Item: Survive the Night
Rating: 2.00
Author: quirkycat

by Riley Sager

THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

One of New York Times Book Review's "summer reads guaranteed to make your heart thump and your skin crawl"; An Amazon Best of the Month Pick; Named a must-read summer book by The Washington Post, USA Today, Vulture, BuzzFeed, Forbes, Entertainment Weekly, CNN, New York Post, Good Housekeeping, E!, PopSugar, CrimeReads, Thrillist, and BookRiot.

It’s November 1991. Nirvana's in the tape deck, George H. W. Bush is in the White House, 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 shocking 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.

The longer she sits in the passenger seat, the more Charlie notices there’s something suspicious about Josh, from the holes in his story about his father to how he doesn’t want her to see inside the trunk. As they travel an empty, twisty highway in the dead of night, an increasingly anxious Charlie begins to think she’s sharing a car with the Campus Killer. Is Josh truly dangerous? Or is Charlie’s jittery mistrust merely a figment of her movie-fueled imagination?

One thing is certain—Charlie has nowhere to run and no way to call for help. Trapped in a terrifying game of cat and mouse played out on pitch-black roads and in neon-lit parking lots, Charlie knows the only way to win is to survive the night.

Survive the Night is the latest novel written by Riley Sager (I'll confess: I have way too many of his books stacked up on my TBR. It's bad, guys). I grabbed it when it came up on BOTM, because it's a thriller, and I can't resist.

Charlie Jordan just needs a fresh start. Or rather, she needs to get back home. She needs to go anyplace other than where she's seen as 'the girl that let her best friend die.' I can't blame her there.

So Charlie doesn't think twice about accepting a ride offer from Josh Baxter. Only, the longer the drive goes on, the more convinced she is that she's actually trapped in a car with a serial killer—less than ideal.

"Women need to do that, you know. Look out for each other. There's a special place in hell for those who don't."

So, I went into Survive the Night with high expectations. So maybe it's my fault that I didn't end up liking it. However, I do have a few key points to explain why I found this book to be a struggle to finish.

Charlie Jordan's character is interesting, at first. I liked the trope of her seeing the world through a camera's lens, whether she wanted to or not. I liked her less the more I read, though, as her decisions frustrated me so much.

I'm not sure if I should say what really killed this book for me, as it is a bit of a spoiler. Instead, I'll say that every moment in this book went against all of the warnings I have heard all my life. Don't get in a car with strangers. Tell people where you're going. Know how to ask for help. Etc.

It made my skin crawl, and I don't think in a good way. Especially when combined with that ending, which is decidedly unhealthy, again, I don't know how much I should say. Let's just say that it wasn't the most feminist of endings, shall we?

Read more reviews over at Quirky Cat's Fat Stacks

Survive the Night

by Riley Sager

Reviewed by Quirky Cat on Nov 22, 2021

Reading updates