Riley Sager tells you upfront in the synopsis of his new novel The House Across the Lake that you have heard this story before. And you have. An alcoholic actress, reeling from some bad press, spends the autumn at her family lake house, wasting away her boozy afternoons spying on her neighbors and suspecting that the husband murders the wife, all the while inserting herself into the investigation. It's like Rear Window, The Woman in the Window, and The Girl on the Train all rolled up into one. But Sager doesn't stop there ... this suspense thriller has a touch of Misery and The Exorcist in there too. However, Sager proclaims that he does put his own spin on things, so I didn't quite know what to expect as I read this book, and I must say that I was quite surprised by the direction it took.

My first Riley Sager novel was Survive the Night, which I loved! I have since learned that it wasn't a favorite of many people and that I should check out some of his previous works, which I am yet to do, but I was eager to pick up his latest novel based on Survive the Night alone. If you are a fan of the suspense genre, which you more than likely are if you are reading a Sager novel, then your reading experience will go one of two ways: 1) You'll get bored with this book quickly because you will have read similar, better executed plots before this one, or 2) You will find something to like here since this novel contains all of the elements of a great suspense - an unreliable narrator, a wide cast of believable suspects, plenty of red herrings, an ominous setting, and the murder of a beautiful young woman.

With that being said, The House Across the Lake is a mixed bag and is surely not Sager's finest work. The novel plods along at a maddeningly slow pace, running off in a thousand different directions that will leave your head spinning. It took forever for something significant to happen, and when the ball gets rolling, it doesn't stop, throwing one jaw-dropping twist after another, several of which required me to suspend my disbelief. Because this book contained twists and turns that fall into a genre that I don't particularly care for, I can't say that I enjoyed how this story ended. It was just too far-fetched for my more sensible tastes, but that doesn't mean that it won't be right up your alley ... just be prepared for this story's big reveal to come completely out of left field!

Riley Sager does it again. This book is the perfect thriller with a touch of horror. The twists were completely shocking and kept me hooked on this story until the very end. Would recommend for anyone that enjoys a good thriller and/or horror! It also has the perfect setting for the summer.

Thank you Riley, NetGalley, and Penguin House for the eARC

The twist and turns in this thriller had me wondering how it was all going to end. It was honestly crazy in all the best ways!

Wow! This is Riley Saver’s best book to date. I’m usually always spot on with figuring out the twist, but this one, oh my god!! I stayed up late to finish it. I just couldn’t put it down.

As a HUGE fan of Sager and his writing, it pains me to say I didn’t love this one. I feel like there was potential for such a great thriller here and then it went a little paranormal. Paranormal is fine, I just really was expecting a straight up thriller from this author. Of course the writing was amazing and the story kept me intrigued, but I’d say this is a 3.5 for me. I will however keep shouting about my love for this author and support him for every book release! I am grateful to have had the opportunity to read this one.

I’m a fan of Riley Sager but this one was a big miss for me - it totally jumped the shark at around 75%. Obviously it would be spoilers for me to say much more but there can be such a thing as too many twists and turns and this definitely passed that point. What a disappointment. Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the advance reading copy.

New York Times bestselling author, Riley Sager is the author of The House Across the Lake . Casey Fletcher, a recently widowed actress who has become an alcoholic and has been shamed by the press has been pushed by her mother to stay at her family’s lake house on Lake Greene in Vermont to recover from her husband’s death and bad press. Early in her stay, she saves a famous model, Katherine Royce, from drowning, and that’s when strange things start to happen. Casey and Katherine connect and become friends, and then Katherine goes missing. Casey doesn’t have much to do, so she uses binoculars to spy on Katherine and her husband.

Sager is an excellent storyteller; there are dozens of ups and downs and surprises throughout the entire novel. Katherine and the strange happenings become secondary to Casey discovering that there are three missing women who were most likely murdered near the lake. Casey is fairly pushy and in her quest for information, breaks the law and does some dangerous things, especially when she is drinking. The main characters are well-developed, and while readers may think they know what is going on, things are not as they seem. Even though readers will think they know these characters, they will be surprised.

There are some supernatural aspects to the novel; this may or may not appeal to readers. However, the circumstances will keep readers on the edge and add a unique aspect to Sager’s novel.

All told, this novel will keep the interest of thriller readers everywhere.

THE HOUSE ACROSS THE LAKE is the latest novel by the one-and-only Riley Sager. This story follows Casey Fletcher, a recently widowed actress trying to escape a streak of bad press by retreating to her family's remote lake house. To pass the time, she keeps a close eye on the comings and goings of her neighbors until she starts to notice something eerily amiss in the house across the lake -- someone goes missing and Casey soon discovers that looks can be deceiving as more lies and deception come to the surface.

Sager has become an auto-buy author for me -- and I definitely enjoyed this one! In my opinion, I like it WAY more than Survive the Night, but not as much as Home Before Dark.

So many positives for this one
- the setting was just what I wanted -- remote, eerie, easy to envision
- the plot gave me Rear Window + Woman in the Window vibes
- the twists were suspenseful and kept me on my toes right up until the very end

NOW, was it totally believable? NO. Am I still a bit confused by some of the twists? YES. Did I I have to talk about it with others? YES. Should you read it? If you enjoy psychological suspense thrillers and don't mind if the characters do the opposite of what you think they should do, then YES, get your hands on this one today!

Thank you, Netgalley and Dutton Books for an advanced copy! OUT NOW 6/21

This one really keeps you guessing. Just when you think you have the bad guy figured out, something else happens to change everything. And of course, there's the supernatural element to it all. Quite horrifying at the end. Good luck sleeping after this one.

I really struggled with this one. Heavy on the supernatural and incredibly slow. Nothing happens til the last quarter of the book. Not my favorite Sager and the trope was old (although did have a twist to it). I don’t think these thrillers are surprising me in any way and aren’t going to be ones I seek out. It didn’t have any of the creepy elements that Home Before Dark and Lock Every Door had.

Thank you NetGalley and Penguin Group for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

This was the thriller I needed. I've been saying since I read Rock, Paper, Scissors and listed to Layla that I need an intense thriller that I can't predict. This was that. I had my theories but they were all proven wrong by the end of the book.

I really thought it was interesting reading a female MC written by a man. To me Casey definitely felt rough around the edges but that was also due to the nature of her character. Overall, I really did enjoy this read and it kept me on my toes with a little light on at night!

I was seriously enjoying this book until it took a weird paranormal twist at the end. The characters were good, although the drunk unreliable female narrator has been done to death. The plot wasn't fast but it was engaging, but when it all became unbelievable at the end it really lost me. Not recommended

Riley Sager has become synonymous with summer reading for me, his books come out this time of year and they are always my guilty pleasure to read. I have read every one of his books and will continue to do so, even though this was not as good as his prior ones. It started off good, although a slow burn, and I was enjoying it. And then, the twist. It comes out of nowhere, introducing an element that was out of left field and honestly just did not work for me. I don’t mind when twists catch me off guard, but this was SO far out there and normally you have some kind of inkling the direction the book is headed, but in this case there was none and therefore I could not get behind it.

I am also over the unreliable female narrator that is drunk the entire time, which was unfortunately the trope, but I was hopeful this would take a different turn but alas, it didn’t. There were some moments that I liked, and I listened to this one via audio and thought the narrator did a good job with what she had. Overall this one was just ok for me.

Thanks for the free audiobook @PRHaudio! And thank you to NetGalley and Dutton Books for the digital copy to review. This one is available now.

*3.5 stars* Review of Netgalley/digital ARC

Before you roll your eyes about another drunk, unreliable female narrator spying on her neighbors and say "PASS", I would ask you to think about who the author is. Riley Sager has written some pretty great thrillers in the past, some with horror and supernatural elements. Not to give away any spoilers, but the bad guy in "The House Across the Lake" was for me, totally unexpected. I would describe the first half of the book as providing a lot of background information without a lot of action happening, AKA, sort of a ho-hum read. But as things start moving, and more than one character starts acting suspicious, I started to really enjoy it. About 75% in I couldn't put the book down. I also really enjoyed the lake as a setting. Sager did a great job creating the feel of the environment and it was quite easy to imagine exactly what the narrator was seeing and sensing. For anyone who generally enjoys domestic thrillers or mysteries involving missing teens, I would recommend "The House Across the Lake".

Well, I am officially never going in the lake at my family’s cabin ever again! Ok, maybe I will, but honestly, maybe I shouldn’t?! I definitely am going to be trashing the binoculars.

Casey is an actress who is holed up in her lake house drinking her woes away, particularly her husband’s death. She saves the life of drowning model Katherine, who lives in the house across the lake. Casey starts snooping, picking up her binoculars and sees stuff she shouldn’t be seeing at the house across the lake. Katherine disappears and Casey is determined to find out where she is, only she doesn’t exactly find the answer she thought she was going to find.

It’s no surprise that Riley Sager has written another great book. But what was a surprise is that he took this book to a place I was hoping he would go in some of his other books, but never did. It shocked me and I felt myself going yes, yes, yes! Could it really be happening? It did happen and it was creepy and kept me up at night, but I feel like he needed to go there after teasing us in his other books. This book has so many twists and turns and kept me guessing the whole time.

If you’re a Sager fan, pick it up. If you’ve never read a Sager book, pick it up then go read Lock Every Door - you can thank me later.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Thank you Penguin Group Dutton and NetGalley for the advanced copy of this book!

Casey is recently widowed and moves to her family lake home to mourn her husband. She recues a women who is drowning and realizes she is a famous model. To keep her mind off her troubles, she begins watching the woman and her wealthy husband who live across the lake in a house full of windows. Based on viewing their lives through binoculars, Casey doesn't believes their marriage is troubled and when the wife disappears, she suspects her husband has something to with it. There are some twists that you will not see coming.

Like a Vermont version of The Woman in the Window mixed with In a Dark Dark Wood. A remote lake house, several famous residents, an unreliable narrator, too many dead spouses and missing girls to be a coincidence. Lots of good-looking people watching each other across the lake and a strange paranormal twist. Good, intriguing, but not terribly memorable.

So far 2022 has been a really bad year for highly-anticipated books from authors I’ve previously greatly enjoyed, and unfortunately this one fits that description.

If you’re into domestic thrillers, I’m sure you’ll like this fine. It’s not particularly well done (tropey, predictable, pseudo-magical element thrown in out of nowhere and never explained) even by the standards of the genre. But if you mostly care about pacing and the basics of the genre, you’ll likely do better with this one than I did.

But if you’re reading this because you liked what Riley Sager made his name doing like I did, you’re going to be disappointed. Sager’s bread and butter has always been a mix of popcorn horror and creepy suspense. This book is nowhere near either of those things. There’s nothing remotely creepy about any of it. And the “twists” are so contrived and predictable that I found myself rolling my eyes.

And then there’s the worst of the worst of the unreliable narrator tropes: The drunk. Can we please stop doing this in suspense novels? There’s nothing interesting about reading the perspective of a drunk. They’re boring, they’re frustrating, and they don’t inspire much sympathy from the reader. It’s also pretty lazy as hurdles the protagonist must overcome go (“I can’t remember important details about a murder because I blacked out!” Yawn.)

I’m not ready to give up on Sager just yet because I loved his first four novels and didn’t hate the fifth, but if this is his new direction, I’m going to have to abandon ship. If this were my first time reading one of his books, there is no chance I would ever read another. The world just doesn’t need more low quality domestic thrillers.

Actress Casey Fletcher has been relegated to her family’s lake house with the hope that she will be able to straighten out her life. Alone with memories of her deceased husband, a bottle of bourbon, and the bad press that has followed her, she begins to observe the glamorous couple who live on the opposite shore. Definitely a power couple – Tom, a tech wizard and his wife, Katherine, a former super model.

If this sounds like a Rear Window/Girl on the Train sort of story you wouldn’t be the first to notice. While I really like the premise of this book, I found it to be somewhat of a disappointment. I didn’t find Casey to be a particularly sympathetic figure. The sharp right turn into a paranormal theme, and the final chapters that provided a twist that I didn’t particularly like, made House Across the Lake a less enjoyable book than I had anticipated.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing a copy of this book for review.

Famous people interact on a secluded lake in Vermont. Katherine, a former supermodel, goes missing. Did her husband Tom kill her? Our main character Casey is on the search for the answer. This is a good thriller but is slower than some of Sager‘s other books. Still a solid four star read!