It was a bloody Christmas Eve for Kara McIntyre. After twenty years it’s still hard for Kara to listen to Christmas music or feel jovial during this time of year. When Kara was seven years old she witnessed the bloody aftermath of her family’s slaughter.
She’s not the only one who loss family on that night. Wesley Tate lost his father who was an off duty cop on vacation.
For twenty years Wesley has wanted to understand what happened in the McIntyre cabin. Now that Jonas is being released from prison he’s hoping Kara is ready to share her side of the story.
So many lives spiraled downward due to the McIntyre Massacre. Only three people survived. One is missing. One went to prison. Kara is the prime witness who was seven years old at the time.
There’s a couple of detectives working the case since it’s been reopened. Lisa Jackson didn’t write an investigative story. Instead she focuses on all the characters connected to the McIntyre family. This is a character driven story with Lisa Jackson introducing more and more characters to help build a longer suspect list.

Lisa Jackson is a bestselling author, yet her writing style and voice doesn’t quite procure that page turning excitement I’d expect to find in a suspenseful murder investigation. At times it became confusing and overwhelming trying to decipher all these character connections. Thank goodness for the highlighting feature.
Given the way this story began I was hoping for something a little more darker and gritty. I wanted to feel the scenes, yet the words had very little impact. There was no punch to the words. The story was easy to read. But I was looking for Something to shake things up. Some books and writers have the ability to use words in a way that vividly draws an image in the readers mind evoking raw emotions. Unfortunately, this story was missing that effect.
I found certain aspects of the story were repetitive. The story wasn’t progressing at the pace I had expected. It seemed to double back in places becoming stagnant.
It’s not the story I was expecting especially after that grueling and shocking opening chapter. Lisa Jackson dumped all the grueling scenes in the opening and closing chapters of the book. The rest of the book read as a long suspect list of character introductions and hidden secrets. Lisa controlled the direction of this story unleashing the secrets for her final big reveal. I completed the book by skim reading.

I love Lisa Jackson and was so excited to receive an ARC of The Girl Who Survived. I wanted to love it, but just couldn’t get in to it. I liked the idea of the plot, but struggled with the characters and found parts of it slow.

I have mixed feelings about this book. It started off slow and it never really got off the ground for me. The synopsis was so intriguing and the book fell flat for me.



Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for this arc in exchange for my honest review.

The Girl Who Survived by Lisa Jackson was a fast-paced thriller. The story immediately drew me in and kept me turning pages right through to the end. Who killed the family? What happened to the missing girl? Was it a jealous lover, an ex-spouse, the greedy aunt, unethical lawyer or someone else? This one kept me guessing! An enjoyable read for sure.

A gripping tale with interesting characters.

I liked this overall. It started very well and was super intrigued.

In between there was a slump and when the mystery was revealed I read in a monotone. Some incidents felt unnecessary and I have mixed feelings about the ending - but maybe that's just me.

On the whole it was an interesting read.

EXCERPT: She was seven again, unlocking the attic door and running down the stairs that curved around and around, spiraling downward to the sound of music - Christmas music. It was faint and there was conversation. Her father arguing with someone. A door slamming. Her mother's screaming. Marlie's warnings insisting that she keep quiet and stay in the attic. Faster and faster Kara ran, always downward along the never-ending staircase, her bare feet stumbling on the wetness, her fingers grazing the rail that was slick. "Mama," she called. "Daddy . . ."

But her voice was muffled over the sound of thuds and shouts and shrieks and that song, that carol echoing loudly as the grandfather clock resounded up the staircase.

Bong, bong, bong.

She lifted her hand from the rail. It was red with blood.

And her feet? They, too, were red, slipping in the blood that dripped from one step to the next.

"Mama!" she cried as the clock's tolling and the horrid Christmas Carol echoed through her brain.

"Sleep in heavenly peace . . ."

ABOUT 'THE GIRL WHO SURVIVED': All her life, she’s been the girl who survived. Orphaned at age seven after a horrific killing spree at her family’s Oregon cabin, Kara McIntyre is still searching for some kind of normal. But now, twenty years later, the past has come thundering back. Her brother, Jonas, who was convicted of the murders has unexpectedly been released from prison. The press is in a frenzy again. And suddenly, Kara is receiving cryptic messages from her big sister, Marlie—who hasn’t been seen or heard from since that deadly Christmas Eve when she hid little Kara in a closet with a haunting, life-saving command: Don’t make a sound.

As people close to her start to die horrible deaths, Kara, who is slowly and surely unraveling, believes she is the killer’s ultimate target.

Kara survived once. But will she survive again? How many times can she be the girl who survived?

MY THOUGHTS: If you're looking for a read to make your heart race, pick up a copy of The Girl Who Survived. My heart beat at an accelerated rate from beginning to end. This was a read that kept me on the edge of my seat throughout, never knowing until the big reveal, just who really was behind the gruesome killings.

This is a twisty and twisted tale. There is a lot of enmity between the various factions of the extended and blended McIntyre family. Lust, jealousy and greed combine to form a maelstrom that many don't survive. But the burning question is 'Did Jonas do it?'

Kara is a complex character. She has been in therapy for the twenty years since the massacre. She suffers from anxiety (no surprise there!) and paranoia, always feeling as though she is being watched. She still has nightmares. She has anger and trust issues, and drinks more than is good for her to try and keep her demons at bay. She feels guilty about an off duty policeman having lost his life while saving hers, but is resistant to the efforts of his son to connect with her. And all the time in the background is Aunty Fai, the woman entrusted with her care and the administration of her parents estate, badgering her, and trying to make money from the family tragedy. No wonder Kara hides from the world!

Although this is a pulse pounding read, it does have a few faults. Just how many times do we need to have the massacre described in full? It became repetitious, and was unnecessary. The ending felt rushed and just a little OTT, BUT I loved the scene with the turntable. Maximum points for that Lisa Jackson! I think the chapter at the end with the police recapping exactly what they thought had happened and Kara and Wesley doing the same, was unnecessary and overkill. We got what really happened. It would have been much better to have cut straight to the epilogue.

But overall, I enjoyed this. And next time I want a prolonged period with an elevated heart rate, I will be picking up another Lisa Jackson thriller.

The Girl Who Survived by Lisa Jackson is due for publication 28 June 2022.

⭐⭐⭐⭐.2

#TheGirlWhoSurvived #NetGalley

I: @readlisajackson @kensingtonbooks

T: @readlisajackson @KensingtonBooks

#contemporaryfiction #crime #familydrama #murdermystery #suspense #thriller

THE AUTHOR: Before she became a nationally bestselling author, Lisa Jackson was a mother struggling to keep food on the table by writing novels, hoping against hope that someone would pay her for them. Today, neck deep in murder, her books appear on The New York Times, the USA Today, and the Publishers Weekly national bestseller lists.

With over thirty bestsellers to her name, Lisa Jackson is a master of taking readers to the edge of sanity – and back – in novels that buzz with dangerous secrets and deadly passions. She continues to be fascinated by the minds and motives of both her killers and their pursuers—the personal, the professional and downright twisted. As she builds the puzzle of relationships, actions, clues, lies and personal histories that haunt her protagonists, she must also confront the fear and terror faced by her victims, and the harsh and enduring truth that, in the real world, terror and madness touch far too many lives and families. Before she became a nationally bestselling author, Lisa Jackson was a mother struggling to keep food on the table by writing novels, hoping against hope that someone would pay her for them. Today, neck deep in murder, her books appear on The New York Times, the USA Today, and the Publishers Weekly national bestseller lists.

DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Kensington Books via Netgalley for providing a digital ARC of The Girl Who Survived by Lisa Jackson for review. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own personal opinions.

For an explanation of my rating system please refer to my Goodreads.com profile page or the about page on sandysbookaday.wordpress.com

This review is also published on Twitter, Amazon, Instagram and my webpage

The first half of this book was incredibly strong, but I thought the second half dragged on without a lot of suspense. The plot itself was engaging and the characters were interesting.

What can you say about a book that hits the ground running and never lets up? I know--it's WOW! I was hooked from the very first page, and stayed up until 5:00 a.m. to finish this thrilling and often puzzling murder mystery/thriller. It gets 5 bleary-eyed stars from this reader.

It's almost Christmas, and 7-year-old Kara is awakened and then dragged up to the creepy attic by her older sister, Marlie, locked into a small room and told to wait because there's something bad in the house. But Marlie doesn't come back, and when Kara finally frees herself, she goes downstairs only to find that her entire family has been slaughtered, Marlie is nowhere to be seen, and her brother, Jonas, is barely breathing, and tells her to call the police--but suddenly she's being chased out into the cold, snowy night in just her pajamas and bare feet, onto the frozen lake where she falls through the ice, nearly drowns, is rescued, and wakes up in a hospital. She's never been back to that "cabin" in the 20 years since then. Her brother, Jonas, is convicted of this horrific slaughter, a terrified Kara testifying at his trial. Marlie, or her remains, have never been found, and Kara is on her fourth therapist, still suffering from nightmares, flashbacks and anxiety, and she clearly has a drinking problem, self-medicating with alcohol. If that doesn't get your whodunit juices flowing, I don't know what will.

Twenty years later, Kara isn't notified by Jonas' lawyer, who, along with his wife, helped raise her, that because there was a break in the chain of evidence, the sword, covered with her brother's fingerprints was unaccounted for for 45 minutes during the initial investigation, and Jonas is being released after spending half his life in prison. When the lawyer doesn't respond to Kara's phone calls or texts, she goes to his house trailer, high up in the mountains, only to find him dead--his neck slashed open from ear to ear, just like her parents and siblings that horrific night 20 years earlier. And that's just for starters among the twists and turns this novel takes.

Kara's was a blended family, both her parents had been married more than once, each had childen, Kara the only child of both her parents, so there's no shortage of suspects. and no shortage of motives among them. Kara's aunt, Faiza and her boyfriend have been living at the house she grew up in and spending her inheritance on themselves. Jonas' lawyer has been dipping into the family fortune as well. So, who really slaughtered her family and why? Where's Marlie? Is she dead or alive? Who keeps texting Kara? Will the media continue to hound her forever? Did Jonas kill the lawyer who got him convicted and then released? What really happened that fateful night? Is Kara's life now in danger? For the answers to these questions, you're going to have to find a comfortable spot, and dig in to this complicated, danger-filled, exciting and puzzling novel to find out for yourself. I highly recommend it.

I voluntarily read an advance reader copy of this novel The opinions stated are my own.

It’s been 20 years since Kara McIntyre’s family was brutally murdered by her half brother, Jonas. Kara was the lone survivor of that tragedy only because her half sister, Marlie hid her. Marlie herself disappeared that night neither her or her body being found. Now, Jonas is being released on a technicality and Kara is getting cryptic texts. Pairing up with a local journalist Wesley Tate, whose father died that night saving Kara, they uncover what really happened that dreadful night.

This book had me hooked from the very first chapter, my heart was pounding that whole time. The plot itself was very intriguing and kept me going when the writing and characters were lackluster. I found myself skipping big chunks and looking for the dialogue as I thought some of the parts were repetitive and long. Overall, I did enjoy this read and hope by publication date all the kinks in this are worked out.

Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this book for an honest review.

An 8 year old girl is the only witness to the massacre of her family at Christmas. Her step brother is convicted of the murder and is sent to jail. 20 years later he is released on a technicality claiming his innocence. Then more people connected to the original case start to die. Who is killing these people and who is really the guilty party.

This book has a lot of characters, its a long read made longer by the author feeling the need to constantly explain and repeat the story line. This is a classic crime story with a surprising twist. 4 stars

The Girl Who Survived centers around Kara, who is almost the lone survivor of the brutal killing of her family.
Kara is awakened by her sister Marlie. She ushers Kara into hiding inside the house and tells her to quiet and wait for Marlie to come back. When Kara comes out of hiding she finds most of her family slaughtered. Jonas is alive but injured. Marlie is nowhere to be found.

Now, many years later, Joan is released from prison. He was convicted of the murders, but Kara doesn't believe he did it, even though her testimony helped to convict him.

When mysterious messages start arriving Kara doesn't know what to think. Could it be Jonas playing with her? Could it be her missing sister? What really happened that night? Could Kara, who was then seven, be remembering correctly?

Detectives are back on the case and are desperate to close it once and for all. Most of them believe Jonas is guilty and was rightly convicted. But was he the murderer?Read this one and find out for yourself!

I have read many Lisa Jackson novels over the years. I've loved them all. I like how easy the story flows and how easy it is to read. The characters in this one were well portrayed and their backstories interesting.

Thank you to netgalley and Kensington Books for the arc.

The Girl Who Survived
Lisa Jackson
June 28, 2022

Marlie woke up her little sister sleeping in the bed beside hers. She was fully dressed. Clothes and shoes were stacked on Marlie’s bed. Were they going somewhere or was Marlie saying goodbye and leaving? Confused but now awake Kara tried to talk but Marlie continued to put a hand over her mouth. “Quiet, no talking,” she would say repeatedly.” Something bad is in the house.” Kara thought it was her stepbrothers being mean to each other but Marlie insisted she be silent and follow her. She was taken to the 3rd floor of the massive old home. It was a place the help used to stay, now mother told her never to go up there. Why would Marlie take her there? She followed her big sister up into the attic, no they had never come up this far, it was a danger. Marlie locked her in and walked gently down the stairway.
Yes, the reader knows that something dreadful is happening right off the bat. Jackson floors us with her opening. The plot never gets clearer. We know angry family members, the desire for money, and the big question - who would commit such a crime. This bizarre, frightening journey continues never really becoming clear. Not when the perpetrator is arrested do many believe that he executed the appalling acts.
The Girl Who Survived is written by Lisa Jackson and will be published by Kensington Books on June 28, 2022. I appreciate their allowing me to read and review Jackson’s latest suspense novel. I didn’t enjoy reading this - it was absorbing, interesting, very shocking but hardly enjoyable. It is however extremely well written and for those who like extreme crime this will hit the ticket.

I will always be a fan of Lisa Jackson! She is my number one recommendation when people ask me for a great thriller author.

The novel centersearound the "lone" survivor of her family's brutal massacre, 20 years later when her brother, (thought to be the killer) is released from jail Kara is not sure who to trust and many characters and an intricate back story develops. It had me guessing until the end and tied up all the threads of the novel very neatly. I liked the main characters and wanted a somewhat happy ending for her.

Lisa Jackson will always be a yes from me!

Loved this one, love this author! She has a wonderful writing style and makes the characters feel so realistic. This was an entertaining book with the perfect amount of drama and intrigue.

The Girl Who Survived by Lisa Jackson is a very highly recommended riveting thriller.

At seven-years-old Kara McIntyre is a survivor of a Christmas Eve massacre that wiped out her family. Her sister Marlie helped her hide, which led to Kara's survival, but then Marlie disappeared. Since that horrific night Kara has been struggling with her memories, recurring nightmares, and anxiety. Her brother Jonas was convicted of the murders but now, twenty years later, he is being released after a technicality and Detectives Thomas and Johnson are back on the case, reviewing all the evidence. Kara is unsure what to think. What she does know is that the release of Jonas brings with it a media frenzy as well as reopening all of her memories. And now someone is texting her about Marlie, saying "She is alive."

The opening of this intriguing novel will immediately capture your attention as it follows seven-year-old Kara during that gruesome night of blood shed. This will immediately elicit sympathy and you will care about what happens to Kara, especially when it becomes clear that the killer is not done and people involved in the case are starting to die again. Could it be Jonas? Or is the real killer still out there? Can Kara survive again?

Kara is a fully realized character and was portrayed in a realistic manner. Enough information is provided about the other characters to give background and keep the plot moving and introduce suspects.

The writing is excellent in this un-put-downable thriller. The plot is complex and moves at a quick pace. The narrative mainly follows Kara's point-of-view, with some chapters following Detectives Thomas and Johnson reopening the case, Wesley Tate, a reporter and son of the man who saved Kara, as well as a few other characters. When murders start happening again, you won't know who to believe as the suspense and tension rises. I was totally engrossed in from the beginning to the end.
Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of Kensington via NetGalley.
The review will be published on Barnes & Noble, Google Books, and Amazon.

When Kara was seven years old, most of her family was slaughtered on Christmas Eve, her older sister disappeared, and one of her brothers was convicted of the murders. Kara spent her childhood being bounced between guardians more interested in her inheritance than providing a stable home, leaving her with trust issues. Now, twenty years later, new information has come to light, leading to her brother being released from prison. Kara, hounded by the press, starts to receive cryptic messages suggesting her sister is still alive and people connected to the case start dying; is she next? Overall, I liked this book and it was relatively fast paced, but to me the characters did not have a lot of depth, and while the plot held surprises, some of them didn't seem very logical.

20 years ago, most of a family was murdered. 18 year old Marlie woke up her 7 year old sister and told her to be quiet and to follow her. Marlie locked her in the attic and told her not to come out until Marlie got her. There is a bad person and something bad going on. Kara waited and then picked the lock. Went downstairs and found her parents and step siblings all dead except for Jonas and Marlie was missing, Jonas was injured and told her to get help and run.
Present day and Jonas is getting out of prison for killing his family, which he denies and Kara doesn't really know what happened. There was a neighbor who had saved Kara but had died while saving her. His son is now a reporter and wants answers.
The investigators want to really know what happened and are getting back into finding answers.
We find out that Jonah's attorney and Kara's aunt have depleted the inheritance and Kara is supposed to be getting it all real soon.
Then murders start happening again and left me with questions and having a hard time putting the book. down and finding out who the murderer really is.
Thanks to Kensington Books and NetGalley for the book to review.

Kara has struggled since she was 7 years old. Since her family was massacred at Christmas and her sister Marlie disappeared. Her brother Jonas has always maintained his innocence and now, after a confession by one of his arresting officers, he's been freed from prison. This would seem to be a good thing but it's not because bad things start to happen. And then she get a phone call that seems to refer to her sister. Who can she trust? Can she trust anyone? It's a claustrophobic at times tale that goes, let's face it. over the top. That said, it's also a page turner. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. Jackson's fans will be pleased,

Kara had a horrific childhood. She was the only survivor of a massacre that took her brothers, and her parents, and caused her sister to go missing. A police officer died that night saving her and his son is also on a quest for the truth. Kara's remaining brother was convicted of the murders but is being released after twenty years because of a legal glitch. Kara's PTSD from that night is escalating; she needs to find her brother and find out what really happened that night. Kara joins forces with the son of the officer who saved her. She has no choice. What they find out is a complicated astonishing story that will keep you reading this book all night. Thanks to #NetGalley#TheGirlWhoSurvived for the opportunity to read and review this book.

If this was a ninety minute movie, I would watch it and I would be entertained.

I liked having a cast of characters who participated in the points of view. Each character brought their own conclusions and interrogations to the table, which made this story feel like one large puzzle. Everyone is obsessed with this twenty year old case-whether they are trying to uncover more details or hide nefarious deeds, each perspective lends some clues to the mystery of what happened that night and who is killing people now?

Unfortunately, I did not identify with any one character. I know we are supposed to identify with Kara, but her actions and trauma kept me from being able to connect. There were moments that I felt she made some poor decisions and listened to her lizard brain just a bit too much. On the flip side of this observation, the plot was enough to carry me through the story and so I do not feel too disappointed in not honing in on any one character.

Some of the writing was a bit awkward in my opinion. This was my first time reading a book by Lisa Jackson, and I found that some of her extraneous details subtracted from the pacing of the sentences. I anticipated that the writing would flow and build in order to create tension and a sense of urgency. Because it was lacking in this pacing, the book did not feel like a thriller beyond the initial first third of the story in which the content matter alone does the trick.

I found this story intriguing and tragic. It would be an entertaining story to see as a shorter film adaptation. I lived in Portland for about fifteen years and now reside in upper NW Washington, so I know that the ambience of the location for a story like this-in film form-would be intriguing.

I have seen reviews on this book and they seem pretty divided, so I think I might go along with the opinions of readers who have read Jackson's works more broadly than I have. Some liked this book and some were a tad underwhelmed, I would recommend reading the story yourself and coming to your own conclusions. All in all, I look forward to reading a book by Lisa Jackson in the future.

3-3.5 stars!

I read and reviewed an advanced eARC copy of this book thanks to Kensington Books via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.

#TheGirlWhoSurvived #NetGalley