A few months ago, I read Riley Sager's debut novel, Final Girls. I liked that book a lot, despite a few things. I thought it dragged a little too much throughout a heavy portion of the book that by the time you reached the climax it was already towards the end. However, I did like the characters and how he handled that big reveal. I only wished that he had kept that momentum throughout the book before it ended. I mention all of this because his newest book, The Last Time I Lied, is surprisingly and positively the most exciting thriller I have read in a long time and much different - yet still the same in a way - than his first novel. The mystery and suspense in Final Girls is carried over in The Last Time I Lied, but this time each chapter, each page, and each sentence is heightened that you cannot help but devour every page until you find out what happens next.
The story follows Emma Davis, told in intervals between the past and present. Fifteen years ago, when she was thirteen years old she spent the summer at the exclusive all-girls Camp Nightingale, run by its wealthy owner, Francesca "Franny" Harris-White. As the last one to arrive at the camp, she was left to share a cabin with three older roommates: Allison, Natalie, and their leader, Vivian. That summer, the girls's most popular game they played was Two Truths and a Lie, often instigated by Vivian, whom Emma looked up to and admired. Then one evening, all three girls vanished except for Emma, who was the last person to have seen them. Now, a twenty-eight year old rising artist, Emma uses her past in her artworks often painting the three girls that still haunt her memories. When Franny contacts and invites to her to work as an art instructor at the newly reopened Camp Nightingale, Emma decides to return. Not only to close that chapter in her past, but to finally find out the truth of what really happened that night those girls disappeared.
This book instantly grabbed me from beginning to end. I could not put it down. Before I knew it, I was already half way through within just the first day of reading it. Sometimes, I have my qualms with stories told in the first person because it can be a hit or miss. Here I thought it worked as we followed Emma in the present day and when she was thirteen at Camp Nightingale. We get a chance to go into her head and meet these characters and follow her on this mystery deducing multiple suspects she encounters and studying any evidence she attains. In my mind, I pictured Emma as Felicity Jones. There's an innocence about her that's still there when she was a shy young thirteen year old. Yet there is also a strong woman hidden in layers emerging as she is faced with conflict.
My favorite parts in the book were Emma's relationship with the new young teenagers she has to room with when she returns to the camp: Sasha, Krystal, and Miranda. The girls are obviously a parallel version of Allison, Natalie, and Vivian. What liked though this time around is that Emma is the older camper looking after the three girls compared to how their original counterparts "looked after" her. Emma can relate to them and genuinely cares about them like an older sister.
Speaking of which, the idea of older and younger siblings is a recurring theme in the book. They appear through various characters, whether related or not, to show how tight that bond is between two people. There is Emma's relationship with the new campers, and her relationship with Vivian who was three years older than her. Vivian is a manipulative bitch (no, honestly when you read it there is no denying it). She takes in Emma as her little protégé knowing that she can make her love her or hate her because of how much Emma admires her. It is her way of control and enforcing power. I think this may be due to her personal life back home as the neglected daughter of a senator and as an abandoned younger sister who's older sister recently died.
The other siblings mentioned in the book are Theodore and Chet, Franny's two adopted sons, and even the sibling-like relationship between Franny and her devoted assistant, Lottie. There's a lot I could expand on these two relationships, but I would end up spoiling the book too much. So for now, just keep an eye on them when you read it.
Along with the mystery surrounding the disappearance of the three girls, there is another mystery that is explored involving the camp's history before it was Camp Nightingale. As the story delves into this, I was waiting for some kind of huge reveal or connection to the disappearance. It turns out there is, but it comes up short which I think was one of the weakest parts of the book because of how much it was built. Then again, it was probably a form of misdirection because like Emma, we were looking in the wrong place. It's also like the characters's recurring game, Two Truths and a Lie. It was never about the lie, but what the truth was. This truth was saved for the book's ending - and it is one heck of a twist in the realms of Gone Girl.
All of the main characters were great, but there were some minor characters that could have been given more depth. I liked Emma's relationship with Theodore, but I felt myself wanting more in their present day selves compared to how they were fifteen years ago. I was kind of expecting something slightly similar to Final Girl's Quincy Carpenter and Coop. Not exactly how that turned out, but how that relationship was, based on their history.
When I was reading The Last Time I Lied, there was a part of me that wanted to go to camp as oddly as that sounds. It seems like a good setting to read a book like this. If you are looking for a campfire story filled with mystery and suspense suitable for the younger and older members of the Midnight Society, I highly recommend this book. It is the perfect thriller to read before the summer ends - and that is the truth.
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