Stay Awake by Megan Goldin had a different take on the unreliable narrator. Even though the overall story line wasn't much different from other thrillers, it did keep me turning the pages to see what was up with the main character's writing on her hands and the recent murder of an unknown man. It took 3/4 of the way through for things to come together, but Goldin did tie up most of the loose ends. There were some details, for example the weird stalker waiter guy, that were left hanging, but for the most part things were explained. Not too bad.

“Lack of sleep does horrible things to a person’s mind.”
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Liv Reese wakes up in a taxi in the middle of the night with no clue how she got there. She looks down at her hands and written there are the words STAY AWAKE. She tries to enter her apartment, but realizes she doesn’t have her purse, keys or phone. After an angry couple answers the door she realizes she no longer lives at this apartment and two years have passed since she can remember anything. When she sees herself on the news as the prime suspect in a murder investigation Liv goes on the run trying to figure out what her connection to the incident is, all while evading the police, falling asleep and forgetting everything again.
🥱
This thriller started off so strong. Goldin is one of my favorite suspense writers so I was so excited to get an ARC/ALC. However as the novel goes on the writing felt a bit choppy and the ending left me with questions because it wasn’t wrapped up completely. It did keep me guessing and I flew through it wanting to know what happened to Liv with her memory and with the murder. Fans of Memento, the show Flight Attendant and Before I Go To Sleep will connect with this one. This book releases August 9! 3.25⭐️

CW: blood, murder, cheating, kidnapping, stabbing, violence, insomnia, alcohol, drugging

Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an advanced copy of this e-book, which comes out in August. Wow! I was totally sucked in, especially once I got the various timelines straight. We follow Liv as events unfold in the original timeline and then as she wakes up over and over again in a later timeline unaware that any time has passed - the last thing she remembers is answering the phone at work - and unable to remember anything in between. Who is living in her apartment? Where is her best friend and roommate? Why isn't it summer any longer? The tension builds deliciously as events in each timeline are revealed and pieces of the puzzle slowly come together. Obviously, this is the epitome of book with an unreliable narrator, since Liv loses her memory whenever she falls asleep. Quite a fabulous psychological thriller in my opinion. Overall a 4.5 stars for me. Grab this one when it comes out!

Another fantastic psychological thriller from Megan Goldin! Her books are all so unique and I've never taken more than 2 days to read one of them because I just can't stop reading. This one revolves around a murdered man and Liv, a woman with memory loss - every time she goes to sleep and wakes up, she thinks it's a sunny summer day 2 years earlier and has no memory of anything in the intervening time. I loved discovering what was going on (along with Liv), from the beginning all the way to the heart-pounding finish. The female detective was one of my favorite parts of the story - she was a great counterpoint to the male cops and detectives. I can't wait to see what the author comes up with next! Thanks to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for the advance digital copy!

Stay Awake had me staying awaking trying to race to the end! After a string of disappointing thrillers, this one really delivered. It uses the unreliable narrator so well in a concept that could be very repetitive—Liv wakes up in the back of a cab with a bloody knife, and no memory of how she got there. Every time she falls asleep, she loses any memories from the last two years. There were many well done red herrings, and I liked the dual timelines, as well as the detective’s POV. Highly recommend this one!

This is a very exciting "whodunit/did I do it?" with lots of unforeseen twists. I don't usually like police procedurals, but this was expertly woven with the narrative of the main protagonist. The author also does a good job of tying up the many loose ends. This book is likely to appeal to a broad range of readers. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I really had high hopes because I was a fan of Golden’s other books but I wasn’t in love with this one. The concept was interesting but other than filling pages, I didn’t see the point of a lot of parts.

This book gave me “Memento” vibes, but I didn’t love it. I enjoyed the “whodunnit” that was a plot point but figured out the ending early enough that it didn’t feel like a surprise. I also got tired of the repetitiveness of the main character falling asleep and having to go through the process of forgetting everything. It led to lots of the same information being repeated.

I liked this but didn’t love it.

4.5 ⭐️

Thank you to Netgalley and St. Martin’s Press for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Holy baby aliens everywhere! This book was WILD. It’s been a very long time where I read a thriller and had no idea who the killer was. I was able to predict one aspect of this complex story, but that was mainly because the author gave us subtle clues throughout the story.

This is told in 2 POVs in different time lapses: 2 years ago and present (with a time clock) with the POV of our main MC Liv and the Detective Halliday.

The book starts out with Liv waking up with no recollection of the past 2 years but she wakes up in possession of a knife with fresh blood.

I really can’t say too much without giving it away, but I loved that we got the detective’s POV. It was fun trying to solve this case along with the detectives.

Liv’s story was sad in a way and I can’t imagine having her life. I’d definitely say she was a strong woman because I don’t know if I could’ve handled many of the things she was forced to.

The killer’s identity surprised me. I was on the edge of my seat once I got to the 56% mark. I flew through this book with so much anxiety!

Ms. Goldin knows how to write a complex and compelling thriller. Her writing style is easy to follow and the pacing flowed well.

This is my second book by her and she will now be an auto buy author for me.

I highly recommend this book if you’re into complex and fast paced thrillers that leave you on the edge of your seat with a strong heroine, along with following the evidence with police.

Seriously. Go read this book.

I love Megan Goldin books! And this was no exception! I thought the book was fast paced and kept you on your toes! Never saw the ending coming!

I started this book in the middle of a massive slump and was hooked within the first few sentences. I thought the idea for this book was so creative and I loved it! It was a fast page turner and I was so excited to read more every time I had to set it down. For the first 85% I would not stop talking to my husband about how it was such an easy 5 stars. After finishing it I settled on 4 stars but honestly that might be too high. This book was so good and then just died for me. The ending twist was such a let down. No explanation, no reasoning. It wasn’t even a twist it was just random to try and be a twist.

3.5 stars

I loved - loved - the premise of this book. A woman wakes in a cab with no idea where she is, how she got there, or why there’s a wad of cash in her pocket but nothing else. She has no cell phone. No purse. No ID. Strangers now live in her apartment. Her workplace has been remodeled with new decor and new staff. Her friends don’t answer her calls. And two years of her life have seemingly been wiped clean.

Worst of all, each time she falls asleep, she forgets everything. All she knows when she wakes up are the notes scribbled in ink on her own skin, the admonition to “stay awake.”

With echoes of “Memento,” I was fully along for this ride.

And it was a good ride, though initially I was expecting some sci-fi flavor, ala a dark underground organization that abducts/tests/trains participants and then wipes memories clean when said participant escapes and tries to reclaim her life. (Clearly I’ve been reading too much sci-fi lately. Whatever.) This is more the woman-in-peril/fuzzy-narrator sort of thriller. Which I was totally down for too, once I re-situated my brain. :)

Liv Reese’s story unfurls with good twists and turns, and with the help of secondary cop character Darcy Halliday. The book was an enjoyable read, but there were a few things that kept taking me out of the story.

First: head-hopping. Oh, how I hate the mental whiplash of changing points of view. If I have to take the time to wonder whose head I’m in, that’s time taken out of the story. The spell is broken. And truly, in this book’s case, it was unnecessary. The information/character development/plot points could have been conveyed through other means.

Second: long, descriptive sentences that are often explanatory and florid and take place in the middle of action sequences where shorter, tighter sentences would better serve the story and keep readers on the edge of their seat. (Exhausted by that last sentence? Then you see what I mean.)

Third: red herrings. I love good red herrings and there were several here. But I also like enough resolution so that they make sense. Without revealing too much, things were set up in the first half that I felt weren’t really resolved in the back half. Bummer.

Finally, the solution for Liv’s memory issue seemed a bit obvious.

But I am a picky reader. With the above being said, “Stay Awake” was still a fun, summer roller-coastery sort of story. Read it by a pool or beach. Which is exactly what I did.

Thanks to NetGalley for an eARC of this book.

Wow. This was my first Megan Goldin, though I have another sitting on my shelf that's been waiting to read. I had a great time with this one!

Liv Reese, basically is living in Memento world. She has traumatic amnesia and resets to two years ago every time she falls asleep. Understandably, this leaves her incredibly disoriented. To make matters worse, she's a suspect in the murder of her ex-fiance...and of course she can't remember what happened, so she even wonders herself if she might have done it. Especially because his body is found with "Wake up" written in blood on the window. A message she also has written on herself as a reminder...

I can't get much more into it without spoilers, but I found this incredibly propulsive. The pacing and choices of when to give us peeks into Liv's life two years ago felt exactly right. I do feel like the end felt a little bit rushed and there were a few things I didn't feel were adequately explained/revealed, but overall, I had a hard time putting this one down, which is always a good sign.

Fast paced, quick read. I can't imagine the struggle of waking up and not knowing who I was or where I was. That is Liv's current life. She's waking up and trying to figure out what's happened because her last memory is from 2 years ago.

From there, she slowly starts discovering what is going on. It's best to go in to this not knowing. Let the story wrap you up and carry you along. It's hard to put down once you start! The twists kept me flipping pages and the reveals were perfectly timed to keep the tension high and your curiosity even higher! I loved this one!

A huge thank you to the author and publisher for providing an e-ARC via Netgalley. This does not affect my opinion regarding the book.

Megan Goldin writes some of my favorite thrillers, The Night Swim just blew me away – Freaking. LOVED. It! In fact, I still recommend it to this day. Stay Awake has a really clever premise but I did find myself slogging through some repetitiveness and yikes, a fairly confusing plot with a few holes.

The plot borrows a bit from the movie Memento with the protagonist, Liv, writing notes on her arms giving subtle yet generally unhelpful clues – basically telling herself to ‘Stay Awake’ and other random clues. And then there’s the whole 50 First Dates theme of waking up each morning and not remembering the last years of her life. The whole time I was reading, my mind was going all over the place for possible reasons why Liv couldn’t remember anything for the last two years when she'd wake up. I don’t want to be spoiler-ish so for the sake of keeping things on the down low, that’s where I’ll leave this.

On a positive side, I loved the characters. Liv herself is an easy character to invest in and the villains are easy to hate! The detectives on the case, particularly, Darcy Halliday, is well written and one that I think would make a great series detective. She’s a badass and should have more books written about her.

This isn’t my favorite Goldin book but I was entertained and found a new favorite character in Darcy Halliday.

My thanks to St. Martins Press for this gifted DRC.

50 First Dates but make it a thriller! Was this really authored by the same person as The Night Swim, one of my favorite books of 2020? The writing was repetitive and felt amateur, and the plot was lacking. After reading so many five star reviews, perhaps my standards were too high, but this was a big letdown for me. Liv was such a frustrating character. While I can’t imagine how it hard it is to lose your memory every time you wake up, she literally ran away from everyone who was trying to help her. I felt like I was the one in the Groundhog Day cycle, because of how many times it felt like I read the same scene. Also, unless I missed something, there are some gaping plot holes, as well as unnecessary red herrings. I’m not sure why we needed the perspective of the detectives, but that’s honestly the least of my complaints. This was just a big miss for me overall, but I certainly haven’t written off Megan Goldin altogether!

This is a typical story of not remembering who you are, where you are or what happened. Trying to stay awake so you don’t forget what you did that day. But you wake up and start all over. Full of suspense and a page turner.

I loved this thriller! There was such a unique plot to this story and the twists and turns were endless. I loved the added layer of suspense and doubt created from having a character with a memory disorder. This book was incredibly hard to put down, and had short chapters that alternated perspectives between characters.

Strongly recommend!

This was a real page turner! Liv wakes up and doesn't remember where she is or how she got there. As the story unfolds, we are switching between the past and the present trying to piece things together. Liv is on the run and has no memories of her life for the last 2 years. She uses the messages she writes to herself on her arms as clues as she backtracks through her old life realizing that it no longer exists. I couldn't put this down as I tried to figure out what was happening and who was after Liv. I loved the storyline and how it kept me guessing right up until the ending.

After reading and loving The Night Swim, I was excited for the chance to read Megan Goldin’s newest book. While it didn’t compare to The Night Swim for me, it was a good psychological thriller.

Stay Awake is about Liv who wakes up in a cab holding a bloody knife. Not knowing how she got there, she gets driven to her apartment only to find out she no longer lives there. She then notices writing all over her hands and and with notes and messages, telling her to stay awake.

She begins to try to investigate what’s going on, and soon discovers she has a condition where she doesn’t remember anything once she falls asleep. She also realizes that she is wanted in relation to a murder and has no idea who to trust.

It’s hard to believe it’s the same author as The Night Swim. The writing felt completely different to me (and not in a good way). While I still think of that book quite often, this one won’t be sticking with me the same way.

I loved the premise of this book. It had me anxious and stressed as I read, but overall the execution fell a bit flat. There were a few too many reaches with clues and a bunch of suspend belief moments. Overall it was different and entertaining and kept me guessing - 3.5 Stars