Stay Awake is easily one of my favorite books I've read this year! It's a gripping, can't-put-down, at-the-edge-of-my-seat thriller. The story follows a young woman, Liv, who is suffering from a rare case of amnesia, in which, every time she falls asleep and wakes up, she can't remember anything that has happened in the past two years. Unfortunately, during that time, she has suffered a trauma (that she can't remember) and now she is the prime suspect of a murder investigation (again, an event she can't remember). The book is very strategically written between Liv's past and present and between her present and the present of the detectives who are working her case. All of the characters are well developed and relatable, including the detectives. I honestly couldn't put this book down. I will be recommending this book to everyone I know; easily 5 stars!

I have very mixed feelings about this book. I appreciated the high concept of a woman losing her memory every time she falls asleep, but I found her behavior in that situation frustrating and implausible. Having said that, I really liked the detective characters and the story was propulsive so I flew threw it. I think he culprit was pretty obvious, but I did enjoy. it more than the author's previous book.

When Liv falls asleep she forgets everything! Her life as she knew it is gone, her job and her best friends, and she may be a murderer. This is told from two different perspectives Livs and a detectives perspectives. 10 years ago Liv was living with her best friend, dating a new guy and she had her dream job writing for a magazine.
Now, she is in the back of a taxi returning to her home only to realize that it's not her home anymore. She can't remember anything that happened and now she is trying to piece everything together to figure out what happened. When she catches a glimpse of the news and finds out the victim's blood has been used to leave a message, the very same message that she has on her hand! Omg, this is a great whodunit type of book and of course, there is one person that will do anything and everything they can to make sure that she never remembers what happened.
"the game is afoot"
If you love great thrillers with a splash of mystery then you will love this novel! While it was easy to find out whodunit I seriously loved it! I couldn't put it down!
Thank. you St. Martin's Press and Netgalley for the extraordinary opportunity to read and review this one!

Wow, Megan Goldin knocks another one out of the park with her newest thriller!

I love psychological thrillers with amnesia themes but Stay Awake captured my attention from the start. Liv wakes up with no memory from the past two years and no belongings. She has a note on her hand not to fall asleep. As Liv tries to remember her past, she learns she is wanted for murder.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who loves a good fast paced psychological thriller. 5 stars easily!!! I loved every minute of this book.

The premise of this book sounded so promising: every time Liv, a woman with a strange kind of amnesia, wakes up she can't remember anything and believes it is two years in the past. The execution, however, was disappointing.

Amnesia in suspense novels is a familiar trope, but is always interesting when done well. Stay Awake is unoriginal and poorly plotted. Much of the novel is repetitive. Liv is constantly remembering things she's forgotten, but the reader does not need to remember with her. I lost count of the number of times she mentions the words written on her hands or various other tidbits the reader was already told about. The writing is poor. The author tells rather than shows, which made for a tedious read.

The only reason I gave Stay Awake 2 stars and read until the end, is because I was interested in the mystery at the center of the story. The resolution there was also disappointing and not worth the read.

Memory loss, insomnia, murder and some fascinating characters will keep you moving quickly through this suspenseful thriller! You will hit the ground running with the main character Liv Reese. The story begins with no memory of events for the past two years, but finds herself with a bloody knife in hand. She suffers from repetitive dissociative memory loss. If she falls asleep, everything that happened that day she forgets so she writes notes on her hand to help. One of the notes is "Stay Awake" so she overdoes the caffeine, No Doz and skips sleep until she falls asleep in the most random places without memory of how she got there.

Liv's roommate Amy and her boyfriend Marco are on one of the timelines two years ago. The story is well-developed in taking you to the occurrences that caused her to forget what happened. Present day timeline she sees the surveillance cameras of herself on the news wanted for a brutal murder of a man with the words scrawled in blood on his window "Stay Awake". Not knowing who to trust she seeks help at one of the places she wrote on her arm to trust The Nocturnal Bar. It is mainly told from her perspective, but the other is told from the detective working the case Darcy Halliday. A very respectful character that does not want to harm Liv, but wants to find her before someone else does.... that wants her dead after a failed attempt two years ago.

The book is high energy except for the helplessness of Liv's condition will leave you restless and begging for her to stop overdoing the caffeine and just go to sleep. I highly recommend reading this one because it is suspenseful and will keep you guessing until the end.

Thanks NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for this e-galley in exchange for my honest opinion.

I wasnt able to read this one before it expired. I had planned on reading it a bit later since it was a August release, but when i went to open it, it had expired. Its a shame!

Megan Goldin, I love you and your writing!!!

This book is such a suspenseful and wonderful thriller. There are multiple points of view with different timelines. One point of view is the main character/murder suspect from the present and then from 2 years ago. The third point of view is from detective Halliday. I genuinely enjoyed all three points of view. It was nice to be able to learn about Liv's life before the trauma and her present life with her rare form of amnesia and being a suspect in a murder case. Detective Halliday's point of view was also wonderful and I enjoyed that she didn't jump to conclusions with Liv's case. All of the characters were enjoyable and likeable. Honestly, I really didn't suspect the murder suspect to turn out to be who it was, I didn't have the slightest idea. The ending was fantastic, it was the right amount of suspense and action. I'm satisfied with the ending and that Liv got the justice she deserved. Nothing about the ending felt wrong or forgotten about.

Overall, I would highly recommend this novel and this author! Thank you NetGalley, Megan Goldin, and St. Martin's Press for the complimentary copy of this ARC.

Liv wakes up and has no recollection of the past two years. The only clues she has are a bloody knife wrapped in a shirt and a large wad of cash, along with cryptic messages written on her hands in her own handwriting telling her to “stay awake.” It turns out she forgets everything about the last two years every time she falls asleep. Meanwhile, detectives have found a dead body and the prime suspect in the murder looks a lot like Liz…

The premise of this book was top notch. It kept me on my toes wondering why Liv’s memory kept disappearing and what it was that she was forgetting. I love a book that jumps back and forth in time to put together the whole story, and this book took great advantage of that technique. It was a little confusing at the beginning when we had to not only keep track of what character we were following and whether we were in the past or the present, but also what time of day it was in the present. As the book went on, the time of day mattered less and less and thus got less confusing. Although I loved the plot, there was a lot of telling and not showing when it came to character development. We were told about each characters ~traumatic~ pasts in what basically amounted to mini paragraph long biographies, and it felt clumsily done. Speaking of other clumsy things, much of the dialogue between characters felt stiff and impersonal, and was often used as a means to reveal a lot of information, which is always a little awkward to read. I liked that we were kept waiting until the very end for the climax, but I didn’t like that I didn’t feel as though there was enough closure concerning the “why” of a lot of the plot points earlier in the book. I liked the story overall, but wish that more thought would have been put into wrapping up loose ends and giving the reader and ending that felt right, rather than one that just went for shock.

Thank you to @netgalley and @stmartinspress for this eARC for review!

Whoa what a rollercoaster! This book was very promising from the start. I really liked it even though around 70% through I could basically tell what was going to happen. Not bad although slightly predictable! Good storyline.

Stay Awake by Megan Goldin is about a young woman named Liv. Liv wakes up in a car, not sure how she got there. She gets dropped off at her apartment. When she gets there she realizes she doesn’t have her phone or her keys. She buzzes her roommate to let her in. However, her roommate doesn’t live there anymore, and neither does Liv. She isn’t sure what to do or where to go. Nothing is as it seems anymore. Why does she have things written all over her hands and arms? Things like “stay awake”! This begins a chaotic and disorienting night for Liv.
The chapters alternate between Liv trying to figure out what is going on and a female detective named Halliday who is investigating a murder. A man was found stabbed death in an apartment and someone has written “wake up” in his blood on the window. All signs point to Liv as the suspect.
This book was very well written. The way Liv’s chapters are written make you feel so confused and disoriented, much like Liv did. I really enjoyed trying to piece together what happened and when it happened. When you think you have it all figured out…You don’t! This is another great book by Megan Goldin. I look forward to many more from this author. Thank you To Net Galley and the publisher for the advanced copy of this book. All opinions are my own.

Take 50 First Dates, swap out rom-com for mystery/thriller, remove Drew Barrymore’s family and friends (and Adam Sandler of course) from the equation, leaving her all on her own to figure out what the heck is going on, and you get Stay Awake.

Up until the very end, I fully intended on giving this book a 5-star solely because I could NOT put this book down. However, the ending left much to be desired. More on that at the end of my review.

Every time our main character, Liv, falls asleep, she forgets everything that’s happened in the last two years. Each time she wakes up (even from a nap), she is disoriented and confused as to where she is and how she got there, since the last memory she has is answering a phone call in her office two years prior. She has no family to reach out to and every time she tries to call her boyfriend or best friend, she gets no answer, leaving her with no one to turn to for help. All she has to go off of are the scribbles on her hands and arms with phrases like “trust no one”, “stay awake”, and “wake up”. When a similar phrase is linked to a present day murder scene, Liv begins to wonder if she’s somehow involved, especially as additional details emerge, all somehow linking back to her. Did she murder someone? Is someone framing her for murder? Liv finds herself running from a crime she doesn’t know if she committed.

The story is told from two points of view, Liv and the detective investigating the crime scene, and Liv’s perspective fluctuates between the present and two years prior, working its way up to the last memory she can recall before the two-year gap. I had a really hard time putting this book down because I wanted to keep reading to uncover what happened to Liv two years prior as well as find out how she may or may not be linked to the murder in present day.

So, why the rating? Because the ending left SO MANY plot holes and unexplained pieces of the story. I won’t give examples because I don’t want to spoil anything, but you know when you’re reading a mystery and stuff doesn’t make sense but you know by the end of the story you’ll understand? Yea, that didn’t happen here. Like, at all. And not in the fun Colleen Hoover “Verity” sort of way where you’re left to make up your own mind about what really happened. While we get the “whodunnit” answer at the end, there are so many other loose ends left hanging, leaving me to think it’s either poor writing or there are several completely irrelevant pieces in the story that should be removed altogether.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

The Night swim is one of my all time favorite books. Megan manages to bring a story together with mystery and intrigue like no other. Stay awake was no different. Fast paced, wildly shocking and taking you on a journey that all ties together in the end, this is a book you don’t want to miss.

LIv wakes up with no memory of the past two years and Stay awake scrawled on her hand. She goes to her apartment but it’s not hers anymore. New people live there. She has a knife in her pocket and no cellphone. The last she remembers is having a successful life two years ago. She sees the news about a bloody crime with a message and it matches her hand. As she runs around manhattan and tries not to give into sleep, she must figure out where the last two years went and who committed the crime she is accused of. Not remembering who is safe and who isn’t the terror and tension through the book as we go along to figure out what happened will leave you breathless. Just remember. Trust no one and stay awake.

I highly recommend this for fast paced thriller and suspense lovers.

Thank you to the publishers for sending me this ARC through NetGalley in exchange for my honest review!

This book is about a woman named Liv who forgets everything after she falls asleep. Her last memory is from over two years ago, and a lot has changed since then. One day after she wakes up, she sees on the news that the police are searching for her for a crime that she cannot remember committing. The story unfolds through multiple timelines and the perspective switches between Liv and the detective on the case, Detective Halliday.

At first, I was not sure if I would like this novel due to the amnesia trope. There was a lot of repetition every time Liv woke up, she would think the same thoughts and try to do the same things. But, for writing about someone who keeps waking up thinking it's the same day, Goldin tackled the amnesia trope extremely well. Although Liv constantly thought she was in the past, the world still progressed and moved around her, creating even more confusion while uncovering the mystery of what happened.

It is so engaging to read when Liv discovers an important piece of information and then falls asleep, forgetting it once again. I was on edge throughout the whole novel, knowing that someone was after her the whole time but not knowing who. Especially in those moments when she has no idea that anyone is after her at all. Astonishing mystery/thriller. A+.

The protagonists confusion and unfolding crime scene, it grabbed my attention until the very end. Once I picked it up, I had to finished it. Highly recommended!

Stay Awake is The Girl on the Train meets Before I Go to Sleep

This is a psychological thriller for the ages. It also reminded me both why I love thrillers and why I don’t read them very often. I was ✨sTrEsSeD✨ reading this one folks, like, can only read so much at a time stressed, would look up the ending so I could enjoy it without the anxiety stressed except this was an ARC so there are no spoilers online STRESSED.

I loved The Night Swim and was excited to get this one but it ended up being just a bit too much for my romance reading soul.

If you like thrillers, and enjoy being on the edge of your seat, you will definitely enjoy this book.

Thank you to @StMartinsPress & @Netgalley for a free copy of this eARC in exchange for an honest review. Pub date for Stay Awake is Aug 9th, 2022.

Everyone needs to write "Read Stay Awake" on their arms right now. Stay Awake was a satisfying psychological thriller that I physically could not put down. Liv has a rare form of amnesia that kicks in every time she falls asleep. The reader discovers Liv's memories and self-written notes as she struggles to piece together what happened two years ago and what is currently happening in her life. The chapters are told from different points of view and the timeline jumps around.

I will say there were times when the story felt VERY repetitive, but that's partly because Liv has amnesia and we are remembering details again along with her. Keep pushing through the slower and repetitive parts. It's definitely worth it.

And while Stay Awake feels very different than The Night Swim, Goldin's comfortable writing style makes it feel very familiar. Definitely pick this one up if you're a fan of Goldin's previous novels.

*SPOILERS*

I do wish there was more build up with different suspects! Once it was revealed what happened, I wish we would have had less suspicion on Liv and more of a "who done it?" with other characters in her life. I never really thought Liv was the person to blame, but it felt like we were supposed to be more suspicious of her up until the last chapters.

Thank you to NetGalley, St. Martin's Press, and Megan Golden for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

“Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you” — Catch 22, Joseph Heller

“What do I have against sleep?”
”You’re afraid of what you do in your sleep.”

“I can’t help but wonder what I’ve forgotten… I’m in danger. I feel it in my bones.”


You guys.

I read this book in two days.

It is quite a bit different than her book The Night Swim.

The formatting, the content, the flow is all different.

Instead of a controversial and heartbreaking mystery with some #MeToo triggers like The Night Swim, Stay Awake is an intense thriller with no political commentary.

And it’s so good!


Some have commented on the plausibility of the plot, but most books don’t seek to say ‘This is what happens when…’ they pose the question ‘What if?’

Stay Awake’s what if is this: What if someone experienced a traumatic event that created insomnia and paranoia and whenever she went to sleep she wakes up and forgets everything that happened since the traumatic event? And what if she’s either dangerous or in danger?

Based entirely on the preview of the CBS show Blindspot (because I never actually watched it) this book is like that.

Liv wakes up on a park bench and doesn’t know where she is going or why she is there. And she has written notes all over her hands that say things like:

STAY AWAKE
DON’T SLEEP
TRUST NO ONE
DON’T TALK TO THE POLICE, EVER!

Oh, and there’s a bloody knife in her pocket.

The last thing she remembers was a summer day two years ago when she answers a phone call from her office desk. It’s now two years later, she can’t find her best friend or her boyfriend, and someone else is living in her apartment.

Soon she becomes the suspect in a murder.

How can she clear her name if she can’t remember anything recent and she can’t trust anyone?

“I don’t know how I became an interloper in my own life.”


This book is fast-paced and intense. I loved it! It’s just the kind of thriller I was looking for.

We have alternating chapters.

The chapters in the present all take place in one day- the day the murdered man was discovered. Liv is scrambling to unravel what is going on and Detective Darcy Halliday and her partner are investigating the murder and tracking Liv down.

The chapters in the past are the days leading up to Liv’s traumatic experience and what caused all of this to begin with.


I did have part of it figured out, but not all of it.

If you like thrillers, I would definitely recommend this one! It’s fairly clean, not much language or gruesome details, and it reads fast.

My only qualm with the book is that after I finished it and sat with it awhile, I realized they didn’t really explain the entire ‘why’ behind the murders. Maybe I was turning pages so fast that I missed it, but I wish they would have fleshed out the motive a little bit more.

But my only thoughts while reading the book were—what is going on?! I need to keep reading!

So yeah. It comes out in August, and you should read it.


A few other random thoughts and surprises:

- The detectives kept calling the murdered guy ‘the stiff’ and I thought that was weird. I’ve watched/read a lot of cop-type books/shows and I don’t think I’ve ever heard that term.

- The killer wrote the words ‘Wake Up!’ on the window in blood, but backwards so that it could be read from outside and they made this big deal about it being a hard thing to do or they were trying to read it from inside and said it was nonsense. But let’s be real… It’s really not that hard to read or write Wake Up! backwards. I have no problem with her dissociative amnesia fugue, but let’s be realistic about the words!

- They talked about not being able to extract DNA from hairs left at the scene because they were rootless. I hadn’t realized the hair had to have roots. So I googled it, and it TURNS OUT we’ve had a breakthrough in technology and some guy actually figured out a way to get DNA from a rootless hair but it’s expensive so probably won’t happen much. But cool news.

- I LOVED how Liv’s character hated performance art! I was an art major and when we started learning modern art history and performance art it was the worst. She says, “I’ve never been to a performance art event that didn’t make me want to barf. Maybe I’m cynical, or maybe I’ve seen too much in my life, but I find these sorts of things fatuous and self-indulgent.” And I would like to give her a high five!

- This was also a fun fact Goldin included: Agatha Christie went missing in 1926 and had her own ‘memory loss’ event! People thought she disappeared for several days and couldn’t find her. Turns out she had checked into a spa under the name of her husband’s mistress and going about life. Someone at the spa recognized her. She didn’t remember any of it! Google it, it’s pretty interesting considering this book!


**Received an ARC via NetGalley**

I was given an advanced reader copy in exchange for my review. Overall, I really liked this book. It reminded me of the movie Memento. The author does a great job setting up the scene, great pacing and suspense as the story moves along. You can feel Liv's terror as she has no recollection each time she falls asleep and then awakes; however, there are some times where the plasibility is seriously tested in the storyline. I like the two police officers and their interplay as they discover clues about the case. I was invested in the story and the ending was good, but not great. I don't think the author really did a great job of bringing it all together, although she carried the pacing, story, and suspense throughout. It never answers the why for me.

I received a free electronic copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
This was also my first Megan Goldin read.
The book uses a play on words, which seems to be popular in many writing styles right now. Wonderful structure and development throughout. Super easy to read and lose one's self into the book I will certainly be reading more by this author. It was fast paced but kept me guessing. Like so many other thrillers you can figure it out, but she certainly elongated the process. It follows a dual timeline which I sometimes find annoying because it give like this time warped feeling but it flowed well. I actually found it was easy to follow and probably made the book even more enthralling. As well as the fact that you can just feel that Liv is a very unreliable source. She seems bat **** crazy honestly (lol) It's all very exciting.
I hate to give away too much. It was a fast but oh so wonderful read. I definitely recommend.