Welcome to the escape room. Your goal is simple. Get out alive.

In the lucrative world of finance, Vincent, Jules, Sylvie, and Sam are at the top of their game. They’ve mastered the art of the deal and celebrate their success in style—but a life of extreme luxury always comes at a cost.

Invited to participate in an escape room challenge as a team-building exercise, the ferociously competitive co-workers crowd into the elevator of a high-rise building, eager to prove themselves. But when the lights go off and the doors stay shut, it quickly becomes clear that this is no ordinary competition: they’re caught in a dangerous game of survival.

Trapped in the dark, the colleagues must put aside their bitter rivalries and work together to solve cryptic clues to break free. But as the game begins to reveal the team’s darkest secrets, they realize there’s a price to be paid for the terrible deeds they committed in their ruthless climb up the corporate ladder. As tempers fray, and the clues turn deadly, they must solve one final chilling puzzle: which one of them will kill in order to survive?

My Review

I was so stoked for this book, when I pulled it off my shelves the plot seemed to radiate what I love most about thrillers: intense, isolation, secrets and gossips.

Um, yum, yes, sign me up!

The first few chapters were delectable. Tensions are strong. Each character is off-putting and secretive in their own way. As the reader, I knew what was going to happen from the blurb, they would get trapped together.

But, what I didn’t know, was that about halfway through the book, this wouldn’t be it for me.

The enormity of their secrets became so self-indulgent and bordered on too much complaining. Instead of tension, the pages started radiating negativity.

The plot got to the point where the inner monologue slowed down the tension to a crawl. What should have been suspense driven, edge of my seat, whodunit, turned into just die already, Jesus!

I didn’t care who died, in what order, or why. I only wanted the characters to die so that I could stop reading. Which wasn’t great. I wound up DNF’ing rather than slogging through the rest of the book for the sake of finding answers.

What had so much promise in the beginning, didn’t hit for me.

Maybe other readers had a different story. Clearly, with raving reviews on Amazon at the time of this review, I’m in the minority who couldn’t finish the book. But, to me, it didn’t slap.

However, I adored Stay Awake, which I finished recently, so this author absolutely isn’t off my list to read in the future. One book does not a bad author make, in the least.

Did any of you read it? What did you think?

Keep Reading Book Fam,

IBCK