WHY DID I PUT THIS OFF FOR SO LONG.
IT WAS INCREDIBLE. I sat here and read this in one sitting. I think Megan Goldin is a genius.
This kept me on the edge of my seat the entire time. And now that it is over I just want to go back to the beginning and start again.

Man, I would recommend this to any and everyone.

This is the best thriller I’ve read all year and might be the top one for 2023!!! Such a good concept and I couldn’t put it down!! I buddy read this book and we both just FLEW through it. Highly recommend

I raced through this book as I couldn’t stop reading it!! Perfectly paced with lots of intrigue. Thoroughly recommend, this must-read novel!

Liv is suffering from a rare form of amnesia. Every time she wakes, she has forgotten the last two years. The story switches back and forth between present day and two years prior. As the story progresses, we discover Liv was injured in a terrible attack. Or was she??? The farther into the story, the more we understand what happened. Liv does have some coping mechanisms but seems to have gone off the rails. I did find the ending lacking. It just seemed to come together too quickly and without a lot of planning on the author’s part. Overall, I did find myself immersed in the storyline and anxious to find what happened next. This was a 3 star read for me.

This was a mind-bending ride for me! At times, I struggled to keep track of the plot but ultimately I enjoyed it. This author is one that I will definitely keep on my radar.

The writing is just not so good. The premise had potential but it's written in a way that makes the story more confusing than it needs to be. I also found the story to be repetitive and it left alot of questions to be answered.

I just couldn’t get into this book. I know it got a lot of buzz and tons of people loved it but not I. When I read the description it sounded right up my alley.

Liv Reese wakes up in the back of a taxi having no memory of where she is and what she has just done. She is dropped off in the middle of the night at her apartment without a phone, purse, or key only to find out that she does not live there with her roommate anymore. She has the message "STAY AWAKE" scrawled on her hand and a blood-stained knife. Liv doesn't know where to go and who to trust. She can't believe that she would have harmed anyone. But, someone is out to get Liv. That person is hoping that she doesn't remember a thing.
This is a fast-paced, intense novel. I loved it. It truly kept me guessing.

STAY AWAKE packs in the twists and turns. I had been worried when I read that it was an amnesia thriller, but this one didn’t get monotonous or bog me down too much in the memory lapse phases. The pace is great and the characters are well-developed despite the memory problems. A fun thriller!

Liv Reese wakes up in the backseat of a taxi with no idea where she is or where she is coming from. When Liv arrives at her apartment, she finds that someone else lives there now and she is covered in writing largely reminding her to “stay awake” and a bloody knife in her pocket.

Her last memory is 2 years earlier when she was working at a magazine, dating her boyfriend Marco, living with her best friend Amy, and living in New York City. In present time she is in New York City, but nothing else seems to be the same. Shortly after her most recent awakening, she sees a news story about a man who was murdered and the same message from her hand is written on the window “stay awake”.

It was easy to cheer for Liv because even though we aren’t sure what exactly happened and how she might be involved in the crimes she is clearly linked to, she felt innocent. The amnesia helps with this—even if she did end up doing something awful or witnessing something awful, it’s clear her brain has completely disassociated from it.

As the story progresses, the pace continues to speed up because we start learning more and more. I loved how some of the answers just led to a new question, because there were lots of twists and turns throughout. It really felt like solving a jigsaw puzzle where some pieces connect and others don’t work until more comes into place. I was shocked by the ending!

If you're in the mood for a hauntingly captivating read, look no further than 'Stay Awake' by Megan Golding. This 4-star book will pull you in with its eerie atmosphere, unforgettable characters, and spine-chilling plot. Once you start, you won't be able to put it down!

Oh my goodness! I can’t believe I’ve been sleeping on this book. Stay Awake is the perfect psychological thriller that I needed to jolt me out of my reading slump.
If you haven’t read this book and psychological thrillers/ suspense books are your jam, pick this book up asap.
Liv Reese wakes up everyday to a new world. She has no memory of the past two years. If that’s no enough of a problem, Liv starts each new day having no recollection that she might have a murderous stalker too 😱🔪
But there is one thing she feels sure of…. She must Stay Awake and not fall asleep 💤

Everytime Liv wakes up she finds herself in a place she doesn't recognize and doesn't know how she got there. The only thing she remembers is sitting in her office on a summer afternoon. Liv keeps waking on on a cold November morning and each time is different. She woke up on a park bench, a train, in a rundown apartment just to name a few. Very frightening places. . When she wakes up she tries to resume her life but when she does there is other people living there in her apartment or sitting at her desk at work. Even at her boyfriends apartment. Liv tries to stay awake and put clues together and find out what triggered this memory loss.
She discovers that a traumatic event in her life two years ago caused the memory loss and she cannot seem to get past it. She writes all over her hands and wherever she can telling herself to stay awake and not trust anybody but she can't remember why. One day Liv sees herself on TV and is being accused of killing someone that she doesn't know. She could not imagine killing anybody. She has no idea if she's guilty so she tries to avoid police but there are more than just the cops looking for her. Can she stay up long enough to figure out this massive puzzle? Thanks NetGalley and the publisher for the advance ecopy.

I don't usually feel the urge to read a book immediately after receiving it. I am such a mood reader that I will buy a book because I just 'have to have it' and then let it sit on my shelf until I feel super compelled to read it. However, my mood reading tendencies FLEW out the window when I recieved an email that said that I was approved for an advanced reader's copy of today's book. I started it immediately! Mood reading----be gone!

Stay Awake is a Thriller written by Megan Goldin. It was released in August of 2022.
If you would like to purchase Stay Awake you can find it on Amazon and Barnes and Noble. You can follow the author, Megan Goldin, on Instagram and Goodreads! You can also check out her website!

Thank you to NetGalley, Megan Goldin, and St. Martin's Press for giving me an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. As always, all views expressed throughout this review are my own.

Liv Reese wakes up in the back of a taxi with no idea where she is or how she got there. When she’s dropped off at the door of her brownstone, a stranger answers—a stranger who now lives in her apartment and forces her out in the cold. She reaches for her phone to call for help, only to discover it’s missing, and in its place is a bloodstained knife. That’s when she sees that her hands are covered in black pen, scribbled messages like graffiti on her skin: STAY AWAKE.
Two years ago, Liv was living with her best friend, dating a new man, and thriving as a successful writer for a trendy magazine. Now, she’s lost and disoriented in a New York City that looks nothing like what she remembers. Catching a glimpse of the local news, she’s horrified to see reports of a crime scene where the victim’s blood has been used to scrawl a message across a window, the same message that’s inked on her hands. What did she do last night? And why does she remember nothing from the past two years? Liv finds herself on the run for a crime she doesn’t remember committing as she tries to piece together the fragments of her life. But there’s someone who does know exactly what she did, and they’ll do anything to make her forget—permanently.

I gave this book 5 stars on Goodreads. Before I go any further into this review, I want to commend the author. Last year, I read and reviewed Megan Goldin's book, The Escape Room----I loved it! I was a bit nervous that this book would not live up to that one but it was so good! The author has certainly impressed me with these two stellar novels. I cannot wait to check out her other books!

Similarly to The Escape Room, this story is told through dual timelines. If you know me you know I love a good dual timeline----as long as it is executed well...and this one was really great!
This was fast paced, it kept me on my toes, and it had me 'Stay-ing Awake' to finish it (pun absolutely intended even though I cringed a bit when I typed that).

Sometimes I find female lead characters in thrillers to be a bit insufferable. Maybe it's just me, but I find that authors sometimes make them reliant on others or even ditsy. Kind of like in a scary movie when the girl should be running out the door but she instead runs up the stairs...so frustrating! What I loved about this book was that Liv was capable, smart, and likable! She was like a breath of fresh air!

Also, I find that some authors who include law enforcement in their books have only gathered all of their character dynamics from Law & Order or CSI. Fiction is not real life and I can always get past things but I often find some pretty egregious errors in the framework of those characters. I LOVED the way that Megan Goldin developed and utilized the detectives in this book! Their inclusion advanced the story and I could tell the author took the time to create them. It was so appreciated!

Overall, I could not recommend this book more! It is one of the best reads of the year, so far, for me. Due to the nature of the plot, and some adult dialogue/situations referenced throughout I would recommend for readers 17+. If you are looking for a book that will maintain your interest and maybe even impress you---I think you should pick this one up!

4 stars

Stay Awake had me in a chokehold from the very start. This book starts with a bang and I knew I was not going to rest until I finished this book. Megan Goldin has been on my authors to watch list because I absolutely loved The Night Swim. So with two knock out reads, I will now read anything she writes.

While I did guess who was the big bad, I didn't mind that it was predictable. Most thrillers are. That's why I love them. But there was definitely some things I did not see coming. I loved how the pods switched from past to present. It fully rounded out the story and seeing both mysteries get solved at once was just PERFECTION.
'
I seriously don't know how Megan Goldin does it, but she writes so fantastic. She knows how to tell a great story and hook me immediately. Now I feel like I need to read her debut which I may just go do right now. Because I am still reeling at how much I loved this book.

READ IT READ IT READ IT

This book had great characterization, excellent story telling, and made me want to keep reading. I will continue to read from this author and look out for their new releases.

This book had so much potential but it was just flat. What I found out about myself with this book is I don’t enjoy reading from the POV of unreliable main characters especially ones as stupid as Liv. It would've been helpful if she wrote more helpful things on her body other than “stay awake” and not wondering around the city.
The conclusion left me with more questions than answers. For example, who was stalking Liv and why before the murders? Did I some missed it?

I believe this is the second book I’ve read by Goldin and of course I will read future books. I loved The Night Swim.

Picture 50 first dates but much darker and no ukuleles and Lucy is in danger. I love this concept. The bouncing around between two years ago and two weeks ago and the present may give some readers a headache but this read just took a few a digits and kept on reading.

I love books by Megan Goldin, and this was no different. Thank you so much for sending my way to read and review!

OK, so I have mixed feelings about this one.

I loved the idea of the amnesia premises. I adored Detectives Halliday and Lavelle. Halliday made the book and is the reason why I continued to turn the pages. The detectives are why I gave this book 3 stars. Well them, the who done it, and the fact I actually finished this one, since I seem to be DNFing a hell of a lot of books lately.

On the flip side, Liv's character drove me freaking nuts. Some days her character felt too stupid to live. And yes, I'm fully away she suffers from amnesia due to a traumatic event. But lord, this chick didn't make very smart moves or decisions 90% of the time. Never asked for help. Ran when she should have stayed. Wrote dumb shit on her body instead of pertinent info. Etc.

On top of that, the book was repetitive. And not just in the fact we live a good chunk of Liv's days over. The writing needed an editor and proofing. If all the repetitive sentences were taken out this book would have been much shorter. Due to this, the pacing sometimes felt off.

The two twist: I figured out one of them rather quickly. However, I did not figure out the who done it. Which looking back, the signs were there.

If I'm being honest, while this was just an okay read, Stay Awake probably isn't a book I would recommend to a friend. There just wasn't enough parts to it that wowed me or made me fall in love. With that said, no two people read the same book, so if you choose to settle in with this one, I hope you have a much more enjoyable ride than I did.

Stay Awake plays so many mind games and I literally couldn’t get enough! I loved this book so much!

Liv stole my heart from the very first page. The tangled web of her past had me in a choke hold. I found myself racing through to find out the truth. I really don’t want to say much because I feel like you need to go into this one completely blind to fully appreciate what the author was trying to accomplish. And boy do I think she accomplished it.

I feel like this is a book I’m going to think about for many years to come.
5/5 Stars

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for sending me an arc copy in exchange for my honest review.