Author:Will Dean

Genre: Mystery/Thriller

Publication Date: August 6, 2024 

Rating: ⭐⭐ (2/5)

The premise of The Chamber reads like the ultimate locked-room mystery. Six saturation divers are locked together in a hyperbaric chamber deep in the North Sea. One by one, they start dying off. Because rapid decompression would kill them all, they have to wait four days after the first body is found before they can safely rise to the surface, all the while trying to figure out who is behind the deaths and whether they will be the next to die.

The execution of the book is another story. While there is a glossary of terms included with the book, I still found myself needing to stop and Google certain terms and ideas to really gain an accurate picture of what was going on. This made it very hard to focus on, and get invested in, the story. I finally gave up on looking things up in an effort to just get through to the end and find out who was killing everyone. With less than 10% of the book to go, there was still no killer in sight. The ending was a let down. I was pretty sure I knew who the killer was, and I was right. I don’t always mind figuring it out ahead of time when the storyline keeps me entertained, but in this case I was just doing my best to finish at all. I believe the amount of technical jargon used in the book is going to make this one hard to follow for many readers.

Thank you to NetGalley, Will Dean, and Atria Books | Atria/Emily Bestler Books for an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.