My Review of The Escape Room by Megan Goldin

My Review:

The first thing I have to say about The Escape Room is that whatever you think you know is going on you don't!!! I loved this facet of the narrative as Megan Goldin cleverly keeps the reader guessing as to what's happening, who is behind it all and what will be the ultimate outcome. It's a tense and tautly written narrative that alternates between four Wall Street financiers and Sara Hall. The Wall Street Four are summoned to a meeting that turns out to be an escape room challenge, or so they think for this is no ordinary escape room and the stakes are their survival. We engrossingly start at the end of the escape room challenge and then Goldin takes us back to Vincent, Sam, Jules and Vincent's begrudging arrival at what they believe to be a meeting, the tension is heightened on two levels are all are insecure about their jobs at the firm and also because of secrets shared, resentments and jealousy that come exploding to the surface under very little duress. 

If Goldin had focused entirely on the escape room this novel would have been a fantastic thriller as she creates a sense of impotence that powerful people are unused to feeling. We don't feel sorry for them most of the time, for they do not deserve it, and even though the tropes of the Wall Street financiers are there, they are never mere stereotypes as Goldin makes them fully fledged characters. However, Goldin expertly creates a sense of pathos with the first person narrative of Sara Hall as we're told very early on that she's no longer working at the prestigious Stanhope and Sons. This heightens our sympathy for her as Sara's first person narrative begins before her employment there and as such we get to experience all her highs and lows in what we know will be ultimately futile. This gives the reader a sense of omniscience but also made me yearn to warn her as to what was coming.  Goldin makes an important soical comment and shows the reader how firmly the glass ceiling is still in place for women and ethnic minorities. Of course being Goldin, there's a twist that is worthy of applause from the reader, there certainly was from me.