A really great read, keeps you intrigued from the beginning until the explosive ending, a great set of characters that you love and hate in equal measure. Second book by this author I've r ad, will be reading more

After being extremely irritated with the opening chapter written in the vocative, I actually started to enjoy this book. I liked the symmetry of the time lines and the way the story unfolded.

Riley Sager has managed to right a few wrongs for me with his second book. The Last Time I Lied follows Emma, an artist, struggling with the memory of three fellow camp mates of Camp Nightingale mysteriously disappearing 15 years ago. She is given the opportunity to return to the camp and hopes that this time round she can find some answers. I loved the camp setting of this book, it really fed into my love of teen slasher movies like Friday the 13th, although there was far less bloodshed in this story. There was plenty of tension with twists coming from lots of angles and as with Sager's first novel, Final Girl's, the time hopping chapters between then and now really set the scene for what was to come. And the best thing about it, I didn't see the final twist coming. What more can you ask for in a thriller.

I loved Final Girls by Riley Sager so was really looking forward to reading Last Time I Lied. The good news is it doesn’t disappoint.

Emma is a 28 year old artist living in New York. She is haunted by her past and events that happened when she was 13. Sent to a summer camp - Camp Knightingale for rich kids, she arrives late and so is put in a cabin with 3 other girls older than her. She soon bonds with them, especially a girl called Vivian who Emma sees as a free spirit, cool, independent and looks to her as a big sister figure.

One night the 3 girls head out in the middle of the night and leave Emma behind as they say she is too young to go and they don’t return. The police are called in, the camp is closed and a major search ensues but the girls never turn up and the camp is closed for good.

Back to present day and at one of Emma’s exhibitions the millionaire owner of the camp - Franny Harris White turns up and tells Emma that she is going to re-open the camp and wants her to return for the summer as an arts teacher to help heal old wounds.
At first reluctant to return to the place that has given her nightmares since that fateful night, she finally decides to accept the offer in the hope she can find out what did happen to the girls and find some closure.

Emma ends up being put in a cabin with 3 young teenagers that she befriends but as she spends time in the camp she is convicted all is not what it seems and she is being watched. She doesn’t trust the Harris White family and questions their motives for bringing her back.

What an absolute cracking read. From first page until last I was enthralled by this roller coaster ride of a story. Sager is just a brilliant story teller. Quite dark themes in both his books but there is such a sense of fun and excitement in the writing. He takes you by the hand and leads you down many cul de sacs before eventually revealing his hand and it’s a thrill all they way.

This is such a well crafted story, so many red herrings, so much suspense and suspicion and guessing going on but so much fun with it.

5 stars all the way. Nearly 400 pages long it felt like half that. Bravo Riley Sagar. A stellar addition.

Many thanks to Netgalley, Penguin Random House UK, Ebury Publishing and Riley Sagar for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Emma Davies was 13 years old the first time she went to Camp Nightingale - the top place to spend the Summer holidays. Arriving late she ended up sharing a cabin with three older girls, Vivian, Hayley and Allison. Vivian became like a big sister and Emma would do anything to please her. They taught her the game "Two Truths and a Lie". After an argument, Vivian, Hayley and Allison snuck out of the cabin after dark never to return. Emma was devastated and accused the camp owners son Theo as he was the cause of their argument - the camp closed down. Fifteen years later, Emma was invited back to a newly re-opened Camp Nightingale to teach art and found herself lodging in the same cabin with three young girls. She accepted the invitation hoping it would rid her of the guilt she has felt since her last stay but she soon starts to notice she is being watched and there is somebody in the camp that knows the truth behind the girls disappearance years earlier. She starts to see "Vivian" and so decides to investigate to try to find what really happened that fateful night. Then the three girls under her care again disappear into the night and it seems like history is repeating itself.

A great read that tells how tragedy stays with a person and shapes their entire life but may not always be what it seems. The twist at the end was great and I certainly didn't see that coming.

I was a huge fan of Final Girls as it was one of the few psychological thrillers that actually managed to surprise me so I was excited to read Sager's latest book, The Last Time I Lied. I did not disappoint.

A book with an unreliable narrator, misdirection and a definite nod to those 80's and 90's horror movies set in summer camps that scare the bejeesus out of me, this is yet another addictive page-turner.

I admit I found this slower to get into than I did the Final Girls, and even put it down at one point, but once I picked it up again there was no doubting the authors' ability to grab you, hook you and lead you on a merry dance among the pages.

Another belter, Recommended.

As I’m sure other reviewers have noted, it’s difficult to say much about this book without giving things away. Emma is an artist who is haunted by the events of a summer she spent at Camp Nightingale 15 years before. That summer, her three cabin mates vanished, and Emma’s role in the aftermath of their disappearance has stayed with her ever since. Now an adult, she’s invited back to Camp Nightingale, this time as an art teacher, and finds herself treading the same paths and seeking answers to questions from over a decade ago.

The novel is pacey and engaging, and the jumps between the two timelines help to build tension. There are enough twists and tricks to keep the reader guessing and the overall tone is sinister, but tinged with the nostalgia of teenage friendships.

Twisty turny book that keeps you guessing right up to the last page. Highly recommend, and I think this could be even better than Sager's first book, Final Girls.

An atmospheric mystery rather than horror yarn. 4/5 stars.

Last year I read and enjoyed Riley Sager's Final Girls but struggled with the book's pacing. The first two thirds seemed to feature little more than the characters dithering about getting themselves into trouble unnecessarily before the blistering final third went a long way towards making up for all the preamble. Last Time I Lied doesn't suffer from the same issue. The action is evenly paced. The chapters tend to alternate between the present and the past incident when Emma's three cabin mates went missing. The present day narrative gets going quickly and the relevant events from the past are dripped in nicely to keep things moving forward and ramp up suspense.

As with Final Girls, this story feels very cinematic with fast-paced dialogue and simple yet vivid descriptions. I wouldn't be surprised if the rights are snapped up and a film version is made soon. It would be good to see the cast, in which the main and most interesting roles go to young women and girls, brought to the big screen.

There is an over-riding creepy atmosphere and sense of paranoia in the story. For me, someone who can't really "do" horror, this was good because the story was never truly scary, just tense. However, if you're a horror fan you'll probably be disappointed! There's never the same level of danger as there was in Final Girls, and I think it's fair to classify Last Time I Lied as a mystery with thriller elements rather than a horror story or dark thriller.

When the baddy was revealed I shrugged rather than gasped, mainly because there was a reduced suspect pool. However, there was a great "bonus" twist which I loved and meant the book picked up nicely at the very end. In fact, I think it's a shame more wasn't done with this final surprise (sorry to be so vague, but I don't want to spoil it!).

Overall: a well-paced, tense, creepy story that will have you looking over your shoulder rather than jumping out of your skin. And hang on for the final twist!

Riley Sager won many fans last year with The Final Girls. I also read the book and I liked it a lot. But personally, I liked "The Last Time I Lied" better.

Emma attended a summer camp as a young girl. There she made friends with the 3 other girls in her hut. Especially with Vivien. One night, Emma sees them sneaking out of the hut. When she wakes up the next morning, she is still alone. The three girls have disappeared and never came back. Emma blames herself and is severely traumatized. In fact, she was not entirely innocent that the girls should not return to the hut. As an adult she processes this traumatic experience by painting the girls disappearing into the wood with great success. The holiday camp then remained closed. Now the owner wants to reopen it. And she wants Emma to return as an art teacher. After initial hesitation, Emma sees it as a chance to find closure. But soon things will get out of hand again.

The book impresses above all by its eerie atmosphere. Emma feels that somebody is watching her. She starts to investigate. Vivien seems to have left her clues. There is something wrong with this camp, with the lake that once flooded the valley. Emma senses a dark secret that Vivien wanted to uncover and probably costs her life.

I liked this dark mood very much. The book is gripping and both narrative levels are interesting. We learn early that Emma is not entirely innocent. It was she who wrongly accused someone. Or was she maybe right? What kind of dark secret was Vivien uncovering? There are a lot of red herrings and twists. Emma is a difficult character. She is an unreliable narrator and not really likeable. Her paranoia and her erratic conclusions are always very impulsive.

Emma is the reason why I do not give 5 stars. Although she is a classic unreliable narrator, the further I read, the more unsympathetic she became to me. She is very impulsive and is chasing a new suspicion every day . She does not hesitate to make hasty accusations. She is obsessed with Vivien and what happened then. Personally, I find that she often overreacts and is a drama queen. I found her increasingly exhausting, and I'm not sure she truly deserves all the understanding she has received over and over again. But somehow it makes her a very interesting and human character.

"The Last Time I Song" is a complex, gritty and thrilling thriller which I enjoyed very much.

Fifteen years ago, Emma Davis spent her first summer at Camp Nightingale. Sharing a cabin with three older girls, Vivian, Natalie and Allison, she was the youngest of the group but the other girls quickly took Emma under their wing, giving her the time of her life. The fun ends one night, though, when Emma wakes in time to watch the others sneak out of their cabin, never to be seen again, and Camp Nightingale is closed.

Now a successful artist, Emma, who has been haunted by what happened at Camp Nightingale all those years ago, paints the girls into each of her pictures; dark leaves and twisted branches concealing their ghostly figures.

Emma's paintings come to the attention of Francesca Harris-White, the wealthy owner of Camp Nightingale and, having decided to reopen the camp once more, Francesca has a propsition for her: to return to Camp as a painting instructor to the new recruits.

Seeing the offer as an opportunity to try and learn the truth about what really happened to her friends, Emma agrees. But on arrival she's horrified to discover that not only has she been allocated a bed in a cabin with three teenagers - the same cabin she shared with Vivian, Natalie and Allison - there's a security camera pointed directly at the door. Surely Francesca doesn't think she had anything to do with what happened fifteen years ago?

When her new camp-mates are out of the way, Emma starts searching the cabin and finds a map that leads her to a box buried a short distance from the camp. Inside, is Vivian's journal. Following the cryptic clues laid out therein, Emma realises Vivian had stumbled upon the truth about Camp Nightingale's origins. Is that why she - and the other girls - had to disappear?

Digging deeper, Emma can't help but think she's getting closer to the truth. And then the girls she's sharing her cabin with, disappear. This can't be happening again!

The parallels are striking and, finding herself under suspicion, Emma sets out to clear her name. If she can find her new camp-mates, perhaps she'll finally discover what really happened to Vivian, Natalie and Allison as well?

But someone else at camp has their own agenda and as Emma sorts through the lies from the past, the threats in the present grow increasingly deadly.

Having recently read and enjoyed Riley Sager's debut, Final Girls, I couldn't wait to get my grubby little wings on his sequel, and immediately I was struck by how much his writing had improved. That's not to say Final Girls was badly written, but he's definitely matured as an author. Camp Nightingale, with its dark forest and creepy lake, is described so vividly that it really comes alive and helps set the mood for the novel.

Told between chapters that alternate between flashbacks to Emma's first visit to Camp Nightingale and present day, what appears on the surface to be a straightforward mystery surrounding the disappearance of Vivian, Natalie and Alison, turns out to be anything but.

And for me, the final chapter was simply genius. So often I'm left feeling deflated by a book's conclusion but Sager's red-herrings, misdirection and couldn't-see-it-coming reveals have ensured that hasn't been the case with either of the novels of his that I've had the pleasure of reading.

Of all the books in all the world that are due to be published in 2018, THIS book was my most eagerly anticipated read. I could not wait to get my paws on Last Time I Lied. Why, you ask? Well, dear reader, it’s because Riley Sager’s debut, Final Girls, blew my mind. It was my number one book of 2017, it’s claimed a top space on my favourite books of ‘ALL TIME’ list and it left me with the biggest book hangover I have ever experienced! I loved it. Actually, I more than loved it. I became quite obsessed with it. Have you read Final Girls? No? You REALLY should…

But this isn’t a review of Final Girls. This is its follow-up and I have a confession to make. I’ve had Last Time I Lied on my NetGalley TBR since the start of the year. I bet you’ve been there. You’re so looking forward to reading a book but you’re nervous too, really flipping nervous. Will it live up to its predecessor? Am I expecting too much? (Yes.) Have my expectations been blown wildly out of proportion? (Yes.) Will I cope if the book disappoints me? (Most probably not.) You know what I’m talking about, right?

I was nervous making a start, really flipping nervous. My nerves were somewhat calmed by discovering that our lead character is called Emma (brilliant name, more Emmas are needed in books! Might have said that before). The reader discovers that Emma attended Summer Camp at the tender age of thirteen. She made friends, learnt new skills, discovered boys and suffered one of the most devastating events of her young life. Her three cabin mates; Vivian, Natalie and Allison snuck out early one morning, never to return. Traumatised well into her adult life by the events and the guilt of 15 years ago, Emma turns to art and becomes a well-known painter. Each forest scene she creates contains the three missing girls, painted over in great swathes of green and brown oil paint. Surprisingly, her latest benefactor is Mrs Francesca Harris-White, multi-millionairess and head of Nightingale Camp where the devasting events of 15 years ago happened. Harris-White is reopening the camp and wants bygones to be bygones, so invites Emma to return to Camp Nightingale as an art instructor. Emma feels she wants to put the past behind her and returning to the scene of the crime will help lay the ghosts of 15 years ago to rest. But memories run long and someone knows that Emma lied all those years ago…

Before I go any further I want to get something out of my system. I enjoyed reading Last Time I Lied, it’s a great book and it will have an army of fans singing its praises, but I’m afraid it didn’t get anywhere near close to Final Girls in my opinion. I’m so upset, so sad that I didn’t love Last Time I Lied. This is proper #bookbloggerproblems territory here, people. I feel absolutely rotten that I didn’t love this book and I’m kicking myself for missing what others have seen and loved. So much so, I am – for the first time in a LONG time – considering re-reading in the next few weeks!

It’s weird, I didn’t really relate in any way to Quincy’s story in Final Girls (but loved everything about it) and I really struggled to connect with Emma’s story. I can’t quite understand what the massive difference is between these two books for me. What I do know is this book is not Final Girls. It was never going to be Final Girls. I just realised that too late and my experience of Last Time I Lied suffered because of it (hence the planned re-read!). It’s a good read, it just doesn’t compare to its mighty predecessor.

I found the ‘whodunit’ a little obvious. There were several times when the author made me doubt myself but I always came back to the same conclusion and in the end I was right. The story moved along at an enjoyable pace and I wanted to discover what was going to happen next, but I had moments where I couldn’t quite believe what I was reading or it all seemed a little too far-fetched. There was a wonderful twist towards the end of the book that I didn’t see coming and it really satisfied my need for something a bit darker to happen. However, the author skillfully uses flashbacks again in this book to tell his protagonist’s frightening tale and create a vivid picture for the reader of their palpable fear which I couldn’t fault.

Would I recommend this book? I would. But I’d make sure you read Final Girls first as that is by far the superior book (IMHO). It’s an interesting tale, Emma intrigued me but became a little too whiny for my tastes at times. My heart was 100% with the devilishly devious Vivian and I could read about her all day long! I’m so glad I read Last Time I Lied. It was enjoyable, and I will recommend it in the future. There was a wonderful ‘horror movie’ element to Final Girls which I really missed in Last Time I Lied. It lacked a certain darkness that Final Girls had and I missed it enough for it to be a ‘thing’ for me. I’m sorry.

At 28, Emma is invited back to the reopening of Camp Nightingale, where, as a teenager, three of her friends mysteriously disappeared, never to be seen again! Emma agrees to return to camp, in the hopes that the ghosts of the past will stop haunting her. After all, she did lie!

With beautifully descriptive writing, an unreliable protagonist and a wide variety of characters, the quest to discover the truth in this suspenseful tale had me intrigued all the way through to the very unexpected end, thoroughly enjoying the journey of discovery as to what was in fact truth, and what was a lie. With plenty of suspicious characters and red herrings, I was completely fooled by the final outcome. I just love when that happens!

Creepy and unsettling, tense and intriguing, The Last Time I Lied was a fresh, atmospheric and tantalising read.
I look forward to reading more by Riley Sager.

Many thanks to Netgalley, the author and Penguin House UK, Ebury Publishing for an ARC in exchange for my honest opinion of this book.

With Final Girls, Riley Sager showed that he is a thriller writer of great promise and that promise has been fulfilled with the excellent The Last Time I Lied. As a young girl Emma went to the prestigious Camp Nightingale where she found herself rooming with three older girls. Socially out of her depth Emma could only watch as the three friends argued, shared secrets and then suddenly one night disappeared into the woods never to return. Years later, Emma is a successful artist who channels her demons into her work. Then she gets a call to return to the newly re-opened Camp Nightingale as a counsellor with a chance to finally lay those demons to rest and solve the mystery of what happened all those years ago.

It's a really interesting premise. Emma returns as a counsellor and mentor to teenagers and instead of being the girl who tags along she's the adult who the girls look to for guidance. Emma is a complicated character, she lashed out in the aftermath of the girls going missing, an action that still has consequences in the present day. She's obsessed with solving the mystery of the missing girls above everything else and often ploughs ahead without thought which always makes for a good story! It's an exceptionally well plotted book, the more mysteries Emma uncovers the deeper the story becomes. There's the usual twists you expect from a thriller and I found it a thoroughly enjoyable read. There's several layers to this book and one character in particular will keep you guessing right up until the very end!

Perfect if you're after an absorbing and thrilling read. I really look forward to the next book by this author.

I received a ARC from Netgalley and the publisher in exchange for a fair review.

This was an intriguing book to read, more a psychological thriller but very gripping, very enjoyable more the story unfolded.

Emma has become a very well known painter but then she is asked to return to summer camp as in instructor where 3 friends disappeared in the middle of the night, never to be found.

She decides to return but to find her friends as she is adamant they are alive. She requests to go in the same cabin as 15 years ago, Dogwood. This time though, she is looking after 3 young girls. There are others there, that were there that fateful summer, she tries to ask questions but its not easy. Things begin to come back to her, she feels like Vivian is there, guiding her and leading her to a discovery. Emma talks to the girls about little bits and they help, then they disappear too.......is it a coincidence or is Emma behind it?

Brilliant.

SO GOOD. I truly believe he’s one of the greatest contemporary crime/thriller writers. (So much so that I am always convinced the writer is a woman because the female characters are so good.)

Our protagonist in this novel is Emma, an artist, who can’t get away from the ghosts of the past. Years ago, three of her friends disappeared from the summer camp. Now she returns to the same camp, to try and figure out, where her childhood friends could’ve gone. But there are some things, which Emma lied about… And the wish to figure out what was the lie creates a tormenting suspense. I really liked the wide variety and very believable characters, which the author chose for this book. Even though I liked Emma, Vivian (one of the missing friends) was the one, who left me intrigued. So even though the story was told by Emma, this story was kind of about Vivian, a charismatic manipulator, who knew how to play with people and their feelings.

The narrative is constantly changing between the present and the past, and Sager is an expert in creating suspense. All the little clues and this time traveling really got me curious and glued to the book, and I was dying to find out what in a world happened there. The author brings back his “love” for mental institutions but with a different approach this time. I really loved all the twists, turns, and intriguing adventures. The story is told from a single perspective, and it was fully enough for me. The setting of this book is quite calming, but at the same time pretty sinister.

I think the author is very talented and his writing is exceptionally polished. The chapters are pretty short, and the suspense makes the “book melt in your hands”. The climax was very unexpected and I really loved the way this story ended. So, to conclude, I really enjoyed this fast-paced, amusing and very well written story, filled with secrets and lies. I do strongly recommend this book and I hope you will enjoy it as much as I did. 🙂

Gosh I loved it ! a fresh twist on the Picnic at Hanging Rock idea of young girls just vanishing into nothing. Emma is now a highly prized artist making strong evocative paintings which hide the three girls, only Emma really knows that the girls are in the paintings and this makes it really quite creepy - as does the size of Emma's works they are vast and I imagine quite overwhelming.

This book is set in Camp Nightingale which sounds idyllic and yet, the lack of electricity and modern amenities adds to the tension of the piece. Characters from Emma's past visit to the camp abound and the whole situation is frankly claustrophobic.

I won't ruin the book for others - its quite a rollercoaster, the characters are well conceived and well executed. The setting of Lake Midnight is quite beguiling and reminds me of the movie, Lake Placid (without the monster shark that is!)

Well worth a read for those who enjoy the genre

Things I learned from this book:
1. I’m glad I am not living in the 1900th because I certainly would be a candidate for the Asylum - you know, for reading.....a lot.
2. I have to thank my parents for never sending me to summer camp, it never is a great experience...ever.
3. We all know this one person (almost always it’s a girl), we think is our best friend, when really you got played....mine was called Suzy

Emma’s story is told in alternating chapters between present day and 15 years ago, when the three girls from her cabin at summer camp go missing. That made, that I got a really good picture of Emma and her struggles. It was hard to see how she had all this problems even years after the event. And how much blame she put on herself. And just like Emma I had my suspicions about what had happened to the girls and who was responsible. In the end I didn’t get it right. I did not see this turn around coming..... And I loved it! It was perfect! Now I’m going to bug everyone with this book, because it was good and intense and an absolute must read.
I chose to read this book and all opinions in this review are my own and completely unbiased. Thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Random House UK!

This one time … at summer camp … three girls went missing. They were never found and nobody knows what happened to them. Now, fifteen years later, Emma returns to Camp Nightingale and hopes to lay old ghosts to rest. Because the events of that summer still haunt her. After all, she lied.

Right off the bat, you’re left to wonder if Emma is a reliable narrator. What did she lie about fifteen years ago? How many times did she lie? And why? Does she know what happened to the three missing girls? The storyline switches between events in the past to the now. Both threads kept me guessing until the very end. I found both threads to be incredibly gripping and was lucky enough to finish the book in one sitting, desperate to know the outcome before bed.

Creating an unsettling and threatening feeling is something Riley Sager does extremely well. Even when it seems there’s little going on, I half expected someone or something to jump out from behind a tree or whatever else creepy hiding place. The setting of the camp and the nearby lagoon lends itself to this perfectly. There’s a constant dark, creepy and chilling atmosphere that had me utterly captivated.

Just like Emma, I tried to follow the clues, got the wrong end of the stick multiple times and just couldn’t figure things out at all. It seemed like just about everyone had a secret they were trying to hide and few characters came across as likeable. And then Riley Sager hit me with the most brilliant epilogue ever! Did NOT see that coming! Fabulous!

I was slightly in the minority where Riley Sagar’s previous book, The Final Girls, was concerned. While I enjoyed it, I wasn’t entirely sure it was as special as the buzz surrounding it made it out to be. Personally, I feel Last Time I Lied was much better. Tense and intriguing, full of suspense and with a deliciously awesome mystery to solve, this is one of those books that is really hard to put down. I’ll definitely be keeping an eye out for Riley Sager’s next book!