This is one book I will never forget. Vincent Ralph is master storyteller. His characters are relatable. I can’t wait to read his other books.

Thank you NetGalley and Wednesday Books for the copy of Secrets Never Die by Vincent Ralph. I loved this book so much I don’t even know where to start! First of all, if you don’t think you like YA books, the story, characters, and writing in this one might change your mind. If you're looking for a fast-paced, creepy story with great characters and stellar writing, try this book! I'm sure this will be on my top reads of this year!

I'm going to try my best to make this spoiler free....

We are following Sam and a group of his friends who run into a little ummm.... trouble (??) at Halloween.

Ok let's get real. Shit starts to go down. The story ebbs and flows and not always on a good way.

And While sam is a good character some of the others are not fully fleshed out, or are annoyingly zipped lipped and uptight and frankly unlikeable (I'm looking hard at Elisha).

The story was good but I got bored and annoyed at times and then super into the story at others.

3 stars

Secrets Never Die is an apt title for this YA thriller and while the secrets indeed never do die the storyline itself suffers a bit from the lack of execution and emotional depth needed to pull the reader in and pull off the scary story line.

Now I am fully aware that I might not be the correct audience for this title and that might be the issue in my lack of enjoyment here, but I had trouble engaging in the story line and caring about the outcome of the characters.

The story's basics: Sam and his friends share their secrets in a way where they are supposed to free them of them, sort of like confession I would imagine. But then they find that their secrets are coming back to haunt them and more.

My issues: as an adult looking at these secrets, well they are not really that terrible, at least not enough for the horror/terror aspect of the story line, plus where are the secrets really the kids to begin with? I mean there is a lot to be debated here. Also, what law/line/reason is keeping the secrets, secret?

There were so many plot holes to make the story flow, it the story wouldn’t have worked if one of the people had simply told the secret. I can suspend a lot of belief for a fiction story, but this story asked too much of me and I just couldn’t hold that much for what little I was given here. I tried but I didn’t enjoy this at all.

Unfortunately, the story just read too much like a rough draft of outline for me and I just felt like it was incomplete and not fleshed out enough for enjoyment.


I received an ARC via NetGalley and Wednesday Books and NetGalley and I am leaving an honest review.

Thanks to Netgalley and St. Martin's/Wednesday Books for gifting me an early copy. Below you'll find my honest review.

This one was an absolute roller coaster. I love when a book has short chapters coupled with great chapter ends, because it really feeds my "one more chapter" behavior and I can tear through them.

Secrets Never Die really built the tension well, starting off a bit slowly on the weird happenings, and then speeding up fast. Have you ever ridden Rock 'N' Roller Coaster at Walt Disney World? If you haven't you load into the vehicle, then pull around a corner and wait about 25 seconds. You get a 3 second countdown, and then you rocket from 0 to 60 in mere seconds. That's kind of how this book went. We had a brief set up, and then BAM - you need to know what's going on, what's happening, what everyone's secrets are so you just keep doing one more loop (reading one more chapter) until it's 5am and you have to be up in two hours.

I did have to give this one four instead of five stars. I wasn't entirely satisfied with the explanation/ending, and felt like it needed a little bit more. Maybe more hints dropped throughout the book so there was a tiny chance of figuring it out?

All in all, highly recommended fun YA mystery/thriller/suspense read. I'll definitely be adding the author's other books to my TBR.

This book was creepy (in a good way). I liked the characters and the plot. I liked that the book was very fast paced and had short chapters.

Thank you NetGalley and Wednesday Books for the arc of this book.

*Thank you Net Galley for the the ARC copy*

Secrets Never Die was my first outing with Vincent Ralph. It's a YA mystery following Sam and four of his friends. Every year on Halloween they go to an old abandoned cabin they call "The Dark Place" in order to leave their secrets and start the next year without them hanging over them. However, this year their secrets are coming back to haunt them.

This is a really quick and engaging read. The writing was well done and moved at a good pace. There are obviously a lot of secrets to be revealed and some make more sense/feel more believable than others. I appreciate that it is a mystery where you have the possibility of figuring out the main twist. I didn't love the big focus on the past in the back half of the book but overall I think young readers will find the story interesting and it would be especially fun to read in the fall.

I would recommend this book to YA readers who are new to the Ya mystery/thriller genre and also to those who like a mystery with a good amount of back story.

Sam Hall and his friends used to visit the Dark Place where they told all their biggest secrets and fears. Now their secrets have come back to haunt them and they are being stalked. This was a very creepy story full of unexpected twists and turns. Thanks NetGalley and St. Martins Press for this ARC that will be released August 29, 2023!

I received a free copy from NetGalley. Story line is interesting and moves along quickly, but the characters are a little flat. Probably great for the teen audience it is intended for.

Date is the date the review was written, not the date of reading.

This book was ok, I like thrillers and I thought I would enjoy this book more than I actually did. It had a lot of potential, and the plot was decent. The story itself was a little convoluted and I wished it was explained a little bit better. The introduction many characters was also a bit much toward the middle/end of the book. I felt myself skimming at some points to try and finish. It had a very strong start and was super spooky and eerie, I think it just went downhill after the first few chapters. So much potential.

I'm going to give this 3.5 stars, it wasn't a horrible book, but it also wasn't the best book.

Thank you Netgalley for this book in exchange for an honest review.

riveting thriller that I couldn't put down

thanks to the publisher and netgalley for the copy for review

I really really wanted to like this book. The premise sounded so good and I felt the setup was intriguing from the start.

But this book dragged on and on for me. The suspense of the stalking wasn’t quite the terror that I was expecting. The secrets themselves didn’t have the build up of anticipation. It was more like “oh they have secrets.” Not, “ I can’t wait to find out what he’s hiding!”

And honestly, the secrets weren’t the terrible life threatening secrets they were made it to be.

The last bit of the book picked up a bit and was a little more interesting, but for the most part, I was bored.

Secrets Never Die by Vincent Ralph was such a creepy book and i loved every second of it. The characters and the plot was was so good. I definitely want to read this again.

Fans of Pretty Little Liars will love this book! What starts as a fun Halloween ritual a group of friends created to rid themselves of their darkest secrets, quickly turns into a scary mystery—that gets more and more dangerous until all their secrets are revealed. Or are they? And how deep does this mystery go? This read keeps you guessing until the deadly end!

My favorite aspects of this novel are the characters. All of the characters have hidden motives and mysteries. It’s like the author picked the best aspects of thrillers, such as the aforementioned, Pretty Little Liars, and I Know What You Did Last Summer, and formed a thriller for a new generation.

Secrets Never Die is about a group of high schoolers who go into the woods every Halloween to whisper their secrets in the Dark Place. Even secrets we think we've buried have a way of coming into the light and this year, Sam and his friends will learn that the hard way.

After reading the premise, I really wanted to like this. However, it just didn't quite reach the hype for me. The plot felt a little shallow; I was expecting these huge, massively horrible secrets to come to light, but they were pretty lackluster for the effort everyone made to hide them. None of them seemed like something that you would choose to die for instead of come clean like the author was trying to portray.

The characters didn't have nearly as much depth as I had hoped they would. Each of them were portrayed fairly one-dimensional, and I don't feel like any of them really grew over the course of the book. Lauren is a liar who can't face up to reality; Dom is a bully but it's okay because he's reformed now; Sam is a disillusioned former child star; Elisha is the emotionally aloof outsider; and Haran is the friend who'd do anything for a buck then blame someone else out of guilt. And let's not forget Molly, the 5 year old professional photographer who can read minds. I'm still unsure if that was supposed to be a paranormal element or just to show that she's highly perceptive. And how did no one know about a certain someone having a daughter? It's a small town and everyone knows everyone's business, so how did no one know about that?

This book sounded really cool, and it's not a bad read by any stretch, but it just didn't live up to its premise for me.

Thank you, NetGalley, for the review copy! Everything in this review is my honest opinion.

I was hooked from the very beginning of the story but as the story progresses there were many twist and turns. Each one pulled me deeper into the story. The characters were slowly developed and I enjoyed unpacking their secrets a little at a time. By halfway through I couldn’t put it down. Spent a rainy Sunday finishing. I throughly enjoyed reading this one. I will be looking for other titles by Ralph.

This was a super good book, besides the first chapter which I thought when a little slow, everything else was really fast paced. The chapters are very short, so it makes you feel like you’re accomplishing a lot and it keeps drawing you in.

This book is great, and unexpecting it in so many ways. It’s a book where secrets never die and they are going to force you to come clean. It has to do with past coming to present, making you face the reality.

There are so many pieces that are placed in the book that you don’t think about and that don’t make a whole lot of sense until later in the book. It was great when they ended up mentioning things that had to do within the first few chapters of the book that you didn’t pick up as important.

I’m not sure how I feel about this book. Maybe 3 stars rounded up 3.5 ⭐️ or 3.75 ⭐️? The plot was just all over the place, like there was A LOT going on, and it didn’t always make sense. But, at the same time, it was suspenseful enough for me to want to continue reading to find out what was going to happen next. It’s just unfortunate that what happened next didn’t always make sense.

In fact, the entire ending didn’t really make a whole lot of sense. If there (at least) three people tormenting Sam and his friends and one of those people is now dead, how does that it make over?? There are (at least) two other tormentors still out there. And now Sam’s neighbors might be involved, which isn’t revealed until the last page? Like I said, there was just A LOT going on.

Maybe Vincent Ralph books just aren’t my cup of tea? I liked 14 Ways To Die, Lock The Doors was a DNF and now this book has me on the fence.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the free eARC in exchange for an honest review.

A twisty, fast paced read with short chapters and tons of actions! Engaging. Entertaining

While this is a great book for some readers to spend their time, the characters could have been greatly helped by the addition of backstory and depth.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
I am just now getting in to mystery/suspense/thriller books, so I’ve only read a couple, but this book made me want to get more into them!! I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book from beginning to end. It kept me thinking and questioning all the characters in my head. I haven’t read anything else by Vincent Ralph, and now I want to go read everything he’s written!! I definitely recommend this book!