“Every Last Fear” by Alex Finlay earned a spot on my “Best Books Ever” list. The characters are compelling; the plot is well organized, and the narrative is gripping. It is the story of things that just get out of hand. It is about a family, the Pine family, a family that dies in the first sentence. (I will not give away more than that)

Things for the Pine family are characterized as before “Year Zero” or after it. Readers meet all the members of the family’ learn what they did, and how “IT” influenced them, and what happened when the cameras stopped rolling. They are living in a national game of Clue where journalists and internet detectives come up with elaborate theories and spend an unbelievable amount of time trying to prove their ideas. This is the new but not improved Pine family.
Finlay hints at significant but unknown details and expertly seeds the readers’ minds with questions. Crumbs of information and tiny details of evidence lead readers down a path that might lead to answers but mostly elicits more questions. What about the party? The medication? That Netflix show? A phone call? Some missing data? Those people who pop into the narrative from nowhere?
“Every Last Fear” is the story of what happened to a family caught in a web of social media, documentaries, politics, and secrets. I received a review copy of “Every Last Fear” from Alex Finlay, St. Martin’s Press, and Minotaur Books. Everyone has secrets; no one wants to tell them, but everyone eventually finds out.

Plan your time wisely because once you start reading, you will NOT be able to put this book down.

THIS WAS SUCH A GOOD STORY. Fast-paced, intense, dark, and twisty...I devoured every moment. 5 well deserved stars....

4.5 stars

This is a crazy convoluted mess and I loved it! There are so many moving pieces and twists in this book. It was definitely intense and it kept me entertained.

Danny Pine is charged with brutally murdering his pregnant high school girlfriend, but the family doesn't believe that is the case. There is also a documentary on and it tries to prove his innocence. This conviction has consumed the Pine family's life I more ways than one.

I really likes how the story was told through a few different POVs with before and after the incident plotlines. It was very intense and it definitely kept me guessing on what happened. I honestly didn't see the end coming.

Thanks Netgalley and publisher for the digital copy in exchange for my honest review!

Wow! This book was exactly what i needed! I read about half the book in one day because i just could not put it down! I will say it was a little slow in the beginning. I didn’t see the connection with all the characters but then it started to connect and make sense and took off!

I loved the timelines and the back and forth with bits of information on both ends. I loved the character development! Everything was so spot on! I did figure out who did it, i had a feeling at one point in the middle that just clicked for me. But i still had so many questions and i wasn’t convinced i was right so when it was revealed it was more of a HA! I knew it!! So it wasn’t a let down to have figured it out.

The ending was perfect as well! I just loved this book!

Every Last Fear pulled my attention in from the first page and was like a crazy roller coaster ride. Whenever I thought I might have the plot figured out, it would take a quick turn.

The book is set in present day after a horrific event has happened. The time period in the book goes back and forth between the past and present. It is also told from multiple viewpoints. This enables the reader to get clues from various sources based upon the specific events they knew about.

I really thought the storyline was inventive and fresh. There was a lot of loss and heartbreak involved. Some of it seemed very preventable. It really demonstrates how one person's action or decision can impact many lives.

This was simply an excellent book. I look forward to reading more by Alex Finlay.

Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC. I voluntarily chose to review it and the opinions contained within are my own.

Thank you @minotaur_books and. @netgalley for this ARC.

Review: I’ve seen so much about this book and it definitely lived up to my expectations. First this book grabbed my attention from the very beginning. I loved the multiple POV and timelines of before and after. I was so surprised at the end and never would have guess “who did it”. Matt suffered so much with his parents and siblings being murdered and watching his brother sit in prison for a crime he believes he committed despite the rest of the family believing otherwise. I couldn’t imagine the feelings he was going through. I really enjoyed the character of Sarah Keller. She fought for Matt and family.

I rate this book a 4/5. And can’t wait to read more Alex Finlay in the future, because this author knows how to write a thriller!

This book circles around the Pine family. They’ve been through the wringer. The dad appears reckless and obsessed, the mom is acts oblivious but is hiding things, the brother is in jail for a murder he claims he didn’t commit. Basically this family is messy, and yet it gets messier.

I really enjoyed this book. This is fast paced and told from many different povs. There is the story before and then after story. But 2 different before and after events. It’s kind if a puzzle that slowly clicks together. It was really well done I wish I would have slowed down when reading to really savour the book.

I will look forward to more books by this author.

I was given this book in exchange for my honest review.

The biggest must read of 2021! Much more than a thriller, this one is at heart about family. The characters are complex and well fleshed out. I became completely invested in their lives and the outcome. The multiple points of view add so much to the story. The final reveal is the ultimate shocker. I can't rave enough about this story. I will be recommending it to all my book loving friends and family.

I love books that mix media, in this case a true crime documentary alongside another mystery. I love when there is a story within a story, and this book seemed to have quite a lot few storylines thrown in. There were a lot of side plots that added a bunch of action-packed scenes. I flew through this one, it was so fast paced and hard to put down. This was one of my most anticipated reads of the year, and it did not disappoint.</p>

I was intrigued right from the start. The book immediately began with a bunch of mystery. I love the dual time lines, it made the book go so much quicker to me. I’m a huge fan of having different narrators. Past and present and different points of view always make me more interested. The inclusion of the documentary really made the story a more main stream and relatable one.</p>

I really liked how every chapter kept you hanging and you didn’t know who the next narrator would be. This really made the book harder to put down. I enjoyed all the characters, except the investigators at first. I thought they were pretty unnecessary early on, but eventually I began to enjoy the investigator and their chapters.</p>

Overall this was an amazing thriller, and I am so happy that other’s will now have the chance to pick this one up. I found the end completely unpredictable and explosive. There were so many twists and turns that kept me guessing.

This book opened with a splash, announcing that a college kids family had died while vacationing in Mexico. The family had been part of a documentary that made a splash on Netflix, due to their eldest son now serving time in prison because he confessed to killing his hush school girlfriend only after the cops coerced him with the confession.

This book was told from multiple POVs of the family members past and present and the FBI agent handling the case. For me, this made this book sometimes hard to keep up with and by the middle I found myself daydreaming through parts of it, having to go back and reread things again.

The families dearth was ruled as an accident due to a gas leak in their vacation rental, however, after looking further it appeared the bodies were staged.

Who killed the family and who killed the high school girlfriend? Matt, now the lone surviving member of the family (that isn’t dead or jailed) has to find this information out and fast!

Overall, the beginning and the end made this a solid thriller for me and I would recommend.

Thank you for my gifted copy #netgalley and #minotaurbooks for #everylastfear

Matt Pine's older brother Danny is in prison for the murder of his girlfriend. The rest of the Pine family is convinced Danny didn't do it as are a couple of documentary filmmakers who made a movie about Danny's case, but Matt is not so sure. When the rest of Danny's family is killed during an unexpected trip to Mexico, the Mexican police seem to think it's nothing more than a tragic accident. However, the deaths are looking more and more suspicious and may be related to Matt's father and sister's unrelenting doggedness in tracking down every possible lead in Danny's case. Matt realizes that there may be more to his brother's case than he thought. This book is a great read for those who are addicted to TV shows or podcasts that champion the allegedly wrongly convicted. The alternating perspectives and the time shifts between before and after Matt's family's murders only serve to add to the suspense of the story. The book is more than just another standard crime thriller, however. It is a book about family and the bonds that tie families together. Even though sometimes those bonds may fray a little ultimately they are tough and hard to break. Although the resolution of the mystery at the center of the story is not the most original, the book is still gripping, mostly satisfying, and worth reading.

What?! How did I not see this coming!! Well played Alex Finlay well played.

This novel was an action packed, never a dull moment, twisty, who done it kind of read and I loved every second of it!

How much can a family go through! First the oldest son, Danny, is sent to prison for something he didn’t do, they had terrible luck with the lawyers, the Netflix documentary that was supposed to be their saving grace but ended doing no such thing, their hometown hates them, they are broke, dad’s suicidal, the daughter, Maggie, is put in a really bad situation and then ends up being bullied. Oh, wait what else… oh ya, they end up dead! Well minus the middle son, Matt Pine, who has distanced himself from the family for some time now.

The novel is told by multiple points of views which resulted in a complex plot. It felt like with everyone’s point of view there was a whole different story and a whole different mystery to solve. I could not figure it out because I kept getting distracted with all the other revelations!

The characters were well written as well. I loved Maggie’s perseverance and resilience. She, alongside her father, refused to give up on Danny. I love reading about strong, smart and badass female characters. Which leads me to Sarah Keller, her husband calls her G-women which yes, she is!

Overall, I would recommend this novel to anyone and everyone. Personally, I wish I could re-set and read it all over again! It was so well written and an enjoyable read.

Thank You to Alex Finlay and St. Martin’s Press, for the digital ARC provided through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Very strong, very solid mystery thriller.

Every Last Fear focuses on one family, but two main story lines. The first is Matt, a film student living in NYC and the middle son. His older brother, Danny, is in prison for murdering his girlfriend; his parents and younger siblings are at home in suburban Chicago. The story is told in two closely-connected timelines - the "rest" of the family working to exonerate Danny (and related side issues) and Matt, dealing with his family's death (these are not spoilers, you would learn this from the blurb!)

There is a lot to this book that makes it a strong thriller. The pacing is fantastic - the action keeps you wanting more but it isn't just moving from one car explosion to the next. The mystery of whodunit is genuinely interesting - who killed Danny's girlfriend AND who killed Matt's family. I feel like the characters were adequately developed - there was enough backstory to explain the present day actions. And I really, really liked that so many of the "heroes" were women -- the lead FBI agent was a woman (although the author was little heavy handed with reminding us she was also a mother! so womanly!); the investigator who got the ball rolling in Mexico was a woman; the lawyer that did the most good for Danny was a woman; and even the family member who was the most useful in solving the case was Danny's sister.

There has been some criticism of this book, particularly how it treats people with a Mexican background. I think it is entirely warranted. That part of the story felt like a bad 1990's action film to me, where all Brown people are terrorists and everyone from Latin America is a drug smuggler. Also, it really added nothing to the story. Matt's interactions with Mexican authorities were pretty limited. The danger he faced there had little to do with the police. The author could have added that roadblock in dozens of other ways without relying on stereotypes.

“They found the bodies on a Tuesday.” From this first line, I was HOOKED. I ignored all responsibilities for almost a whole day just so I could stay put on the couch to finish this one. What a wild wild ride! This documentary-thriller-dual timeline novel is one I will recommend to anyone who asks me for a good mystery. The Pine family will be in my heart for awhile.

Thank you to Netgalley and Minotaur for the opportunity to read this in exchange for my honest opinion.

“𝒀𝒐𝒖 𝒉𝒂𝒗𝒆 𝒕𝒘𝒐 𝒄𝒉𝒐𝒊𝒄𝒆𝒔 𝒘𝒉𝒆𝒏 𝒚𝒐𝒖’𝒓𝒆 𝒄𝒐𝒏𝒇𝒓𝒐𝒏𝒕𝒆𝒅 𝒘𝒊𝒕𝒉 𝒚𝒐𝒖𝒓 𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒚 𝒍𝒂𝒔𝒕 𝒇𝒆𝒂𝒓: 𝒈𝒊𝒗𝒆 𝒖𝒑 𝒐𝒓 𝒇𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕 𝒍𝒊𝒌𝒆 𝒉𝒆𝒍𝒍.”

Every Last Fear focuses around a family, who is found dead while on vacation; this same family was the subject of a true crime series on Netflix. The topic? The oldest son Danny is imprisoned for the murder of a young girl named Charlotte. Danny’s father, Evan, never believed that he was guilty and fought to find out the truth until the very end. Matt, the second oldest child, is left to pick up the pieces and to find out the truth.

First the good: I really liked the many different points of view, including before the family’s death and after. It made me feel for each character, and see how each of them was searching for answers to help Danny. I became attached to each member of the Pine family, even though I knew that they were dead. There was so many different uses of technology, including FaceTime, texting, and excepts from the Netflix documentary, that it felt very current. I definitely wanted to know the truth about the night of Danny’s arrest, along with trying to piece together the current mystery of what happened to the Pine family. I also loved how dark and twisty the book was, and the teaming of Matt and FBI agent Sarah Keller was a highlight.

The unsure: something that really bugged me is that the author was inspired by a vacation taken to Tulum, Mexico, and yet the portrayal of the Mexican people seemed very stereotypical. I disliked the referral to “the Mexicans,” which seemed to blanket all people, instead of being specific (like the Mexican authorities). It felt like a cop out, playing into stereotypes.

That being said, Every Last Fear reads like a movie or a mini series, and I think it would transfer well onto screen; in fact, it may be an opportunity to address the piece that I found problematic about the book. It is a tightly paced, quick moving thriller that gives me hope for Alex Finlay’s next book.

“𝑩𝒆𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒆 𝑫𝒂𝒏𝒏𝒚’𝒔 𝒂𝒓𝒓𝒆𝒔𝒕 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒊𝒎𝒑𝒓𝒊𝒔𝒐𝒏𝒎𝒆𝒏𝒕, 𝒃𝒆𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒆 𝑨 𝑽𝒊𝒐𝒍𝒆𝒏𝒕 𝑵𝒂𝒕𝒖𝒓𝒆. 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒍𝒅 𝒘𝒂𝒔 𝒅𝒊𝒗𝒊𝒅𝒆𝒅 𝒊𝒏𝒕𝒐 𝒃𝒆𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒆 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒂𝒇𝒕𝒆𝒓 𝒕𝒉𝒐𝒔𝒆 𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒔.”

With all of the 4 and 5 star reviews of this book, I feel like maybe I missed something here? I am clearly in the minority, but I really didn’t think this book was as twisty and suspense filled as others. One of the things that I didn’t like was there were too many POV and too many narrators.

Flipping back and forth between past and present, multiple timelines, jumping from character to character really prevented me from being fully invested in this novel. I found myself bored at times and kept hoping that the pace would pick up.

While this book did hold my interest enough to finish and rate it, I am obviously one of the few readers who wasn’t blown away by this book. So I would encourage you to give this a go for yourself as there are tons of glowing reviews out there.

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press for my copy of this book via NetGalley

Every Last Fear is a psychological thriller which is one of my favorite genres, and this book certainly didn't dissappoint. This was a new author for me, but I certainly will be reading more of his work. Matt Pine's world comes crashing down around him when he finds out his family has been found dead in Mexico what follows is a riveting storyline in a book that was hard to put down. I would certainly recommend this book to others.

I received a ARC from NetGalley and the publisher and was under no obligation to leave a positive review, all opinions expressed here are my own.

This was a fabulous twisty thriller about a college student that must figure out who murdered his family while they were on vacation. The novel flashes back and forth between present and the point of view of the deceased family members before the murders occurred. I have to say, I enjoyed the flashbacks more than the actual arc of the mystery, they were like little puzzle pieces that clicked in place as the story progressed and really added depth to all the characters.

Thank you to Netgalley for the opportunity to read and review this book! #EveryLastFear #NetGalley

Thank you to NetGalley and Minotaur Books for an advanced readers copy in exchange for my honest review.

This book opens with a bang, as you've read from many other reviewers. Instantly hooked.

The Pine family (four of them) are on "vacation" in Mexico and all are found dead due to a supposed gas leak. FBI shows up to Matt Pine's college to inform him that his parents and younger brother and sister are dead. The only surviving family member besides Matt is his older brother, Danny, currently in prison for murdering his girlfriend. A true crime documentary was done about Danny, which put his family in the spotlight, especially Mr. Pine.

This was a good thriller read, but I wasn't overly wowed by it. I found all the POVs a bit too much and I am not a big fan of back and forth as far as past and present time. I also felt like some of the POVs could have been cut as they added nothing to the story. I got the most enjoyment out of reading through Matt's eyes.

3 stars.

University student, Matt Pine’s, family dies in a tragic accident. The FBI notify Matt that his parents and younger siblings died from a gas leak in their hotel room while on vacation in Mexico. Matt’s older brother and only other living family member, Danny, is in prison for the murder of his girlfriend seven years ago. Matt has to deliver the devastating news to Danny. The Pine family is well known for the true crime documentary series that featured Danny’s crime and the many questionable aspects of the trial that landed him in prison. Was Danny really guilty? Why is the FBI involved in notifying Matt of his family tragedy?

This novel started off strong! I was gripped by the tension and suspense and eager to find out what happened. I really enjoyed the first third. The storyline was intriguing and unique however, after the halfway point, it took a turn for the worse. I found several plot points unrealistic and absurd. There was plenty of stereotyping and several storyline conveniences and plot holes that I couldn’t look past. There was too much going on. Unfortunately, the far-fetched aspects took away most of my connection and enjoyment.

Was this a quick, easy and entertaining novel? Yes! Was it as good as I had expected and hoped? Not even close. I am clearly the outlier as there are many raving reviews, so please check those out!

Thank you to NetGalley and St Martin’s Press for my review copy!