In My Dreams I Hold A Knife Review: A Killer Reunion

Every once in a while a book comes along that makes you want to RSVP “no” to every future reunion invitation you’ll ever receive. In My Dreams I Hold A Knife is that book. Ashley Winstead has crafted a thriller so full of betrayal, tension, and secondhand embarrassment that you’ll want to call your college roommate just to double-check they are not harboring a long-buried grudge.

The setup is delicious. A group of six former college friends returns to their elite liberal arts school for their ten-year reunion. They have carefully curated adult lives, and absolutely zero interest in digging up the very public murder that shattered their college experience. So naturally, that’s exactly what happens. Champagne is poured. Accusations are made. The truth, as it turns out, is extremely not chill.

Our narrator is Jessica Miller, who shows up ready to prove to literally everyone that she is hot, successful, and unbothered. She has worked hard to become a glossy, Instagrammable version of herself and is counting on this weekend to finally rewrite the legacy of her college years. Small problem. Someone else has also shown up with a different agenda and possibly a vendetta. Murder vibes are strong.

From the first chapter, you know you’re not just in a whodunit. You’re in a who-do-I-trust and also a who-do-I-secretly-want-to-slap. This book is like being invited to a dinner party where everyone is beautiful, unreasonably bitter, and holding onto decade-old receipts. You do not want to be there but also you cannot look away.

Winstead’s greatest trick here is how she weaponizes nostalgia. College, in all its chaotic glory, becomes the perfect backdrop for unraveling the shiny lies we tell about ourselves. As each character’s secrets start to slip through the cracks, the book turns into a psychological guessing game. There’s a murder at the center, yes, but there’s also academic rivalry, romantic betrayal, toxic friendship, and so much petty drama you’ll wonder how any of them graduated with a functioning nervous system.

Jessica, our narrator, is a special kind of unreliable. She’s not a hot mess in the way thrillers usually go. She is tightly wound and vaguely delusional and constantly trying to win a contest no one else is playing. Her internal monologue is part pep talk, part spiral, and all extremely relatable if you’ve ever had a nightmare about running into your ex while underdressed and emotionally unprepared.

What really elevates the book is its pacing. The chapters flick between present-day reunion chaos and flashbacks to their senior year, and every time you think you’ve solved the mystery, a new clue yanks the rug out from under you. No one is innocent. Everyone is lying. And just when you think the book is wrapping up nicely, Winstead throws a final twist that will make you want to text three friends and scream.

If you like your thrillers fast-paced, emotionally messy, and filled with characters who would all benefit from therapy and maybe an exorcism, In My Dreams I Hold A Knife delivers. The tension is real. The campus setting is deliciously claustrophobic. The dialogue is sharp enough to cut glass. And the social dynamics are somehow both deeply toxic and weirdly nostalgic.

Final takeaway? College may be over, but secrets have a long shelf life. And if your old friend group is planning a reunion, maybe fake an illness. Or at least double-check the guest list.

OUR RATING