The Night Shift

From the author of Every Last Fear comes Alex Finlay’s newest thriller, The Night Shift. This page-turning, bing-worthy thriller delivers a gripping plot and weaves together characters with intertwining fates and dark secrets. This book kept me hooked from the opening lines, “New Year’s Eve 1999. The night was expected to bring tragedy.” All the way until the last page. 

The story opens on New Year’s Eve of Y2K in Linden, New Jersey at a Blockbuster Video store. The manager and three teenage employees are viciously murdered. The remaining employee Ella is the lone survivor. The police’s chief suspect, Vince Whitaker is taken into custody but shortly after disappears. The case remains open until fifteen years later a new set of murders (copycat crime) takes place in an ice cream shop in the same town. 

Ella, now a therapist is asked to counsel Jesse Duvall by Linden high school’s principle. Just like Ella, Jesse is the only survivor of the ice cream store murders. 

The looming question-could this be the same killer? 

The Night Shift is told through the perspectives of three individuals who all have ties to the story’s crimes and small-town secrets. The story unfolds at a fast pace making it a huge challenge to not jump to the next chapter. In this suspenseful tale, I loved how Finlay wove together the complicated lives and crimes of his cast of characters. The reader is allowed access into the characters private thoughts, which to me gave a nice depth into the story as a whole. There is a sense of urgency in the book’s structure and has a very cinematic feel. It felt frenetic and at times wonderfully frustrating to get to the end of a chapter and be left with a cliffhanger and suddenly the perspective would shift to another character’s POV. A wonderful way to keep the reader hooked!

A fun, suspenseful, quick read, I highly recommend you “make it a Blockbuster night” and check out this book!