Thankyou to NetGalley, Flame Tree Press and the author, Robin Triggs, for the opportunity to read a digital copy of Night Shift in exchange for an honest and unbiased opinion.
Unfortunately, this turned out to not be a book for me. I thought the overall storyline was full and I really struggled to connect with the characters.

This could have been better. It could have been different. great leaps of faith required for an interminable plot with a poor inconclusive ending. Quite dull really. Did not really enjoy it.

This Antarctica thriller slight sci-fi novel takes an age old plot device and gives it an exotic backdrop and delivers. It is a page turner that truly delivers and kept me engaged throughout.

The characters are well developed and when they start disappearing one by one, you particularly start to care and they are not there as just fodder for the plot to spit out. This is a credit to Triggs to be able to provide a classic plot of people in a remote area and being picked off one by one. He pulled the rabbit out of the hat by ensuring that all these characters are memorable as a lesser writer tends to give you characters that are just body count.

The plotting of the novel is well handled and moves at a jaunty pace. Some of the science was a bit loss on this reader but this is not the fault of the author but more to the fault of this reader as I am not very science minded. Triggs keeps things tightly wound and though I was frantic towards the end, I was very much involved to the final page.

Overall, this is a tightly written strong book that lends itself to the thriller genre using good old fashion storytelling and strong characters to reach its triumphant conclusion.

The past three months have been super busy for me—and that has resulted in my reading a number of books without having an opportunity to write reviews for them. Things have finally slowed down a bit, and I am taking the opportunity to review some of the books that I read over that period. When I saw this title in my list of books that I still needed to review, I didn’t remember the name—but the minute I glanced at the synopsis, I was flooded with visual/sensory memories of my feelings while reading this book.

The concept feels a bit like a cliche—a group of miners are living on a remote outpost in the Antarctic. The main character is sent to join this outpost as their new Chief of Security. Once he arrives mysterious events, including a murder occur, and he has to try and figure out what has happened. If you are imagining the movie The Thing, you have the right idea.

The rest of the novel is a race for our protagonist to figure out who is committing the crimes within a claustrophobic environment, surrounded by people who don’t trust him. I enjoyed this read; it was fast-paced and really atmospheric. Some reviewers have mentioned that they guessed the ending of the mystery early on, but I am not prone to that, and was really surprised by the ending. I am, however, getting more and more tired of the unreliable narrator trope, and was disappointed to see its use here.

However, if you like to read claustrophobic thriller/mysteries, give this book a try.

I received an advanced reading copy from NetGalley and the publishers. Thanks!

Night Shift is a great who-done-it story set in Antarctica in the vein of And Then There Were None. I really enjoyed the first person narrative. I thought it enhanced the story and brought another level of suspense. The story was a bit slow in places, but I sped through this one. The ending was good. Night Shift is a satisfying read indeed.

So this book starts up right as Anders, the MC, arrives at the mining base of Australis. The previous security guard left under questionable circumstances and the crew are not very welcoming of a new member. A few days after Anders arrives, a celebration is held honoring the last sunset for six months. Anders is still learning about the individuals stationed at Australis when he is thrown smack dab in a murder investigation. Slowly but surely someone is picking off the crew and since he is the new kid on the ice, Anders may be the best suspect. Knowing this, he sets out to catch the true culprit and clear his name in the process.

"Night Shift" is full of action and atmosphere. I love book set in snowy, wintry settings and you don't get much more snowy and wintry than the Antartic. I loved getting to know the crew alongside of Anders and I have to admit, I was slightly pleased to learn the identity of the first victim. Because the crew is so isolated, they soon not only start fighting each other but they also have to rage a war against the elements.

I am hesitant to say that Anders is not the most reliable narrator (and nope, there is no Gone Girl of Woman in the Window comparisons here). Nonetheless, I found him likable and was rooting for him. I also really liked Max, the janitor. She's pretty kick ass and I adore the fact that the person most familiar with the machinery and technology of Australis just so happens to be a woman. While there are hints of some romance, or to be honest, sexual encounters, anyone turned off by those elements in an action, survivalist setting need not worry. That element is not overwhelming and not shoved down your throat.
"Night Shift" is best described as a book about survival and I enjoyed every minute of it.

I received a complimentary copy of this book through Netgalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.
Anders Nordvelt is promoted to security chief of the night shift on the mining base of Australis. In Antarctica, night lasts for six months, but the world is depending on the oil and coal produced by their small 12-person crew. What seems an easy job becomes increasingly difficult as sabotage and murder threaten the plant and the lives of the remaining crew. Who is guilty, and will any of them survive the long night until rescue arrives?
This book was pretty good. I like how all the different personalities of the crew are described and how they all start to clash after so long cooped up together. I think there should have been more of a description of the world outside the base and of "the company". Hints were made of Anders past that I feel weren't fully explained. But overall it was a good, fast-paced psychological thriller with a bit of sci-fi thrown in.

There are other Antarctic mysteries out there, but this is a very good one!

The author puts directly into that cold wasteland and gives us a very intriguing mystery with an absolutely surprising solution. I truly didn’t expect the *who* in our ice-cold whodunnit – it was a nice surprise.

The book is a fast read and features a small group of fascinating characters.

Happy I read this one!

*ARC Provided via Net Galley

The book appears to be a beginning of the series for me, the first one is more murder mystery than science fiction. The book gives us a glances of possible dystopian future, as we see a mining crew in Antarctica struggling to produce the necessary minerals for the main land. There are some mentions of a hard times on the main land, but nothing is clear yet.
The language is good, the plot is flowing, however, I would like to see more of the future in the book, as it is not really clear why the crew is in this remote location and what send them there.
As the first book it is good, but for one and only I think there are some unfinished lines.
I would like to thank the publisher and Nat galley for the advance reading copy of the book.

This book should have terrified me, but it didn't. Antarctica in the winter time? Heck no! My problem is that I figured out whodunit almost from the beginning. Normally this wouldn't be a deal breaker for me, if there had been more world and character building. The little I did get to know about these people, the less I liked. The world outside of Antarctica is something I was real curious about, yet not much was revealed, and what was revealed just left me with more questions. I did like the MC Anders? Sorry, but the people in this book left little impression on me. I'll admit there were a few tense moments, but all in all I ended up disappointed. My thanks to Flame Tree Press and Netgalley.

Review of NIGHT SHIFT by Robin Triggs

I love Antarctica. I always have loved everything about the concept of Antarctica (up until the last few years of ice melt and global warming). I am fascinated by the “winter over” syndrome which seems to occur only in Antarctica: that specialized, location-specific version of Seasonal Affective Disorder, caused by isolation, deep winter, and six months of night (hence the term, night shift). So I was delighted to find NIGHT SHIFT, an engrossing, captivating, intriguing novel of a winter over in Antarctica, set in the slightly near future, after Resource Wars have resulted in the virtually complete takeover by The Company, a multinational megalith which provides resources and employment to much of the globe, and is opposed by a quite weakened United Nations.

The novel takes place in Australis, a Company-owned mining and oil-drilling site in Antarctica, not far from the South Pole. Anders Norveldt, a man with a bizarre childhood history, raised in the Company foster system, is unexpectedly a last-moment inclusion for Australis' Night Shift, as replacement for the departed Chief of Security, who apparently had psychological and health issues. Nobody likes Norveldt, from the commander on through the crew, for no particular reason it seems, but he soon becomes the target of rampant suspicion. As one tragic event follows another, morale doesn't just wane—it collapses, and eventually the remaining crew are suffering near-starvation, cold, and lack of security and privacy, wondering if any will survive till the sunrise (after Antarctica's six months of night).

"We had good cause for fear. This assignment was rapidly becoming a nightmare. Just a few days into the night shift and we already had a death on our hands."

Night Shift is more of a whodunit thriller story with some underdeveloped science fiction worldbuilding elements. The story is a spin on the And Then There Were None motif of a group of strangers are isolated from the outside and are picked off one by one. 13 people are working in Antarctica for what is known as the night shift: a six month period where the sun doesn't rise and inclement weather isolates them completely from outside help.

This is a plot driven narrative told in the first person perspective of Anders and written well to keep the suspense throughout for the reader, and Triggs does a good job of expressing the characters' paranoia through the text. I liked that the beginning started at the end with the tease of the terror about to unfold with the confidential memo.

Where this story fell flat for me was the worldbuilding. There are actually a lot of nuggets of interest that are woven into the exposition well, but we all know that I love me some worldbuilding. I was left wanting to know more about the Company, the Resource Wars, and what happened in the world to bring humanity to this point. The book is set in some undertermined future that is possibly post-apocalyptic as they purpose of the project is to mine fuel and find food and clothing solutions for the people.

I guessed the reveal, but for me the impact that Triggs was going for was undermined by the underdeveloped worldbuilding and the ending also left me unsatisfied as there is no real resolution. And I suppose that is the point: it is about the ordeal that those at Australis went through. But there are allusions to a greater conspiracy that I would have been interested in exploring.

Overall as a thriller is concerned, it is an enjoyable read but I was left wanting more because the world sounds so interesting. I wouldn't be surprised if Triggs expands this into a series, and I would happily read to find out more about this world.

Many thanks to Flame Tree Press for sending me an eARC for review. Quotations are taken from an uncorrected proof and may change upon publication.

Robin Triggs delivers an initially-solid-but-ultimately-rage-inducing Antarctic mystery-thriller peppered with a few doses of low-key science fiction concepts, in his debut, Night Shift.

As the Australis base prepares for six months of darkness, a freshly-appointed security officer, Anders Nordvelt, arrives just in time for the crew to find themselves under attack. Obviously, it doesn't take long for Nordvelt to become the prime suspect in the baffling string of disasters befalling the Australis's researchers and miners, and Triggs keeps both Anders and readers guessing about the real culprit and his or her motivations in this little whodunnit.

The isolated Australis is positively rife with suspects, from the overbearing and sexually promiscuous base commander, right down to the janitor, Max, who keeps herself secluded from the rest of the crew and surrounded by jury-rigged robots and welded metal sculptures. Seemingly everyone has a motive, and as Triggs reveals new facets of his characters he gives readers plenty of meat to chew on as the guessing game wears on.

While the mystery aspect of Night Shift is pacey and intriguing, the science fiction aspects feel a bit tacked on, and even superfluous at times. Triggs gives us small doses of near-future tech and hints of a dystopic Company-ruled world at large, but these minor conceits are never explored deeply enough to feel wholly necessary. Even the book's climax, which ultimately hinges on the half-baked incorporation of these sci-fi elements, lacks the necessary oomph and depth of information to really deliver a powerhouse of a finale as the culprit's motivations come unraveled.

After seeing how the all pieces fell together, I was still left with a frustrating question of why? Why was any of what happened necessary? Unfortunately, Night Shift isn't able to provide a satisfying answer to resolve its own premise, and Triggs simply doesn't do enough world-building or provide us with enough information to make the culprit's motivation for the attacks feel smooth and logical. Worse still, in a brief supplemental interview with the author at book's end, Triggs compounds the lack of information in Night Shift with a promise to explore all this stuff in better detail over the course of a trilogy. As far as I'm concerned, it's a cardinal sin, as well as a rage-inducing annoyance, to knowingly fail to properly execute a narrative in book one, hinging the importance of your book's finale on concepts reserved for book two, and promise to make it up to readers at a later date. Night Shift's finish is the type of cash-grab finale that makes me hate the whole damn thing, which is a shame because I did enjoy most of it, right until it royally pissed me off for wasting so much of my precious time.

The bulk of Night Shift is a breezy and engaging enough read, right until the book's last few chapters where it quickly falls apart and devolves into a supremely frustrating experience as Triggs delivers a softball non-ending that serves only to provide fuel for additional mysteries regarding a concept that felt largely extraneous to begin with. It's a book that I mostly liked, right up until the bait-and-switch revelation that Night Shift is intended to be the first in a trilogy. Triggs gives us an interesting bit of mystery in the Antarctic, a location I absolutely love to see explored in fiction, but fails to stick the landing, delivering a finale that's cheap and flimsy, and, worse, predicated upon its expectation that readers cough up for more time and money for a sequel if they want the real story.

[Note: I received an advanced reading copy of Night Shift from its publisher, Flame Tree Press.]

Anders Nordvelt has been hired to work the night shift. But in Antarctica in a mining camp, the night shift is six months long. Anders will effectively be stranded at the end of the world with 12 other people. While Anders feels he isn't really qualified to be the security chief at an Antarctic station, the mining operation is well supplied and safe....so what could possibly go wrong? Turns out.....a lot.

I love reading action stories or thrillers about Antarctica. It's the ultimate spot, isn't it? Especially with darkness falling for six months. The port closed. No help for months. If something goes wrong....if things go bad....all the mining crew has to rely on is themselves. But what if one of them is a saboteur and murderer? Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. Only 13 people within 1000 miles. 12...11...10....

Definitely not a place for the cowardly.

The pace and suspense of this story definitely kept my attention. There were enough twists to surprise me several times. Really I should have seen the ending coming....but I didn't. Perfect ending. Nicely done!

I enjoyed this story. I will definitely be looking for more by this author. And so far I'm quite impressed with the horror and fantasy books published by Flame Tree Press. I've enjoyed every one I've read so far.

**I voluntarily read an advanced readers copy of this book from Flame Tree Press via NetGalley. All opinions expressed are entirely my own.**

An interesting psychological thriller. Anders, a company man is sent to Antarctica as a security specialist. He's part of a twelve person team that must spend six months in the winter. One by one the staff starts dying. Plot keeps you guessing until the end.

You can survive six months no problem. Anders has just arrived at Antarctic to take up his new position as head of security for the next six months. He is thinking that it is going to be a easy task with no problems but from the very beginning no one really likes him as they don't trust him. Can he change their minds or will what is about to happen next change everything. He finds out the commander of the base De Villiers allows the others to drink & smoke which is against company policy and that is just the beginning. Anders knows that he has to report this to the company but that isn't going to happen as the communication tower is taken out and he knows that someone here did that. But who? They all think that it is Anders as he is the company man and they don't know him at all. When the commander is found dead and Anders hurts the doctor by accident everyone knows that it is him but there is no proof. So they lock him in his room but things keep on happening so it can't be him right? How is the rest of the team gong to make it through the night shift when someone is out there making sure that no one survives? Anders knows that he would never do anything to hurt the company as they gave him a home after his parents were killed but he realises that maybe they are using him somehow. But how can he prove that and can he get the others to believe him? A good read. I don't want to go work in Antarctic no matter how much they pay. I was lucky enough to receive a copy via Netgalley & the publishing house in exchange for my honest review.

While this book takes place in the future it is more of a who-dun-it than science fiction. Triggs adds many nuances to the story that imply a future series in a post-war apoclyptic world. The pace of the story is rather slow but does not bog down. The only issue would be a lack of emergency communication or procedures when communication is lost. Does not seem realistic.

Robin Triggs had a interesting concept for this book with Antarctica, mining company,in the future, and murder. I was excited to read this book,but was disappointed and became bored. I would still give this author another try because of interesting plots.

Night Shift by Robin Triggs, an interesting premise that for me failed to deliver. I felt the opening was too slow and took too long to actually get anywhere that was interesting.

"...this age of decay..."

Anders Nordvelt is a last minute replacement as Head of Security for the dark winter months at the Australis station in Antarctica.

The story takes place in the future at least twenty years out. The world is pretty much run by The Company. Australis is producing coal, iron and oil from an Antarctic affected by global warming.

Anders arrives at the station, contact is decreased because of winter, and almost immediately a series of horrible crimes start to happen and the other twelve people at the station are all eying each other, but especially Anders, with suspicion.

I love books about Antarctica even ones in the future. This story presents a grim look at aspects of a future world along with the crew at Australis.

This was a book that I enjoyed very much.

I received this book from Flame Tree Press through Net Galley in the hopes that I would read it and leave an unbiased review.