Thank you for the ARC Net Galley & Poisoned Pen Press! A mystery stemming 20 years after a Memorial Day massacre. Unfortunately the lack of character development did not help further the plot more than it did. I think this would have been a great read with flashbacks to the past, two storylines at once. The book did give me ‘The Only One Left’ by Riley Sager imagery.

3.5*/5 ✨

If you want a modern-day Clue, this is your book. A beautiful house filled with characters who all have their reasons to seem guilty. One thing about this book is that it starts QUICK with a lot of action to confuse the reader and you really start pointing the finger.

Overall, this read is fun and filled with action, but personally, I wish there was more about the event that happened 20 years ago to get them all to the cabin.

Thank you to NetGalley, Stacie Grey, and Poisoned Pen Press for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

*rounded up

SHE LEFT by Stacie Grey is a five star locked room mystery that grabbed me by the throat and didn’t let up until the gasping end.

Years ago, Amy Brewer walked out of a party in a huff and into infamy when she was the only survivor of the Memorial Day Massacre which killed all of the remaining partygoers. That experience led ‘Therese’ Brewer to follow in her father‘s footsteps and become a law enforcement officer. When she is contacted about an interview on the anniversary of the massacre she accepts with some serious trepidation.

When she arrives, she comes face-to-face with nine other individuals who had some connection to that long ago event. There are siblings, parents, relatives, family friends and the former detective on the case all on board for the interview. When a storm bears down on their very remote castle in the woods, they are cut off from communication, and the body count starts rising. Who has reason to want these people dead and are the current deaths suicides or is something more sinister going on? As the remaining assembled struggle to put the pieces together, some of the group decide to walk out and look for help. Which group will be able to get help first?

I loved the way this book grabbed me from the beginning. I always feel that it is sometimes difficult for an author to have so many distinct personalities in a book, however Stacie Grey was able to pull this off seamlessly. I love her writing style which is clear and concise and leads to a very enjoyable read. My heart was pounding and my pulse was racing, as I kept turning pages well past bedtime. This would make a great addition to any dark and stormy night.

Thank you to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for this ARC opportunity. All opinions are my own and given voluntarily.

People related on some way to a massacre that happened twenty years ago meet at a house to talk to a reporter about it. The protagonist is Therese, the lone survivor of the massacre and who is now an fbi agent. When they get there though, they realize there is something nefarious going on.

I thought the first half of this book was really captivating but then it petered off more. I think having two characters leave was weird as it didn’t really seem like anything came of that.

I received my copy from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

It's been twenty-years since the Memorial Day Massacre that claimed the lives of five of Amy's friends. It happened at a small house party they'd been enjoying together. After Amy was made to feel like she didn't belong though, she left. Little did she know, that was the luckiest choice she could've ever made. Within an hour, all of those left at the house were be dead.

In the present, Amy, along with ten other people connected to that night have been invited to a cliffside lodge by a journalist preparing to do a piece on the murders. After arriving at the home, and being introduced to one another, events quickly take a dark turn. With inclement weather closing in, isolating them even more from the outside world, it becomes clear that this weekend isn't what any of them expected it to be. As bodies start dropping, Amy and the others must fight to figure out who orchestrated this event and stop them before they complete their goal; keeping the secrets they've been hiding for twenty-years.

Y'all, I really enjoyed this. I went into She Left with zero expectations. I hadn't heard anyone talking about it and I was unfamiliar with this author's other works. I was attracted to it purely for the cover and synopsis. The synopsis was giving me a classic mystery/horror set-up, where people get invited to an event, like a dinner party or weekend retreat, only to arrive and realize it's not what they thought. It's very And Then There Were None, amongst others.

Grey succeeded in her delivery of that set-up. I loved how this started off, meeting all the characters and learning how they were all connected to the Memorial Day Massacre. They're not all as directly connected as Amy was, so it was interesting to figure out all of that. We do get glimpses into all the various character perspectives, but Amy is definitely our main focus, and as an FBI Agent, Amy really had the most to offer as far as figuring the whole thing out.

Grey also succeeded in really building out her atmosphere. I loved the setting of this. She didn't just tell us it was remote, it felt remote. The inclement weather, and potentially hazardous mudslides, added an extra element of danger that only aided in the feeling of anxiety and desperation. This is extremely fast-paced, as well as engaging and easy to follow. I listened to the audiobook and loved that as a format choice. I absolutely flew through it.

At the end of the day, I wouldn't say there's anything particularly ground-breaking about this story, but I didn't need there to be. It was still highly-entertaining and that's exactly what I was looking for. Overall, the plot is gripping and fun. It doesn't take itself too seriously, but still delivers a well-plotted, intense mystery that will keep you guessing until the end.

Thank you to the publisher, Poisoned Pen Press and Dreamscape Media, for providing me with copies to read and review. I'm pumped to read more from this author!

This was an enjoyable read! She Left is your classic closed circle mystery. Amy returns twenty years after she escapes a grueling crime scene that kills her friends. This time though she is the one in danger when a mysterious reporter lures her and several others with connections to the crime to a secluded house. This story shares perspectives from each of the guests while simultaneously solving the murder from 20 years ago and today! This was a quick read that kept me engaged!

This is a new to me author, and the novel was well written. But I don’t think I was the target audience.
While I do enjoy a good thriller/suspense now and then this just didn’t hit right for me.

1 sole survive of a tragedy. 20 years later the truth is being revealed. Some twists and turns and a lot of back and forth of the plot. Think isolated cabin, no cell phones and a murderer on the loose.

This is my first book by this author.
It had a good plot, with decent story building. The main characters are likable.
My only negative is that the ending was a bit ambiguous in the way it all tied together. Not a lot of hints to get you there, and then all of a sudden it's solved.
Overall I'm giving it 4 stars.
Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for allowing me to read this ARC

20 years ago Amy Therese escaped with an inch of her life when her group of friends were brutally murdered. Now she and a group of people connected to the teenagers killed have been invited to secluded cabin on the death-aversary. One by one, they are being killed off and everyone is a suspect!

She Left by Stacie Grey was UNPUTDOWNABLE! The plot was so interesting and I loved how the story was told in multiple POV. I’m eager to see what this author writes next

This is my first read by author Stacie Grey and the blurb sounded really interesting.

We meet main character Therese, also known as Amy many years ago.

Amy/Therese is known as the survivor from the Memorial Day Massacre which saw her friends killed in a horrific way. Amy/Therese was the sole survivor and has lived with the guilt for many years.

She changed her name and became a FBI agent in her later years.

The story starts really quick and we see Therese and other people who are all connected in some way to the massacre come together in a large house as there is a journalist who wants to hear the story and take it to world many years after the event.

There was quite a few different characters and to be honest I did get confused, but glad that I stuck with the novel as it is a good read. A really good concept and the story telling was good.

Thanks to Netgalley, the author and publisher for allowing me an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

3.5 stars from me.

"She Left" by Stacie Grey and narrated by Linda Jones is an outstanding thriller that arfully blends a tight circle of suspects with an isolated locale, revenge murders and worst of all, all tech and ability to drive away are taken

Add to this, landslides, the guests being picked off one by one and one heck of a back story that builds throughout the narrative thanks to the beautifully performed multiple POV's by the hugely talented Linda Jones

Oh my goodness, this one is a doozy! I am not usually one for thrillers that involve being stuck in a cabin in the middle of nowhere with no way to get back and peril at every turn, but "She Left" is so very different.

The back story: A party on Memorial day, the popular group of high school teens get together and Amy Therese Bower thinks her social dreams have come true, that is, until the group at the party begin to get nasty and she leaves, by foot, to go home and leave it behind her. Her route is scary and fraught with unknown noises, but when she gets back home, the response is not as she would imagine. She is not told off for not calling, instead, everyone is relieved she is back. why? She is the only person that survived that party

The Present day: A group of people are invited to a remote cabin in a New England forest seemingly by a journalist. At this point, Amy is noww Therese and is an active FBI agent. She doesn't talk to journalists about what happened that day due to being the only survivor (survivor guilt) and even her dating life is affected, with one guy trying to get a date with her who turned out to be a true crime podcaster. She cancelled that date. However, this is different, so she drives up to the luxury cabin. When she gets there, she meets other people who have a link to each person that died at the memorial day massacre, some obvious, others not so. However, after a really, really good nights sleep, the group discover they have been drugged and all their tech and keys taken. Who did it? And why?

This book is outstanding in that as each back story is revealed, each person has a perspective and a motive to be the killer in the cabin and as each person is picked off, who the real killer is likely to be becomes less and less easy to spot. Intricately woven and utterly compelling, this is a thriller that will keep you rapt throughout. Brilliant!

Thank you to Netgalley, POisoned Pen Press, the author Stacie Grey and narrator Linda Jones for this fantastic ARC. My review is left voluntarily and all opinions are my own

Twenty years ago, an angry and humiliated Amy Brewer left the cabin where her circle of popular friends was staying one Memorial Day weekend and trudged home through the woods. When she discovered that a bomb had gone off in the cabin shortly after she walked away, she was assailed with both shock and guilt, even before she became a suspect in her friends’ deaths. While she was eventually cleared, the aftermath of the tragedy made it impossible for her to stay in town. She and her family moved to Florida, where she kept her head down and finished high school as anonymously as possible.

Fast forward two decades and Amy now goes by her middle name Therese. When renowned journalist Angela Scott invites a number of people related to the tragedy, including Therese, to discuss it on a weekend retreat for an article Angela is writing, Therese is both intrigued by and resistant to the idea. She ultimately decides that it’s better for her to attend, in an effort to persuade the reporter to leave out at least some of the details of the life Therese is leading now. But almost nothing goes to plan from the instant she sets foot in the beautiful but remote mountainside mansion where the retreat is being held.

Once murder almost inevitably enters the picture, Therese feels obligated to take charge. While some of her fellow guests decide to brave the harsh elements in a potentially hours-long search for help, she makes it a point to stay behind:

QUOTE
And it wasn’t just [because of] her honest concern for the other people who were trapped with her. Those were the things she could point to if anyone asked her why she hadn’t taken the first opportunity to get herself out of this place. But Therese had another more selfish reason to stay put. Coming here, Therese’s main idea had been to try and push back against the narrative that had defined her throughout her life, as the girl who ran away. If she did it again, no matter how reasonable or sensible the decision was, that would be the story, and as long as anyone wanted to talk about her, that would be what they said.

So she was staying.
END QUOTE

As the body count rises, Therese finds herself investigating this current mystery not only to find a killer in the present day, but also to gain insight into what really happened all those years ago. Despite one of her classmates ultimately being convicted of the bombing, there had always been rumors that he’d had an accomplice. The longer Therese stays in the mansion, the more inclined she is to believe the rumors. But will she be able to find and stop whomever this shadowy accomplice might be before she becomes the next victim herself?

This manor house mystery – or, as Stacie Grey aptly calls it, closed circle mystery – was wholly absorbing, not only for the contemporary conundrum, but also for the psychological insight into what happened twenty years prior and how the tragedy affected the people the murdered teenagers left behind. While the triggering experience that led Therese to abandon her circle that night felt like a big deal to her, she swiftly learns that she wasn’t the only person damaged by her popular friends. Joseph, the once-boyfriend of the only gay kid in her squad, has a lot of words for her on how they’d treated Oliver at the time, starting with a derogatory necklace Oliver had been given to wear by their ringleader Jenna:

QUOTE
[“]God, that was humiliating. But he wore it, you know? Because it had diamonds in it. Tiny-ass fuckin’ diamonds, and that was all it took for him to be that bitch’s pet. You and your sad little story of them being mean to you, like that was the worst thing that could ever happen. And then you walked away, because you knew you could. That was a privilege you had, one he never got.”

Therese reeled under the force of his anger. She remembered the stories he was telling, either from being there or hearing about them after, but Joseph’s version had no relation to her memories.
END QUOTE

The ways in which recollections differ and warp underpin the narrative of this engrossing murder mystery, as Therese fights both the elements and a ruthless killer to keep herself and the rest of the mansion’s guests safe. The plot is well constructed, following classic Christie-esque lines while infusing the proceedings with a very twenty-first century sensibility, especially in terms of what it means to have privilege. Ms Grey has written a smart, entertaining novel that will surely satisfy both the crime aficionado and any reader with an appreciation for what it means to grow up and genuinely reexamine the memories you’ve always taken for granted.

She Left was a remote location whodunit. One by one people are picked off and they have to figure out why. The hook is that one is an FBI agent who once left a cabin shortly before all of her friends were killed. Of course, everyone assembled has some connection to this event. Unfortunately, I had to suspend belief and common sense a lot while reading this. In the end, the whole thing didn't make a lot of sense. Talk about overkill.

Thanks to Poisoned Pen Press for this read and NetGalley. This book was okay but it had too many characters to keep track of. The lock door mystery was done okay but I didn’t enjoy it because the cast was large.

This book had a lot of potential. The basic plot was interesting but the whole book felt more like an outline than an actual story. There was little to no character development or even character description. The first chapter that tells of her leaving the house was super uninteresting. Okay, so some random girl left her friends and walked home. I think this book could have been good if it had a strong editor that helped the author flesh out the details.

Thank you to Netgalley and Poisoned Pen Press for the ARC.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book! I like that the book details the murders from 20 years ago while also currently going through a "who done it" situation. I enjoyed the plot twist and the different characters points of views! It was a fun easy read. I do prefer more action and suspense in thrillers though, and this book lacked that. It was fun trying to figure out who the antagonist was since there seemed to be so many different options! I would be interested in reading more books from this author!

I got to the 30% mark before I gave up. There are way too many characters to keep track of. I had high hopes but it fell flat.

This was a fun whodunit to keep you on your toes. From the first 2 chapters i had an idea of who-actually-dun it, but there were definitely times when i questioned myself! I’ve been trying to find interesting thriller's that are not detective driven and this one (sorta) fit the bill.
I wish there were a few more various perspectives throughout, i think those made it much more interesting of a read! Overall it was a decent lil read!

If you like a locked room mystery this one is a fun one.

20 years ago Therese left a party before it was over and just in time because right after She Left everyone was killed. No one really believes that the person that was arrested for the deaths did it… present day everyone that had means or motive or was a lil sus gets invited to a secluded cabin for a reunion. Will they figure out who the murderer is before the murderer kills again??? 👀

Definitely had some Clue vibes-which were very fun. My main complaint would be that Therese is an FBI agent and she comes off a little incompetent for someone supposedly trained in detective work… amateur sleuth/bumbling around…

It was fast paced and easy to consume/hard to put down. A good summer thriller.

Thanks to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for an eARC

This was a two-part locked room mystery! This was such a quick read that I finished it in virtually one sitting. I love a good reunion story, and this one is a winner! Amy departed from the party early 20 years ago. Shortly after, a bomb exploded in the house, killing everyone inside. Amy is now an FBI agent returning to town for a weekend with a journalist researching a story on what really transpired that night. Nine other people with ties to the case and the victims have been invited as well. Of course, nothing goes well in these kinds of situations, and the reunion quickly turns fatal. Of course, there's a storm. I was turning the pages so quickly, I'm not sure I trusted anyone at all. It's a lighthearted yet dark murder mystery, that has you questioning everyone. I love how it is told from each characters POV. Each POV is told by a character that is stuck in the lodge. its a real Whodunnit.

Thank you to Poisoned Pen Press for sending me an advanced copy of this book to read. Published on May 14th.