Liv wakes up in a cab with no memory. After she gets to her apartment, that is no longer hers, she realizes that not only has she lost her memory, she's lost time.
The story is a thriller told from THEN and NOW from the perspective of Liv and two detectives trying to solve the case of a murder. A murder that looks to have been committed by Liv, but every time she falls asleep she loses her memory and has to start all over again. She doesn't know if she was the one to do this horrible act, but it's clear that someone is after her.
Each time she wakes up, she has to start fresh and relearn everything, leaving her vulnerable and not sure who to trust. She is running for her life, but she's not even sure who is chasing her anymore. The cops are after her too, and until she can remember what she did or didn't do, she needs to stay away from everyone.
I wish I could say I didn't see the twist coming early, but I did. There were subtle hints throughout that led me to the person that was responsible. I absolutely loved the two detectives, Lavelle and Halliday. They were the perfect team and I really hope that we get more books with the two of them solving crimes.
The narration was amazing for the detective, but the narrator for Liv bothered me with the way she pronounced things and sounded breathy all the time. It didn't make it suspenseful, it made it awkward.
Thank you to Netgalley, Macmillian, and Megan Goldin for an early audio copy.

What It's About: Liv Reese wakes up in a back of a taxi with no recollection of how she got there. She finds a bloodstained knife in her pocket and her hands are scribbled with messages: STAY AWAKE. Meanwhile, Detectives Darcy Halliday and Jack Lavalle are called to investigate the homicide of an unidentified man, where on the apartment's window were written the words: WAKE UP - in blood.

My thoughts: This was my third book by Megan Goldin and let me tell you - IT DID NOT DISAPPOINT! She is my auto-buy author now!

I loved the plot which I find really intriguing and it kept me guessing throughout the story. I really have no idea how it will end but I did guess whodunit, just not sure of the motive. The pacing was perfect and I loved the POV of both Liv and Detective Halliday equally. The investigation was filled with suspense and I loved following their investigation.

I've read and listened to this book. However, I enjoyed reading the print better as the narrator for Liv Reese wasn't for me. There were parts where her narration sounded comical and it felt like she clenched her teeth all the time while talking. I did not enjoy it at all.

Regardless, I personally think this was a solid thriller/mystery and I enjoyed it thoroughly. If you're looking for a book that will keep you at the edge of your seat, this may be the one for you!

Pub. Date: August 9th, 2022


***Thank you Macmillan Audio and NetGalley for this gifted listening copy. All opinions expressed are my own.***

3.5- 4 stars! 🌟

I was seriously so invested into this plot. It is definitely a page turner (or “can’t put down the headphones” kinda book if you did audio like me!) Unreliable narrators are probably one of my favorite things in a thriller, so that element did not disappoint with the main character’s amnesia. At some parts, this story was scaring me at night and everything 🫣

HOWEVER, when I got to the end I was a bit disappointed. I actually had to message a friend who also read this book to clarify some things. Overall I just feel like there were some loose ends but it was a very gripping read! It was absolutely fabulous on audio.

Thank you SO MUCH to Net Galley & Macmillan Audio for my gifted ALC in exchange for an honest review!

This was my first book by Megan Goldin, and I was in for a treat. I was intrigued by the title alone. Stay Awake!!!! I was immediately drawn into the book by the premise. A woman must stay awake because every time she falls asleep, she loses her memory. There was a murder, and no one knows what happened. The crime scene is gory and with a cryptic message Wake Up! written in blood on the window. Who was murdered and what does this woman with no memory have to do with it. This book was a great homage to Memento with a twist that made it its own story.

Stay Awake is about a woman, Liv, that appears disoriented. She only remembers receiving a phone call and rushing home, but nothing after that. Every time she falls asleep her memory erases. But what is worse is that Liv Reese, the main character wakes up in a cab with no phone, no purse and no memory. Why is she carrying a bloody shirt? What kind of nightmare did she wake up to? When she awakes in the cab, she notices a lot of writing all over her hands and arms. The cab brings Liv to her apartment in New York. And the roller coaster ride begins because she becomes the number one suspect, and the police are closing in.

Megan Goldin did a great job in this book with showing the anxiety of the unknown. The characters were so well written. I felt so deeply for Liv and wanted her life to find some type of normalcy. I wanted her to solve the mysteries she was wrapped up in. I wanted the NY detectives to bring the murderer to justice. The book is written in different points of view: Liv's life 2 years in the past which starts to slowly come into present time, Liv present day with no memory, and Detective Halliday's point of view. I like how we can see the tension build up as the past catches up to the present. I liked that the characters were smart, none of the characters me want to scream at the book despite my being on edge the entirety of the book. The only downside to the book which was also needed was the repetition of the memory loss.

I definitely recommend this book. I think it was a stay on the edge of your seat type book. This was a unique thriller and think everyone should give Megan Goldin a chance. She made this book worth every second of reading.

I received this book from NetGalley as an ARC. My opinions are my own. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to read this book.

I DNF’ed at 26%. The narrator spoke so slowly and so ridiculously that I wanted to crawl out of my skin. The writing was so repetitive at one point I thought I had accidentally listened to the same chapter over. At 100 pages I couldn’t tell you if anything had happened at all. I also should have known better because I hated Memento.
The Night Swim was good and other reviews have convinced me that I must read Escape Room, but do yourself a favor and if you’re going to read this skip the audiobook.

ARC audiobook provided in exchange for an honest review.

Wowza! That was a rollercoaster ride I was not expecting to go on! I’ll start by saying that the narrators Imogen Church and January LaVoy were phenomenal! They kept it very intriguing and fast paced and it was easy to identify which character was talking. The story itself had me on the edge of my seat! There were some nights where I was listening right before bed and got a little paranoid so I was running around my house making sure everything was locked! I loved the plot as memory is such a fascinating topic and the twists the main character continually dealt with. I would definitely recommend to anyone that enjoys psychological thrillers with an extremely unreliable narrator half of the time!

4.5⭐ rounded up.
A suspenseful, thrilling read! I was intrigued and engaged from the questionable beginning until the exciting end.

Liv wakes up with a note written on her hand that says stay awake, but has no memory of how it got there. Turns out she has a rare form of amnesia and her memory goes back two years if she falls asleep.

The confusion she faces, not knowing who to trust or where she lives or what's going on at all, was so well written that you can't help but feel empathy for Liv. Obviously she can't stay awake forever, so there is quite a bit repetitiveness every time she wakes up, but I didn't mind it too much, well maybe a smidgen. Although the puzzle pieces are put together rather slowly since Liv is ultimately living groundhog day over and over again, it still took on a fast pace and I was on the edge of my couch throughout the entire book.

It's told in both Liv and Detective Darcy Halliday's pov in the present and two years prior. This way gave us little tidbits that kept the story flowing nicely at a suspenseful pace. I felt that the current detectives, Halliday and Jack, did a much better job investigating than the ones prior. The others never took her seriously, but I suppose that would be hard to do when you're reporting a carton of milk in your fridge that you didn't place there. But did she truly put it there and can't remember, or is there someone playing with her already fragile mind?

I was lucky enough to get a kindle copy and an advance audiobook to review. I went back and forth between the two. Ultimately, either way was great, but since I started off listening I enjoyed this way slightly better.

On the longer side at 11 hours and 59 minutes, easy to follow along at 2x. I was thrilled that there were 2 narrators ~ January LaVoy & Imogen Church. I am used to January's voice as Detective Lindsey Boxer from the Women's Murder Club series and fittingly she voiced the detective here. She did a lovely job as always. Imogen was overall fine. She spoke on the slower side, but I think it fit well what was Liv was feeling.

This is my 3rd book by Megan, which I think are all of them. I thoroughly enjoy her writing style and definitely recommend her for psychological thriller and wild ride lovers.

If she closes her eyes, it may be the last thing she ever does...

Liv opens her eyes, disoriented, in the back of a cab. The driver drops her off at her apartment, and she's ready to fall into bed. She doesn't have her keys, so she knocks on the door, hoping her roommate Amy is home and will let her in. A stranger opens the door, demanding to know why she is knocking on their door so late at night. Liv is shocked to find she doesn't live there anymore. When she reaches for her phone to call Amy, her fingers close around a bloody knife. Upon inspecting her hand, she notices her hands are covered in written messages, the most prominent one being, "STAY AWAKE." Liv navigates her way through New York City, becoming increasingly confused and distressed when nothing is the same as she remembers. She has no memory of the last two years of her life, let alone last night. She's chilled to the bone when a breaking news story shows the window at the scene of a murder with a message written in blood: STAY AWAKE. Liv doesn't know what she did, if anything, but someone knows the truth about that night. Can Liv stay awake, or will she go to sleep for the last time?
I loved this propulsive psychological thriller. I felt so sorry for Liv and was almost as desperate as she was to find out what caused her memory loss. I listened to the audiobook, and the narrators were perfect for their respective characters. The narrator for Liv seamlessly exuded a wide variety of emotions, exactly the way I would imagine her to sound. I highly recommend this psychological thriller to anyone looking for an intense, quick-paced read!

Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for the ALC!

Liv wakes up in the back of a cab. Why is she there? How did she get there? Why does she have STAY AWAKE written on her hand?

The book goes back and forth between two POVs - Liv, read by Imogen Church, and Detective Halliday, read by January LaVoy - as well as multiple timelines. Due to Liv's amnesia, the story does give off Groundhog Day vibes, which I'm not the biggest fan of due to the repetitiveness. It was also hard for me to get over the inflections in Imogen Church's narration of Liv - it drove me crazy!

I tried my best to listen closely, but I got a bit confused at times. Especially when the big twist comes - I was completely stumped which was a bummer. Overall, I enjoyed the listen, but I may have liked it better if I physically read it.

I would like to thank @netgalley and @stmartinspress for this advance listen of Stay Awake. This was one of the best thrillers I’ve listened to in a while. It kept me guessing and was unpredictable. The unreliable narrator was done really well and you felt her confusion along with her.

Every time Liv falls asleep she forgets everything that happened to her . The last thing she remembers is two years ago. She leaves notes on her body and drinks large amounts of caffeine to stay awake. When a man is murdered and the words “Stay Awake” are written in his blood, Liv is the prime suspect. She has no recollection of killing anyone. As she is trying to piece together what happened with her memory constantly resetting every time she sleeps, she is also being stalked.
#netgalley #thrillers #thrillerbooks

Liv wakes up in the back of a cab with no idea how she got there or where she's going, the only clues she has are a bloody knife in her pocket and messages scribbled on her body many of which are urging her to "STAY AWAKE" (*snap snap*) Meanwhile, detectives are investigating the murder of a man who was stabbed in his bed, the same "Stay Awake" message left at the crime scene. Is Liv a victim or a murderer? Not even she knows the answer.

<i>Stay Awake</i> is a well plotted and paced, twisty thriller. It held my interest and had me anxious to find out how all the pieces fit together.

As a Megan Goldin fan, I was so excited to get the audio book for “Stay Awake!” Before I get started, I have to give a shout out to the narrator because I absolutely loved her. She made me feel like I was living this story!

Ok, onto the book. This story drove me crazy because it is about a woman named Liv, who forgets everything if she falls asleep. She only realizes why she can’t remember anything as she notices things written on her hand like, “stay awake.” So when I say this story made me feel crazy, it’s actually because the author nailed her main character, who happens to be the most unreliable narrator of all time!

This story is about a murder, and Liv trying to understand what is happening to her, and how she was involved. Did she kill someone? Was she the victim of a crime? It’s a very captivating book and my only criticism is, I wish the ending explained how her condition started more.

Overall, I really enjoyed it and couldn’t wait to find out what was happening! I actually wished I had the book, and audio book, so I could have gotten through it even faster. Thank you Macmillan Audio and NetGalley for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

What would you do if you woke up in a cab and didn’t know where you were, how you could’ve gotten there, where you’re going or why you have writing written all over your hands saying things like STAY AWAKE 🫣

Liv Reece decides to go to what she remembers is her address and when she gets there, there are people living in her house but nothing looks the same and they’re insistent she doesn’t live there and she’s back out to the street. She reaches to her pocket to call someone and there’s a bloody knife where her phone should be.

She knows she is (or was?) a successful writer for a trendy magazine in NYC and now she’s disoriented and nothing is quite like what she remembers it to be.

She sees the local news and realizes in horror it’s two years later than she thought it was and there was a murder last night. Was she involved? What did she do? Someone knows and wants to make sure she doesn’t remember any of it.

This was a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ for me. Thank you to @netgalley, Macmillan audio, stmartins press and the author for the advanced copies in exchange for an honest review.

This new thriller hits shelves August 9th!

Stay Awake made a common “problem” in books interesting. I didn’t guess the ending and I made a lot of assumptions (mostly incorrect) before the book was over. If you like mysteries, you will enjoy this fast paced book. I enjoyed the narrator and I liked the chemistry between Halliday and Lavelle. I recommend!

Thank you to the publisher for the advanced audio copy.

Stay Awake
Megan Goldin, author

I enjoyed this fast paced psychological thriller very much. I thought it to be one of those stories that was hard to put down. This was up there with "Night Swim" for me. Goldin seems to be developing a style of writing that reminds me of Ruth Ware's books and I adore the books written by Ware.

The story revolves around Liv Reese. She continually wakes up with amnesia and has forgotten a two year period of her life. Her doctors have determined her amnesia is more than likely due to a traumatic episode that happened to her years earlier.

The story is told from two perspectives. Liv's and the detectives.

Liv is running from a strange man and perhaps the police. She just might also be trying to figure out WHY she has lost her memory for that period of time. It doesn't help that her most recent awake finds her in a cab with a bloody knife in her pocket and the words STAY AWAKE on her hands. As she attempts to return to her apartment, she discovers that others are living there, and her cat has been taken to a shelter. Then she discovers she no longer has a job when she goes there. She tries to reach her best friend and her boyfriend, but they're not answering their phones. What the heck is happening to her life?

Meanwhile, the detectives are hard at work on solving the recent murder of a man. It seems like the clues are leading them directly to Liv Reese.

The characters in this story were intense, especially Liv's characterization. I quite enjoyed the banter between the detectives as to whether Liv was the murderer or not.

As far as the narrations of the book, job well done! I seem to enjoy any book narrated by Imogene Church. January LaVoy was new to me, but he did a good job as well.

I was gifted an advanced audio version of the book from Netgalley, the publisher, and the author in exchange for my honest review. I highly recommend this intense and very thrilling novel. I am already looking forward to Goldin's next book.

This audiobook took me a while to get through. The story dragged on and was repetitive. I pushed myself to finish but never felt invested. I did not like the narrator for Liv. I think it would have been a lot better if the narrator for Detective Halliday read the whole book. Overall it was a miss for me.

Well, isn’t this ironic?

STAY AWAKE kept me company the first few nights I brought my newborn son home. Like the protagonist Liv Reese, he too has a propensity to stay awake.

In Goldin’s latest release, Liv suffers from sudden memory loss/possible psychotic episodes where she forgets the last two years of her life due to a lack of sleep. Yikes—this sleep deprived mama is paying attention. Liv is on the run for a crime she cannot remember if she committed and is determined to stay awake to avoid further amnesia.

I’m drawn to stories that play with memory and I appreciated the premise here. Although the book started off strong, it became redundant as Liv continues to wake up and rediscover her memory loss multiple times throughout the book.

The audio was narrated by Imogen Church and January LaVoy. In all honesty, Church’s narration felt a bit grating and reminded me of an angsty YA protagonist. If YA is your thing this might not bother you.

Overall, this was a decently entertaining read albeit a bit repetitive. I much prefer the author’s previous book, THE NIGHT SWIM and would recommend adding that to your end of summer TBR.

RATING: 3/5
PUB DATE: August 9, 2022

Many thanks to Macmillan Audio, St. Martin’s Press, and NetGalley for an ALC in exchange for an honest review.

Review will be posted to www.instagram.com/kellyhook.readsbooks in advance of publication date

I picked up this book purely based on the author, I didn't know anything about it when I went in. It begins with a woman waking up in a taxi, completely confused as to how she got there. The last thing Liv remembers was sitting in her office, answering a phone call. As you read, it becomes obvious that she is missing a very significant amount of time (turns out to be over two years that she can't remember). In addition, it appears she was potentially involved in a murder the night before. And to top it all off, it turns out every time Liv wakes up, her last memory is answering the phone at the office.

The mystery/thriller is told in a dual narrative from Liv's perspective, as well as the investigators trying to solve the murder the night before.

Definitely a page turner as the mystery unfolds. I would have given this five stars, but towards the end of the book it did feel very repetitive every time Liv woke up. It was essential to the story when she would "reset" but you can only write a person waking up in confusion so many ways.

Thanks to NetGalley, I was able to listen to the audiobook version. There are two narrators and they were both fantastic. They did read on the slow side and I sped the book up a bit, which was perfect for me. I think if I were reading a physical book, the pages would have been flying by, it's a page turner!

Overall, this is a great thriller and I do recommend picking it up to read or listen to.

I listened to the audiobook version, and enjoyed the narrator. What an interesting premise, when you fall alseep you lose your memory for the last two years due to a traumatic event. So, what if that event puts you in danger? When you do fall alseep and then wake up, how do you know who it is you are supposed to trust? The suspense builds as events are revealed. The only question I have that I wished was answered (although I can guess) is what was the motive behind the initial crime? Fans of fast-paced suspense/thrillers will enjoy Megan Goldin's new release. Aug 2022.

Oh no, the dreaded three stars...

What I Liked
This is a cleverly plotted mystery, I actually did not guess the identity of the villain before it was revealed. I didn't have a huge amount of buy in for the motive, but I can set that aside for the fact that in the end, I appreciated the way things turned out.

I really liked the portions involving the police officers and their process for trying to figure out who committed the murder in the beginning of the book. I appreciated that the author didn't make the male/female cops automatically start a romantic relationship, this book was much better for having zero romance.

What Didn't Work
I was constantly annoyed by Liv's character. I listened to most of this as an audiobook, and the narrator didn't really help. Her portrayal of Liz was more frantic and hysterical than it needed to be. (On the flip side, the narrator for the police detective was fantastic) I kept thinking--so you have this medical condition that makes you forget everything when you fall asleep. Instead of checking yourself into a hospital or making sure you have someone with you at all times, you write "Stay Awake" on your hand instead and then run willy nilly all around town trying to make sense of things over and over? I would think that the medical professionals would put her on a psych hold because she was a danger to herself, or that she could recognize that she needed help.

The reveal of Liv's backstory was way too slow. I (and most readers I assume) had already figured it out long before the police thought to pull her old files and see what the heck happened to her two years previously. Things could have been wrapped up and solved much more quickly had they done a bit of research.

At risk of going on too long and sounding like a broken record, I thought Liv was just too naïve and trusting about certain things, and then overly paranoid about others.

Even though I have many cons about this book, it wasn't a bad read for me. I was invested in the story and thought that in the end it had a decent conclusion. I'm a fan of Goldin's books and will definitely read another one in the future.