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Phil M. Williams

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What Happened at the Lake (Serial Killer Thrillers) Kindle Edition

by Phil M. Williams (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

4.3 9,327 ratings

Part of: Serial Killer Thrillers (3 books)

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They went on vacation. Not everyone made it back.

The Palmers went to the lake for a week of fun in the sun. But Alex Palmer had an agenda. He wanted his brother to reconcile with their hypercompetitive father. He wanted his daughter to break up with her shady boyfriend. Most of all, Alex wanted them to be a family one more time before he faced his predicament at home.

Evil incarnate and a brutal double murder shifted Alex’s focus from wants to needs. He needed to keep his family safe. He needed to find her. He needed to know what happened at the lake.

His pastor often said, “God won’t give you more than you can bear.”

This had nothing to do with God.

Buy this twisty page turner to find out what happened at the lake.
Adult language and explicit sexual violence.

What readers are saying
"This is the best fiction book I’ve read in a very long time. Masterfully suspenseful." - Salina Young ★★★★★

"Shocking, but realistic, "What Happened at the Lake" will grab you from the beginning and shake you to your core!" - Susan ★★★★★

"I gave this book the 5 star maximum but it was 20 stars short. This book was unbelievably fantastic and I stayed up almost all night to finish it because I knew I wouldn't be able to sleep otherwise." - Kindle Reader ★★★★★

"Phil Williams can make more twists and turns than a pretzel maker. I finally have up trying to get one step ahead of him. Instead I fastened my seatbelt and let him take me around hairpin turns at 100 mph, down into dark and dangerous tunnels and finally bringing me gasping for breath back into the light." - Mary R. ★★★★★

"I loved this book. Could not put it down. Phil Williams is now one of my favorite authors." -Anon ★★★★★

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Shocking, but realistic, "What Happened at the Lake" will grab you from the beginning and shake you to your core!" - Susan ★★★★★

"This book caught my attention from the very start and kept me glued to my Kindle to the very last word!" - Texaspup ★★★★★

"I love this author's writing! This book was just amazing. The story held me in its grip from the first paragraph to the ending paragraph. I kept telling myself to get up & get my chores done....enough reading already!!! Well, chores waited while I stayed totally absorbed in this book. If you want to read a good mystery, treat yourself to this one." - Bookworm ★★★★★

"This is the first book of this author I have read, but it will certainly not be the last. I love his writing style. I loved the character development. But most of all I loved how smoothly the story flowed." - AMB ★★★★★

"I gave this book the 5 star maximum but it was 20 stars short. This book was unbelievably fantastic and I stayed up almost all night to finish it because I knew I wouldn't be able to sleep otherwise." - Kindle Reader ★★★★★

"Phil Williams can make more twists and turns than a pretzel maker. I finally have up trying to get one step ahead of him. Instead I fastened my seatbelt and let him take me around hairpin turns at 100 mph, down into dark and dangerous tunnels and finally bringing me gasping for breath back into the light." - Mary R. ★★★★★

About the Author

Phil M. Williams is the author of ten books: Fire the Landscaper, Against the Grain, Stone Lake, Cesspool, Initiation, No Conscience, The Propaganda Project, Sedition, What Happened at the Lake, and co-author of Farmer Phil's Permaculture.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B07BHYNNM8
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Phil W. Books; 2nd edition (March 15, 2018)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ March 15, 2018
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 2173 KB
Simultaneous device usage ‏ : ‎ Unlimited
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
Print length ‏ : ‎ 290 pages

Best Sellers Rank: #81,767 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #403 in Vigilante Justice
- #598 in Mystery Action Fiction (Kindle Store)
- #663 in Serial Killers

Customer Reviews:
4.3 9,327 ratings

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Phil M. Williams

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Phil M. Williams is the author of twenty-five books primarily in the thriller genre. His thrillers span many subgenres, such as: murder mysteries, political, domestic, dystopian, legal, psychological, and technothrillers. His stories often feature regular Joes and Janes in extraordinary situations that are ripped from today’s headlines.

Williams lives in central Pennsylvania with his wife, Denise. When not writing, he can be found tending their permaculture farm.

If you’d like to read two thrillers for free, go to http://PhilWBooks.com.

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4.3 out of 5

9,327 global ratings

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Kindle Customer

A great mystery

Reviewed in the United States on April 22, 2024

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When I started reading this book I wondered where it was going it was dull and kind-of everyday dull but it started getting sorta interesting the became one that you didn't want to put down and you will not believe the end don't miss it.
sorta of slow. Before you knew it it was getting interesting

Reviewed in the United States on March 25, 2024

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but it got muddled 2/3rds of the way through it! I ALMOST gave up on finishing it..... it was close. If it wasn't for that stumble, I'd have given it 5 stars

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Cindy Steinmueller

Page turner

Reviewed in the United States on April 25, 2024

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This book was awesome! Once you pick it up you can’t put it down until you’re done with it! Very fast paced reading! The ending…well all I’m going to say is WOW! You all will just have to read it cause it will blow your mind.

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Suzie J J

Engrossing and impactful!

Reviewed in the United States on April 17, 2024

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The deftly woven threads of this story become a maelstrom. During a seemingly idyllic family get together at the lake, family dynamics and ongoing family resentments are exposed in a chilling climax. This is an author who can weave a tale that will have you thinking about the characters long after the book is read.

Reviewed in the United States on August 12, 2018

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What Happened at the Lake by Phil M. Williams is remarkable first for the number of characters introduced throughout the story. Second is either the complete lack of character development (see Kate and Whitney or Ed the septic tank man) or characters that contradict themselves (Kristin for only one example). At the thirty percent mark, I still had to stop and consider how a mentioned character related to others, even those in the central “crew.” This group is a large dysfunctional family which for some reason consented to go on vacation together. We can blame Alex, not the family patriarch, for deciding to call each of the eleven family members and invite them to a rented house near a lake where, perhaps, long-standing family issues can be worked out. I was busily highlighting family names and trying to figure out family relationships and family problems when I came across this passage in chapter ten at the 17% point in the novel. Maybe Williams was taking pity on the reader and was offering a helpful summary of characters. It didn’t help.

“Nearly everyone was present for the maiden voyage. Alex and Matt loaded gear onto the pontoon boat. Emma and Rachel sat near the front, talking under their sun hats. Harvey, Cathy, and Seth sat in the rear, under the canopy. Brett and Kristin sat in the sun, talking in hushed whispers. Buster the Boston terrier trotted from person to person, wagging his tail in search of treats.” (Kindle locations 651-652)

By this point I felt comfortable with the character of Buster, the one most clearly defined. We know about Alex. He organized the outing. Emma is his wife. Matt is either Alex’s brother or stepbrother, a PTSD sufferer, and a combat veteran with a dishonorable discharge due to failure to follow orders while in combat. This brings disgrace to the entire family according to Harvey, father of Alex and the family patriarch. Harvey is a successful author of war novels although it is not clear whether he has seen combat. Rachel is Harvey’s daughter and Seth’s wife. It is clear that Harvey wants to sleep with Rachel and that Rachel is up for sleeping with anyone. Cathy is Harvey’s wife. Although she is considerably younger than Harvey and once was considered a trophy wife, she is beyond her expiration date which seems to give Harvey license to perv on Rachel. Brett is an older “bad boy” and boyfriend to the sixteen-year-old Kristen. Alex, the father of Kristen, thinks Brett sinister but invites him on the trip anyway so Kristen won’t sulk. Brett’s goal in life is to get Kristen to go “all the way” but she is a good Christian girl only good for hand jobs and describing bodily functions to one and all in the fashion of TMI. Seth is a wimp, husband to Rachel but pretty much an unneeded appendage as Rachel is doing everyone in sight.

And these are not the only the characters in the family. I lost Alex’s brother, Jeff and his wife Gwen. And only at the 20% point of the novel. We still have to deal with Kate and Whitney (above), Dorothy and George (landlords of the rental property), Ed (above), a neighboring peeping Tom, weird cops, and the evil Danny. These additions bring us to 30%. At this point, I am fascinated by the story and want to know how many more characters can possibly be added. There are 59 chapters and I am only at chapter 19. Can the characters possibly come together in a story with any semblance of a coherent tale?

And the answer is … Yes. After all the characters above plus a few more, we get down to the story. There are killings so the story turns into a murder mystery but with lots of victims. Some are not even human. Unfortunately, with this many characters, we have this many suspect. As each suspect’s possible motivation and background situation is examined, I referred frequently to my “organization of characters” chart. There is an unpredictable almost ending which is interesting. It is followed by a further ending for different characters that is syrupy sweet and cloying. I would have been happier if the additional part had been left out but it was necessary to explain yet another late-arriving character.

While there is a good story here, I could only give it three stars due to crowded pages which made me work too much. My progress through this work of fiction was as slow as with an academic text. This is not a page-turner; a reader would get lost in the weeds. The writing interested me enough to try one more of the author’s novels, Against the Grain. I read a sample and it seems there are far fewer characters.

This novel is listed on Amazon for USD 4.99. Amazon notes I purchased the novel. I would have been very disappointed had I paid this price. I would have tried to return it. I got it for USD 0.00. After completing this review, I checked my order details and also looked at other reviews. There are 112 five-star reviews. What did they read?

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Jan from Wales

A really great thriller.

Reviewed in the United States on April 18, 2024

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One of the best books I’ve read in a long time. The book was extremely well written, and had me engaged from the first page. Funny bits like their toilet habits at the lake house, but other than that a cracking thriller. I will definitely read more from this author l

Reviewed in the United States on September 8, 2018

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Sometimes you do absolutely everything right, and you still lose. Sometimes the loss is small, easily overcome. Sometimes the loss is so unspeakably traumatic that the course of your life is changed forever. Who you are as a person becomes starkly delineated between "Before" and "After." That is what the reader finds in What Happened at the Lake.

Alex is determined to do all the right things. He has so much going for him. He's raising a beautiful, kind, compassionate, intelligent daughter. He's dedicated to his wife. He loves his family and wants to reconcile his father and two of his brothers. He wants everything to go well during this family vacation. And spurring him on is the knowledge that there is a big problem just waiting for him when he goes back home. A big problem that he's been hiding from his beloved wife and daughter, but that he won't be able to hide much longer. Thinking on that, he's determined to make this family vacation as good as it can possibly be. He had no idea that what was waiting at the lake was so much worse than his problem at home could ever be.

The problems start with inconveniences. Problems with the plumbing leaves Alex's family members having to make trips to the woods to handle their business. Then there's the creepy factor. A strange find on a small island on the lake makes Alex wonder if there isn't a dangerous person nearby that could threaten his family. Then people go missing and turn up horribly murdered. Worst of all, all the evidence appears to point directly at a person in their very own cabin. With all of this going on, Alex's intention to help his father and brothers reconcile is all but forgotten.

Alex dedicates all of his energy, all of his mental prowess, to figuring out who is responsible for murder. He is not in time, and he is dealt a devastating blow - the loss of a loved one. Beyond the pain of that loss lies the shame and guilt of having pushed to go on this trip despite having reasons not to go from the beginning. But the journey does not end there.

After returning home, Alex is consumed with needing to find out who the murderer is. Who it was that stole a beloved from him. He throws himself into his own investigation, to the exclusion of everything else. As determined as he is, he's wholly unprepared for what he finds when he finally tracks down the killer.

This book comes with a warning that there are graphic scenes and depraved subject matter. That warning does not sufficiently prepare a reader to have their heart completely ripped away from them. The plot reaches a point where it becomes clear that - just as Alex having all the best intentions and doing all the right things, he still lost - the reader becomes certain that, even if good triumphs in the end, evil won't truly have lost, and there will be no celebration.

2 people found this helpful

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R E Tiner

Excellent read

Reviewed in the United States on May 2, 2024

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Liked it from the start, loved it the rest of the suspenseful way!!!! Next up "Cesspool"!!

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Amazon Customer

Excellent!!

Reviewed in Canada on January 15, 2024

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I chose this rating because I was kept in suspense right until the end. The characters were believable and the plot well done. I highly recommend this book and author!!!

Susan

A good read

Reviewed in Spain on April 11, 2024

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I enjoyed this thriller and recommend it to other readers. It’s exciting but shocking too. Well written and enthralling. Food for thought.

dawngoodall4

Brilliant!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 8, 2024

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This was a very enjoyable book. The writing is superb, the characters well described and the plot has so many twists and turns it makes you breathless! As for the ending...... you'll never see it coming. I recommend it to everyone who likes a really good murder mystery. You won't be disappointed. Enjoy!

José L

Excelente novela, te mantiene atento de principio a fin

Reviewed in Mexico on September 2, 2018

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Excelente novela, te mantiene atento de principio a fin, le gustó mucho la historia y algunas crudas descripciones de los crímenes, aunque sentí un "poco" apresurado el final, me pareció un justo cierre a la historia, lo leí rápido y la verdad lo considero recomendable, ya estoy buscando más libros del autor

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Amazon Customer

Kept me up all night

Reviewed in India on January 5, 2019

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It was an amazing read... On the edge all the time, kept me up all night, couldn't sleep before finishing it.. The characters were described beautifully, each scene described with precision..

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What Happened at the Lake (Serial Killer Thrillers) Kindle Edition

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