Riley Sager’s debut, “Final Girls,” brings new depth to the horror genre’s last-girl-on-Earth trope as it explores the complexity of life after survival. The narrative is well-layered and steadily paced, building reader tension as the sugary-sweet facade of protagonist Quincy Carpenter crumbles and the reader is left questioning even the most solid of assumed facts.
The horror-steeped thriller is the first published by Riley Sager, a gender ambiguous pseudonym for author Todd Ritter.
The novel follows Carpenter, a young woman living in New York City, who was the sole survivor of the Pine Cottage Murders 10 years prior. Dubbed a final girl by the media, Carpenter is grouped with fellow massacre survivors Lisa Milner and Samantha Boyd in a morbid and undesirable club.
Carpenter has repressed memories of that night and shunned her final girl label, establishing a seemingly normal life for herself complete with a successful baking blog and caring boyfriend, Jeff.
Carpenter’s veneer begins to crack when Lisa is found dead of alleged suicide and Samantha appears on her doorstep with questionable motives. Soon, Carpenter’s life becomes a race against time as she works to separate the truth from the lies and unlock her memory before a killer returns to finish what was started at Pine Cottage.
Sager’s writing style is clipped and rapid fire, compiled into brief chapters that are swiftly paced and easy to digest.
The story unfolds in alternating timelines, with Sager weaving details from the present with flashbacks. The literary device helps build tension throughout the novel as revelations in each timeline shift the reader’s perspective of the overall situation.
As more details come to light, Carpenter and Sam’s innocence are questioned and it becomes apparent even the protagonist may be untrustworthy. Each chapter sets the reader on edge and leaves him/her with an aching sense of dread.
The speed picks up in the last 60 pages as Sager brings Carpenter to the brink of her memory and lingering questions are resolved. The truth of that night at Pine Cottage is cleverly interwoven in the story line, but subtle enough the reader won’t recognize it until the moment Carpenter does.
The ultimate results were surprising but not unpredictable. They were options the reader could deduce while considering potential plot lines, but the way they were pieced together was interesting.
Though interesting, I felt the final reveal was unfulfilling. The question of Carpenter’s innocence and the return of her memory were more enthralling than the confirmation of the killer’s identity and his/her motives. When the identity was confirmed, it felt rushed and a tad underdeveloped.
Looking beyond the bloody climax, I felt the denouement was poorly constructed. It was an important character development for Carpenter to embrace her legacy as a final girl, but felt a bit cliche and could have been handled differently.
The most intriguing part of the novel is its exploration of the psychological aftershock that follows slasher films’ climactic bloodbath. As evidenced in the novel, Carpenter and her fellow final girls hardly enjoyed a standard happily ever after.
Carpenter is Xanax and wine dependent, hiding her intense loneliness and habit for petty theft from her touch-too-reliable boyfriend. She refuses to voice her desires and sincerest feelings to her partner, who is deeply out-of-touch as he continually insists Carpenter has moved beyond her tragic past when she clearly has not.
Barely bottled rage and despair simmer just under the surface as Carpenter refuses to face the reality of her situation. The few relationships she has are dysfunctional and toxic, especially her female relationships, which are marked by jealousy, grief, mistrust and blame.
Despite some missteps, the look at life after survival is refreshing and original. Overall, “Final Girls” is an enjoyable thriller that honors a hallmark of the horror genre while bringing it into new territory.
