This was one C off the rate books that I didn’t have figured out until the end. This is Memento meets 50 First Dates. Stay Awake will keep you turning the page to figure out the reason Liv forgets everything and what happened before she fell asleep. This book isn’t perfect, because there is a huge loose end not tied up, but it is worth the read and I will be adding it to my library’s collection.

4.75 Stars (I received both an e-arc and audio arc from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review)

Originally I had gotten an e-arc but then I saw they had one for audiobook and I got accepted pretty quickly. When I read The Night Swim, I had listened to the audiobook and it was quite well done. With this release they definitely raised the audio book game.

The book follows three different perspectives Liv in the present day, a female detective investigating a murder in the present timeline and then Liv in the past, roughly two years prior. Present day Liv wakes up disoriented not know where she is and tries to go back to her apartment, only someone else lives there now.

We also go back to Liv’s life when she was actually living in the apartment with her best friend and is dating her boyfriend. Working as a food critic for a popular fashion magazine but also dealing with some paranoia regarding a stalker.

The other perspective is Detective Halliday, a female ex veteran who has recently joined the police force and has been bouncing around with different cases not with technically in a permanent position. But this time she is the first detective on the scene due to being on her way to work, so she gets to work on her first major case. Honestly her POV chapters were my favourite to read, and it was nice to have a change from Liv’s various perspectives.

I also wonder the condition that Liv suffers within the story is something that can happen in real life, losing your memories from the past couple years every time fall asleep. It is interesting seeing Liv’s story slowly be revealed, which some aspects I did guess (like the cheating and that the two people who were killed in the apartment, before they were revealed). I will say that I didn’t expect the villain to be who it was, I thought it would have been the artist who was the killer.

Overall it was a very engrossing, engaging and the best thriller I have read this year. Possibly even of all time.

I sure do love a good amnesia trope thriller!! I became a fan of Megan Goldin's when I read the Night Swim (still my fave!) and have loved everything I read of hers since.

The suspense was so great in this one I didn't want to stop listening! And I absolutely loved the twists!!

I highly recommend this one!

3.5 overall! Read via audiobook.

After reading and absolutely loving The Night Swim, I was super excited to read this one by her! I was really intrigued by the concept and the summary had me hooked. Right from the start this book had me hooked and wanting more. I didn’t want to stop listening. I needed to figure out who the killer was and why Liv couldn’t remember anything after she fell asleep.

I usually love multiple POVs, but with listening to this on audiobook I felt a little lost at times. It also felt like it dragged a bit in the middle. It did pick up at the end and I couldn’t stop listening until I was done. Overall, I did enjoy this book and maybe would’ve enjoyed it a little more if I read the physical copy.

Thank you NetGalley, Macmillan Audio, and Megan Goldin for this advance reader copy in exchange for my honest review.

I absolutely loved this book!! Megan Goldin wrote another phenomenal book! Stay Awake kept me on my toes the entire time and literally made me stay awake to keep reading. I devoured this book in one sitting and I'm not ashamed one bit. There was the perfect amount of suspense and mystery and the twists were perfect. One of the few thrillers that I haven't been able to completely guess what was going to happen or who the antagonist was.

Both narrators, Imogen Church and January LaVoy, were great and did a wonderful job with emotions and emphasis. I would highly recommend this book to every person who loves thrillers and mysteries. I will definitely be ordering a copy of this book when it releases!

Twisted thriller that includes insomnia and amnesia, as well as crazy killer that does not have mercy. Liz has experienced big trauma 2 years ago and now every time she wakes up her memory is erased. She is the last person who was seen with 3 victims and even she starts thinking she is a murderer. Can she solve a murder by staying awake ?

Thank you to Macmillan Audio, Megan Goldin, and Netgalley for the complimentary advance listeners copy of STAY AWAKE for an honest review.

STAY AWAKE primarily follows Liv in two different timelines. In the present Liv wakes up with no knowledge of how she got where she is. She tries to get into her home but someone else lives there and she can’t get in touch with anyone she knows who can give her answers. Written all over her skin are messages she seems to have written herself, with the most prevalent message being a directive to stay awake. Every time she goes to sleep, her memory resets again. Meanwhile a murder victim has been found and signs point to Liv’s involvement. She remembers nothing and must try to hunt to find answers in parallel to the police who are investigating her.

Every time Liv goes to sleep her memory resets to two years prior with no knowledge of the how or the why. In the second timeline, we are following Liv’s story beginning from a little more than two years ago where she’s living with her best friend, dating a good man, and working a great job, following Liv as she approaches the time wher. This timeline continues moving toward the time that Liv’s memories end.

I really enjoyed Megan Goldin’s previous novels so I was thrilled to get approved for the audiobook for this one! Megan Goldin is an auto read author for me and this one did not disappoint! Liv’s interesting form of amnesia gave an interesting twist to the typical unreliable narrator situation. Over time, the reader begins to have more information and insights into Liv’s situation than she has as she sleeps and resets her memory. I was worried that this might become frustrating, but getting the police POV and the alternating timelines gave the novel a good pace and progression.

The audiobook for this book was fantastic as well and the mystery kept me hooked to keep listening and to get answers to what had happened to Liv in the past and what caused her unique form of amnesia. I did have some accurate guesses to some of the answers, but I hadn’t figured everything!

STAY AWAKE is a fun read and one I’d recommend to the thriller fans!

In the beginning, I found myself trying to guess where this story might be going. As more details were revealed and I started getting a clearer picture of what was happening, I couldn’t help but empathize with Liv. I can’t imagine what it would be like to wake up every morning freaking out because I don’t know where I am or how I got there.
Megan Goldin does a great job of telling Liv’s story in a way that makes you like her and want to step into the story and help. The story is written in a suspenseful manner that kept me turning page after page.
I would recommend this to anyone who loves a good murder mystery, alternating timelines, or unreliable narrators.

January LaVoy & Imogen Church do an amazing job narrating this book. They are both some of my favorite narrators to listen to and they really make this book come to life.


Thank you to NetGalley, Macmillan Audio, St. Martin’s Press, and of course Megan Goldin for making this book available to me to read and review. (Publish date: August 9, 2022)

After a run of not so good thrillers and mysteries I have been on a winning streak. Stay Awake has been one of my recent thriller wins and a book that I could not put down.

Liv wakes in the back of a taxi with a bloody knife she is thoroughly confused. She gets herself together and tries to return to life but something strange is going on. Her apartment is no longer hers, her job is no longer hers, everyone thinks she went to London. She just remembers the phone ringing at her desk on a normal workday as her last memory.

The mysteries keep piling up for Liv. She also has covered her body in messages, most notably "Stay Awake". She also has notes on her person about not trusting others, or the police, and reminding her that she forgets everything when she falls asleep. Add to the mix that a body has been found with a message in blood painted on the window, Wake Up.

Why does she lose two years of her life every time she falls asleep? What has happened to her life? Could she really have killed someone before falling asleep and forgetting the whole thing? So many questions to answer and the revelation of everything was well executed.

I switched between reading and listening to this one and would not hesitate to recommend the audio for this one as it was very well done.

Thank you to NetGalley, MacMillan Audio, and St. Martin's Press for the opportunity to read and review this one in exchange for an honest review.

Liv Reese has a great job writing for lifestyle magazine, Cultura, a hot Italian boyfriend, Marco, a stunning physician roommate/best friend, Amy, and a great apartment in Brooklyn.

Doesn’t she?

She did until she woke up this morning. Why is everyone treating her so strangely? And who is the couple who answered the door of her apartment? Weirder still: Why is there a bloody knife in her pocket, and why are her hands and arms covered in ballpoint ink admonishments to “WAKE UP!”, “STAY AWAKE!”, “TRUST NO ONE”, and more?

If all of that isn’t alarming enough, during her wanderings, she’s just seen a news report showing a murder scene where the killer scrawled “WAKE UP” in blood on the victim’s window. Is she connected to it somehow? Detectives Darcy Halliday and Jack Lavelle certainly suspect so, and now they just need to find her to ask questions.

That’s a great premise! You have an MC who’s not just lost two years of her memories but whose brain does a complete reset to her last familiar day each and every time she falls asleep. She’s confused, scared, and vulnerable to dangers she’s completely unaware of. I should feel the utmost care and concern for her! Wouldn’t anyone? So, why did I start feeling detached?

Questions are what mysteries are built on. It’s why most of us read them! However, there’s a big difference between a series of new questions that move you toward a conclusion and the same question being asked repetitively, like a child in the backseat saying, “Are we there yet?” over and over and over - only Liv’s question would be some variation of “What’s going on?”. I enjoyed it at first, then … not as much.

While I liked the story, my over-analytical brain got in the way of just going along with some things. Other than Detectives Halliday and Lavelle and those involved in the investigation, no one seems to know how to ask or answer a direct question. Everyone tells Liv that she doesn’t remember things, but no one seems to ever tell her the facts, like “Hey, you seem really confused. Let me help fill in the blanks.” Nope. Liz doesn’t ask and they don’t offer, and no one thinks to call the cops to help this clearly very confused woman.

What did work for me was the narration by Imogen Church and January LaVoy. I thought they both did a fantastic job, and listening to this while reading along on my Kindle kept me engaged in the story. The premise is intriguing, the story is good, the writing is excellent and it has a solid ending reveal, so the book has a lot going for it! Definitely more pros than cons.

For those of you considering this book, I hope that much like our MC, Liv Reese, you’ll go to sleep tonight and completely forget my review and wake up tomorrow with only memories of that last glowing one you’ve undoubtedly read before mine. There are many! I think most readers will really enjoy this book, and I know I’ll be eagerly awaiting Megan Goldin’s next one!

★★★ ½ (rounded to 3)

Thanks to Macmillan Audio, Netgalley and author Megan Goldin for this digital ALC to honestly review. This will be published on August 9, 2022.

This book kept me hooked and I wanted to keep listening to find out what happened!
Liv has a rare form of amnesia where every time she falls asleep, she forgets everything and her last memory was 2 years ago. There have been 3 murders that Liv is connected to and the most recent one leaves everyone suspecting it was Liv -except she can’t remember what happened and the police are looking for her!
At times, it got repetitive with the main character waking up, not remembering and noticing the writing on her hands. I liked the multiple POV and going back and forth -before and recent leading up to the murder.

Have you been looking for a good thriller? This may be for you!

It has been a little while since I've found a good thriller, so I was very excited to receive this ARC from NetGalley.

I don't like to give spoilers but you follow our main character, Liv, as she tries to figure out what is going on. Her last memory is of her in her office working and it's summer, but now its nearing winter and she cant remember any of the time in between. Oh, and she may have committed a murder. She has to stay awake to be able to figure out what is going on.

I have to say I liked the unreliable narrator aspect in this book, something I normally steer away from. I liked learning along with Liv what was going on. By the end of the book I couldn't stop listening because everything started unfolding and I needed to know EVERYTHING.

I listened to this as an audiobook, and I found that I had to pay more attention because it was a thriller and I was trying to figure everything out. I'm not sure if it was my advanced copy but the narrator reads very slow when it is on the chapters with Liv in the present time and I could put it on 1.75 speed and couldn't really tell that it was sped up. Which is not actually a problem, it just felt like she read very slowly.

If you read Night Swim by Megan Goldin I think you would also enjoy this. I enjoyed this one a tiny bit more than Night Swim but it was close.

This book was incredibly written and told. A premise like this could have easily been a miss, but I am so glad for me it wasn’t. I held on to every last second waiting for more. Great story and character development.

Let's just say this book was not for me. I found it to be incredibly repetitive, which makes some sense because the main character has a rare amnesia disorder that causes her to forget the last two years of her life every time she falls asleep, but I found the middle of the book to be excessive in repeating the same scenes and conversations. In addition to this, Stay Awake had one of my biggest reading pet peeves: I figured out the "bad guy" before it was revealed. The only saving grace for this title was that the characters Goldin created were really well developed and I think others will enjoy this title more than I did. My favorite book of hers is still The Escape Room and I will pick up her next title despite not vibing with this one.

4.5 stars!

I binged this book in less than 12 hours. I could not put it down because I was so curious about all the plots and how they were going to link/play out. There were a lot of parts to the story that I didn't expect and definitely DID NOT see the ending coming at all. Some parts may have seemed extreme, but IMO it did not take away from the story at all!

Thanks to NetGalley, St Martin's Press & MacMillan Audio for advanced copies in exchange for an honest review!

This was an immersive experience! Both narrators were great and gave life to each character. I enjoyed this thriller and have recommended this to friends.

💭 Stay Awake hooked me from the start! Though it seemed sort of confusing, I got my bearings and was very intrigued by the plot line. Unfortunately it ended up falling flat for me. 😩 I liked the idea of back and forth timelines and dual POV, but they seemed pretty disjointed skipping backwards like 2 days or 2 years and the detective parts were boring. I liked the short chapters and that it definitely felt creepy at times—I was craving a good, creepy thriller when I picked it up. It felt a bit too repetitive for me though— I understand why that was part of the plot with the amnesia storyline, but it felt a little drawn out. I wasn’t super shocked by the twist and left wanting more explanation at the end. Overall, this one was a bummer based on my expectations and really liking the author’s prior work THE NIGHT SWIM— I recommend it over this one.

This audiobook was pretty good. Two narrators made for easy listening and understanding which POV the chapters were in, but some of the performance elements were not great (fake laughing that was pretty terrible). Overall though an easy listening experience.

Thanks to NetGalley & MacMillan Audio for providing an audio ARC in exchange for an honest review.

So, if you've watched the movie "Memento," you might be familiar with the issue that's at hand in STAY AWAKE: Liv Reese has undergone a trauma which causes her to blank slate her memory to the time just prior to the traumatic event, each time she wakes up. Naturally, she fights this by trying to ... you know, *STAY AWAKE.* What this means for readers of this book is that, as a matter of course, we have to go through some frustration after each time Liv wakes up and repeats many of her previous tasks. As we open, she finds herself minus her wallet, phone, and keys (luckily she is carrying a giant wad of cash), having just woken. She is also carrying a bloody knife in her pocket, which she soon discovers is related to the murder of a man who was found with "Wake Up" written on the window of the apartment where he was found ... in his own blood. We tag along with Liv while she bops around the city, forgetting stuff after having a catnap that she desperately tries to stave off by taking No Doz and drinking energy drinks by the case (somehow she never seems to need to find a Wawa for a pit stop, but whatever. We're not in this for the reality).

We also spend alternate chapters with the lead female detective on the case. Darcy Halliday. Darcy is a tough-as-nails former soldier who, despite her hard-bittenness, doesn't believe that Liv is to blame for the murder of the man. Darcy is out to prove herself to her new partner, LaValle, who's been on the force longer than she has and is a dude. LaValle doesn't agree with Halliday, and as evidence stacks up against Liv as a murder suspect, it gets harder for Halliday to defend her.

Obviously, you have to suspend your disbelief a lot for this one, and be ready for some repetition as Liv makes progress, zonks out, forgets again, lather rinse repeat. That does get old, but if you can shelve both of those minuses, it's a pretty good romp. I spoiled it for myself by accidentally clicking on a spoiler in GoodReads, but I doubt I'd've figured out whodunnit (although TBH I don't usually try bc I like to enjoy the twist at the end). The voice actresses are competent, although perhaps Imogen Church might have spent less effort making Liv sound like she is having trouble stringing words together. Both women do a good job of differentiating between characters so there is no confusion about who's speaking. Church's Italian accent is a little over-the-top, but who cares. I just imagined Liv's boyfriend, Marco, with a little chef's toque and a mustache, with his thumb and forefingers held to his pursed lips. LOL

Overall, not a bad outing. Kept my attention. The folks who want a repeat performance of Benson and Stabler, er, Halliday and LaValle, might want to look to the headlines and read about what real cop behavior is like (hint: it doesn't usually involve exonerating your key suspect). Bu then, it's rare that the hero cops in these novels ever resemble the officers we see on the news.

Unfortunately, this one just didn't work for me. I liked the premise, and having an unreliable narrator who can't remember anything is definitely an interesting perspective to be reading from. I just think it got a little bit repetitive by the time we got to the end. There were definitely some twists I didn't see coming though!

I did unfortunately find one of the audiobook narrators hard to listen to, as well. She was just overly emoting a lot, which made the character quite annoying.

I hate to be a downer, and I a think there are people out there that would enjoy this! It just unfortunately wasn't for me.

Unfortunately Stay Awake was a miss for me - I found the story to be thin, repetitive, and slightly obvious. The back and forth on the timelines / multiple perspectives led to the same plot points being repeated over and over again. The ending was also frustrating to me - the main driver of the plot was suddenly no longer an issue?

The narration was unfortunately not better - I found it to be actually distracting and detracting from the story. The accents for different timelines were a little jarring and there were some mispronunciations that were surprising to me. Words like misogyny and Houston.

I do think that a lot of readers will have a different experience than I did. I have seen many positive reviews! Thank to Netgalley and Macmillan Audio for the advanced copy - Stay Awake is out 8/9/22.