DARK ROOM ETIQUETTE by Robin Roe – Review

I received this book for free from the Publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Dark Room Etiquette by Robin Roe
Published by HarperTeen on October 11 2022
Genres: Psychological thriller
Pages: 512
Format: eARC
Source: Publisher
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The nitty-gritty: A psychological thriller that explores trauma and recovery, Dark Room Etiquette is an edge-of-your-seat read that delivers both thrills and emotion.

“The bad things are going to change you no matter what, and they can make you angry and bitter—or they can make you better.”

I’m not the biggest fan of YA fiction, but once in a while I come across one that’s exceptional. Dark Room Etiquette has plenty of rave reviews, and after reading it I can see why. Robin Roe takes readers on an emotional journey, following a teen’s experience with trauma and his attempts to heal from it afterwards. This is a story with some upsetting subject matter, but it’s told in such a way as to be accessible to teens without being graphically violent or explicit. For a 500+ page book, I was able to fly through it in only a few days, it was that riveting.

Sayers Wayte is a spoiled rich kid, a junior in high school who can basically get away with anything. Failed a test? No problem. Stopped for speeding in his Aston Martin? Hey, he’s a Wayte, so the cops always look the other way. Sayers’ best friends are a group of bullies who torment kids like Evan Zamara, and although Sayers might not do the bullying himself, he doesn’t do anything to stop it either.

But everything changes when Sayers decides to crash a school field trip and finds himself the victim of a kidnapping. After a series of events involving a broken GPS and an empty gas tank, Sayers wakes up in a small, windowless room, chained to a bed. A man who calls himself Caleb tells Sayers that he’s his long lost son Daniel, and that everything Sayers knows to be true is a lie. So begins Sayers’ nightmarish time spent in Caleb’s house, as he cycles through various emotional states, including anger, confusion, despair and ultimately, acceptance.

The story is roughly divided into three sections: before the kidnapping, during the kidnapping and after the kidnapping, and I loved the way Roe takes her time to really dig into each phase of Sayers’ experience. Many stories like this end with the protagonist being rescued or escaping the clutches of their kidnapper, but Roe takes her story one step further by showing what happens to Sayers once he’s back home. She covers a lot of ground, and I thought it was all very well done. In the beginning, I loathed Sayers and his friends, entitled jerks who think they can get away with anything. And I think that’s the point: to paint Sayers as an asshole who deserves what’s coming to him. But once he’s kidnapped, it’s hard not to feel sorry for him. Sayers has lost his power, and it’s heartbreaking to see how he reacts to it.

The time Sayers spends in captivity is tense and scary. This is the psychological thriller portion of the story, and I thought the author did a great job of keeping the reader in the dark (so to speak). Caleb is a terrifying man, and yet by the end of Sayers’ time with him, he’s become brainwashed into thinking Caleb cares for him in some twisted way. Watching Sayers change from a confident, happy kid into one who doesn’t even know what day it is was heartbreaking. And I loved the way time seems to stretch during this section. Sayers doesn’t have his phone, there aren’t any clocks, and Caleb convinces Sayers that it’s Christmas—over and over again. I lost track of time right along with Sayers, and it wasn’t until he’s rescued that you finally understand how much time has passed.

Surprisingly, my favorite part of the story was watching Sayers go through the recovery process after he’s rescued. And Roe doesn’t make it easy for him. He has very little support from his mother, who is also traumatized because her son was kidnapped (think about that one, parents!) and she just doesn’t know how to help him. His friends at school expect him to bounce back and be the “old” Sayers they used to know (and are surprised when they see that he isn’t that person anymore). He ends up making a new friend who helps the most with his recovery, and I really enjoyed that unexpected friendship.

As for negatives, there were some religious elements that didn’t really work for me. I’m not opposed to religion in fiction as long as it’s not “preachy,” but in this case that’s how it came across. There’s a character named Penny who plays a pivotal role in the story (I won’t go into detail due to spoilers), and she comes from a religious family who prays before every meal, etc. I didn’t mind that at all, because it felt authentic to Penny’s character. But when that religion started to spread to other characters, it just felt forced. Luckily, these parts are not the focus of the story, so don’t let that stop you from picking up this book. 

I will admit I guessed the ending, and in fact I even knew what the last line would be (it’s telegraphed pretty heavily). But still, it was an absolutely perfect way to end the story. Fans of YA will love this tense, emotional thriller, and I’m betting that adult readers will also find a lot to love about Sayers’ traumatic experience and his journey of recovery.

Big thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy.