An unforgettable YA murder mystery set in an escape-room themed game show, by Marissa Meyer, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Lunar Chronicles, and Tamara Moss, rising star and acclaimed author of Lintang series.
It’s all fun and games until someone ends up dead.
Six months ago, season four of The Escape Game ended in horror when contestant Alicia Angelos was found murdered on set.
Now season five is underway, and new contestants are ready to put their skills to the test solving the show’s trickiest escape rooms. There’s Adi, the cryptographer; Carter, the math whiz; Beck, the wannabe game master, and . . . Sierra Angelos, the girl who got away with her sister’s murder. Or so everyone believes.
But Sierra’s not just here to win. She’s here for justice.
When the contestants begin uncovering clues that hint at the identity of Alicia’s true killer, it becomes clear that the stakes aren’t high in this competition, they’re deadly. If these teens want to win—and survive—the game, they must solve the biggest mystery of all: who killed Alicia Angelos?
From #1 New York Times bestselling author Marissa Meyer and rising star Tamara Moss comes a twisty thrill-ride, filled with sabotage, betrayal, and puzzles to die for.
Read: March 30, 2026 – April 2, 2026
Final Rating: 4.25/5 – great read, I enjoyed it and I would definitely recommend
Thank you NetGalley, Penguin Young Readers Group, and G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are 100% my own.
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The Escape Game is a YA mystery about an escape room themed game show where our four main characters (er, contestants) Adi, Beck, Carter, and Sierra are trying to figure out who killed former contestant Alicia Angelos. Oh, and Alicia happens to be Sierra’s older sister. So it’s personal.
Can I just say that I loved the main characters? No, seriously. I thought it might be overwhelming following all four at the same time, but I enjoyed the writing and was able to remember important information about each of them. Carter is my favorite. I loved her from her very first introduction, and I thought that her character arc was well-written, especially as she struggles with separating her online avatar and persona from who she is in real life, and being confident in accepting herself. Honestly, I thought each of the main characters had well-written arcs. We see their motivations, the writing takes us into the heart of who they are, and we see them grow and bond and honestly, become better people (as much as they can, I mean they’re teenagers who are still growing and experiencing the world).
Now the plot? Oh my goodness. I love escape rooms. My family tries to do them as often as we can, and I play them online. I also love puzzles, and the fact that we were given the puzzles in the text so we could work them out ourselves. That made the story feel engaging and interactive. And honestly, believable. It didn’t seem like things were happening randomly; rather, we see these brilliant teens working together to uncover the mystery. I will say that towards the last quarter of the book, the pacing picked up rather quickly and it seemed as though the authors were trying to tie all loose ends together. It didn’t feel as satisfying as it had felt throughout the rest of the book. However, I think the ending made up for it and set the stage for book #2 which I would gladly read in a heartbeat.
I love Marissa’s writing style (she is one of my favorite authors ever and wrote one of my favorite books ever, Winter) and this was my first time reading a book by Tamara. What a wonderful pairing. I thought the descriptions of the escape rooms, the puzzles, and just the scene in general were vivid and easy to imagine. I could easily see this as a TV show or movie. The dialogue was funny and I was actually laughing out loud at some parts, which is a good thing. And looking back, I realize there was some foreshadowing throughout the chapters and I was able to not only solve a couple of the puzzles but piece together part of the twist at the end.
My only issue is that I thought the reveal felt very… “scooby doo villain” is how I wrote it in my reading journal. I don’t consider it a bad thing necessarily but given the seriousness of the issues, it made the book feel very YA, you know? Like the tension builds and then the story reminds you that it’s for young adults and perhaps not taking itself too seriously. It pulled me out of the story towards the ending. I also found it difficult to believe the twist because the motivations seemed extremely over the top and quite frankly, not very well explained. I wished we could see into the mind of the villain a little more, but there’s only so much that can be squeezed into a book and there’s the set-up for a sequel anyway.
The book is also tagged as romance on The StoryGraph and I have my two ships ready (I’m looking at you, CarterxAdi, and SierraxBeck). But there wasn’t a whole lot of that in this book and honestly, that’s okay. I am really looking forward to the next book and I would recommend this book wholeheartedly to anyone who loves puzzles, escape rooms, mystery, and extremely funny and endearing main characters.