I don't think that I was prepared for this title! I spent so much time trying to follow what was happening and where the characters were going. So shocking!

I’m not sure how I feel about this one still. I liked it while I was reading it but I found it very forgettable. I did really like the characters and the story line.

This story was mostly fast paced; there were a few chapters in the beginning that felt too slow for me. I really enjoyed that this book is told in dual perspective slowly gaining glimpses of all the characters involved in the story.

This is a very character driven thriller and I liked how we slowly were given information about them and what led them to the situation they found themselves in.

While the plot was fairly straightforward and predictable, there were a couple twists that I didn't see coming. Overall, I really wish more had happened in the elevator. There was a big lead up to it, with the title of the book and synopsis but in the end it felt like not much actually happened.

Grateful to have received a complimentary copy to honestly review.

Free ebook, review is my own.

Loved it. Though there were some problems with the writing and some of it was redundant or done before it was overall quick paced thriller that kept me entertained. The Escape Room did a great job of building the who what and why. Is it possible to be a slow paced thriller? Great for those that love diving into the details of why people behave the way they do.

Great, multi-faceted characters. Very interesting plot. Vivid descriptions. I felt every emotion. Kept me intrigued from the first page to the last. Simply a GREAT read!

*I received a complimentary ARC of this book in order to read and provide a voluntary, unbiased and honest review, should I choose to do so.

The Escape Room by Megan Goldin an excellent book from the start to the finish. Once I opened my kindle and started to read it I was gripped and ended up reading it all day. This book was a phenomenal novel about a work exercise! for work colleagues It ended up being a game that was horribly dark and you have to survive to live. But, how wrong it all was!

WoW what a brilliant book and I thoroughly enjoyed it to the last page!

Big Thank you to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for my ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Hopefully this will get edited because I couldn’t even finish this because of all the typos and mistakes.

This was a new author for me and a it was different in a way from my usual read. I was pleasantly surprised by it. The twists and emotion it provoked kept me reading until I was done. It was so good and there was so much character to everyone. Loved how it turned out. Will definitely read more from this author.

Thank you to Netgalley and St. Martins Press for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

This was a very intense, complex, revenge thriller. I was able to read this engrossing book in one sitting. The characters, the twists, the storyline were all put together with such ease it read seamlessly you just need to keep reading to find out what's happening next. I will definitely be recommending this one to a lot of people!

I loved Goldin's The Night Swim and The Escape Room is another page turner, this time about a team building exercise going wrong with a cast of the least likable characters you could imagine. This one is a page-turner as long as you're willing to "go with it" in terms of suspending disbelief.

Thank you to Netgalley and St. Martin’s Press for a free copy of this ebook in exchange for an honest review.

I first read this book in June 2019 while recovering from personal trauma. At the time, I was desperately trying to use books as a form of escape and I had completely forgotten to write and submit a review for NetGalley. So here am, almost exactly four years later, rereading the same book and finally writing a review.

Synopsis:
“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 to survive?”

I went into this book with so much anticipation. I love a good locked room mystery, secrets, and deadly games. Soon into reading this book, I realized that as much as an elevator helps encapsulate the feeling of claustrophobia, it’s not the best setting for an “escape room.” There just wasn’t enough in that space for the character to interact with, to seem plausible.

I found that Sara’s POV was the most interesting part of this story, but for a book called “escape room” and for the synopsis to say it’s a “dangerous game of survival” and a “competition,” I found all of that to be VERY misleading. I’m my opinion, this was just a bunch of corporate gossip and manipulations, not the fast-paced deadly game of a book, that the synopsis eludes to.

Overall, I rated it three stars both times I read this story. It was fine, but I just wanted what was promised.

This is not usually my style of reading, I prefer romance. However, this one caught my eye and I decided to give it a shot. Escape rooms are fun so reading about a group of people trying to escape one sounded interesting. This one was way beyond what I ever want to do in an escape room hah. These people are trying to escape with their lives. Overall a very captivating read.

The story wasn't as much about the escape room as it was about the backstories of all the people and their work in a fast-paced, cut throat financial firm.

The story goes back and forth from the four members of the team who are trapped in an elevator to Sara Hall who fills in the blanks on the leadup to the elevator escape room. It did get more exciting in the end but also wasn't very believable. Plus I wanted the escape room participants to find out why they were summoned for the supposed work meeting.

The Escape Room by Megan Goldin is a slow-burn thriller I really enjoyed. The book is strongly character-based which allows the simple plot to show the depth of each character, Vincent, Jules, Sam, and Sylvie, who the reader comes to despise even while rooting for them.

The story is one of revenge, deception, backdoor deals, Wall Street intrigue in a world many hope to inhabit because of its wealth and decadence, but one I find distasteful.

The construction of the novel with its dual time lines and alternating POV kept me engagd solidly from beginning to end and made me want to know more, even when I thought I had it figured out.

I recommend The Escape Room for lovers of thrillers and revenge stories. They will not be disappointed.

I just want to say that the cover of this book is stunning. When I saw it, I knew I had to have it. The plot unlike the cover wasn't as exciting as I was hoping. There is something about Escape Rooms that bore the daylights out of me, but I do enjoy puzzles so I powered on. I would say that I wish there was more puzzle in this book. It felt at times weighed down in getting the corporate culture down than it did in maintaining the mystery. It reminded me of the movie Devil, where they are stuck in the elevator, but the characters here were compulsively unlikeable in a way that made me totally check out. I didn't have anyone to root for and I didn't enjoy rooting against them either.

The premise was over all interesting, but I don't think I could recommend this to my students because of the overly corporate speak.

To be honest, I expected more from this book. It wasn’t boring, it just seemed it took forever to get through. I might not have been the right audience for this one. Most of the narrative revolve around the world of high finance at it’s finest, and what people are willing to do to others to make it to the top, which I have zero interest for. I can understand why tons of readers have enjoyed this book though: the corporate shenanigans and the sense of entitlement and greed that goes on.

The ending did surprise me (although totally unbelievable), so I’m glad I decided to read until the end. The first third of the book had my attention, building on the thrill of the Escape Room challenge that we knew was going to happen. Although the story alternates between the four members who are stuck in the elevator and Sara Hall, the second half of the book was too slow for me but did pick back up for the ending.

Overall, I could not stand many of the characters in the book, especially those who were stuck in the elevator. I liked Sara Hall’s part in the story and liked how she waited patiently to get her revenge.

I love a good locked room mystery! If that’s what this even is? This author is fantastic. She hooks you and that’s where you stay even after you’ve finished the last page!

I really enjoyed this book. It kept me wanting to keep reading. Looking forward to reading more by this author.

Escape rooms are very popular at the moment. People pay to be locked up in an 'escape room' and follow clues to find their way out.
This is the basis of Megan Goldin's book, 'The Escape Room,' but with a much more sinister intention.
Sara Hall lands the job of her dreams at the top-of-its-game, New York finance company Stanhope and Sons, beginning work on her new team of egoists, Vincent, Sam, Jules, Sylvie, and Lucy. Like all Stanhope's employees, Sara is expected to give her life to her work in return for excellent remuneration. Despite the demands on her time, Sara strikes up an unlikely friendship with her colleague, the brilliant, but eccentric Lucy.
Things however are not as they seem. When Lucy dies unexpectedly under mysterious circumstances, Sara becomes suspicious and begins to ask questions, questions that ultimately lead to a gradual unravelling of everything she has worked for.

I initially found the dual storylines of The Escape Room a little confusing, so be patient with yourself as you begin the first few chapters. What seems like a series of completely unconnected events gradually begins to make sense, as you are drawn deeper into an intriguing story of high finance, murder and revenge.

I received an ARC of this book from Netgalley.

This is a generic thriller. There's not much to get a grip on; it's solid, middle of the pack, airport bookstore revenge story. I've read worse, and fairly soon I'll probably forget all of the character's names. I'm guessing the author had Gillian Flynn or even Kelley Armstrong in mind. There are two timelines, a conspiracy, a murder and a cover-up. There's also paper thin characterization, and the real reason I wrote this review, several paragraphs of ableist, dehumanizing language about an autistic character. This character, Lucy, is a bundle of stereotypes about neurodivergent people. She's a math genius, terrible at social situations, doesn't make eye contact, the works. She's a caricature, and I'm actually surprised that no one pointed out how offensive her portrayal is before this book made it to publication.

But really, none of the characters in this book feel like real humans. Instead they feel like chess pieces to be moved around until it's time for the denouement. It's hard to care about them and the high finance world they inhabit when everyone is a materialistic, shallow, misogynist Wall St. remora. Bonus "relationship I don't care about" goes to Sara's fiancé Kevin, who might as well be a sock puppet for how much he matters to the plot.

I keep reading these type of books, hoping to find a spark. This one was definitely swing and miss.