From the publisher:
From the bestselling author of If Something Happens to Me, comes one of the year’s most anticipated thrillers.
In the glow of their children’s exciting first year of college at a small private school in Northern California, five families gather over dinner and cocktails for the opening festivities of Parents Weekend. As the parents stay out way past their bedtimes, their kids―five residents of Campisi Hall―never show up to dinner.
At first, everyone thinks they’re just being college students, irresponsibly forgetting about the gathering or skipping out to go to a party. But as the hours tick by and another night falls with not so much as a text from the students, panic ensues. Soon the campus police call in reinforcements. Search parties are formed. Reporters swarm the small enclave. Rumors swirl and questions arise.
Libby, Blane, Mark, Felix, and Stella―The Five, as the podcasters, bloggers, and TikTok sleuths soon call them―come from very different families. What drew them out on that fateful night? Could it be the sins of their mothers and fathers come to cause them peril―or a threat to the friend group from within?
Told from each family’s point of view―and marking the return of FBI Special Agent Sarah Keller from Every Last Fear and The Night Shift―Parents Weekend explores the weight of expectation, family dysfunction, and those exhilarating first days in the dorms when friends become family.
“From one of the genre’s best . . . Finlay has a gift for intertwining many storylines and characters in a cohesive, compelling way. The tropes used here don’t feel stale, and plenty of surprises and red herrings will keep readers interested. Fans won’t want to miss Finlay’s latest.”―Booklist
“Finlay writes . . . with red herrings galore, and he caps the proceedings with a particularly shocking conclusion.”―Publishers Weekly
A Barnes & Noble’s “Most Anticipated Mysteries & Thrillers”
A LibraryReads Hall of Fame Selection for May 2025 ― Best Books Voted by Librarians
A Goodreads’ Readers’ “Most Popular Books Published in May 2025”
The title is what drew my attention here, but it’s the story that kept it. One of the worst weekends of my life was a parents’ weekend at college, for very different reasons than those in this story. Plus, I work at a small, private university and experience parents’ weekend every year from the staff side of things. Thankfully, nothing like this ever happened where I work!
The student body here is a mixture, like most campuses, of the haves and have-nots. One of the parents is a highly placed federal government employee who has Secret Service protection, while at the other end of the spectrum is the college president’s admin, whose son attends on a full scholarship. Another set of parents are staying at a five-star resort some distance from the school as they are too snobby to stay at the local hotel, so it’s a real mix. Most of the students live in the dorms, but one student lives in a fraternity house. These parents are thrust together because their kids are in the same capstone program at school.
The first nightmare is that a student goes missing a few days before the weekend, and is found accidentally drowned in a cave off the shore. That is horrible enough, but when the parents all meet up for the first night dinner, none of their kids show up. The parents spend some time getting to know one another and musing about their missing kids, chalking it up to kids being kids, and figure they probably went to a party instead of the parental dinner. But when no one can get hold of their kids, no texts, no phone calls, nothing, they start to worry a bit. By the next day, there’s still no word and no sign of them anywhere, and panic starts to set in.
FBI Agent Sarah Keller (Every Last Fear and The Night Shift) has asked for a hardship transfer as her father-in-law isn’t doing well and needs help. Her husband, a stay-at-home dad, and their kids have moved in with him, and her first assignment is at the university. Being new to the area, she doesn’t know anyone, even in her new department, but she is happy to work with the head of security at the university. He is professional and seems to have a real handle on things, as he was a former law enforcement officer. The story moves quickly, and I liked that we get different points of view. The local police are also involved, and as the days go by, the tension really ratchets up.
There are plenty of twists and turns here, and I couldn’t turn the pages fast enough. I don’t want to give anything away, but I will say that the ending was a shocker and very well done. This was a suspenseful page-turner, and I highly recommend it!
5/2025 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch
PARENTS WEEKEND by Alex Finlay. Minotaur Books (May 6, 2025). ISBN: 978-1250360724. 320p.
Stacy Alesi's BookBitch.com™ 