One of my Top Reads for 2022! Fast paced. Nail biting. Edge of my seat reading.

Tom and Heather leave Seattle for a medical conference in Australia. The kids demand to see koalas and kangaroos and in a moment of tension the family decides to venture via the O'Neill family's ferry to their Island. All hell breaks loose and the family is left fighting for their lives.

The book was ingenious. I felt like I was watching a movie. I could barely put it down and devoured it in under 24 hours. I highly recommend this for an intense read.

The Island by Adrian McKinty is a fast-paced thriller about a family vacation that goes VERY wrong. It's one of the books I read while on vacation, and I'm very grateful our trip had nothing in common with this plot!

When Tom Baxter, a recently-widowed 40-ish orthopedic surgeon, is invited to be a medical conference keynote speaker in Australia, he brings his new young wife, his 14-year-old daughter, and his 12-year-old son along for a family vacation. The relationships are new and would benefit from some bonding experiences.

All goes relatively well until their itinerary brings them to Melbourne, and a chance encounter leads the Baxters to a remote island populated by members of a single family. Then a terrible accident launches a horrific chain of events, forcing the Baxters to run, hide, and fight for their lives.

I was on the edge of my seat and read this only during the day to avoid nightmares. The action was nearly constant and (for me) was intense and "believable." There's characters you'll love to hate, and humans and dogs meet violent ends.

Hulu has the rights to develop The Island as a limited series. I hope it gets created ... I'll be watching some parts through a mask of my fingers! Thank you to Little, Brown and NetGalley for a review copy.

Heather Baxter is married to Tom, a widowed doctor with a young son and teenage daughter, when they travel from Seattle to Australia for Tom's business conference. They accept a boat ride to a private island off the mainland, but after Tom hits an island resident with his car, his life and his family's become endangered from the angry owners of the island.

The rest of the book is sheer terror and nail biting suspense as the family tries to escape from the island and its manic inhabitants. Without means of communicating to anyone outside the island, the family is in dire straits.

I liked that young Heather becomes the brave and resilient heroine of the book, thinking fast and thinking ahead in this action packed, often violent story of survival. A book not for the faint of heart, the action is often violent and brutal but extremely suspenseful.

I was so pleasantly surprised by this book! I really enjoyed The Chain, but the Island was even better. This is a super fast paced, action/thriller. This book truly feels like watching a movie! There were about 30-40 pages of buildup but after that this story really took off and did not let up until the ending. I will say the only thing I didn't love was the ending was very quick and only lasted a few pages, but it was still a really great story. I would definitely recommend this!

A great thriller! Quick and easy to read, keeps you on your toes throughout the whole story. Another great book from McKinty

THE ISLAND was a wild ride from beginning to end. A family vacation gone very, very wrong.
When Heather travels to Australia with her new husband and two step kids, it seems like a chance for them all to bond and move forward together. As they have travelled very far, the kids convince their dad to go to a private island to see koala bears. From here, well I don’t want to say too much because you should go in blind!
I finished this book in 24 hours, and even though it required some suspension of disbelief, it worked for this book, because I feel like you truly just need to enjoy the ride. It has a lot of nail-biting moments, how are they going to get out of this situation moments, and what, no way moments.
The writing ran through my head like a movie, so I am very excited for the adaption of the Island as I think it will be very exciting and suspenseful on the big screen.
Thank you Little, Brown and Company for the eARC through NetGalley in exchange for the honest review.

3.5 ⭐️

Heather is a newly married young stepmother on a work trip/vacation in Australia with her husband and two kids. One day, the kids pressure Heather and her husband Tom into seeing some animals on a very small island a family lives on that the general public doesn’t go on. With another couple, the family heads onto the island only for everything to start to go extremely wrong.

This was wild. First from the author and yes, you really do have to suspend disbelief. While crazier things have happened, this book is extremely unrealistic. For some reason, I couldn’t put it down once I got past the beginning and got into it. I stayed up way too late reading this one. For me, the best part was reading about Heather and her resourcefulness. The cat and mouse chase is the majority of the story and it kept me on my toes and interested. I liked Heathers relationship with the kids as well. The only complaint I really have is the writing/language. There were some parts or lines that for me didn’t need to be included, especially Carolyn’s and the fart comments. The kids did not always talk how kids talk, the writing generally felt stiff especially with those one or two word lines (I can’t think of the proper word for that). Regardless, this was an interesting, very different read for me and I was entertained and liked the ending. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the free preview in exchange for an honest review.

This was no Gilligan's Island and no three hour tour! Deciding they needed to see koala's Heather and Tom's vacation takes a sinister curve when the kids decide they must see koala bears. So, even though warned not to, they rake a ferry to Dutch Island and encounter the threatening and vile clan that live there. The O'Neals were a dastardly group but soon they would face Heather, newly married to Tom assuming a superwoman role to battle these horrible people.

Heather and the kids, sans Tom ,who was captured by the O'Neals, escape after being held captive and are out in the wild of this island's terrain. They overcame a plethora of experiences, being chased by dogs, the family with guns and wheels, and other myriad happenings. Implausible you say? Exactly! Heather becomes a superwoman, and soon proves fiction is a fine way to achieve that status.

This was a book that required the reader to extend their disbelief as far as the eye could see with binoculars! All in all however, I was not bored by this story as ridiculous as it often was!

So, if you need something to fill in some time, this might be the book for you. It is fast paced, improbable, and has a number of quite grisly scenes. Thank you to Adrian McKinty and NetGalley for a copy of this book which published in May.

An Exhilarating, Tense, and Spine-chilling Page Turner

The Island is the newest heart pounding thriller by Adrian McKinty, and it does not disappoint. Heather, a massage therapist and underappreciated stepmom, is on a family vacation in Austrailia with her new doctor husband and his bratty teenage kids. Heather doesn't have a proper education, but she has her head on her shoulders with plenty of survival skills. The kids are entitled and resent their new mom, while the father ignores their behavior. This changes as they become trapped on a private island inhabited by the sketchy O'Neil family, and Heather's parenting and survival abilities are put to the test.

"Perhaps they are worse than evil—they are bored"

This novel was filled with vivid imagery and dynamic characters brimming with depth. It is impossible not to root for Heather. I was on the edge of my seat with an increasing heart rate everytime the odds were against her. This was a wild ride from beginning to end. Everything about this story was unique and compelling. It's not everyday that I come across a genuinely original thriller that rocks me this hard. It's action packed and graphic with a surprisingly heartfelt end. There's one twist that was a bit predictable, but the reaction was not. The plot has an engaging design and is incredibly well written. It was interesting to learn that this book's setting is based on a real island. I also enjoyed learning a few pieces of Austrailian history, geography, and slang. For example, I learned about the bunyip, an aboriginal mythological man-eating monster. Somehow this part of the story makes Heather seem even more of a badass. Tired of your typical popcorn thrillers? Look no further because The Island is not your average B rated thriller. I for one, can't wait for The Island adaptation. I'd recommend this to anyone looking for a unique and heart racing thriller.

Thank you Little, Brown and Company, Netgalley, and Adrian Mckinty for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.

I am sure this is a good book and I may finish it someday but what got me was the first chapter. Reading that chapter made me feel a horrible sense of deja vu like i had already read that book. It took me a little bit to figure out but the opening chapter was way too much like the opening chapter in The Hunted by Roz Nay, who i am a huge fan of. Don't get me wrong, the premise based on the sypnosis is different but the opening was too similar for me to be able to settle into the story since i just read that book a few months ago.

Great read!! This is a story of a family vacation gone wrong. Great thrill ride with lots of twists. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Thank you net Galley and the publisher for the ARC

The Island was a book that I was hoping to love based off of previous books I have read by this author. I enjoyed the plot of the book, but struggled to get through some parts of it. I rated it 3/5 stars. It was overall a fast paced thriller, and I was anxious to see how the story was going to end.

4,25 stars!

Thank you to Netgalley and Little, Brown and Company for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

The Island follows Heather Baxter, who marries Tom, a widowed doctor with a young son and teenage daughter. After the whole family goes on vacation to Australia, they discover the remote Dutch Island, which is off-limits to other people. Bartering to get their way on Dutch Island, they end up in an accident that sets the residents of the island against them.

I thought that this thriller was a wild ride in the best way! I was really rooting for our main characters and hoping that they would find a way out of their crazy situations because I know I would've been scared out of my mind.

The only thing I didn't like is that at times I felt like the book was bogged down by unnecessary side plots but definitely a fun survival thriller. I will be going back to read The Chain!

This book was an easy 5 stars! It started with action and kept right up until the end.
I loved the characters in this book and they made it easy to root for them! This was so action packed, I read it in one sitting!! 5 STARS!!!

As soon as the ball got rolling on this there were a dozen horror films that came to mind. The dialogue and events were very similar to certain popular horror films. Some of the lines even felt like they were pulled from these films line-by-line. Make no mistake, I would never want to be put in this situation and it would be terrifying no matter what!

Whoa. This book is a wild ride. Yes, some suspension of disbelief is required, but still a good book. If you've ever thought of worst-case scenarios... this is it. Stuck on an isolated island with people who want to kill you. With your children. So many nightmares rolled into one.

This will make a great movie!

Thank you to the publisher and Net Galley for providing an ARC of this book for review.

Having read and loved The Chain by this author, I very much wanted to read The Island and I was definitely not disappointed.

A family visiting Australia decides to go off the beaten path and pay to be taken to a private island to see the koala bears. When they arrive, there is an accident and the next thing they know they are running for their lives.

This was without a doubt a thrilling page turner and the action never seemed to stop. I know I couldn’t get enough and finished it within 24 hours.

I am looking forward to seeing what this author comes up with next. I’m all in.

*Thanks so much to Little, Brown and Company, and to NetGalley for the eGalley!*

Wow whatever I expected from reading this book, was not what I got. This story was an weird combination of the outback version of Deliverance mashed with GI Jane, with a hint of Home Alone, but in a muderous way. 😂 It should have been a train wreck, but man it really did fit well together. I read it in one setting because there honestly was not a good spot to stop, it was action from the start to the end, and now I have to watch Hulu to see how well they captured the craziness of this story. 😂

I really enjoyed this one!
Perfect for getting out of a reading slump.
The action starts and never stops. I was feeling so anxious by this situation in the best way possible.
The main character felt relatable and was easy to root for. A woman in over her head who uses her skills to step up and kick ass.
Some things are definitely over the top but it was such a fun ride that I just ate it up.
A couple character decisions near the end didn't totally work for me but I still wholly recommend this book especially for fans of No Exit by Taylor Adams.

This was a fast paced insane thriller that I surprisingly enjoyed. A family trip to Australia unleaded many dark secrets. When they happen across an island filled with koalas and kangaroos they didn’t realize they may have stumbled upon their last trip together. It took me a while to like anyone but I was rooting for some of these people and the insane plot made it an exhilarating ride.