This is a brilliantly conceived and executed murder mystery. Six deep sea divers, five men and one woman, are locked into a hyperbaric chamber for 28 days on a ship in the North Sea. There they will live, sleep, work and eat together in this claustrophobic space until it is time to be decompressed and returned to their families. Their food, water, and other needs such as laundry, reading materials and medications will be sent into them through a special area by people there to watch over them and see they come to no harm. The divers have all done this before and have mostly worked together all over the world, so barring an accident they are not expecting any surprises. However, when first one diver dies in his sleep and then another, they know there is either a murderer amongst them or someone on the ship is harming them.

I loved that Will Dean took a deep dive into the detail of what it is like to be a deep sea saturation diver, one who dives to the deepest levels and so must spend long periods in a cramped hyperbaric chamber with several others breathing a mix of nitrogen and air, since it would otherwise take several days to decompress after each dive. For most of us who know little of what is involved in this type of diving the glossary at the start of the book is very helpful in understanding the terms used. I had never really appreciated just how dangerous it is to work at those depths and how the divers are totally reliant on each other for their safety in preventing even the slightest mistake that could lead to catastrophic death. The claustrophobia of the chamber was palpable as was the need for constant cleaning, necessary to prevent bacterial growth and illness in the humid conditions.

The events are seen from the point of view of the only female diver on board, Ellen Brooke. We come to know her well through her reflections on her life with her husband and children and the difficulties she has had to overcome to prove herself as a female diver in an industry almost entirely populated by men.

The suspense builds gradually as the scene is set and we get to know each of the divers through the stories they tell of previous dives and exploits on shore. Towards the end the tension is near boiling point and the reader can be forgiven for wondering if anyone will come out alive. Even once the boat is back in port the divers are totally cut off from the outside. With none of their usual access to wifi and newspapers they have no idea what the police are doing or thinking and paranoia sets in with suspicion directed at each other. The superb ending is cleverly done and will have the reader questioning everything they have read, resulting in a totally gripping and addictively heart pounding thriller.

Will Dean always has a fresh new mystery and he once again thrills us with this locked room mystery! Perhaps what made this book unique was the high stakes of the underwater "chamber". Deep sea divers are working on the sea floor for a job so they are contained in a hyperbaric chamber to minimize the time required to equalize and work in the deep sea. Things quickly go awry within the cramped chamber and as the reader we are left gawking at what is happening.

I loved the setting, but I found the pacing to be a bit slow with not much happening. There was some background details that were shared about each of the characters in an attempt to create some depth to them and perhaps give the reader clues about the mystery, but I actually didn't find myself connected to them.

I can't wait to discuss the ending with a fellow reader!

Thank you to NetGalley and Atria for this advance e-copy of this book.

Reading this book was an emotional journey for me. It was totally different from what I expected from a thriller. For many, it might not even qualify as one. However, I loved how the main character struggled every day, making her story incredibly relatable and poignant.

The setting in the Saturn chamber was fascinating. While some might find it claustrophobic, I loved the quiet and silence it offered. It felt like a refuge, a stark contrast to the chaotic world outside. The depiction of divers living wildly and the various intertwined stories of military life added layers of complexity to the narrative.

The protagonist's inner battles truly moved me. Her resilience in the face of relentless challenges broke my heart. The way she confronted her fears and demons was both haunting and compelling. Her struggle wasn’t just physical but deeply emotional, resonating with my own experiences of facing personal difficulties.

The ending, however, divided readers, and I understand why. I, too, found it hard to believe what really happened. It wasn’t the conclusion I expected, and it left me with mixed feelings. But perhaps that’s the mark of a powerful story—it stays with you, leaving you to ponder its implications long after you’ve turned the last page.

Overall, this book's emotional depth and unique setting made it a memorable read for me. It’s a story that lingers in the mind, challenging you to think and feel deeply.

THE CHAMBER

Saturation Diving. SAT Rats. Offshore deep water oil pipeline repair. Six workers in a very small, cramped, mini submarine shaped living quarters - under water for a month.

One of them dies. And then another.

This is an intelligent and intense psychological thriller. It is subtle and mysterious, a slow burn. Pipeline infrastructure maintenance is extremely expensive. SAT divers are very well paid, and the Diving Support Vessel and 90 plus staff required to keep them alive results in each job having to be well planned and efficient. A cancelled contract represents the loss of hundreds of thousands of dollars. And decompression from the depths takes time. A lot of slow moving time. With ever increasing tension, the claustrophobic atmosphere becomes almost unbearable. And some frightening truths begin to emerge.

This book is well researched, with some good technical explanations of deep water diving and pipeline repair, but never too much to interfere with the flow of the story. It also incorporates several serious topics, including PTSD, war, and loss. It is a smart and cleverly constructed story that doesn’t let up until the absolute final page. Definitely a recommended read - if you can bear the tension.

I would like to thank NetGalley, Will Dean, and Simon & Schuster for the opportunity to read and review this book.

I love claustrophobic whodunnits, ESPECIALLY when the ocean is involved. The Chamber was no exception. After his last novel, I expected this one to be a lot twistier. It was still enjoyable but not quite to the same caliber for me personally. Brooke was a very interesting main character in her complexities and trauma. The ending was confusing, albeit I believe intentionally so.

I cannot fault the amount of research that must have gone in to write this book. Will Dean does an amazing job at getting all the information across and I did feel the same claustrophobia that the divers did as they found themselves in such close quarters. I only wish the book had been just that bit more exciting. It is marketed as a thriller however the writing says otherwise. I didn't feel the pull of wanting to keep reading as there was nothing hooking me into finding out what happened next.

A truly claustrophobic follow up to The Last One from Will Dean that you will devour.

The chamber kept me sat on the back patio of my AirBNB on a girls trip, I HAD to finish it. This was the perfect kind of locker room (or locked chamber) mystery that I crave. This one has a murky ending so if don’t love murky endings, skip it!

However…if you understand the ending more than I do please reach out to me

Review: After reading The Last To Burn, I knew I needed to pick up a copy of this book. I absolutely love the movie the Abyss which reminded me so much of this book.

This book started off so promising. I was so excited to read a lock room mystery in an underwater oil ridge. Ellen and five men go down to the chamber to spend 30 days there. On day 1, one of them gets murdered and no one has any idea why. It will take days to decompress and the tensions build up. 3.5 stars rounded up.

While I loved the concept and even the technical side of the chamber, there were a few things I didn’t love. I didn’t love the slow beginning that felt repetitive. I was also confused because everyone had “dive names” and regular names but didn’t really have any standout qualities, so I had no idea who was who. It was hard to connect with the characters.

Also the ending…so much build up and I was completely let down. You will love or hate it. It’s not really a thriller but more of a suspense. I loved the idea of it but found it hard to connect to the characters. If you are thinking about DNF, try to read to at least chapter 20 (that’s when it picked up). After that, it moved quickly and was interesting.

“We turn to our old memories because we survived those times.”

Will Dean always scares the sh** out of me and induces some of the worst anxiety. His books are the definition of claustrophobic, but The Chamber takes claustrophobia to a different level. His writing is so immersive that I felt like I was no longer breathing oxygen, but heliox, pressurized like the six divers we meet in this book. I felt the panic, the desire to give in to the flight instead of fight. I am familiar with how unhinged Will Dean’s books get, but I never knew where The Chamber was going to go, and I was shocked with every twist and turn. When I wasn’t reading this book, it was all I could think about. Get your hands on this as soon as you can.

This book grabbed my attention from the very beginning and held it nearly the whole way through. There were a few spots in the middle that were a bit slower, but overall it was a suspenseful, interesting, and fast read. The synopsis would be my worst nightmare in real life, so if you get claustrophobic easily... you've been warned! My only complaint is the the ending wasn't very definitive. Generally I like my books to be wrapped up in a nice pretty bow at the end so I had to be okay with not fully getting that. Despite that, it was definitely still worth the read and one I'd recommend if you like locked room thrillers! 4 stars!

This is a tense and thrilling read about…hyperbaric chambers. You wouldn’t think it would work, but it does. Though the story is a slow burn, I could not put down this book down. I was fascinated with all the aspects to saturation diving. The research required must have been insane. I have already looked up the author’s backlist to add to my TBR. Thank you to NetGalley for the chance to read and review this book!

Wow, talk about a book that makes you realize you’ve been holding your breath! Will Dean is usually hit or miss for me, I really liked The Last Thing to Burn by this author however I hated First Born. This one fell somewhere in the middle for me. The story was enjoyable but the ending didn’t work for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC! This is my first Will Dean novel and definitely won't be my last. I was very excited to read this because the premise and setting already had me hooked- claustrophobia, atmospheric, (possible) murder, and mystery at the bottom of the sea. You can tell that the author did a lot of research for this novel and I appreciated that. However, I unfortunately did find the ending a little anticlimactic and confusing. I also felt like the book could have been shorter and got repetitive. I still had about 100 pages to go and was surprised that there was still that much story to tell. Even with a 3 star rating, I will recommend the book and will read more of Will Dean's work.

I received an advanced copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

Whoa! I don't even know what to say. Listen. I couldn't put the book down. I opened it thinking "meh, this might not interest me", I was wrong. It very much interested me. I even had to do a deep dive, no pun intended, on things mentioned in this book. This man is intense, his research notes must look like chaos, but in the best way?

This was intriguing, very interesting, and I don't even know how to explain the ending. Truly. No idea what happened there. It was a criss corss double cross? I don't know.

4 1/2 solid stars.

It took me a near a month to finish this book which is very unusual for me. True, I was in the big middle of selling my home and moving but also, the story was just really hard to get into - especially the first half. Trust me, I love Will Dean. I RAVED about The Last Thing To Burn. I also enjoyed First Born and The Last Passenger. But this book was very detailed in its technicality. It went on and on giving us all the info on being a deep sea diver and their own little language, which I thought was great maybe for people who are familiar with that world. To the normal layperson, it was too much background info for a book. I was beginning to wonder if there would be a test at the end of each chapter, checking if we retained the knowledge that was dispersed in great quantities throughout.
The end also could’ve been more clear. I was left wondering if I knew what I thought I knew about who the antagonist actually was.
I enjoyed getting to know the characters in this book but it was not comparable in any way to the Will Dean I have become familiar with.

I became a Will Dean fan immediately after reading The Last One.

When I saw that he had a new book coming out, I put in my request immediately. And I’m really glad I did. He has an amazing imagination. He comes up with amazing ideas and implements them beautifully in his books. Quite frankly, I’d be afraid to get on his bad side, lol! The way people perish in his books, well, let’s just say, I never thought of those ways, lol!

Ellen is confined to a diving chamber with five other divers. One by one there murdered and if she knows she’s not the murderer, then who is? The author has done an amazing amount of research so I was quite comfortable that all the detail about diving, atmospheric pressure, decompression, etc., etc., was accurate. It was also very disconcerting.

Thanks to Atria Books for the galley. All opinions are my own. #HighlyRecommend.

This book was interesting. However, I found it not exactly what I was hoping for and it was a small let down. I enjoyed reading it but it was not everything I thought it would be.

Will Dean continues to deliver stories that are wildly different and all seem to hit their target. While other thrillers tout “pressure,” “claustrophobia,” and “atmosphere,“ this book actually delivers those constantly, puns intended.
I gave it the following SCORE:
Setting: Ocean off the coast of Aberdeen, Scotland, present day
Characters: Brooke, an experienced saturation diver, and her 5 male diving mates in the submerged hyperbaric chamber, the medical and technical staff on the support ship, and the Aberdeen law officers
Overview: Brooke and her intriguing dive mates are submerged for 28 days deep under the North Sea maintaining oil pipelines when strange, totally unpredictable occurrences happen to the veteran crew. The technical detail and continual sense of impending doom make this an extraordinary story.
Recommendation: I rate this book 5 stars
Extras: The tension created in this story is constant – the mystery, the relationships, not only of the crew but of the supporting technical staff on the ship and onshore, make this the most page-turning thriller of the year. Read it!
Thanx to NetGalley and Atria/Emily Bestler Books for the opportunity to provide this candid review

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC. I have read and really enjoyed a couple of other Will Dean books so I was very elated to read his newest work but unfortunately this one ended up disappointing. The premise of this book sounded so unique. Six saturation divers are locked into a hyperbaric chamber so that they are able to go to very low depths in the ocean to work. Throughout the book divers are picked off one by one and they lose trust in the ship crew and each other.
I can tell the author did a lot of research on the subject and there were terms that I was unfamiliar with. The book does start with a glossary but it’s a long glossary and it would be difficult to remember all the meanings. I had a hard time picturing the setting since I’m not familiar with this line of work.
The scenes where they discover another crew member deceased were the only exciting parts of the story. The rest seemed to be a lot of filler since there wasn’t hardly anything to do in the chamber. Their tasks often repeated. The divers told many personal stories that I felt were irrelevant to the overall book. It was also hard to keep each diver straight since they each had names and also nicknames throughout the book.
The ending was lackluster in my opinion. I’m disappointed that this one was a miss but I’ve enjoyed a couple of his other books and I still plan on reading future books from this author.

This was a tough read for a few reasons. There was a lot to keep up with in terms of character development and back stories. There was also a lot to visualize as a person with no idea or background on knowledge in Sat diving. I will say though that Will Dean thoroughly researched this topic and it shows in his skillful writing. I wouldn't say this is a thriller but it will definitely make you appreciate wide open spaces and not living in close quarters to dead people.