Book Review- That Night by Nidhi Upadhyay
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN AN INNOCENT PRANK GOES HORRIBLY WRONG?
Natasha, Riya, Anjali and Katherine were best friends in college—each different from the other yet inseparable—until that night.
It was the night that began with a bottle of whisky and a game of Ouija but ended with the death of Sania, their unlikeable hostel mate. The friends had vowed never to discuss that fateful night, a pact that kept their friendship and guilt dormant for the last twenty years.
But now, someone has begun to mess with them, threatening to reveal the truth that only Sania knew. Is it a hacker playing on their guilt, or has Sania’s ghost really returned to avenge her death?
As the faceless enemy closes in on them, the friends come together once again to recount what really happened that night. But when the story is retold by each of them, the pieces don’t match. Because none of them is telling the whole truth . . .
That Night is a dark, twisted tale of friendship and betrayal that draws you in and confounds you at every turn.
Author: Nidhi Upadhyay
Paperback, 288 pages
Published: April 14, 2021
My Review
You might pick That Night for its horror and mysteries, but you won’t be ready for the unexpected betrayals that will come along with life and death circumstances.
Four best friends, a drunk night, an Ouija board, a prey, and promise to never talk about that night.
That Night revolves around the life and secrets of Natasha, Anjali, Kathrine, and Riya. Narrated in four perspectives and two different timelines, 1997 and 2017, That Night is a page-turning novel with a very fine line between horror and thriller. I must say, Nidhi Upadhyay has done an excellent job in blending both. Till the very end, she kept me engaged between the two genres.
The plot and the characters are magnificently crafted, giving a sharp edge of reality and how people are in real life and how many secrets they have buried in their backyard. Every quirk of Upadhyay’s characters reminded me of someone in my life, and sometimes they became so real that I didn’t like them and their behaviour. That’s how humanly she has raised them.
The pace of the story is also what didn’t allow me to keep this book down. Not too rushed or too slow, everything was unfolding at the right time and place, leaving trails of suspicion behind.
I know I have said it somewhere above, but I’ll say again, Nidhi Upadhyay has done an outstanding job, and considering it’s her debut novel, it is all the more marvelous. She has managed to keep a sense of something-is-wrong in the air throughout the plot, giving the book an eerie and sinister feel. And the amalgam of ghost and blackmailer kept me anxious and eager till the very end.