I’ve been enjoying reading Alex Finlay books and this one was pretty good too! I give it 4 stars as I felt it was a little slow and predictable. I did love the intensity and the action-packed moments, but a lot of it felt just really conversational. Definitely a fun, quick read!

3.5/5

This book kept me interested and I didn’t guess the ending. Some of the plot points were a little far fetched but overall a decent book. Thank you to the publisher for gifting me an early copy to review in exchange for my honest opinion!

Okay how is it 11 on a work night - I stayed up way past my bed time to finish this ! Thank you NetGalley for approving me and thanks to Alex Finlay for keeping me enthralled and up past my bed time ! What a great murder mystery with so much action and twists and turns!! If you like FBI/ police procedure and investigation, or serial killers - this is likely a good book for you! I really enjoyed it and haven’t been up so late without notice or question in a while so it will def keep you turning the pages !

Side note what a trip down memory lane with BLOCKBUSTER -talk about a center part of teen years and movie filled weekends - really glad my memories are great and nothing like the workers experience in this story …

Possible spoilers :
Loved agent bad ass!!!
Going to pretend that Atticus lives happily ever after I mean we met his mom and all !!!

This was one of the best written books I have read in a while. It kept me up into the wee hours of the night because I never wanted to put it down, the book starts with a murder spree at the local Blockbuster in 1999 with a sole survivor. Flash forward to present day, and there is a very similar murder spree at the local ice cream shop. Both homicides had young teens as the main victims and left one survivor. The survivor from the original tragedy is now a social worker who was called to counsel the surviving victim. This reopens the Blockbuster cold case as the question arises, did they have the wrong suspect or is it’s copycat killer. Highly recommended, but you might want to wait for the weekend when you can devour the book without being completely sleep deprived for work!

More nostalgia than you can shake a stick at! I thoroughly loved this book! So much fun! Great story, great writing, and a great ending! Alex Finlay has become an absolute must read!

Despite going through a huge book funk and taking a lot longer than normal to read this book, it was an amazing read. The writing is excellent, making this one seem like a movie I was watching the entire time. There were quite a few plot twists that came out of nowhere and had me grabbing on the edge of my seat. This is the first book I read by this author and definitely won’t be my last.

Thanks to the publisher for my copy - all opinions are my own.

I have to admit, this quickly became my favorite Alex Finlay book to date. There is something so perfectly crafted about this book that pulls in those nostalgic 90's slasher vibes that are near and dear to my heart, and I devoured this entire book in one afternoon.

I love the premise of this book, and the pacing was bang on. Give me any book that shifts perspectives between characters and I am sold. It kept the plot unfolding with just enough tidbits to keep me hooked for "just one more chapter".

No spoilers, but this is the perfect summer escapism reading you need on your list!

I have received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

The Night Shift brought me back in time. Mostly because of the Blockbuster vibes because I used to love that place. So, when a murder happens within one in the very beginning, well, my heart was a little sad. Then I got very invested pretty quickly because it was time to solve a freaking murder.

Long story short, I had no idea who the murderer was until the very big reveal. One would think that I would be able to put the clues together. Unfortunately, I self-sabotaged myself in the very beginning because I kept thinking it would be a copycat killer. My mind couldn't get around it being the same person until my eyes read it. Then things started to click into place, and I was mad at myself for not seeing it.

Other than that, I was honestly suspicious of every person throughout this. Especially when trying to figure out who was the actual murderer because people kept hiding things. I needed all the secrets and information so that I could process everything. Then when people started dying my suspect pool because smaller and smaller.

In the end, I'm still creeped out with who it was and why everything went down the way it did. It also made me really sad with how many people died throughout this. The number was way more than I originally thought it would be. Definitely enjoyed the murder mystery because it kept me on my toes. I also can't wait for the next book that Alex writes. I seriously need more murder mysteries stat!

This book was exactly what I needed!! It is a very faced past thriller and I was on the edge on my seat the entire time. There were so many twists and I was second guessing what I thought was going on the whole entire time. I cannot wait for more from this author and highly highly recommend this to any thriller fan!

In a batch of “final girl” novels hitting the shelves, Alex Finlay’s story stands out. The multiple viewpoints really helped me immerse myself in the story. The characters were well-developed and although I was able to guess “whodunit”, there were plenty of twists and turns to keep me engaged. Finally, the sense of nostalgia is strong – anyone who grew up going to Blockbuster to get the latest VHS will appreciate it!

3.5 stars

I love a fast-paced, page-turning thriller when I am trying to get my reading mojo back. I read an ARC of this (thanks to NetGalley). I did accurately predict almost every major reveal here, but I don't think that's a bad thing personally. To me, it means the author set up some believable twists. I ultimately enjoyed the whole experience, but I do wish that the pacing had been more even. The ending felt SUPER rushed compared to the first third in my opinion, but I was still having fun from page one to the end! I definitely recommend it, it's the perfect poolside read.

(Review posted on Goodreads originally)

I'll admit it.. I'm a sucker for a mystery that's told in two timelines. In this case, there are two separate tragic events, fifteen years apart. I found both storylines compelling and stayed up way too late to finish this one!

I was a fan of Alex Finlay's previous novel and there was no sophomore slump with this one.

*Thanks to Netgalley for providing an advanced copy for an unbiased review.

This is one of my favorite books of 2022! Multiple point of views and timelines that interweave. I loved the strong character development and storyline. I highly recommend! This is a strong 5-star read!

While there are some parts of The Night Shift that are formulaic and similar to other thrillers, one unique piece is the alternating perspectives. Not only do we hear the story from the victims of two eerily similar crimes that take place 15 years apart, we also hear from an FBI agent looking into similarities and a public defender who just happens to be the brother of the accused murderer in the first crime. There are some definite jaw drop moments and I was kept guessing until near the end with this one. It moves fast and could easily be read in a weekend if you’re not busy.

I read this book and shortly after finishing The Night Shift, I read Alex Finlay's book that we published a year earlier, Every Last Fear and was a little confused about the timeline in The Night Shift with the character FBI Agent Sarah Keller. She is in both books but her character is 8 1/2 months pregnant with twins and in The Night Shift but in the book Every Last Fear that was published 1 year earlier her twins are around 6 years old. So is the The Night Shift an earlier novel written by Alex Finlay but wasn't published until after the success of Every Last Fear? Was there a lot of editing to be done with The NIght Shift before it was ready to be published? I had a hard time with Agent Sara Keller's timeline. I also did not find it believable she can be very actively involved in working on this case when she is 8 1/2 months pregnant with twins. Everybody I know who has been pregnant with twins has either had their babies by 8 1/2 months or put on bedrest.
I liked the premise of The Night Shift with the video store angle. Who doesn't have fond memories of shopping for a video on Friday night at Blockbuster...
Lots of actions and twists but I did enjoy Every Last Fear more.

Thank you NetGalley for providing me an ARC of this book.

I found this book so hard to put down, and action packed. I knew from the beginning I was going to enjoy this one! The twists and turns absolutely caught me by surprise.
I'm a huge fan of book with multiple points of views and this one gave me a bit of it all. We had Ella's our therapist and previous attack survivor. Keller our FBI agent trying to solve the new crime and Chris who is a lawyer and brother of the first attacks suspect.
I enjoyed reading from each of their points of view and how they all came together. The story itself was hard to put down especially when we hit some big twists. I can't wait to read more by this author.

This is a 4.5 that I have upgraded to a 5 star. This story begins with a hell of a hook, with the brutal slaying of 3 teen girls and their night manager at the blockbuster video store. The killings leave Ella as the only survivor and 15 years later the sole suspect in the case has successfully vanished into thin air. For the people of Linden, NJ they thought they would only have to live the nightmare once. When a near identical crime occurs in a ice cream shop, everyone is asking the same question, is a sadistic copycat out there to torment the town, or has the original killer surfaced to exact a new round of revenge? This latest spree killing also leaves behind a sole survivor, Jesse, a too smart for her age, spark plug of a 17 year old girl. Agent “badass” Keller is called in to consult on the case, in the hopes that they can prove or disprove the existence of a copycat. Caught in the middle are Ella, Jesse, and Chris, the younger brother of the only suspect, Vince Whitaker. Clearly all these people are trying to just live their lives while under the strain of an enormous amount of unresolved trauma. There is a whole lot going on in this story, and we have to pick up all the little threads and follow them. A perfect blend or action/ suspense/ and heart. There is a lot of laying the groundwork early on, with the story kind of falling together slowly and then all at once, with a nail biting ending. Review posted to Goodreads, Instagram, Facebook, Amazon, Litsy, and LibraryThing

Alex Finlay really knows how to tell a story. I really loved going back in time, even though it was just to experience a murder in a Blockbuster but it felt so nostalgic. I really liked how he wrapped up the book and made the entire plot flow.

I was in an incredible book slump when I picked this one up and then blew threw it The story is so well written, the characters and alternating POVs kept things moving quickly. It was creepy at all the right parts and I gasped a number of times. Definitely recommend this one to all thriller lovers.

4.75/5

I may have read it almost 2 months ago, but I am STILL thinking about The Night Shift by Alex Finlay. I was a fan of his last book, but I absolutely LOVED this one and will definitely be buying a finished copy to add to my shelf. The chapters are incredibly short, and the pacing is quick, so it basically flies by. There is also excellent nostalgia filling these pages and I was instantly transported back to the days when Blockbuster was the place to be. Honestly, I kind of miss that, but you know progress is progress! I thought the publisher did an excellent job with the marketing of this book, and the advance reader copy came inside a sleeve JUST like an old-school VHS tape! There are multiple viewpoints that the story is told from, and I was completely gripped from the first page to the very last. The end is pretty much action-packed, and it made me want to see this as a movie.

I actually bought the audiobook as soon as it came out, and I think this is the right choice if you love and can focus on audio. There is a full cast of narrators which are Brittany Pressley, Cady McClain, Devon Hales & Gary Tiedemann, and every single one of them just blew me away. I remember loving the audiobook of Every Last Fear as well, and it is clear to me that the publisher really knows what they are doing. The cast of narrators for the cast of characters was pure perfection and being the person that I am, I particularly loved Brittany Pressley as Ella. The story was twisty as well, and at no time did I have the bad guy figured out. I listened to this in one day because once I started there was no humanly way possible that I was going to have the restraint to put it down. I thought the plot was clever and well-executed, and all fans of thrillers and Finlay are definitely going to have to read The Night Shift.

I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.