Reviews tagging 'Schizophrenia/Psychosis '

Survive the Night by Riley Sager

45 reviews

kayelina's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

How many times did the author use the word “movie” in this novel? My god it was like her entire personality this cinephile trait of her’s. The plot was predictable and the suspense was not suspense-ing like I know Riley can usually do and bring. Not his best.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood

Moderate: Torture, Violence, Suicide attempt, Fire/Fire injury, Murder, Suicide, Panic attacks/disorders, Gun violence, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Suicidal thoughts, and Mental illness

Minor: Blood, Mental illness, Suicide, Cancer, Death, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Vomit, Gaslighting, Car accident, and Death of parent

polarisbooks's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Kidnapping, Suicidal thoughts, Grief, Suicide attempt, Gaslighting, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

Moderate: Blood, Death of parent, and Car accident

cady_sass's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

Riley Sager has a knack for writing a novel that you think is mediocre for the first half and then changing your mind in the last act. This book is widely accepted to be the “worst” of his thrillers but I was pleasantly surprised! I understand that people take issue with the protagonist being dumb and making horrible decisions, but I think the issue is more that people don’t enjoy an unreliable narrator who’s also self aware. She’s making decisions based on the fact that she doesn’t believe her own mind, and thats where things get dicey. Of course she’s going to do things that seem dumb to you, when, as the reader, you slowly grow to have more information than the protagonist (but… not really). It seems frustratingly obvious what she should be doing, but, as with much of Sager’s work, nothing is what it seems. My biggest critique is a massive spoiler, so read below at your own risk. 
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My main issue here (aside from the fact that we have yet another iteration of boyfriend/love interest is the villain) is that there are only 4 characters in this book, if you leave out Maddy and the cop. So, by the end, there’s realistically only two ways you can swing the plot: boyfriend is the serial killer, or the serial killer is unknown. Once you get to a certain point it becomes clear we aren’t going with an ambiguous ending, and therefore it can’t possibly be a surprise anymore who the killer is because the boyfriend is the ONLY option. So is it even a twist? There’s no other character in the book!!! Maybe the final twist with Robbie did it for some people, but for me I would’ve preferred a not-so-tidy ending. Using the boyfriend as the villain is just sooooooo…. Boring? Unoriginal? Obvious? Some combination of all of that. 
That said, what he did here with the OTHER 3 characters was nothing short of masterful. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Fire/Fire injury, Death of parent, Death, Gaslighting, Blood, Car accident, Chronic illness, Murder, Suicide attempt, Cursing, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Self harm, and Suicidal thoughts

Moderate: Toxic relationship, Medical content, Cancer, Vomit, and Terminal illness

shereadsmysteries's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Grief, Car accident, Suicide attempt, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Death of parent

Moderate: Gun violence, Gaslighting, Kidnapping, Blood, Fire/Fire injury, Vomit, Violence, Suicidal thoughts, Cancer, Injury/Injury detail, and Stalking

Minor: Rape, Misogyny, and Toxic friendship

Specific triggers: broken nose, teeth, teeth pulling

madiesue's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Major plot twists

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death of parent, Murder, Kidnapping, Trafficking, Suicide attempt, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Mental illness, Grief, and Car accident

mkzach's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Blood, Car accident, Death, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Gore, Grief, Gun violence, Violence, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

Minor: Vomit, Toxic friendship, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, and Terminal illness

tays_books's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Death, Kidnapping, Mental illness, Violence, Gun violence, Gaslighting, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

Moderate: Death of parent, Blood, Cursing, Injury/Injury detail, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Suicide, and Suicide attempt

Minor: Abandonment, Car accident, Cancer, and Stalking

jillkaarlela's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

This suspenseful mystery really leans into the idea of getting swept up in movies and discerning between reality and fiction. The main character, Charlie, sees hallucinations, or “movies in her mind” and has a hard time discerning what is real after her friend was murdered, after Charlie left her behind at a bar after they got in a fight. Charlie was the only one who saw her friends murderer, but during a movie in her mind, and can’t discern if any of it was real. She gets so overwhelmed with grief and guilt for leaving her friend, that she has to leave the university. So she takes a ride with the first person she sees, Josh. But as the ride goes on, Charlie becomes highly suspicious of Josh, but can’t tell if these things are actually happening or if they are a movie in her mind. She has to figure out what is real, before it is too late. 
That concept of the “movies in her mind” kinda gets confusing as to what is real or not. I guess that’s the point, because the protagonist can’t tell what’s real, but it makes it a little bit harder to keep up. 
I also didn’t particularly like the brief change in focus/narrator because it was an unreliable narrator, and it was almost deceptive in the way it portrayed the characters in those chapters. It just kinda made me confused. I would’ve just chosen to not make the one or two chapters focused on the other characters. 
However, I did like this book. It was one of the better mystery suspense novels I’ve read in the past few months. Not the best by far, but it was fairly good, and interesting. I wouldn’t call this a thriller, but it is definitely a mystery suspense novel. 

ok, so I guess the whole thing was the movie, that took liberties in the story and changed some of the “actual events”. I guess that fits well with the theme, but again, it’s a little confusing. I do like that she and josh/Jake ended up together and got to make the movie. I didn’t expect it to be Robbie though, I guess I wasn’t thinking about it that much. I kinda thought the whole thing would’ve been a movie in her mind, and none of it would’ve happened. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Cursing, Grief, Torture, Death, Gaslighting, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Violence

Minor: Car accident, Suicide, Death of parent, and Suicide attempt

karamelka_kar19's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

I heard so many negative things about this book, but I really enjoyed this one. It had a steady pace, although really slow for a triller. I liked the discussions of victim-blaming and gaslight, the story was written with great compassion and care. 

There are many plot holes, characters did some stupid (and weirdly realistic) things, but they're kind of made sense as the wholе book is a bit ridiculous. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Kidnapping, Torture, Gaslighting, Violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Gun violence, Grief, and Death

Moderate: Terminal illness, Cancer, and Car accident

seawarrior's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

Sager's newest installment contains twists and turns that fizzle into a more predictable plot, but remained entertaining nonetheless. Charlie is my favorite of his protagonists so far. The women guiding his stories are cut from the same cloth, and tend to have both a unique hobby and a trauma based mental illness that causes an internal conflict complicating the external one they need to survive. However, Charlie really appealed to me. I felt that she was a very humanized portrait of a person with psychosis. Her hallucinations are never used to make her seem monstrous and instead, any horror surrounding their existence comes from her vulnerability to be gaslit. This type of empathy towards a psychotic character is rarely a given in horror, and was refreshing to read. I also felt that Charlie's motivations and self-image were clearly defined, so that even when she was making decisions that seemed colossally poorly considered, I understood why she chose them. 

Other than my interest in Charlie, there wasn't much in this story that stuck out to me. I read it primarily to see how it resolved, but without the same gripping fascination I've had for some of Sager's other books. Those who are interested in Hitchcockian suspense may be more drawn to the story than I was, and I'd recommend it to people who fall into that category. Otherwise, this may be one to skip if you don't think Charlie will appeal to you as a protagonist.  

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Misogyny, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Gaslighting

Moderate: Torture, Terminal illness, Suicide attempt, Suicide, Injury/Injury detail, and Car accident