This book had so much potential. A full-contact haunted house where someone gets murdered?! Absolutely intriguing! Unfortunately, Mattson managed to make this book utterly underwhelming.

My main problem with this book is that Mattson tried to tackle too many issues in this book. The best thrillers and mysteries always tie in societal issues, which tethers them in reality, but that didn't quite work in Reprieve. All of the issues that Mattson included (racism, homophobia, misogyny, etc) felt thrown in and very surface level. The characters were also all very underdeveloped, and honestly...they were all kind of horrible people, with the exception of Kendra. I do not mind at all when characters are unlikeable--I actually prefer those types of characters. But what I do have a problem with is when there is no nuance to them, no reason to care at all about what happens to them. I was just completely detached from every character in this book, and as a result, I found myself spacing out for most of it. For a book that's 400+ pages...that's a problem, It wasn't engaging.

I will say that I did enjoy the scenes within the haunted house. They were sufficiently gory and detailed, but it did make me wonder just what genre the author was trying to fit this story into. It felt like he couldn't decide between horror, thriller, mystery, and literary fiction, so he just decided to do them all. Which would have been fine, had he fully committed to making it work, which I don't think he successfully did.

I wanted to love this, but I couldn't have cared less for any of the characters and didn't really care what happened to them.

WOW! I am a true horror fan and this is an absolutely gorgeously written, socially significant literary horror tale. I think it's the horror book of the season.

It will be an easy sell to people who like Paul Tremblay and Victor LaVelle. I might even give it to someone looking for House of Leaves, which is always ALWAYS checked out this time of year. The contestant characters are fully fleshed -- and then the periphery characters are mostly all-bad, ill-intentioned. The haunted house theme is on point for the season. It's an ensemble cast, who come together interestingly at the end as they become contestants in the Quigley House's "full-contact" contest to try to will sixty thousand dollars. Each character has wildly differing world views and motivations for joining the contest, and learning the backstories makes the horrific tragedy that unfolds at Quigley that much richer. Trauma horror is very du jour, and this is a good example of that genre. It's also meaningful and thought-provoking. I love this book and do not imagine it will sit on the shelf much this fall -- the cover alone is foreboding and frightening. Thank you very much for the opportunity to read and review this book.

It has great potential but I wasn’t a fan of how the story went. It has so much unnecessary description on things that are not needed in the story, Not a fan of this book but of course, everyone is different and maybe if this book didnt work for me probably the author’s other works could.

Lincoln Nebraska: A full-contact, haunted, escape room has every horror fan mesmerized. If a group can make is through with out yelling the safe word, they win BIG! Only one group in the Quigley House history has made it through, but that doesn't deter people from trying. Finally by the end of April in 1997, a group of contestants makes it all the way to the last cell. But its what happens in that last cell that takes a turn for the worst. No one expected it. Or did they?
Reprieve but James Han Mattsson was hard to read at times. Some of the subject matter showed up in my dreams, which wasn't exactly the most pleasant. There is a lot of subject matter going on in Reprieve. Lots of characters, which can get confusing at times. The court manuscripts were thrown in there and I wasn't sure exactly why until the end. I really enjoyed the premise of the book but I thought the ending fell flat. I re-read the last chapter twice. Could the ending have gone in a different direction? Maybe? I am really torn on how to rate this book. I would like to read additional works by Han Mattsson.
Special Thanks to NetGalley, James Han Mattsson, and William Morrow- Custom House Publishing for the advanced digital copy in exchange for my honest opinion. 3.5 stars for me.
#Reprieve #NetGalley

Reprieve has writing with a ton of potential, but there was just too much going on. Some courtroom drama esque things, a horror escape room plot, and also tackling many social issues in the process? I’m interested in the author but Reprieve took turns that I was definitely not expecting!

Reprieve is a hard one for me to rate. I feel like there was a lot going on that could have made an excellent novel but it just didn't work for me.

There were a lot of main characters - none of them likable. There were a lot of genres - horror, thriller, social commentary drama - some of them likable. The idea seemed like it would be fun but it just didn't all come together. The chapters will the "Cell" activity were done well. They were gory, creepy and made me want to turn pages. The court transcript chapters were short and fast, keeping the story moving along. The rest was a bit of a sludge.

There were attempts are some important themes like racism, homophobia, American greed and hypocrisy. They were lightly sprinkled throughout until about 75% into the novel when they were smashing you over the head.

Again, some great parts that didn't add up to a whole for me.

Thank you to William Morrow and Scene of the Crime for advancing a Kindle edition in exchange for an honest review.

The premise of REPRIEVE is absolutely thrilling--four contestants make it to the final cell of the Quigley House, a full-contact haunted escape room in Lincoln, Nebraska, made famous for its monstrosities, booby-traps, and ghoulishly costumed actors. If the group can endure these horrors without shouting the safe word, “reprieve,” they’ll win a substantial cash prize—a startling feat accomplished only by one other group in the house’s long history. But before they can complete the challenge, a man breaks into the cell and kills one of the contestants.

I wanted so much to like this book, but the chapters were ridiculously long. I wanted to be invested in each of the four characters, but so much of their back story was just told rather than interwoven into the story. It felt very much like I was reading separate books that were meshed into one. The transcripts that were interspersed throughout were an interesting touch, but unfortunately, it did little to enhance my enjoyment of this book.

REPRIEVE was marketed as horror but often read more as a YA book. I could tell that the author was trying to make some profound commentary about big issues in present-day society, but unfortunately, this one just fell flat for me.

Thank you so much to William Morrow and Scene of the Crime for this gifted e-ARC.

A haunted house full on contact. Probably my biggest fear. I wasn't sure what to expect from Reprieve. This story is told via court transcriptions. Contestants, a brutal murder and a lot WOW! It took me a little while to get into this story but once I did I couldn't put it down. Horrifying, confusing and shocking. Thank you so much for letting me read this!

On April 27, 1997, four contestants make it to the final cell of the Quigley House, a full-contact haunted escape room in Lincoln, Nebraska, made famous for its monstrosities, booby-traps, and ghoulishly costumed actors. If the group can endure these horrors without shouting the safe word, “reprieve,” they’ll win a substantial cash prize—a startling feat accomplished only by one other group in the house’s long history. But before they can complete the challenge, a man breaks into the cell and kills one of the contestants.

This book was very slow to start. The author give the backstory on a couple of the main characters, too much backstory, in my opinion and not enough on anyone else. You read what was done, and how it was done, by not really the why.

The characters are hard to care about, as they are all a self centered lot. Maybe this is the morale of the book, is if you only think about yourself, you will be left to yourself.

Many scenes can be a tad gruesome. Just a heads up.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for an honest review

As a horror fan and based on the title alone, I went into this expecting a spooky/gothic read of a house of horrors, a la Stephen King or Shirley Jackson. Instead, this novel blends several elements and uniquely sets it apart from the rest. As you read, you begin to see that the real horrors the contestants face isn’t ghouls and vampires, but racism, homophobia, greed and obsession. The story is a bit of a slow burn at first, showing the backgrounds of the characters and interspersed with court transcripts and the characters time in each room.
I felt that the author did a wonderful job of creating a spooky atmosphere when the setting was the escape rooms. The tension and the fear leaps off the pages. The Quigley House reminds me of a few “extreme” haunted houses of my youth, and one perhaps I might even have dared to venture to in my younger days. Many of the characters are deeply flawed and unlikable, but there were a couple that I was rooting for.

This was supposed to be about a full contact escape room. I really thought it would have been more of a thriller. It started out slow with background information about three of the main characters. It had teenage angst and race issues, sexuality and prostitution and basic family drama. This took place in the 90’s. The chapters also included court testimony from the trial. Eventually, when it gets to the part about four people trying to finish out the five cells, it gets interesting. But this was halfway through the book.
The only character I really liked was Bryan. He was in college trying to be a good guy and help his cousin and roommate.
Thank you to #WilliamMorrow and #NetGalley for my early ebook ARC.

A super interesting concept, I think I was just very eager for the concept of a scary escape room narrative and this didn't really deliver in that aspect, which might have been my own expectations getting in the way.
We spend very, very little time in the escape room cells themselves, and instead, we spend a lot of time with a confusing cast of unlikeable characters, no matter how intentional that is I found making every character unlikeable made me care very little about anything happening.
Not to mention I was often very confused about the order of events and the characters within the narrative, and often I had to go to the back of the book or other chapters to refresh myself on who was who.
I think there was a ton of potential but unfortunately not a lot of scares or twists in this story

The premise to this disappointing novel is a locked room situation made into a horror haunted house, There are 5 rooms to go through, each progressively scarier and harder than the previous. The house already has quite a country-wide reputation, but the owner cooks up a scheme to generate more interest, a scheme that tragically backfires. The plot is relatively straightforward, but the organization of the book is terribly confusing. It bounces from chapters about the players to chapters about the room activities to excerpts from some sort of court proceeding. This style makes understanding the story extremely difficult. By the time I got to the end, I just didn't care. Thanks to NetGalley and to William Morrow and Custom House for providing an ARC.

This book is about Quigley House, an immersive haunted house experience. People in groups of 4 go through rooms, each room has different theme, in each room the contestants collect envelopes and when they have collected the correct amount they move on. If they finish all the rooms, they win $60,000. Only one team has ever made it. Kendra, a high school student works parking cars there. Her cousin Bryan is in college, his roommate is Jaidee, who is from Thailand. Jaidee came to America because he fell in love with one of his teachers in Thailand, an American named Victor. Victor and his girlfriend want to do Quigley House and talk Jaidee into joining them, and Kendra talks her cousin, Bryan into being the 4th person for the team. The book drags on in many places, it really isn't a horror story, there is no moment in this book where you are reading fast to find out what happens next. The book hype says it touches on some social issues. I guess it does, Jaidee is gay and from Thailand, and Bryan and Kendra are black, but so what. They have some issues but who doesn't. It is sad I was looking forward to reading it. I have AOC from Goodreads and also one through net galley.

This is a truly unique and original concept for a horror novel - but let’s start with the fact that it read more as solid literary fiction with some horror elements interspersed.

The narrative begins with the reader already aware that a horror has occurred, so the narrative unfolds as it backtracks. I did find it a little difficult to keep up with the various characters and a good bit of jumping around at first, but it did become clearer as the story progressed.

I did feel, in the end, that there were many unanswered questions and even more unsatisfying answers. I did really enjoy the book, but it wasn’t quite what I was expecting or hoping for.

This book is not so much a horror novel as a depiction of the state of the social conditions in this country. I found the characters interesting and realistic. The writing is excellent.

This book wasn't what I expected. I thought it was going to be a somewhat 'elevated' horror novel, but I didn't feel the horror at all; I would call it solid literary fiction. In fact, I found the horror chapters to be the most lackluster part of the book. I think that some readers who were expecting horror may find the heavy backstory meandering. I did enjoy following the backstories of each character, and was looking forward to the dramatic culmination, but somehow it just fell flat for me. I had a couple of significant, why-based questions at the end that left the story feeling unresolved and uneven. I was compelled by the majority of the book that did not take place at the haunt - I would certainly read more of that - but the core concept of the book, the haunt and the plot that revolved around it, never came together for me.

This is a small thing, but why was the haunt owner paying 3 parking lot attendants to "direct" two teams of 4 people where to park, and then to just sit around the rest of the night? It would make sense if there were a crowd, like in a regular haunted house, but there was often only 1 car per team - the van. Two attendants would be enough. I pick this point in particular, because the answer is obviously because they all three needed to be there for plot purposes. When this happens, it pulls me out of the story and makes me wish the author had found a more realistic way through the plot.

“ONLY ONE THING CAN TRIUMPH OVER FEAR, at least temporarily, GREED.
And, the owner and proprietor, of Quigley House, John Quigley, is counting on that.

The rules are simple-if your 4 person team can make it through the six cells of his “full contact” haunted escape room, without using the safe word (which means you want to quit) “Reprieve” AND two of the envelopes you have found match those held by the ghost of Martha Quigley, who waits in cell 6, the group will win 60,000.

Oh, and a t-shirt!

Only one group has succeeded so far, and our group-Victor, Jane, Jaidee and Bryan hope to be the second.

A scoreboard is on the wall and the instructions for Cell One say:

* #envelopes total 8
* # envelopes you need to find to move on to the next cell- 5
* Contestants who attack will be disqualified
* First Aid kit behind the clock

Sounds, like a nail biting thriller, doesn’t it?
It isn’t. Though it could have been, and what I was HOPING it would be.

The rooms (cells) in the house are known for having ghoulishly costumed actors, who CAN touch you, elaborate props, and LOTS and LOTS of fake blood.

Sounds like a horror story, right?
Well, those chapters are definitely GROSS and qualify-but most of the book takes place outside of the house, as we get to know the back stories of our players, and the staff members of Quigley House, before and after each cell. So, the majority of the book is not.

Two of our protagonists, contestant Jaidee and staff member, Kendra are young, and their respective chapters read like YA. But, the book isn’t labeled as such.

So, what is this book exactly ?

A guess it’s a crossover of genres, as the back stories touch on the things that can make our characters vulnerable, such as race, prejudice, deceit and sexuality, as you might find in literary fiction.

I feel like the book would’ve been stronger if the author had decided on one genre to concentrate on. As written, it is a little bit of each but doesn’t quite reach the full potential of any of them, and as I finished I felt quite apathetic about it-I didn’t hate it-but it won’t leave a lasting impression on me, either.

Thank You to William Morrow and Scene of the Crime for my gifted copy provided through NetGalley.
It was my pleasure to offer a candid review!

Available on October 5, 2021.

This was a most interesting concept for a thriller/horror novel, set in a commercially run "house of horrors." The chapters alternate between characters, and their stories, prior to their ill-fated visit to the house. Interspersed are chapters of courtroom testimony, after the crime is committed. The book starts slowly, and delves into the concept of an extreme horror experience, and how it can go so very wrong. Most of the characters are deeply flawed, and while the character development by the author is good, the characters are definitely not likeable. The final chapters and epilogue, are well done, and definitely bring everything to a believable conclusion. Thanks fo Netgalley and Scene of the Crime for the complimentary copy.