The Escape Game

With more twists than a corkscrew, new YA thriller The Escape Game hits the ground running transporting readers to the corrupt, murderous and shallow world of Hollywood Reality TV built around the sets of devilishly designed escape rooms where fiendish clues, betrayal and sabotage await tenacious code crackers.

The brainchild of NY Times bestselling American author Marissa Meyer, who seized upon the idea of a dead body discovered inside a prop during a visit to an art themed escape room, it also draws on the talents of her Australian friend Tamara Moss Bailey known for her adult crime thrillers.

Enjoying collaborating on conundrums and solutions built around ingenious escape room maps reproduced in the book by Owen Pomeroy, the authors play with intertextual references, word trickery, numbers and atmospheric sets. The novel is also a double act between Putnam book editors Rimas and Durning, who count Agatha Christie and horror novels among their passions.

Sizzling with suspense and crackling with tension, the plot delivers high stakes, challenging cryptography and melodramatic theatricality. As the narrative plays with the concept of what is real and what is staged for the cameras, four teens with very different agendas and secrets to hide are introduced through audition videos. Following a season 4 finale that ended in tragedy, they quickly get caught up in the race for a prize amidst the machinations of an ambitious producer, a predatory Games Master, a cheery Australian host, a surly social media co-ordinator and a former star obsessed with fame.

Nuanced protagonists Sierra, Adi, Carter and Beck are poised to crack the ciphers with their mathematical, designing, decoding and analytical skills but the spectre of a cold case haunts them. Are they just pawns for Season 5 fodder as other focused teams plot against them and a killer has them in their sights? Will their talents fail them when their insecurities are played upon? Flashbacks reveal truths being kept from them as readers are taken on a rapid rollercoaster ride to a pulse pounding showdown delivered with gothic panache. With an ending promising more problem solving ahead, this series will have great appeal for would be code crackers, twisty thriller fans and teens looking for diverse characters.