I received this book for free from Publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

All of them are guilty.

All of them must play the game.

But only one can survive.

On the first anniversary of a tragic fire at their high school, seven teenagers jump at the chance to attend a luxury desert retreat. But when they're left at a rundown abandoned motel and a sinister text message accuses them of complicity in the fire, they realize someone is playing a deadly game of revenge.

The rules? Every hour, one of them must sacrifice themselves, leaving the motel to be killed, until only one survivor remains. Otherwise… they all die.

As the countdown begins, the stranded must answer the questions: when everyone's guilty, who deserves to live? Who deserves to die?

With time running out, can they work together to uncover who's running the game before the bodies pile up? Or will it be survival of the fittest?

Short and Sweet Review

A year ago there was a tragic fire at their school and now seven of the survivors on their way to a luxury retreat, but when they arrive to their location it’s an abandoned motel. The group of teens think its a mistake until they find a note accusing them of being complicit in the fire and now they know this isn’t a mistake but revenge.

The synopsis for this book sounds interesting, we have seven teens at a motel and we’re about to find out their secrets. Our main characters are Ana and Ellis we get other POVs but these are the main ones. Ana immediately gives off the impression that she knows more about the current situation than anyone else so I was eager to learn what she knew. Ellis was probably the most annoying person, I used to like the name Ellis and after reading this book it’s definitely off of my list of potential names. Ellis is like an alpha male and more often than not he tries to use force to get people to do what he wants. Ana figures out that what’s happening is the balloon game which is something she’s played in her debate class, every hour the group has to decide who they’re kicking out and that person ends up dying. The group splits in two some going with Ana who thinks they can figure out a way to get back to civilization without anyone dying and some going with Ellis who is more than happy to see his classmates meet his demise. We really just follow the teens face the count down clock, learn their secrets, and see who will make it to the end alive. I did enjoy Ana more mainly because she wasn’t jumping up and down about seeing her classmates die she was determined to find a solution, Ellis on the other hand I couldn’t stand he thought it was a game and his main goal was to win it even if it meant his friends were dying. I though t this book got repetitive really quick and having to deal with characters I did not care about made it even harder to push through.

Overall, this book was a miss for me. There was potential but in the end the book just didn’t win me over, the secrets felt anticlimactic and the reveal of who the person who created this elaborate attempt at revenge was just weird and it makes sense but also doesn’t. This book unfortunately was just not for me.