'm in 2 minds about this one. Initially the story was interesting, different and intriguing but then it lost me about 30% in and I struggled to read it. I kept picking it up and putting it down again after a few pages. I finally got to about 75% and it drew me in again and I couldn't put it down.
It was a good story for the most part, the middle just lost me a bit and I think I was bored of it but there was light at the end

Dr. Alex Taylor wakes up alone in an operating room, blinded by bright lights, and strapped down to the operating table with her ankles in stirrups. She was naked and only covered with drapes and her private parts were displayed. Alec doesn’t know how she got there or why. She sees a man in surgical attire with only his eyes showing. The Alec wakes up a second time in the hospital with her colleagues all around her. Alec had been found in the parking lot unconscious with a bump on the back her head but that was all that was wrong with her. No one would believe what Alec had to say about the operating room and the man and the threats of hurting her with hints of rape and stapling her mouth shut. Her family, friends and colleagues tell Alec she had not been naked in an operating room with a man asking her a question. No one stands by Alec not friends, colleagues, family or even Alec’s boyfriend. They all think she is having a breakdown. Alec wonders if she is losing her mind. Then a pregnant nurse is abducted, when she is found and brought to the hospital she is no longer pregnant and what she says before she dies makes Alec believe the man who torments her thoughts was the same man who took the nurse and caused her death. The police think Alec may be a serial killer. Alec finds out it wasn’t an accident for what had happened to her , someone was upset with Alec and wants her to pay. Even though Alec was released her ordeal isn’t over and her abductor is not finished with their work.
I really loved reading this book. It kept you at the end of your chair also it was unpredictable and I really liked that. It did make you wonder what was real and what wasn’t. It is a great psychological thriller. The ending comes very quick. . It had a great plot and pace. You do keep guessing while reading this. I really loved the ending. I don’t know why no one stood by Alec. She was suppose to be a respected doctor. I loved the characters and the twists and turns and I highly recommend.

A fabulous debut from a very talented author. Kept you on edge right to the end. An excellent basis for a series including both main characters I think.

Wow!

Liz Lawler you are responsible for my lack of sleep today. This book had me hooked from the very first page and didn't let me go until the last.

If you are looking for a fast paced,can't put it down, well written psychological thriller that will get your heart thumping then look no further. If you are squeamish about blood and/or medical procedures then it may not be for you.

I give it 5 stars*****

An interesting thriller read, however i remain slightly disappointed by the reveal, there was no real motivation for the character to carry out these crimes, and was too unrealistic - the main character being perfect as well was quite jarring!

I went with 4 stars on this novel because I give Liz Lawler endless writing credit for taking an unlikeable character and making me care! The main character is definitely an unreliable narrator, and at first I found her so flawed and shallow that I developed a dislike and almost stopped reading. I am so happy that I stayed with Ms Lawler for the rest of the ride. She managed to bring in secondary characters that added layers to my knowledge of the heroine. My attitude changed, and I cared about what happened! Well done.
The pacing of Don't Wale Up definitely builds in speed as you read. The story is tightly woven and the twists and turns are seldom telegraphed.
I would like to read more from Ms Lawler.

I will let the book description give you the basics of the story and give my opinion of the book here.

Don't Wake Up is a medical suspense/psychological thriller that NEVER lets up! A fast-paced roller-coaster ride from start to finish, it will throw you into twists and turns that you never expected, and keep you in the dark until the very end of the thrill ride. The characters are well-drawn and believable even when some of them are unlikeable.

WARNING: This book is very gruesome and gory in sections. If you are sensitive to that sort of material, this book is NOT for you.

Now that I've finished it, I hope to get my heart rate back to normal soon! This thriller gets 4 stars from me!

Many thanks to NetGalley and Bonnier Zaffre for allowing me to read and review this book in exchange for an honest opinion.

Don't Wake Up sounded fascinating when I requested it, and it delivered. It was very well thought out, tense, and intriguing. Absolutely enjoyable. I found the characters interesting, and the writing is decent too, but the plot just shines. I'm definitely going to pick up Lawler's writing in the future too.

The opening to this book actually made me feel a little sick imagining myself in the same predicament as the main character, Alex. It was scary, definitely started off with a bang. While I was impressed with the sick feeling the author managed to induce, it took me awhile to get seriously into the book... but once I was, I didn't want to stop reading. I found this book to be nerve-racking and unpredictable, and the last 25 percent is a complete roller coaster and actually stressed me out.

Alex is a very accomplished person at the age of 28, a well respected doctor. She's intelligent, driven, and successful. She is the kind of person people look up to... so when she suffers from an attack and no one believes her, it's harrowing. Though she's been tied to an operating table and taunted, maybe violated, she's found dumped in the hospital parking lot relatively unharmed. No one believes her crazy story because she doesn't have any injuries or any injection marks even though she insists they should be there.

When a young woman who'd been missing is brought to the hospital, she says something to Alex that makes her think she went through a similar experience. Her colleagues and partner are worried she's losing it. She has started drinking more than what could be considered healthy... maybe her story is true, but maybe she has simply snapped and needs psychological help. More incidents start to happen without explanations, and she finds herself alienated from nearly everyone.

More alone than ever, she's easier prey for the psycho after her... or is she unknowingly her own worst enemy?

I received a copy of this book from Net Galley and Bonnier Zaffre, thank you! My opinion is honest and unbiased.

What a great book. Could not put it down as the twists and turns kept coming. The ending was sensational. I would definitely recommend this book to other readers. Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the chance to review it.

Don't wake up by Liz Lawler is probably one of the best psychological thrillers I've read in a while.
Dr Alex Taylor wakes up and finds herself tied to an operating table with a male surgeon towering over her and threatening to do all sorts of things to her. At first she thinks she must have been run over or had some other kind of accident but then realisation hits that she doesn't think she has. The next thing Alex knows she's coming to on a bed in the hospital she works at surrounded by the people she works with. When Alex who has been found in the hospital car park says she has been attacked and possibly raped her world starts to fall apart. Everyone thinks she's losing her mind as there are no marks on her, no signs of rape so the assumption is she is having a breakdown and dreamt this up. The book follows Alex's journey on trying to prove this actually happened while others around her are always judging her character, her actions and her words. This ends up by the police trying to produce evidence that Alex is the murderer of two other women and it becomes a race against time to try and prove her innocence.
This book has been well written with believable characters and great research into the medical side of things. From the first page I knew I was going to love this just by the style of writing and the ability to have so much going on but not muddle you too much. The 'real killer' I didn't even guess at until a couple of pages before the big reveal so well done there!!
I would like to thank netgalley and Bonnier Zaffre-twenty7 for this ARC I received in exchange for an honest review.

Shortly after Alex goes missing, she is found unconscious in the hospital parking lot where she works. She swears that someone kidnapped her, maybe even sexually assaulted her. How could something like this happen? How did the perpetrator pull it off? Who is it? And why doesn’t anyone believe her? Is it really possible that she is losing her mind? That it never happened? Why is no one on her side?

And then she finds a new victim, a new connection. She’s convinced something nefarious has happened to this woman and the same person is responsible for both of their attacks. But where is the proof? And what is the end goal?

I was hooked from the onset. The plot was brilliant. Wicked smart. The suspense built in parallel with Alex’s frustration, which was palpable. At every twist and turn, I wanted to shake the innards out of everyone who didn’t believe her. It was infuriating!

There is no question that I connected with and empathized with Alex. A smart, highly successful woman in a healthy relationship, and because of a trauma that occurred earlier in the year, she is deemed unbelievable. Meanwhile, her fear and anxiety builds while she’s trying to find answers and worrying about what might happen next. As a result of the attack, her relationships are deteriorating and she no longer has much of anyone to confide in. Her world is crashing in and she has to find a way to stop it before it’s too late.

All the love. Maybe the best thriller I’ve read all year. So. Damn. Good. Read this book.

Fast-paced, gritty, and disturbingly creepy!

Don't Wake Up is a character-driven psychological thriller that highlights how fragile the mind truly is and how easily someone’s behaviour can be questioned, misinterpreted, manipulated, and used against them.

It is, ultimately, a story about jealousy, revenge, hatred, violence, and murder.

The characters are multilayered, vulnerable, and at times believably unreliable.  The writing is well done. And the plot unfolds rapidly and has a nice balance of suspense, tension, suspects, and surprises.

Overall Don't Wake Up is a compelling, well-written debut for Lawler that once started will keep you intrigued and entertained until the very end.

Not only did I receive a review copy from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review, I also bought a copy through Amazon's Kindle First program

Wow, this was one book that I was really not digging. Lawler sets us up with a great beginning, but Alex Taylor is not a great lead character. I get it in hindsight, I really do. This is a woman we're supposed to think is crazy, so crazy that she made this crazy abduction. From the outset it does seem that way. There's no evidence at all that Alex was abducted. Problem is, Alex is a borderline alcoholic and annoying. When writing a book like this it's important to have something about the lead character you can relate to, but here, not the case. I was ready to throw the towel in on this and just give it a bad review. Not because the story was bad, but the lead character was boring, and if anything I wanter to see her die a horrible death.

Then something happened. Around chapter Twenty an amazing thing happened. The secondary characters were given a chance to shine, which allowed me to actually care about Alex. We begin to know more about the character and are even given some insight into who she is. Don't Wake Up is an interesting novel that starts slow, but once it picks up speed it's a decent suspense thriller that wants to give us something unique, and almost does. Problem is, the first half isn't all that great, and I really didn't care if Alex was imagining it, or if it really happened. It was the subtle shift that made this an interesting whodunnit, and provides a bit of distance from your average suspense novel.

The how, and even the why of Don't Wake Up will truly blow your mind. Comes totally out of left field and lifts the novel out of mediocrity. Had Lawler started the book as strongly as she finished it, we'd easily have a must read book on our hands. With the way its structured you have to make it to chapter twenty before the book becomes something you can't put down. Not a lot happens, and it's Alex who bogs the book down, but once you hit that chapter it's full speed ahead. It takes a while to hit her stride, but as a first time author it's easily forgivable. This is still a decent read, and if you're a fan of suspense I would certainly urge you to check this one out. Lawler has given us something different which is great to see in a genre cluttered with authors who attempt to create something different and end up a clone of someone else.

The end is something I never saw coming, and the reasoning behind it blew my mind. I love books that take sharp left turns, and take you for a bit of a ride. Lawler is a decent author who I can't wait to read more from. I just hope her follow up doesn't take so long gain speed. What we have is a decent novel that could have been perfect, but settles into worth a read status. Just be warned, you may hate this book for the first nineteen chapters, but don't give up. Trust me., it's worth it.

The plot of this book is quite original and I enjoyed that, it makes you think about how you would feel if you was to wake up in that situation and then have no one believe you.
I can't put my finger on what it was exactly, but I didn't enjoy this as much as I expected to. I couldn't connect with Alex unfortunately so maybe this was the reason.

Totally disturbing and sadly quite believable!

Inner turmoil of not being believed and the sad reality of rape and attempted rape cases not being reported for these reasons handled succinctly and with grace by Lawler.

A who done it with some many twists it really does leave you guessing and changing perpetrator throughout.

A clever roller-coaster of a book - loved it!

Pretty good read. Kept me interested throughout. A little too wordy in some sections. Overall a passable read.

Don't Wake Up by Liz Lawler I would love to give unlimited stars to but will have to be 5.
Dr Alex Taylor wakes up tied to a surgical gurney with a man dressed as a surgeon standing over her, telling her nothing has happened to her, but Alex isn't so sure, when she next wakes she's in the hospital she works at telling her colleagues and the police her story, but no one believes her, this then leads her on a scary journey which ends with her being investigated as a murderer, Alex has a race against time to prove her innocence but with everyone thinking she's lost her mind can she prove she's not crazy??
I was glued to this book from the first page, I had to force myself to put it down to go to sleep. This story had so much going on but it didn't overwhelm you, this author has an amazing ability to tell a story.
I voluntarily reviewed an advanced copy of this book through Netgalley.

What a fabulous way to spend a day or two, wrapped up in the pages of this superb psychological thriller. Alex was such a fabulous character, her situation was maddening and terrifying and I loved every moment of all of it.

I have read some great suspense books this year, and this one is right up there with the best of them. I loved the idea of a well respected and loved doctor facing this terrifying ordeal and then having no one believe her. I felt Alex’s frustration and anger and then her fear coming through the pages. I wanted to yell at people for her, such was my investment in this very well written character.

I read this book in almost one sitting, not wanting to put it down, because I needed to know that Alex was going to work her way out of her predicament and that a seemingly unsolvable and unfixable mystery was going to leave Alex well and whole. I wasn’t at all sure there could be a good outcome. You’ll have to read and find out for yourself if there was.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who loves a fabulously written psychological suspense with an amazing heroine who you will be rooting for all of the way through. This was a delicious read and I loved every moment of it.

This was one of the scariest books I've ever read! Brilliantly written, great plot and believable characters.

But terrifying!