Synopsis
A couple on an outdoor retreat meet their doppelgangers on a hiking trail and are soon tested on how well they truly know each other.
Review
There is something about a high-concept thriller that I just can’t get enough of. Is it the fact that they can be easily described in just a few words that my TikTok addled brain can enjoy without getting distracted? Is it that the setup is deceptively simple, and yet in that perception of simplicity, it leads these stories to go in wild directions that you can’t predict? I don’t know, but what I do know is that The Other, the next novella in The Outsiders Sequence from Annie Neugebauer – published by Shortwave Books – is even more electrifying than the first!
The Other follows married couple Elise and Logan as they go on a hiking trail trip in the Oklahoma wilderness, only to bump into another couple coming in the opposite direction who look, act, and seem in many other important ways, to be identical to them.
And this is where my main and only problem lies with this story… I cannot talk about it much more without, in my opinion, affecting your enjoyment of one of my favourite spine-tingling, edge of my seat, goosebump inducing reads of the year! I truly believe, much like its predecessor, The Extra, that this is best enjoyed with as little knowledge going in as possible.
Just know this; what you will encounter is a story so tense, with characters so believable and relatable, forced into a situation that goes from creepy, to scary, to downright nail-biting in its suspense. It’s like a Hitchcock movie by-way of a Crichton story – it’s fast paced, gripping, and sweaty-palm exciting.
The Other has me super excited for the third novella in this sequence. I have said it before and I’ll say it again, I could easily have 100 more of these and not get bored of them. Neugebauer continues to build a subtle mythos in this wilderness, one in which we don’t know why or what is going on in the wider narrative (yet), but that’s not the point. The point is to stick some real people into an uncanny valley, analog horror type situation involving doppelgangers, a mysterious additional person, the unending yet claustrophobic liminal space of the outdoors, and watch them react to their situation. I can’t get enough of it, and I’d highly recommend The Other to everyone!
The Other by Annie Neugebauer releases tomorrow (June 9) from Shortwave Books.
Big thanks to Shortwave Books and Annie Neugebauer for the ARC copy!
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