A college graduation trip gone wrong is the basis of Sarah Linley’s new thriller, The Beach. Holly and her three college roommates take a dream vacation, a backpacking trip to Thailand, but only three of them return home. Over the next five years, Holly begins her teaching career and does her best to put the trip behind her, but suddenly she starts receiving threatening messages that someone believes there’s more to the story of George’s death, and they won’t stop until they get all the answers to what really happened.

The Beach is a twisty, entertaining read, leaving you wondering right up until the final page what really happened to George. Sarah Linley gives the reader one piece of the puzzle at a time, notching up the suspense until one dark and stormy night when the answers are revealed. It’s intense, entertaining, and the perfect summer beach read!

Four friends from university travel to Thailand only 3 return home.
An accident occurred while they where there but was it an accident.
Holly is now a school teacher in a relationship .
Holly starts to receive texts and pictures of holly which she had deleted
Who is sending her these
There is only two other people who know what happened that night
Who is intent on revenge
Thanks NetGalley

I totally enjoyed this book by Sarah Linley. I like the plot and her writing style. Will definitely be checking out other books written by her in the future.

This book was a slow start for me but once I pushed through, I found it engaging and intriguing. The things you do when you are young and carefree, very often come back to bite you and that is just what happens to Holly and her friends. Holly is trying to start a new life but someone wants to make her pay. Does good or evil win out?

Excellent thriller. Holly and three friends went on a monthlong trip over seas. One of them did not make it back alive. What happened? Why is someone stalking the remaining friends years later? This is a roller coaster of a story with a shocking ending! Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.

I really love books that go back and forth between the past and the present like this one did. It was a great escape read and I found it a very enjoyable read.

"The Beach" is a good story. It's about a young woman named Holly working as a teacher in England. When she was in college, she and her 3 best friends went on backpacking through Thailand together and something tragic happened. Now she's a college graduate and doesn't talk to those old friends anymore. She's moved on with her life.

Until things start getting weird. Holly would swear someone is following her. She's receiving weird text messages from an unknown number. But she's pretty sure the person reaching out to her died in Thailand years earlier.

Holly is a pretty flat character. In college she dated a very unavailable guy, and she's making the same mistake in her adult life but I couldn't tell whether she didn't want to see it or whether she was too dumb to see it - which at times made me want to grab her by the shoulders and shake her.

Tom, who is Holly's boyfriend and the father of one of her students, is still married to his estranged wife. Tom seems oblivious to how much Holly loves him and clearly the relationship isn't as important to him as it is to her.

I wanted to like this book more, but all of the characters were kind of one-dimensional and Holly, the main character, isn't the most likeable person.

This book is pretty slow for a thriller. I’m not a fan of the alternating timelines, it just doesn’t hold my interest. I also didn’t like knowing who the “bad guy” was so early on in this book. Not an amazing read or something I would recommend to a friend.

I was sucked in from the first page, it was so very well written, I look forward to reading more books by this author. This book, in my opinion, deserves way more than five stars. One of my favorites reads so far this year.

Thank you Netgalley for this chance to read and give my honest review about this book.

Yikes! I really enjoyed this book. Not every character is what they seem. What really happened to George on the beach? Who is stalking Holly if, as she believes, George is dead? Is it possible he survived? What about her new relationship with Tom and his small son, Jack? It took me about five or six chapters to get into this book and used to the perspective and time changes. I really did enjoy it once it got going though. I'm excited to read more by this debut author. Recommended.

In Sarah Linley's The Beach, this gripping thriller debut has some shocking twists and turns in store to keep you at the edge of your seat. Five years ago, four friends who graduated from university, partied at a beach in Thailand. They had the time of the lives there until things took a turn of the worse. When Holly's boyfriend George tried to rape her best friend Meg, one of her friends hit George with a rock. The three of them made a pact about to keep this secret about his "accidental death." But fast forward to the present, Holly Metcalfe is a teacher in London and had found a soul mate with her boyfriend Tom, who's been having issues with his ex-wife Rebecca. While she deals with a student's tardiness at her school, someone's been stalking her, burned her house down, and leaving her cryptic message via the phone. It makes her revisit the past to that horrifying time. When she learns that her best friend was killed by an accident OD, it makes her suspicious of who's next and why. And when her other friend was killed a week late, it makes her fear for her life. As she picks up the pieces to this puzzle, she faces her stalker and confront her in a life-and-death struggle with a gripping climax for the ending.

Holly is now a primary school teacher, living in a secluded village cottage in the calm and quiet Yorkshire Dales. She comes from an adopted family and has an elder sister Lisa who's pretty famous. She's seeing Tom who is divorced with a kid. He wants to keep their relationship secret from the village and she's tired of sneaking around.

The story takes a twist as Holly starts getting anonymous text messages and letters that threatens to unravel the one secret she's hiding from everyone. A secret from her past. Her university days when she used to live with her then best friends. With whom she's not in touch anymore. Something terrible happened when the friends decided to take a trip to Thailand after uni and their lives hasn't been the same again.

Someone knows her secrets and threatens to expose her. And Holly knows it's time to go down the memory lane to find out who!

It's hard to believe that this book is the author's first novel. I loved the suspense that's building up right from the first few chapters. The atmosphere was very likeable and the recurring characters were friendlier than the main ones. In a sleepy little village where everyone knows everyone it's hard to hide a secret. Doesn't mean there isn't one though. The Vacation to Thailand showed the youthful days of the friends. Drinking partying all day and night as typical holidayers. It was a quick read for me, chapters rolling by smoothly and the suspense still waiting to come out by itself. If you want a light, fast paced, atmospheric thriller set in rural England with a taste of holiday in Thailand, then this book should be yours!

Thanks to Sarah Linley and One More Chapter for my digital copy in exchange for my honest opinion. All views are solely mine.

Holly, is a young woman, who is a teacher. She is in a relationship with the father of one of her students. Her life is going well until she suddenly starts getting messages from someone who knows about what happened when Holly and her university friends Meg, Kristoff and George took a trip together five years before. Worried that her life will be ruined she tries to hide what is happening but eventually she has to tell her best friend she is being stalked. This story is told in chapters that go between the past and the present. The stalker is revealed to the reader earlier than expected but it stays interesting and keeps the story moving forward. This book was a good escape read and had an enjoyable twist at the end. 4/5 stars.

Outstanding! Suspense at its best! Thank you netgalley and publisher for this arc in exchange of an honest review.

Holly, her three friends from uni are off on a summer vacation. College is over for George, Kristoff, Meg, and Holly, they have been together since their first year of uni, off to Vietnam, and Thailand for their big summer break, then the rest of their lives will start, or will it? Which one dies, who is stalking the three that are left, and what really happened that last horrible night?
A good read by a brand new author, who will only get better! I don't find it on edge the entire book, the last few chapters do get your heart pounding and keep it there until the end! Did I like the ending? No, I didn't, but most readers of thrillers probably will.
I highly recommend! Thank you Netgalley!
carolintallahassee.com

Thank you so much to @netgalley and @harpercollinsuk for allowing me to read and review this book for you!

This book was released February 21, 2020!

This book is about a woman named Holly. She is currently a kindergarten teacher and living what appears to be a normal life. One day she gets a text message with a picture from a trip to Thailand she went on with her college friends in the past that can turn her life upside down. The story is told from Holly’s perspective, a perspective of someone who appears to be stalking Holly, and Holly’s perspective of her days in college.

❤️Review❤️

This book is currently being marketed as a mystery thriller novel and I honestly would call it a suspense novel instead. This book kept me on the edge of my seat because I wanted to know where this story was going to go, but it did not have as many twists and turns of a typical thriller novel. While reading I felt like I was watching an intense Lifetime movie. As the reader we knew Holly had a stalker and that things weren’t going to go well for her. I was very interested to find out how it would all turn out for her. I liked all of three of the perspectives. I wish that the stalker’s identity remained a mystery for longer than it did because we found out pretty quickly who it was. The identity was revealed in a very simple way and could have been a more complex twist if done differently. I really liked Holly in the beginning. By the end the author definitely had me questioning my opinion on her. The setting was also very well done. The fact that this book primarily takes place in a village/ remote area of land really added to the creepy factor. I also loved getting to read about the scenes set over in Asia. Overall though I was very glued to this story and the writing style. If you are a beginner to the thriller genre, I would highly recommend this book! I’d also recommend it if you are just looking for a suspenseful read.

4 stars ⭐️ ⭐️⭐️⭐️

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This is definitely my kind of book! I am shocked that this is Sarah Linley's debut thriller for sure! The plot flows well and all the characters are well advanced. The book alternates between the past and present and I love that we get a look back at what went on with all the friends and why Holly is the way she is. This is a debut that is going to be a hit for sure!

Holly, Meg, Kristof and George are all friends that go to university together. They all end up living together and when they are finally done with university they have decided to take a trip to Thailand. It will be unforgettable right? But in what way?

Holly is a teacher now and thinks that she is finally getting settled into a nice routine and meeting some friends that she is going to be able to hang out with away from work. Holly has fallen for Tom, Jack's father, and is anxious to get on with their relationship to see where it might go, but Tom is still not ready to move on since Jack's mom and his ex up and left them. Holly is careful not to get caught at Tom's because Jack is one of her students.

When an incident happens with one of her other student's sisters where she happened to fall into a river and Holly had to help rescue her, all her memories come flooding back of her time in Thailand with her friends. Not only that, Holly is getting some strange text messages that she has no idea who is sending them. There are some pictures that no one has seen and when one of them resurfaces, she begins to question if George is alive or not.

When we get to go back to the past, we learn that there was quite a bit of partying going on in Thailand and that everyone was just there to have fun. There are some situations that they are put into that could have ended differently and it might have changed the outcome for some of them, but what happened, happened and nothing can be done about it now.

I love that we get the whole story of what really happened in Thailand and to know why the stalker is doing what he is doing and why Holly is having the difficult time that she is dealing with the stalker. There were lots of twists in turns in this story that I did not see coming but enjoyed so much. Once I started reading this one I couldn't put it down. I was upset with myself that it took me so long to start it. Well done Sarah Linley! I am anxious to see what you have in store for us readers next!!

I voluntarily read and reviewed this book and all opinions are my own. Thanks to Netgalley, the author and the publisher for an advanced copy of this book!

This book starts out slowly but then picks up into a decent thriller. This is set around a group of university friends who travel together post-graduation and things do not go as planned. This is told in a dual timeline so we see the main character, the protagonist, Holly who is now in current day a single woman who has moved to a smaller town to take her first teaching job. She has a stalker who sends her old, nostalgic photos to prompt her memory of the university days.
Once this books gets going, it is really entertaining and engaging.
Definitely recommend. #Netgalley #TheBeach #HarperImpulseandKillerReads #OneMoreChapter

It may be her debut book but it doesn't read like it. It's a strong plot with three dimensional characters. If you like thrillers as much as I do pick up this winner of a book and prepare read this as fast as you can. I will definitely be reading more books from this author. Well done.

A superb read that shows you can never quite leave the past behind

Holly is settling into her new job as a teacher in the beautiful Yorkshire Dales, she is loving life but has a secret....a secret she shares with old Uni friends Meg and Kristoff....George was also in the ‘Gang of 4’ but,sadly, George is dead......

The book goes between Uni days and the present and covers a backpacking holiday the 4 took to Asia, this part of the book is described superbly ( was not surprised to read the author spent 2 years backpacking there ) and the story really takes flight on one of their last nights in Thailand, they go to a ‘anything goes’ party but none
of them expected what happened
to happen

A really good ‘read read’, it was great to pick this book up over the last few
days and immediately be back with the characters and the plot

Written in a welcoming style and easy to follow, the pretty chilling ending was unexpected, always a good sign 😊

Excellent debut novel

9/10
5 Stars