In 1926, five women disappeared from a remote island in Vermont. Now, one hundred years later, it’s happening again.

Struggling actress Marin Keane is shocked when she lands a role in a major motion picture about the unsolved mystery of New Avalon, an island on sprawling Lake Faraday in Vermont. She’s even more surprised when she learns that the role requires a weeklong research trip to that very spot.

Because New Avalon isn’t your ordinary island. A century ago, it was a commune for spiritual mediums—until they all vanished in 1926. The only trace of them was five dresses hanging from the branches of an old oak tree in the middle of the island, one for each missing woman. Some locals say they simply left. Others think they were murdered. But the prevailing opinion, thanks to a diary left behind by one of the vanished, a young woman named Daisy Rue, is that a séance gone wrong conjured something supernatural that took them all one by one.

Not long after arriving, Marin and her castmates, including legendary actress Violet Wright and white-hot director Ronan Peters, begin to realize all is not right with New Avalon. They hear strange noises in the night and notice mysterious symbols left behind by the island's previous occupants. And after a sudden health emergency leaves Marin, Ronan, and the other actors stranded on the island, the disappearances begin again.

Is it the work of someone trying to derail the movie? Or is the island’s alleged supernatural past catching up with the present? As fear and suspicion mount, Marin turns to Daisy’s diary, hoping it holds the key to figuring out what really happened to the women of New Avalon—and how to keep the island’s terrible history from repeating itself.

I am always excited to read a new Riley Sager book, and was particularly looking forward to this one because I didn’t really enjoy his previous one but the synopsis for The Unknown sounded right up my alley!

I am happy to say that I liked this! It was a fun, fast-paced read, and did that thing that I love in Riley Sager’s books where I was constantly asking myself if something supernatural was going on or not. It also made for some excellent Book Talk Etc. book club discussion!

The setting, with its isolation, was excellent and I love stories about haunted movies and film sets, so this book ticked so many boxes for me.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a Riley Sager book without one too many twists at the end, but overall this was a pretty fun, fast-paced read, and would be a great one for this time of year if you haven’t read it yet!