To Brooke, image is everything. She works hard to maintain perfect grades, perfect looks, a perfect life—especially after “the incident” that threatened it all. Getting into her dream university puts her that much closer to a fresh start. How can she say no to celebrating with all her classmates?
Hanging out with her crush by the bonfire is the perfect end to the night. Except it isn’t the end. An old truck starts aggressively tailing Brooke and her best friend on the isolated road toward home. Someone thinks they know the truth about “the incident,” and they won’t stop until it’s all out in the open. This terrifying drive is about to bring out Brooke’s worst fears…if she survives it.
- Title: No Place Left to Hide
- Author: Megan Lally
- Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
- Publication Date: January 7th, 2025
- Genre: Mystery/Thriller
- Source: Digital ARC via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review
- Targeted Age Range: YA
- Content Warnings: underage drinking, death, blood, injury/injury detail, drowning, car crash
- Rating: ★★★★.5
In February of last year, I read Megan Lally’s debut novel, That’s Not My Name (my review) and I honestly think about it all the time. It was a very easy choice for one of my top books of 2024, and I knew it would be after I finished it. Because of how much I loved That’s Not My Name, when Megan Lally announced her sophomore novel, No Place Left to Hide, would be coming out in January of this year, I knew I had to get my hands on a copy asap. I’m so thankful that I was able to get an ARC of No Place Left to Hide, and it did not disappoint!
After the way that That’s Not My Name affected me, I had very high hopes for No Place Left to Hide, and sometimes, that can be a little terrifying — especially when you love a book as much as I love That’s Not My Name. I think all readers understand the little bit of worry when going to pick up an anticipated read; is it going to meet my expectations? Is it going to be as good as the author’s previous works? Those are all things that run through our heads, and it certainly ran through mine when I opened to the first page of No Place Left to Hide, but those fears were quickly extinguished.
Truthfully, I think my 4.5 star rating simply comes from the fact that I took too long to read this book. The pacing of Lally’s books is so fast that ideally, you sit down and read it in one sitting. However, in my excitement to read No Place Left to Hide, I ended up starting it while on vacation and instead of reading it in one sitting, I read it in 3 days — which obviously is still fast, but I do think this book should be read in one sitting if possible to really amp up the suspense. I’m itching to do a reread, in one sitting, and see if that bumps my rating to a 5 star, even knowing the twist at the end.
Reading most of this book while in an airport/on a plane was absolutely the worst decision because I had such a hard time controlling my face and verbal reactions. I don’t verbally react to books often, but Megan Lally always has me verbally reacting while reading, and I cannot express how hard it was to hold back my reactions in public. Especially towards the last 80% of the book. I didn’t think that Lally would go in the direction that she did for the end, so she totally surprised me with it and I was obsessed. I probably looked crazy to anyone who happened to glance at me randomly because I was absolutely gagged.
The characterization was really strong; from the first page you got a great sense of who the characters are and I loved how they developed throughout the story. Our main character, Brooke, is one of those characters that you love to hate. As the story went on it got harder and harder to find any redeeming qualities in her and I loved that. Reading from Brooke’s POV was so fun because I swear, she got more delusional and her victim complex got stronger and stronger as the book went on, but she truly believed these things and it was so entertaining. The side characters were also really well written and I liked the development of each of them as the story went on. I went back and forth a lot with my theories of who was involved and who wasn’t, but then when I knew it for sure and Brooke was still in the dark because she was so preoccupied with herself and believing that she was so much smarter than everyone else, was honestly so great.
I think Lally’s writing is so cinematic — I could easily see this book being adapted into a TV Mini Series, and let me tell you, I would eat it up. It’s giving Gossip Girl and Pretty Little Liars vibes, which really, is all I need to want to check out any piece of media. Her writing is so descriptive, her books really do play like films in my mind as I read them and I think the energy of No Place Left to Hide would translate so well on screen.
Overall, I really enjoyed my time reading No Place Left to Hide and I think that Megan Lally has fully cemented herself as one of my autobuy authors. If you’re a fan of thrillers I definitely recommend her books!
Links for No Place Left to Hide: Goodreads | TheStoryGraph | Bookshop
Megan Lally is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of That’s Not My Name.
When she’s not writing dark and twisty young adult novels you might find her barefoot at the ocean, drinking one too many lavender lattes, or arguing about the validity of glitter as a favorite color. (It’s absolutely a color, and it’s the best one.)
She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her family and four chaotic animals.
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