THIS Is Where I Tell You How Much I Loved This Book

From NetGalley

Eight friends went on a trip. Only six made it out alive. Now a killer has one night to make sure the survivors pay for what they did . . . so that zero make it out alive. From the author of Perfect Little Monsters comes another incredible twisty thriller.

Sadie, Will, Isla, Anthony, Emily, and Charlie are survivors. They were the six (out of eight) to return from a ski holiday turned nightmare two years ago. Although… nobody knows exactly what happened; the details hushed up via the wealth and connections of Sadie's rich parents.

When an exclusive private island with a mansion for rent goes viral on social media, their graduating class persuades Sadie to rent it for the weekend. The six arrive first by helicopter and wait for the rest of their classmates to join them by boat the next day.

But nobody ever comes.

Cut off from the rest of the world with no cell service and no means off the island, paranoia and terror mount as they start to be picked off one by one by an unseen killer. Their past has finally caught up with them, and they'll need to figure out who is killing them before they all wind up dead.

One of my favorite reads of the entire year--This Is Where We Die is a captivating tour de force from start to finish! With Agatha Christie vibes through a modern lens, Cindy R.X. He delivers a thrilling masterpiece that readers will be talking about for years to come.

The story drops us into a horrifying situation immediately, as eight friends--isolated, cold, and hungry--seemingly devolve into madness in a terrifying flashback. Cut to eighteen months later with the six survivors on their graduation day and we learn that though survival has forced them to remain friends, it doesn't mean that they're stronger than ever. In fact, just beneath the surface, they're all breaking.

With the hope of celebrating their graduation, Sadie rents a palatial glass mansion on a private island for the six of them and fourteen other graduating members of their class. When the six arrive early to get a head start on festivities no one is there to greet them. No staff at the dock, no one maintaining the grounds, no chef, not housekeeper. There's no one else on the island but them...right?

Cue anxiety!

Everything that follows is a masterful example of tension, paranoia, and deceit. Though there is a Donner Party motif throughout the plot, things take on a Lord Of The Flies energy as friends and exes turn on each other, and the body count rises steadily. They're forced to really figure out if they're actually alone on the island, or if the killer is one of them...

This book is written at a breakneck pace, with twists that make your head spin and keep you turning pages rabidly. The ending is the heartbreaking kind that might not be every reader's cup of tea, but it was definitely my glass of whiskey. True thriller lovers will devour every word.

I highly recommend this book to fans of shows like Yellowjackets, movies like The Glass Onion, and books like One Of Us Is Lying and And Then There Were None.