Book Review - Middle of the Night by Riley Sager

Title: Middle of the Night
Author: Riley Sager
Genre: Mystery/ Thriller
Published: 2024
 
Description: The worst thing to ever happen on Hemlock Circle occurred in Ethan Marsh’s backyard. One July night, ten-year-old Ethan and his best friend and neighbor, Billy, fell asleep in a tent set up on a lawn in a quiet, quaint New Jersey cul de sac. In the morning, Ethan woke up alone. During the night, someone had slices the tent open with a knife and taken Billy. He was never seen again.
 
Thirty years later, Ethan has reluctantly returned to his childhood home. Plagues by bad dreams and insomnia, he begins to notice strange things happening in the middle of the night. Someone seems to be roaming the cul de sac at odd hours, and signs of Billy’s presence keep appearing in Ethan’s backyard. Is someone playin a cruel prank? Or has Billy, long thought to be dead, somehow returned to Hemlock Circle?
 
The mysterious occurrences prompt Ethan to investigate what really happened that night, a quest that reunites him with former friends and neighbors and leads him into the woods that surround Hemlock Circle. Woods where Billy claimed monsters roamed and where a mysterious institute does clandestine research on a crumbling estate.
 
The closer Ethan gets to the truth, the more he realizes that no place – be it quiet forest or suburban street – is completely safe. And that the past has a way of haunting the present.
 
Review: I’m totally up-to-date with Riley Sager’s novels, so whenever a new book comes out, I’m ready for it. Last year, his new release “The Only One Left” had me stunned. It was the last book I read in 2023 and ended up being my number one book of that year. Telling you I was excited about “Middle of the Night” was an understatement. But this book will not end up on my favorites list at the end of the year.
 
The book starts of with a young Ethan and his friend Billy, camping out in Ethan’s backyard. In the morning, there is a slash in the tent and Billy is gone, never to be found. Thirty years later, Ethan returns to his family home, being confronted with this memory. When strange things start to happen, Ethan is determined to find out what really happened that night.
 
The start of the book is strong, I was sucked it. But that didn’t last long. The book, overall, is pretty dull. Not a lot happens. And then when something exciting does happen, it only lasts a moment. And there are often these fake scares, that we also know from horror movies. When the main character hears a strange noise, thinking someone’s in the house and it turns out to be cat. Similar situations happen a lot in “Middle of the Night”.
 
WARNING!!! THE FOLLOWING MIGHT HAVE SPOILERS!!!
 
There are these “Stranger Things” vibes in the book. The childhood friendships, the 90s nostalgia (80s in the TV-show) and a mysterious institute nobody is allowed to enter or talk about. I liked that. But when we finally get a glimpse of this institute, which made me excited and felt it finally gave me what I wanted, it goes nowhere. Sager could and should have done more with this. It felt like a diversion now and the institute really only functioned as this. I really wanted to dig into this more, I wanted this to be focus of the book.
 
As for the end, it felt uninspiring and lackluster. Riley Sager can do much better and I was really disappointed. We never got that crazy twist or reveal, that I often love from him. His only book I'd rated under a 3-star was “The Final Girls”, which was a 2,5, but “Middle of the Night” is now officially my least favorite book by him. It just felt to generic and not exciting at all. I’m so sad.
 
Rating: 2/ 5