PRODUCER NIK VS THE OTHER: THE OUTSIDERS SEQUENCE BOOK 2

Producer Nik digs into Annie Neugebauer’s THE OTHER: THE OUTSIDERS SEQUENCE BOOK 2 and understands it’s not a sequel. Its next in the sequence…

A couple on an outdoor retreat meet their doppelgängers on a hiking trail and are soon tested on how well they truly know each other.

Title: The Other: The Outsiders Sequence Book 2

Author: Annie Neugebauer

Genre: Psychological Horror

Pages: 176

Format: Paperback/eBook/Audiobook

Have you ever wondered how well you know your significant other?

What about how well they know you?

How much are you willing to stake on your intimate familiarity with one another?

These are the questions at the heart of Annie Neugebauer’s follow-up to The Extra. If you haven’t read that book, I recommend you remedy that error before you go any further. Sure, you don’t have to read The Extra first, but I definitely recommend it. It helps to have some sense of what’s waiting out there before you explore the wilderness with Logan and Elise, a couple who have reached a pivotal point in their decade and a half relationship.

After being together for so long, they’ve both started to question whether they should continue down the path together, neither one knowing whether they (or the other) are interested in adding a child to their relationship. This is how they find themselves on a backpacking trip into the forest, where they hope to confront their respective needs and determine whether they can move forward together or go their separate ways.

When they encounter another couple heading in the opposite direction on the trail, they’re surprised at how superficially similar these two strangers appear to be. Not wanting to make things awkward, Logan and Elise decide to share the same campsite with this new couple, but what started as surprise quickly becomes a sense of dread, as something feels off about them.

When those superficial similarities become mirror-like reflections, it’s too late to simply walk away from the encounter, and it’s clear that something sinister underlies what was clearly not a chance meeting. These strangers want to replace them—or at least one of them—and they seem to know everything that they know.

How can either of them choose to return to their car and their shared life outside of the forest, until they know they’re with the person with whom they started this journey?

Told alternatively from Logan’s and Elise’s perspectives, the reader knows better than the characters, who they should trust and what they should do. But that knowledge only adds to the tension and frustration as we witness them questioning themselves and each other, both of them desperate to know they’re able to discern their partner from the counterfeit—and that they can trust one another to do the same.

It’s virtually impossible not to get caught up in the paranoia of the situation, as we witness the two of them going back-and-forth as to who is real and who is not.

Much like The Extra, The Other keeps you wondering if these characters are going to make the right call. The difference here is that the reader knows the truth, and can’t help but feel a sense of frustration as we experience the uncertainty Logan and Elise are contending with. But—in their shoes—would any of us fare any better?

Could you be certain you made the right choice, in the end?

And—speaking of the end—this one is…let’s say it’s complicated.

Nikolas P. Robinson is an avid consumer of books, movies, and television, especially where horror, science fiction, and fantasy are concerned. When he isn’t consuming media, he’s creating it as an author, photographer, videographer, and news producer in Portland, Oregon.

PLEASE NOTE: The views and opinions of the staff of Memento Mori Ink do not necessarily represent those of Memento Mori Ink or Crystal Lake Publishing. Thank you for understanding.