The Escape Room

June 3, 2019
Australian author Goldin makes her debut with a riveting, if flawed, tale of greed and revenge set on Wall Street. After being called to an out-of-office meeting, four investment bankers from the Stanhope and Sons firm are trapped in an elevator on their way to an escape room challenge organized by their company. They realize that the elevator itself is the escape room when they start to receive increasingly more personal puzzles to solve on the elevator’s TV monitor. Meanwhile, in flashbacks, recent hire Sara Hall becomes indoctrinated into the firm’s culture of long hours and incredible pay. When a coworker dies, Sara wonders whether foul play was involved. Though both plots start off strong, the elevator narrative slows as it waits for Sara’s story to catch up. Lucky flukes and coincidences stretch credulity, and the unlikability of those targeted for revenge lessens the scheme’s impact. But these shortcomings aren’t fatal. Thriller fans will eagerly turn the pages to see what happens next. 150,000-copy announced first printing. Agent: David Gernert, Gernert Company.

June 1, 2019
Four people answer an ominous summons from human resources only to be deliberately trapped in an elevator in Goldin's debut thriller. In the highflying world of finance, Vincent, Sam, Jules, and Sylvie used to be superstars, but recently they've failed to close too many lucrative deals, and they know their jobs are hanging by a thread. Called to a Friday evening meeting at an office building under construction, they become trapped in the steel elevator, which has been rigged to emulate an escape room. If they solve the clues, perhaps they can find their way out. At first, they assume it's just the worst team-building exercise ever--but the clues point them toward a much darker possibility. How much do they know about the deaths of two young associates? Will they be able to solve the mystery and escape--or is the whole system rigged against them? There's a Spanish proverb used by Tana French in The Likeness: " 'Take what you want and pay for it, ' says God." The main characters in Goldin's novel should probably have paid more attention to the second half of that saying. Powerful, attractive, and unbelievably wealthy, they truly believe that their security and success are worth protecting at any cost. Despite the unsavory characters--or perhaps even because of them--this novel is pure entertainment. Offering a modern take on the classic locked-room mystery, Goldin strings the reader along by alternating chapters set in the past and in the present and by peppering the present chapters with riddles and word games. This is a commentary on the cutthroat, hypocritical world of finance, where one must sacrifice everything to stay on top. It provides us with antagonists we love to hate as well as a sympathetic heroine who pays the ultimate price for survival: her own sense of goodness and fair play. Cancel all your plans and call in sick; once you start reading, you'll be caught in your own escape room--the only key to freedom is turning the last page!

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July 1, 2019
It is not difficult to figure out who has set up the escape room, which is actually an elevator, in this debut from journalist Goldin, and there is clearly no happy ending likely for the four colleagues trapped inside; but fans of JP Delany and Ruth Ware will want to be right in there with them. Vincent, Jules, Sylvie, and Sam are living the life of overindulged entitlement, straight out of The Wolf of Wall Street. Their ruthless ambition and greed drive them to all manner of arrogance and intimidation. Perhaps even murder. Their poisonous remarks to each other have always concealed secrets that leak out as the hours pass in a hellishly overheated, confined place, and it seems only a matter of time before they turn feral and attempt to devour one another. Meanwhile, the sad fates of two of their coworkers unfold in the background. A nail-biting tale of a corporate team-building exercise gone horribly wrong, with a credible explanation of how the seemingly undoable is done. And to the victor go the spoils.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)

August 2, 2019

DEBUT Investment bankers Vincent, Jules, Sylvie, and Sam receive a mysterious invitation to a company-mandated team-building event: an escape room in the elevator of an unoccupied building. Once the elevator doors close, though, they realize that this isn't an ordinary escape room--it's something far more sinister, and whoever's in control is looking for revenge. The first clue involves a former Stanhope and Sons team member, Sara Hall, whose rise and fall is chronicled in alternating chapters. Sara, unlike the rest of her team, doesn't have an Ivy League education and comes from a middle-class background. She bonds with Lucy, a socially awkward fellow outsider whose financial acumen has earned billions for the business. Sara's friendship with Lucy then takes a tragic turn, and Sara's subsequent downward spiral is devastating. As the tension in the locked elevator increases, the two stories intersect, and the situation escalates to violence. VERDICT Goldin's debut features the twists, turns, and misdirection psychological suspense fans crave, set against a backdrop of corporate greed and excess. Bad people get their comeuppance, good people get revenge, and readers get immersed in the tangled web of vengeance and deceit. [See Prepub Alert, 2/11/19.]--Nanette Donohue, Champaign P.L., IL

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