A brilliant thriller/mystery book.
I dare you was a suspenseful, eery book that had me guessing until the very end. The premise is that a young girl goes missing and the blame falls upon a likely suspect... but did they really do it? 30 years later and the imprisoned man is released, things start to go amiss but who is to blame?
If you are a fan of creepy, suspenseful whodoneit stories this is definitely one for you!

An interesting, gripping book – why have I never read anything by this author before? I will be rectifying that.
An unpredictable story full of twists and turns, full of excitement that kept me hooked and not wanting to put this book down. Taking some time to get going, I enjoyed this more than I usually would.
Being told between two time periods, with storylines being interwoven and various characters POV keeps it interesting I enjoyed this and never found it confusing at all which has been a problem in other books of this genre.
A well written and thrilling book, Id highly recommend.

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for my digital copy in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

This was my first Sam Carrington book and honestly, I requested it because of the title and the cover. They are a very catching combination, in my opinion. Lately, I have been into books that are more suspenseful than romantic and this one did not disappoint. It starts out with two girls who have grown up together since their mothers are best friends...their relationship isn't exactly equal, however. Many of us grew up with a friend who was a little more bully than friend. Someone you always felt like you had to impress or you might lose them. This was the case for Joni and Belle. So when Joni repeatedly gets Belle to do things she doesn't want to do, things have to go wrong at some point. Kids will be kids and the entire neighborhood of kids has made up a game of driving an old man(who isn't even really old) crazy until one night, the worst thing possible happens. He has snapped, one friend has gotten away and one friend is never seen again. The entire book goes back and forth from past to present, which I don't normally like, and eventually things become clear. Jump to the future and a new kind of game and you realize that things were never as they appeared. There were quite a few twists and turns all the way to the end. This was a very quick read that kept me interested the entire time. It definitely won't be my last Sam Carrington book.

This was my first Sam Carrington novel and it really did not disappoint! It grabbed me from the get go and was full of twists and turns which is just the kind of book I like.

Billy Cawley is the local outcast, accused and imprisoned of killing Jodie Hayes when she goes missing in 1989. Fast forward to present day and he is released and the local villagers are scared he will come back for revenge. The story then flits back and forward from 1989 to the present day, written from the perspectives of Anna and Lizzie. Both ladies have links to the village and this reveals itself as the book goes on.

It really had me gripped and whilst I had my thoughts that Billy didn’t do it, I was none the wiser to who had done it! This book is full of suspense and thrills, keeping you wanting to read more. I loved the twists at the end and the book was really satisfying in how it was finished. So often books can be thrilling and fast paced but the ending dull - this was definitely not the case with I Dare You!

The way Sam Carrington writes is engaging and suspenseful - she made the two time lines run seamlessly together and not at all confusing. Now to investigate what other books she has released and hope they are as thrilling and as answer demanding as this one!

This is a slow burn of a novel about a date between two schoolgirls that goes wrong. I have mixed feelings. The characters did not engage me or feel real and the ending was unsatisfactory. I was drawn into the atmosphere of a small village and the sense of alienation of a newcomer of they do not fit in. Two stars.

Thank you to Netgalley, the publisher and the author for the opportunity to read a complimentary copy of this book in return for a review based upon my honest opinion.

I couldn’t really get into this book. It had a decent storyline, but I had guessed pretty quickly what had happened and I just could not connect with any of the characters. Small town mentality, a missing presumed dead little girl, the convicted man being released,, 30 years since the crime, it all had the makings of. a great book, but it fell flat for me. I see many other loved this book, I don’t know what it was about the book for me that I did not like,. I have enjoyed this authors other books and will read more.

I enjoyed this book but wasn’t surprised by the ending! The story was good and I found the characters engaging.

Sam just gets better and better and this is brilliant, great characters, I loved Creepy Cawley. Never really sure what way this was going to go and it surprised me! I could not put it down as it keeps you hooked all the way through. Excellent writing and a best seller in the bag.

This was a really solid psychological thriller

I really enjoyed this book because it incorporated some of my favourite thriller tropes. 1. Being set in a small town and 2. Something bad happening, in this case a girl going missing and someone 30 years later trying to find the truth

I thought it was really well written, and I liked the fact it was told from mutiple perspectives and timelines but was never confusing

However, I did feel that this book was slightly too long and the middle did drag a bit

But the ending, the pace really did pick up and I did not see the sending coming. There was plenty of twists and turns throughout with some pretty big ones towards the end, which I loved

This also had some really creepy elements which I loved too!

I really enjoyed this thriller overall and I definitely think it's one a lot of people will enjoy

TW: child abuse and pedophilia

I’ve long been a fan of Sam Carrington’s books and I think there’s only one I haven’t read even though I’ve got it. I Dare You is a standalone novel and once more is set in the South West of the UK albeit a fictional village. And just as well! The residents of Mapledon are a strange bunch and definitely a bit toxic. You can’t blame Anna for getting out of there as fast as she could. It’s a place full of secrets and shame. But a hysterical phone call from her mother draws her back to her childhood home.
Lizzie, a journalist, has a personal reason for heading to Mapledon. She’s not searching for a scoop but the truth. Anna and Lizzie team up to find out what really happened thirty years before.
I loved this book. It’s told in two timelines with multiple voices. The clever thing with the past timeline set in 1989, is that it starts with the event and works backwards, looking at the lead-up to it. I’ve not seen this done before and it’s very effective. I enjoyed seeing how the motives for the crime came about. In the present timeline, there are very creepy incidents of parts of dolls being hammered to Anna’s mother’s front door. When a copy of the book was sent to me for review, it even came with it’s own doll’s arm. Freaky or what! Of course it’s a clue but who is doing such a thing to a woman close to 70? As much as Anna wants to leave and go home to her own daughter, she has to stay and look after her mother.
Setting the story in a village means it has similar principles to a murder mystery in an old house – cut-off location (black spots for mobile phones), small cast of people and a classic denouement – or so we think. I’m not going to give away anymore than that!
I loved the characters of Anna and Lizzie. Neither of them could fully trust the other so although they work together, there’s this wonderful tension between them that Sam Carrington pushes to the max.
Short chapters and twists and turns aplenty kept me reading late at night. I couldn’t always work out what was going to happen which kept me on my toes and thinking about it when I wasn’t reading. As I wrote earlier, I’ve read almost all of Sam Carrington’s books. For me, this is her best book so far. Bravo Sam!

My first read from this author and not my last. I have now to check his other books without a doubt.

The twits are amazingly done and keep you in check, once you start reading the book, you won't be able to put it down. The fact that the chapters are pretty short helps you to believe you haven't read a lot when in fact you already half in the book.

A heart chilling book that had me turning page after page as I wanted to know what happened.

I was shocked as I didn’t expect the twist of this book! The build up was expertly written and I simply loved the style of writing. There was suspense and intrigue throughout the book. I also found it slightly heartbreaking that things like that could happen.

Makes me weary about small villages and what goes on!

Sam Carrington's style is not necessarily one that I would usually relish in other authors and while her previous one "The Missing Wife" was rather slow burning but it packed a punch by the end, I was still a little dubious going in with this one. I need not have feared...I DARE YOU was five star brilliant!!

I generally do not enjoy slow burn thrillers. I would rather they reel me in from the first page and get to the point to keep that ride going. However, despite being a slow build in her writing style, Carrington still manages to do all that - reel me in from the beginning, dropping little snippets through to keep me interested whilst building up to the inevitable climax. And what a climax it was!!!

1989: Two 10 year old girls, Jonie and Bella, are playing the childhood game "Knock Knock Ginger" (which here in Australia we call "Knock and Run") on the local weirdo of Mapledon village they cruelly call "Creepy Cawley". They aren't the only ones to play. In fact, the entire village children at one time or another are playing the same game, knocking on the same door, playing their childish pranks on the same man over and over again.

Until one day...the prank goes horribly wrong. The two girls go out to play and only one returns. She was last seen getting into Creepy Cawley's truck and never seen again. Her body was never found and the village was never the same again.

Billy Cawley, the subject of these games and pranks, was never going to fit in with the "Stepford wives" village of Mapledon and when his wife died, it only got worse. He became a recluse, seen as the local misfit. The local kids tormented him relentlessly. Even his young daughter Eliza was deemed weird with her perverse pleasure of dismembering her dolls.

The local village women banded together to rid Mapledon of the Cawleys. So sure were they that Billy was abusing his 8 year old daughter Eliza, that they called in social services and had her removed from his care. And then Jonie went missing. And all eyes turned to Creepy Cawley... He pleaded guilty to abducting and murdering Jonie Hayes and was given a 30 year prison sentence.

2019: In the thirty years since the tragedy that shook the village, Mapledon hasn't changed. There are secrets that have been buried for far too long, simmering beneath the surface, whispered behind closed doors...if at all. But now people are on edge. Because Billy Cawley is out on licence and the village of Mapledon awaits to see if he has the audacity to return to his home that has sat empty since his arrest 30 years ago.

The gossip that had tongues a-wagging 30 years ago is once again alive and well as villagers question what's to come. Will Billy Cawley return and exact revenge on those he deemed responsible for putting him away? Will he disclose the whereabouts of Jonie's body so her mother Tina can at last have some closure? The village is filled with anxiety, fear and even guilt.

It's been twenty years since Anna left the toxic atmosphere that was Mapledon. But now, at the request of her mother Muriel, she returns home. Someone has been tormenting Muriel, leaving dismembered doll parts nailed to her door with frightening messages alluding to the fact that Muriel knows something. Within a couple of days, her mother's erratic behaviour leads Anna to believe that she is in fact keeping secrets. So Anna endeavours to search for the truth.

Lizzie is a journalist married to Dom. Upon receiving a letter notifying her of Billy Cawley's release, she decides to return to Mapledon to seek out answers to her childhood. Although she knows she had lived in the village a long time ago, she has no real memories of that time but hopes upon her return they will begin to come back to her. But her journey is also one of truth. And it isn't long before she discovers that Mapledon isn't keen on sharing the truth with outsiders.

Anna and Lizzie team up in their search for answers, each wary of the other and wondering whether they can really trust the other. When each woman's true identity is revealed, both women are shocked while at the same time realisation dawning as to the sense it all actually makes. They both begin to question each other's motives while at the same time Anna questions her mother's role in it all.

One thing is abundantly clear...Mapledon has a toxic undercurrent simmering below its surface, reminding Anna why she escape the clutches of the poisonous village two decades ago.

But Mapledon is also a village that will stop at nothing to protect its own. Anything to protect its children. So many secrets, so many lies, so much manipulation and deceit. The truth is somewhere in between.

And Anna and Lizzie will stop at nothing to reveal it...whatever the cost.

WOW! If I had one word to describe I DARE YOU, it would be that. It starts out as one thing and ends as something not too far removed while at the same time being completely different. The toxicity in that village was so noxious I'm surprised anyone could breathe!

Told from several perspectives back and forth from 1989 to the present day, I DARE YOU is very easy to follow. The dual timelines are woven together seamlessly with a tension that is palpable throughout. Anna and Lizzie are the main narrators that bring us to the penultimate climax...and what a climax it is!! It just keeps on giving...and just when you think you have all the answers there is still even more to come. Normally the tension builds to a climax that is over within a chapter...this one kept going and going and going with many more reveals.

A slow burner initially, I DARE YOU does pull you in from the beginning and I think it's the short snappy chapters that keep the story moving at a steady pace despite its slow build. Sam Carrington has a way of weaving her stories like that in such a way it doesn't feel as if you are reading a slow burner. The twists are misleading, enlightening and confusing all at once as the pressure builds.

While the overall theme appears to be how far will you go to protect your children and yourselves, I DARE YOU is rife with manipulation, lies and secrets that would suffocate any normal person should they happen upon Mapledon. How can a village steeped in so much poison find peace? And when the truth is revealed, what then? Can all those involved move on and find their own peace? Will justice be served? I'm not sure justice was served in the end, but it left you pondering what may or may not happen. As well as the mystery of who? I have my suspicions...but who knows? It was a bit of a loose end leading us to an unknown conclusion. I guess it was subjective to the reader.

The question that remains...was Billy Cawley guilty or innocent? You will need to read the book to find out! I dare you...you won't be sorry!

I would like to thank #SamCarrington, #NetGalley and #AvonUK for an ARC of #IDareYou in exchange for an honest review.

Mapledon, 1989
Two little girls were out playing a game of dares. Only one returned home.
The ten-year-old told police what she saw: village loner Bill ‘Creepy’ Cawley dragged her friend into his truck and disappeared.
No body was found, but her testimony sent Cawley to prison for murder. An open and shut case, the right man behind bars.
The village could sleep safe once again.
Now…
Anna thought she had left Mapledon and her nightmares behind but a distraught phone call brings her back to face her past.
30 years ago, someone lied. 30 years ago, the man convicted wasn’t the only guilty party.
Now he’s out of prison and looking for revenge. The question is, who will he start with?

There's nothing like a small village for keeping secrets, and Mapledon is no stranger to that. Some thirty years ago, Jonie Hayes disappeared after playing a game of Knock, Knock, Ginger with her best friend Bella. Her body is never found, but Bella tells the police that she saw Jonie being taken away by the local wierdo Bill Cawley. He pleads guilty to her disappearance and is sent down for murder but now he has been released and is desperate to find out what really happened as both he, and others in Mapledon know he isn't the killer.

Bella (now going by the name of Anna) returns to Mapledon at the request of her mother who has been experiencing some threatening behaviour of late that has left her a little scared. Anna isn't keen to return to the home she grew up in but she knows that her mother needs her. Whilst she is there she meets Lizzie, a journalist, who also has a connection to the area; one that she is keeping close to her chest. As the book progresses, it seems that there is more than one person who has some idea of what happened to little Jonie, but it's anyone's guess as to what actually happened and who was responsible.

The book flits back and forth over the thirty year period filling the reader in on the characters of Bella and Jonie as children and of what the village was like in 1989. Many of the residents still live there though friendships have both ended and grown since the night Jonie vanished. It would seem that there are many regrets and lies having been told, but someone in Mapledon seems to have figured out just what occurred, and is hoping that the killer will finally admit what happened so that Jonie can be laid to rest. Sam Carrington puts in lots of twist and turns to keep you guessing 'whodunnit' throughout the book. It kept me hooked to the very last page!

I don't know what to think about this book - as the atmosphere was really doing the thing, but characters were such strange sometimes like the mother-daughter relationship was non-existent like made into some strange exchange of sentences that was more appropriate in the position of two women that were the same age.
Thirty years ago, a tragedy happened, now that the convict is out of prison a village is in the uproar with that info. Now, a lot of things will be put in motion so nothing can be sure - be always cautious of everything that is going on in such a small village. A tight spider web of lies will be threatened but will it survive the storm that is coming?

A very good mystery/ thriller. While not an original story line, Sam Carrington has packed enough of the misguided actions of the past into the story of revenge and retribution that I was very much engrossed in the characters and their reactions. The story moves pretty quickly, with enough references to past actions that you THINK you know what will happen next. Surprises are in store for everyone. Great read.

I Dare You is a compelling addictive read told between 1989 and the present day.
In 1989 a young girl goes missing in the close knit community of Mapledon and straightaway fingers point at Billy Creepy Crawley who is subsequently imprisoned for 30 years. When he is released on licence the old secrets and lies of the village are slowly uncovered. I loved the characters and found them very believable. This book is full of twists and turns which I loved and it kept me guessing right to the end.
Thanks to Avon Books UK for allowing me to read this in exchange for an honest review.

I Dare You is a suspenseful, slow burning thriller that had me turning the pages as fast as I could to see who the murderer was in this fab whodunnit.
Anna has returned to her childhood home, she has come to see her mother and suspects she is suffering from dementia but as the days go by she realises it’s not dementia at all. Anna’s childhood friend was murdered when she was ten years old, the weird bloke who was a village outsider was convicted for this awful crime and served thirty years. Thirty years is now up and strange things are happening to Anna’s mums house, is it Bill Cawley the man that is now free from prison or is it someone else having a laugh at their expense, either way it’s someone that seems to know more than Anna.
This was a fab thriller, I have read other books by Sam Carrington before and enjoyed them so I kind of hoped I’d be on to a winner and I was! Dark, suspenseful and thrilling from the beginning to the end.
I would like to thank Netgalley and Avon Books UK for this ARC I received in exchange for an honest review.

I Dare You is that interesting blend of past and present and as the two time frames start to collide so long buried secrets start to be revealed. However, the journey to this final reveal is convoluted and complex and filled with lots of twists and turns. In the present we meet up with Anna and Lizzie, two young women who have more than enough going on in their private lives but when they inadvertently meet in the small village of Mapledon in rural Devon, the reasons for their return to this place of childhood memories becomes chillingly apparent as the story progresses.

The village itself is a major character in the novel, not least because all of the action takes place there but also because it shields a mystery which happened a long time ago and which continues to hold a shadow over those who call Mapledon home.

The author writes this type of psychological suspense really well and allows just enough tension to pervade without losing sight of the individual personalities of the main players. There are some fascinating characters particularly the shadowy 'Creepy Crawley' around whom the plot circles. I enjoyed watching how the story unfolded, and particularly enjoyed reading the short snappy chapters, and the way in which both past and present were clearly defined without muddling the story with unnecessary detail.

I Dare You is a clever psychological suspense story in which a definite air of creepiness pervades. It looks at the power of childhood memories and of those long buried family secrets which once exposed can never be forgotten.

This was my first read by Carrington and I will certainly be reading more! This was a fast-paced intense read that kept me guessing throughout - there are some triggering issues raised, but these are handled well. This was also a cautionary tale of the idea of mob hysteria and guilt being presumed. A gripping, interesting read.