I love a good locked room mystery and this one was pretty good! It was a fast paced read and kept me entertained. I feel like I guessed who done it pretty early on, so it took out the shock for me, but still had a good time reading this!

This book has a great premise where when Amy was a teenager she left a party that she was at with her friends and shortly afterwards her friends were all murdered. Now in present day, she is invited with others to a remote house to talk about the events from that day. But then people start dying. This book and setup sounded like my type of book. I love books that play with Agatha Christie's novel And Then There Were None and love mysteries set in isolated locations. This was set to be a very me type of read. And while I did enjoy it, it wasn't as amazing of a reading experience as I had hoped that it would be. One of the struggles I faced was all of the different characters. The setup was that someone related in some way (family, friend, acquaintance) to one of the five murdered teenagers was brought to this house under the same pretenses of talking about what happened so long ago. What made it confusing or hard for me was keeping track of those individuals and who they related to from the past or how. Also, Amy herself in present day now goes by a different name which didn't help matters. There were also a few others there that were just related to the investigation in some way like a witness and the detective that worked the case that were there too. It took me entirely too long to get it all straight in my head of who was who which effected my enjoyment of the book to a certain extent. I did enjoy the isolated location, the struggles the characters faced when a storm hit, and the mystery behind it all when people started dying. I just felt that the difficulty in really getting to know the characters and relations to those from the past took away from the mystery behind it all. That's just my opinion though. Overall, I enjoyed this book but didn't love it like I had hoped to. 3.5 stars and I will probably round down on Goodreads.

Readers who enjoy mysteries or are as intrigued by that premise as I was should definitely give this book a try. I would definitely read more by this author and am looking forward to seeing what she comes up with next.

This is a lone survivor meets stuck together mystery that will thrill Agatha Christie fans. It really had an updated feel to a classic scenario with plenty of situational twists to have you blazing through the pages. The author sets an atmosphere of suspicion right from the start and carries that throughout her story.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publishing company for this Digital Advanced Readers Copy! I thoroughly enjoyed it!

A classic whodunit read, but I wish there were a little more twists because I felt like I was able to guess who the culprit was decently early on. Not the worst book but not my favorite either.

Predictable twist, but good writing and character development overall!

I really enjoyed the setting—Pacific Northwest-ish, in a secluded forest, in an older vacation mansion, in the middle of an epic storm. I loved all of the scenic detail, and the characters who claimed to be experts in one piece of outdoor living or another…and then just weren’t when they needed to come through.

The book started off with a LOT of characters. Obviously not all survive this old house in the forest, and once they started getting killed off, it was much easier to keep the survivors straight. There were a few who seemed inconsequential all the way through, however.

Overall, a quick read that kept me on my toes!

Poisoned Pen Press essentially means "this work will be great" at this point and She Left does more than just deliver, it sings with emotion and intensity.

A modern take on the classic locked room mystery. I liked the atmospheric setting that enhanced the tension in the tale. . Some of the plot twists were telegraphed early. which reduced the overall suspense and impact of the story.
Many thanks to Poisoned Pen Press and to Netgalley for providing me with a galley in exchange for my honest opinion.

What even was that? I think it will be the first book to take me 3 months! to reach 37% mark and finally dnf it. At this point I don’t know if I want to laugh or cry for waisting my time.
I think it just tried too much to be like Agatha Christie story, but the main character in no way can’t be compared to Mrs Marple or Hercule Poirot. Therese was way too boring, had no charisma that Poirot has, and definitely wasn’t so charming as Mrs Marple.
The plot it self was so childish, that I couldn’t think about this book seriously. Was it meant to be a parody of a mystery thriller? Or was it supposed to be a cozy mystery? Author only knows…
I can’t get the time I lost trying to read this book, but I can at least try to save some of yours.
I think you guessed it… I do not recommend this book.

First I want to thank NetGalley, Poisoned Pen Press and Stacie Grey for my ARC of She Left.

This was a fun read! Definitely more of a mystery than a thriller but it was still really good! It was a quick read and kept my attention till the end. I really enjoyed the setting of the book and I liked how we got to know the characters but the book kept moving. If you enjoy a good locked room mystery I would definitely recommend reading She Left!

I thought this book was ok. I really liked the premise but thought it could have been executed better. There was multiple times where in conversations I struggled to follow who was talking. It was such a slow build to a rushed ending. Would consider reading more books by the author.

this was just okay as a whoddunit book. Too many characters to keep up with it. I liked the premise though, of Therese’s guilt on leaving her friends, then making up for it by not leaving the mansion in the present when she had many chances to save herself.

This book was the perfect read, suspense with twists.
Characters worked well and could perfectly envision the words coming to life!

I was initially drawn in by the concept of this book and thought the opening chapter was particularly strong. However, as I continued reading, I found the rest of the story fell short of its potential.

There were too many characters to keep track of, and most of them felt one-dimensional, including the main character, who I found particularly uninspiring. This made it hard to connect with any of them or care about their journeys.

The plot also felt a bit forced at times, with certain twists and turns that didn't seem entirely believable. And while the final reveal did tie everything together, I had already figured out who the killer was early on, which took away any element of surprise.

SHE LEFT by Stacie Grey tries its best to be the kind of mainstream thriller/mystery that you'd find on the shelves along Riley Sager, Alice Feeney, and Shari Lapena, but it falls like TWO inches short of the finish line. Stacie Grey knows the formula and she knows how to write, but without something special to push her books over the edge, I'm unsure if we'll ever see one of her novels sitting among the greats. The was just perfectly okay.

This book was gripping and hard to put down. It didn't feel like everything else you see out there, it felt very fresh. I really enjoyed this book!

This is a perfect example of a thriller/mystery that I ate up while reading it. Read it in like a day and a half, loved it. I can’t remember anything about this. And you know what that may be on me. But if you love locked door mysteries this was honestly a really fun, interesting addition to the genre. It follows Amy, the lone survivor of a high school massacre that claimed the lives of five teens. As the title suggests, she left before the carnage had begun. Now a group of people are reuniting at a mountain cabin, all related in some way to the victims and now FBI agent Amy has to try and solve the crime she survived all those years ago. If you want an easy thriller, with a solid mystery and great atmosphere that you can totally finish in a weekend- this is a perfect pick for you.

This review is posted on my instagram @boozehoundbookclub

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the chance to read an early copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. She Left by Stacie Grey released on May 14th, 2024.


Honestly? I wasn't a huge fan of this one, but I didn't hate it either. The story was fine and I can't really pinpoint exactly what I didn't enjoy about it, it just wasn't a book I couldn't put down. I do enjoy the locked-room vibe of it though!

A few friends, a rented cabin, cheap alcohol, some ill-advised decisions, many some regrets. A house party with your friends in high school is a dumb idea, but it’s hardly unheard of. But when Amy agrees to go a Memorial Day party, she has no idea she will somehow escape the unexpected fate of her classmates.

Insulted by their bullying of her, she decides to walk out of the first and hitch a ride home. Shortly after she leaves, the cabin explodes. She is the only survivor of the incident, making her a suspect among the parents and friends of her classmates. Even the ones who don’t think she planted the bomb think she must know much more than she has shared with authorities.

Now it’s twenty years later. Amy is an FBI agent, and someone has invited her and family members connected to that night to a reunion that will be covered by journalist. Amy has no interest in reliving that night, but as a grown woman and a law enforcement agent, she decides to set aside her sentiment and see if she can discover any clues to the still-unsolved murder.

No sooner does the group assemble than a massive storm causes mudslides that washout the road and endanger the structure of the cabin. Then guests start disappearing. Like Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None, everyone begins to wonder if the murderer has returned? Or perhaps someone is out for revenge from that night twenty years ago.

…the building she had arrived at, a huge, wood-shingled structure sprawling across a ledge that looked to be carved in the mountain. It reminded her of the kind of national park lodges they built in the 1900s, when no one visited the wilderness without a butler. ~Loc 197

It’s a better than average thriller, with a smart protagonist and a cracking mystery. There are psychological complications, a dusting of clues, well-drawn characters and a quickly moving plot.

My thanks to Poisoned Pen Press for the review copy. Read via NetGalley.

Book loses the intensity after the first chapter of the book. It doesn’t offer the smallest explanation of what is happening inside the cabin. The walk through the park was good, but there was so much hit and miss on suspense and thrills. I tried hanging with the story. I wanted a connection with the kids in the cabin a background story with Amy, but there really wasn’t one. For me the book fell flat.