give this book ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫.

Synopsis: Maggie Holt is used to such questions. Twenty-five years ago, she and her parents, Ewan and Jess, moved into Baneberry Hall, a rambling Victorian estate in the Vermont woods. They spent three weeks there before fleeing in the dead of night, an ordeal Ewan later recounted in a nonfiction book called House of Horrors. His tale of ghostly happenings and encounters with malevolent spirits became a worldwide phenomenon, rivaling The Amityville Horror in popularity—and skepticism. Today, Maggie is a restorer of old homes and too young to remember any of the events mentioned in her father’s book. But she also doesn’t believe a word of it. Ghosts, after all, don’t exist. When Maggie inherits Baneberry Hall after her father’s death, she returns to renovate the place to prepare it for sale. But her homecoming is anything but warm. People from the past, chronicled in House of Horrors, lurk in the shadows. And locals aren’t thrilled that their small town has been made infamous thanks to Maggie’s father. Even more unnerving is Baneberry Hall itself—a place filled with relics from another era that hint at a history of dark deeds. As Maggie experiences strange occurrences straight out of her father’s book, she starts to believe that what he wrote was more fact than fiction.

Hello October

For the month of September I read romantic comedies but now that it’s October, and my favorite month of the year, I’m only reading thrillers. Thrillers and suspense novels are my favorite. Here are a few thrillers I’ve read and absolutely loved. What are some thrillers you have enjoyed?

Author Highlight- Riley Sager

If you are looking for a great thriller than I highly recommend any book written by Riley Sager. His stories completely take over you and hold onto you from the beginning until the very end. There are always twist and turns that have you guessing all the way through. I have enjoyed every book he has written and I look forward to the new books he will write. In order of my favorite, I would have the say that Final Girls was my favorite followed by Lock every Door and then The Last Time I Lied. These are some of the best thrillers I’ve read in a long time and I encourage you to read them as well.

The Last Time I Lied by Riley Sager- Book Review

I think Riley Sager may be becoming one of my favorite authors. I just read the third Riley Sager book this month and once again I was not disappointed. If you are looking for great suspense books with a little thriller then his books are a must. While I really enjoyed this one, it wasn’t my favorite of his. I would still absolutely recommend reading this one though. I was guessing at the big secret the whole time I was reading this book and it was definitely a shocker at the end. What better place for suspense and thrill than at a summer camp? (Which it also makes a good read for this time of year since it’s summer time) I give this book ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️. While it wasn’t my favorite of his three books it’s was still a great read with a great ending.

Synopsis:

Two Truths and a Lie. The girls played it all the time in their cabin at Camp Nightingale. Vivian, Natalie, Allison, and first-time camper Emma Davis, the youngest of the group. But the games ended the night Emma sleepily watched the others sneak out of the cabin into the darkness. The last she–or anyone–saw of them was Vivian closing the cabin door behind her, hushing Emma with a finger pressed to her lips. Now a rising star in the New York art scene, Emma turns her past into paintings–massive canvases filled with dark leaves and gnarled branches that cover ghostly shapes in white dresses. When the paintings catch the attention of Francesca Harris-White, the wealthy owner of Camp Nightingale, she implores Emma to return to the newly reopened camp as a painting instructor. Seeing an opportunity to find out what really happened to her friends all those years ago, Emma agrees. Familiar faces, unchanged cabins, and the same dark lake haunt Nightingale, even though the camp is opening its doors for the first time since the disappearances. Emma is even assigned to the same cabin she slept in as a teenager, but soon discovers a security camera–the only one on the property–pointed directly at its door. Then cryptic clues that Vivian left behind about the camp’s twisted origins begin surfacing. As she digs deeper, Emma finds herself sorting through lies from the past while facing mysterious threats in the present. And the closer she gets to the truth about Camp Nightingale and what really happened to those girls, the more she realizes that closure could come at a deadly price.

Final Girls by Riley Sager- Book Review

There is a special place in my heart for the suspense/thriller genre, and Riley Segars’s Final Girls is perfect in every way. It’s got lots of twist and turns and keeps you guessing throughout the entire story. I had a guess as to “who done it” while I was in the middle of the book and was completely wrong in the end. That is one of the many reasons why I loved this book. I’m okay being wrong especially if ending blows me away. I thought the main character, Quincy, was intriguing because of what she had been through. It’s a book that takes the reader from past to present and the writing is perfect. I give this book ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.

Synopsis:

Ten years ago, college student Quincy Carpenter went on vacation with five friends and came back alone, the only survivor of a horror movie–scale massacre. In an instant, she became a member of a club no one wants to belong to—a group of similar survivors known in the press as the Final Girls: Lisa, who lost nine sorority sisters to a college dropout’s knife; Sam, who went up against the Sack Man during her shift at the Nightlight Inn; and now Quincy, who ran bleeding through the woods to escape Pine Cottage and the man she refers to only as Him. The three girls are all attempting to put their nightmares behind them and, with that, one another. Despite the media’s attempts, they never meet.
Now, Quincy is doing well—maybe even great, thanks to her Xanax prescription. She has a caring almost-fiancé, Jeff; a popular baking blog; a beautiful apartment; and a therapeutic presence in Coop, the police officer who saved her life all those years ago. Her memory won’t even allow her to recall the events of that night; the past is in the past. 
That is until Lisa, the first Final Girl, is found dead in her bathtub, wrists slit; and Sam, the second Final Girl, appears on Quincy’s doorstep. Blowing through Quincy’s life like a whirlwind, Sam seems intent on making Quincy relive the past, with increasingly dire consequences, all of which makes Quincy question why Sam is really seeking her out. And when new details about Lisa’s death come to light, Quincy’s life becomes a race against time as she tries to unravel Sam’s truths from her lies, evade the police and hungry reporters, and, most crucially, remember what really happened at Pine Cottage, before what was started ten years ago is finished.