Small Game by Blair Braverman
Small Game
by Blair Braverman
Mystery | Thriller | LGBTQ | Fiction
288 Pages
Released November 2022
Rating: ★★
Goodreads
Content Warnings
I had high hopes for this one. As a big fan of the TV series Alone, I was really excited to see a book with a similar (though darker) premise.
Mara is a wilderness survival instructor and is surprised by an offer to be part of TV series. The premise? Survive in the woods with four other strangers and the barest of essentials. If she survives, she stands to gain a life-changing amount of money. But things take a dark turn, when one morning the contestants wake up and realize something is very wrong.
See what I mean? It sounds like a thriller version of Alone (which has a similar concept, except there’s 10 survival contestants, they don’t get to work together, and they film themselves instead of being filmed by a TV crew). Unfortunately this book fell short. By a lot. The survival elements are kind of weak and bare-boned. Mara is a strange character because I feel like we never fully get in her head so she feels a bit flat and “distant” (for lack of a better word).
The twist is predictable and odd - predictable because you pretty much know exactly what’s going to happen but odd because there is no real resolution in this book. Sometimes I really like when a book is open ended but this one just left me scratching my head. It feels, well, kind of directionless.
This is really unfortunate because the premise had so much potential. But overall I feel like the reader is just left wanting. More survival, higher stakes, bigger twists, just something.
At least it was a fast read.